4 Months Old

Kira is now 4 months old. She had her 4-month well visit. She gained almost a pound this last month. Not quite what they wanted to see, but definitely better than the 7oz she gained the previous month. So she now weighs 11lbs 6oz, which was 9th percentile. Her brother was 5lbs more than her at 4 months...yikes! She is 24 inches, which was 42% and her head circumference was 15 inches which is 26%. Overall, she is a petite little thing. The good news is that we don't have to do further testing. Her liver enzymes had improved and because she gained a bit of weight the pediatrician was happy.

This month Kira learned to roll from tummy to back. She grabs things and tries to put things in her mouth. Kira is better at the bottle now and even tries to feed herself at times. She is now looking around and following moving her head to follow things like the dog. Kira now likes to hang out in the exersaucer for short periods of time. The bad thing about this month is sleep. Somehow she forgot how its done. I never believed in the four month sleep regression that I had heard other mothers talk about, but now I fully believe. Prior to this she was waking up 1-2 times a night and would take at least one 5 hour stretch a night....this is not the case any longer. I am hoping that it is a small bump in the road because now that I am at work again, I feel like I am burning the candle at both ends and it is not so fun!

Nathan Updates

It has been awhile since we have done any updates on Nathan. He is your typical three-year old. Three comes with some great highs and great lows. Nathan is super smart. He know all of his letters and sounds and is starting to sound out words. He loves to draw, color and write. He is constantly asking us how to spell words. As you can see from the videos he is getting better at skateboarding and the swimming seems to be finally clicking for him and he now enjoys it. He continues to have a love of dinosaurs and hotwheels and occasionally still likes to pull out the trains. Nathan's counting is getting better and he can now count to 30 in Spanish. He just seems to be a sponge right now.

Three is also a very challenging age. He wants to be in control of everything and often forgets that he is not the center of the universe. We have had some really rough times lately with screaming fits, and challenging behavior. People keep saying that two is easy and three is hard and you know what...they are right! Overall, though, he is a great kid and is becoming a great big brother. While I do think the jealousy is starting to kick in the more interactive Kira gets, he does have quite a few moments now where is just so sweet to her.

3-months old

Kira is now three months old. Things are starting to get easier in terms of having two kids. This month Kira really seems to recognize us. She even smiles in recognition of Nathan, which is cool to him because he is starting to really talk more about having a baby sister. Kira spends her days kicking away and batting and grabbing objects. She has found her thumb for sucking and and you will often find her with that thumb in her mouth. Her neck is getting stronger everyday and she is quite close to rolling from back to tummy. Kira starts daycare next week when I return to work. We are a bit worried because she does not appear to like to drink from a bottle. I am hoping that it works itself out.

Kira has really struggled with putting on weight. She is barely two pounds over her birth weight at 3 months. Given her hefty start, we would have expected her to take off. This past week her pediatrician ordered a round of labs to try to determine what might be contributing to her slow weight gain. We were suspecting it might be a milk protein allergy but the labs for that came back negative. All of the labs came back negative except she appears to have elevated liver enzymes. I am not exactly sure what that means and Dr. Berent wants to re-run the labs before her 4-month well check. I am really concerned due to her slow weight gain, but we just keep trying to offer her feedings and hope for the best. They also started her on Zantac for reflux. It did help her to put on five ounces in two weeks since prior to that she had not put on anything in two weeks. Still not great, but better than nothing.

Despite the weight issues, she is a smiley, happy girl! I hope we can resolve these issues and help her to chunk herself up.

Easter 2010

We had a great weekend down at our river home. Nathan had a blast playing with Jared, Kaitlin and Kory. He went tubing behind Dave's boat a couple of times, colored eggs at the William's camp and had an egg hunt at Bill and Becky's camp. Kira just enjoyed the attention of many. We all had a great time. Brian, Nathan, Kira and I all left about 3 on Easter Sunday to head back home. At about 3:30 we were at a stoplight in Mexicali when a 7.2 magnitude earthquake hit. Let me tell you, when you are less than 40 miles from the epicenter of a huge earthquake, you really feel it. Meanwhile, the rest of our family and friends were still down at camp, which was about 3-5 miles from the epicenter. The damage we are seeing in pictures is crazy and it is amazing that noone was seriously hurt. Houses and docks on the river can be replaced, but people cannot. Needless to say a wonderful weekend turned scary in a minute and a half.

MVI_0072

MVI_0072
Originally uploaded by Davies Fam

Nathan's firs time sledding.

Disneyland and California Adventure

Yesterday we took Nathan on his first trip to Disneyland. We brought Kira too because both sets of grandparents were going so there was noone to leave her with back home. It all worked out because she was perfect until the ride home! Anyway, Brian's co-worker and her sister-in-law were able to get all six of us adults in to both parks free of charge. Talk about a a score!!! So we started at Disneyland. As we entered the park Donald, Mickey and Goofy were all out for photo ops. Nathan enjoyed meeting all three of them. We then headed over to Fantasyland where we rode the Merry-Go-Round, Dumbo, It's a Small World and Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. Nathan said that Dumbo was his favorite and Kira enjoyed the lights and sounds of It's a Small World. We stopped for lunch and then went on Pirates of the Caribbean. Nathan said he enjoyed it, but I think the the drops scared him a bit and he clung to me during the cannon fights. Next, everyone except Kira and I went on the Jungle Cruise. We headed over to Tomorrowland where Brian was so excited to take Nathan on Autotopia because it was the one thing he remembered loving when he was a kid. Nathan enjoyed driving the cars and then wanted to ride the train around the park. We tried to go on Peter Pan, but the line was long and Nathan was about done at that point. We plopped him in the stroller and then headed over to California Adventure. He got a whopping 15 minute nap on the walk over there. That 15 minutes helped to rejuvenate him and when we got there he was ready for more. We first started with photos with Lightning McQueen and Mater. We got fast passes for Soarin' Over California and then let Nathan run around at the play structure. We found spots for the Pixar Parade and Nathan enjoyed it, though he really has only seen Finding Nemo and Cars, Inc. We need to expose him to more Pixar movies. We then went to see the Bugs Life 3D show, which we all enjoyed. The adults went on Soarin' Over California, which we all enjoyed and then decided to call it a day. We attempted to have dinner at Downtown Disney, but on a Friday night lines and waits were long and we knew Nathan was tired. So we headed home and Kira decided she had had enough of her carseat and pretty much cried from Disneyland all the way home, with a few breaks in between. Nathan was exhausted because he was able to sleep through her cries. Overall it was a great day and Nathan woke up talking about Pirates this morning and asked when we could go back.

2-months old

Kira is now 2-months old. This month she is smiling and "talking" up a storm. She really recognizes mommy, daddy and her brother. Her head continues to get stronger and she looks around and smiles while on her tummy. Kira is enjoying time on the play mat. She spends lots more time awake during the day and sleeps longer stretches at night. We had a few nights of only one wake up, but that didn't last and she generally wakes up twice a night. Kira likes to go on walks with her friend Natalie at Mission Bay. We think we found daycare for her, which is a good thing because I go back to work in five weeks, which may seem like a long time, but in reality it is right around the corner.