Holidays & misc pictures

We totally failed to get any classic around-the-table Thanksgiving pictures, but here she is providing some entertaining at my uncle's house for Thanksgiving lunch...

...and planning meals with her Bubbie for day-after-Thanksgiving dinner.

We were back in San Diego only a few weeks later for Sylvia's first Hanukah at her Auntie Robyn's house.

While we were there, we finally introduced Sylvia to our friends Mike & Amanda and their kids Andrew & Megan...

And then we were in Orange County a few weeks after that for Christmas Eve.

It's been a whirlwind month or so!

We take pictures of little Sylvia everyday, but we're fortunate enough to know some VERY talented photographers. We've had a few opportunities to get some exceptional photos.

These are by Max's uncle Shimon & cousin Jake.

And these are by our good friend Heidi.

That's all for now!

Sylvia is 5 months old!

Sylvia Rose is 5 months old today!

She is absolutely a delight! Of course she has her cranky days and fussy times, but who doesn't? She spends most of her waking time reaching for her feet, gnawing on her hands, playing with her toys, and smiling at her parents.

At about 14 pounds, 2 ounces she is very close to doubling her birth weight.

She's mysteriously stopped rolling over from her tummy, but she sometimes seems to be considering taking it up again. She has started occasionally rolling from her back to her side, but then she thinks better of it. A few times when she's been laying on her back, she has wiggled in such a way that she ends up rotating herself in circles, like the hands of a clock.

No teeth have emerged, but we suspect that they're working their way through.

She's started eating "solid" food in the last few weeks -- first bananas, and now apples. In both cases, it's actually the fruit blended with milk. She seems to have taken an eager interest in eating from a spoon:

We're in the midst of Sylvia's first holiday season...

I'll try to give a more in-depth treatment soon! Stay tuned!

4-month progress report

Sylvia had her 4-month check-up today, and it went very well. She weighed in at 13 pounds, 2 ounces, which is the 45th percentile! I guess she's a little chubby, cuz her height was still closer to 25th percentile. She apparently also has a big head - 75th percentile!

After her 2-month appointment, I posted a picture the cluster on her back shoulder which the doctor told us was an hemangioma. Here it is today:

It looks about the same; maybe a little more disperse. The doctor says it'll probably stay as it is - possibly get a little bigger - and disappear in a few years.

The doctor had nothing but good things to say. She called Sylvia "beautiful" and "advanced"!

She had her second round of vaccinations - one shot in each thigh. She got VERY upset about a second after the first shot, and the intensity practically doubled immediately once the second shot went in, but she calmed down very quickly when it was done. She's fast asleep on my lap right now after an epic fit, so I do think she's having a bit of a reaction to the vaccinations. Last time she had a fever overnight, so we'll see what the next 24 hours have in store for us!

Here she is with her sad little bandaids again:

She's a cutie, isn't she?! Want additional evidence of her adorable-ness? For your viewing and listening pleasure, here are a few videos taken with our new iPhone 3GS's:

Sylvia is 4 months old!

Sylvia is 4 months old today! I'm not gonna lie... she just keeps getting cuter! She squeals and squeaks and kicks and chews on her fingers, and it's all extremely delightful!

When we last weighed her, she was about 12.5 pounds, though it's been a little while, so she might be pushing 13 by now. We'll get an official number in about a week and a half when we go in for her 4-month checkup.

Yesterday & today were her first Thanksgiving celebrations, so we're away from home. When we get back, we'll try to give some more updates & pictures.

Sylvia's first (4) Halloween (costumes)!

You can only have one first Halloween, but that doesn't mean you have to have only one first Halloween costume!

Officially, Sylvia was a monkey! (Yes, that is a tiny banana!)

But she was also a ladybug...

...a pumpkin...

...and a princess!

Plus she had a bonus Halloween outfit:

And she was adorable!!!

(Also, she's 11 pounds, 6 ounces today, which means she finally surpassed her mom's birth weight! Yay! -- Does anyone else think my mom deserves some kind of medal?!)

Sylvia is 3 months old!

Sylvia Rose is 3 months old today!

She weighs a little over 11 pounds. She's still predominately wearing her 0-3 month clothes, but we've gone through another cycle of retiring stuff that's a bit small and pulling out a few things in the next size up. We already feel like she's growing too fast!

Max & I feel very lucky. She doesn't sleep through the night, but she usually falls asleep very easily. And when she's awake, she's often smiling, laughing and singing / chatting / cooing to us, or else scoping out the world with apparently intense curiosity.

Her daddy is definitely the person who she smiles for the most, but even more than daddy she smiles for her toy owl that hangs on her carseat.

She'll giggle and smile and chat at him for ages. Car rides are much easier now that she has Mr. Owly!

Well, we'll try to post again soon with some more pictures (and maybe videos!) from this past month. We'll definitely post some Halloween pictures soon!

2-month progress report

Sylvia passed her check-up today with flying colors! They weighed her in at 9 pounds, 13 ounces, and they were very happy with her weight gain. They also said that her eating & sleeping habits sound good, and the doctor was impressed with how alert and chatty and strong she was.

The doctor noticed that Sylvia has an hemangioma on the back of her shoulder. It's a cluster of raised red spots, which we had noticed a while ago and been keeping an eye on. Apparently it will likely get bigger and then disappear. Right now it looks like this:

She also got her 2-month vaccinations today. She was calm after I lay her down and held her hands and told her everything was okay, and then the shot went into the first thigh, and her face turned red and her expression clearly indicated intense feelings of misery and betrayal. And then there was the second thigh! Her eyes watered, and she has never looked so sad. It was terrible! She calmed down pretty quickly, but I remain traumatized, and she's continued to act like she's in a bit of discomfort. Here she is with her sad little bandaids:

Will try to follow up soon with more pictures!

Sylvia is 2 months old!!

Sylvia Rose is 2 months old today, and still perfect!

She's been giving us full-fledged smiles for the past couple weeks, which is absolutely wonderful. She's awake more than ever before these days, and seems to really enjoy looking around at the world and at people fussing about how cute she is. She definitely has good days and bad days, but she seems to spend less of her time screaming. When she does get upset, it's usually not to difficult to calm her down. She's been sleeping 4-6 hours straight in the evening. The only trouble is that this usually starts a few hours before we're ready to go to bed, but it often gives us a chance to get some chores done without interruptions and get a few hours of sleep before she wakes us up needing to be fed.

Today, we estimated that she weighs 9 pounds, 12 ounces and is 22.5 inches long.

Tomorrow morning we go in for her 2-month checkup and her vaccines, so I'll at least post a quick official progress report, and if I have some time I'll also post more recent pictures, including one of her first trip to the beach!

Time goes by...

Max & I have been married for 3 years! We've had a pretty low-key anniversary. We took the baby to her first movie and got ourselves some Thrifty's ice cream and otherwise just hung out at home and enjoyed each other's company. Yesterday, though, we continued our tradition of going to Buca di Beppo the night BEFORE our anniversary.

This tradition started because Max spent our first anniversary flying to Mexico so we decided to celebrate the night before by driving to one of our favorite restaurants. We realized that we also had dinner at a Buca di Beppo at our rehearsal dinner one year previous, and a tradition was born!

But enough about us, right?

Sylvia is now 7 weeks (and 2 days) old! On Monday we estimated her weight to be 9 pounds, 7 ounces (after adjusting for the blanket & diaper).

And several days earlier we used Sylvia's great-grandmother Sylvia's measuring tape and estimated her length to be 22 inches (a full 3 inches longer than at birth).

And if our crude measuring techniques are not sufficient to convince you that she is growing, I can attest to the fact that certain outfits that used to be fairly roomy are now too snug and are ready to be boxed away. She feels and seems like a bigger and older baby.

She still rolls over whenever we try to put her on her tummy, but she occasionally stays on her tummy for a while and does some impressive commando crawling first. She's also been smiling a lot more for at least a week or so, which is pretty much the best thing ever!

There seemed to be a bit of a trend where she was spending more and more time being fussy, so we started more seriously putting the "5 S's" from The Happiest Baby on the Block into effect. When she starts getting worked up for no apparent reason, she gets wrapped up (swaddling) and gets her pacifier (sucking), and if that's not enough than we bring out the noise-making Sleep Sheep (sshh'ing) and bounce (or swing) while holding her on her side (stomach or side), and it works great!

So, things are going really well! I do miss sleeping for more than 2-4 hours at a time. A lot. But we're all doing well! I'll post again in about a week and a half when we have our next pediatrician's appointment (if not before).

Here are a few more pictures to tide you over!

Sylvia is 1 month old!!

Our little girl is a whole month old today!! Thanks to our good friend Tess' food scale, we can estimate that as of this morning, Sylvia weighs about 8 pounds, 12 ounces (a 10-ounce gain over 9.5 days). She can still fit in all of her "newborn" clothes, but they're a little more snug, and we've started being able to pull out some of the "0-3 month" stuff, as well as moving up from "newborn" diapers to "size 1".

In her first month, Sylvia has probably gained around 1.5 pounds, has gone through no less than 240 diapers, has had many hundreds of pictures taken of her, and has met many friends and family members. Her laundry has probably been done at least 10 times, and her nails have probably been clipped at least 5 times. She has spent most of her first month sleeping, but she has longer and longer periods when she's wide-eyed and staring around at things around her. The poor kid also seems to have more frequent and longer periods of discomfort.

The past week was a big one for little Sylvia. We took her on her first overnight trip, to San Diego. On the course of the trip, she was reunited with most of the relatives she'd met so far and met some new ones and some new friends. She also had her first bottle feeding and attended her first wedding. Pictures will come soon!

Sylvia is 3 weeks old!!

Today marked Sylvia's 3-week birthday. It's hard for us to believe that it's been 21 days that we've been responsible for this tiny little person. She's definitely a different baby than she was 3 weeks ago. She was strong from the beginning, but her mini-pushups have only gotten more impressive, and we can't even really give her 'tummy time' anymore because she immediately just rolls over. Speaking of her tummy, she's developed a sizable gut for such a small person! It seems to give her some distress, and she sure does makes sure that we hear all about it! She's also deeply annoyed unless at least one of her parents is totally incapacitated in an effort to keep her happy, and she's very hard to fool.

Thanks to our friend Tess who has a food scale, we can estimate that as of this evening Sylvia weighed 8 pounds, 2 ounces, which would represent a 12-ounce gain over 10.5 days, which is plenty.

Sylvia is 2 weeks old!!

I am unabashadedly ripping off our good friend Jayne, who blogged pictures of her son Kurt in a particular chair each month over the course of his first year, usually with a little update about how he was doing. So far, we've been taking pictures of Sylvia in the rocking chair that her grandparents and a few of her great (and great great) aunts and uncles bought for us every day since the day after we got home from the hospital. I figure we'll post a monthly update like Jayne did for a while, but that the first 2 weeks were momentous enough to warrant their very own post...

Sylvia is 2 weeks old today! She still sleeps most of the time when she's not eating (and most of the time when she is eating, too). Watching the little faces she makes when she's sleeping, you'd think she was having very intense dreams. When she's awake, she's usually either crying (apparently with a tummy ache) or looking around the world with wide eyes. She loves to snuggle and does NOT like to be put down. She's ambivalent about the outdoors and the car, but so far she has a perfect track record of good behavior in stores and supermarkets.

Sylvia's parents were VERY happy today when her little belly button stump finally fell off because the 3 of us were all feeling pretty traumatized by the experience of having to wash it multiple times a day, and soon we'll be able to give her a bath without worrying about getting water on it!

She's still exclusively wearing her "Newborn" clothes and is not yet fitting in the "0-3 month" outfits, but her legs are filling out enough and spending enough time uncurled from the fetal position that we can finally put pants on her, which is good because she seems to prefer a slightly warmer temperature than her parents, who always seem to want the house to be about 10 degrees lower than anybody else would.

It's been a great 2 weeks! Max & I are both exhausted and totally feeble-minded, but we're mostly just deliriously happy with our precious little girl!!

And here are a few more pictures: