The Kind of Post Only a Mother Could Love

Our little Aly is already a whole 4 months old. Time flies when you are having fun, I guess. And we really are. She is a delight! And she brings so much joy to our family. She is an extremely happy baby and usually only cries when she needs something.

We went to her Dr. appointment the other day, and in the words of the dr. "she is perfect!" weighing in at 13 lbs. (32%) and she is 24 3/4" long (67%). (Yes. You read that right. I have a child that is in the 67th percentile for length. That is crazy! I am sure it won't last long. Sorry girls, you have short genes.) She seems to be right on track or slightly advanced in development. She is holding all of her weight on her legs, is holding her head up steadily, is almost ready to sit unsupported, tracks people and sounds across a room, and a lot of other fun stuff I will talk about later. The dr. says some of the things she is doing is more on a 6 month level.

And, for now, it appears her eyes are going to be blue.

Alyssa has taken on many nicknames, most notably, her dad calls her "munch," as in munchkin, and Sadie calls her "cutes", as in cutie. I call her "sissy," which gets confusing because I call Sadie "sis." And we all call her Aly every once in a while...except for Sadie who will adamantly correct you if she hears you call her Aly. "Her name is Alyssa. NOT aly!!" Sadie got in many an argument with her cousins over the holidays because they all called her baby Aly.

Alyssa's favorite toys are her toes. She LOVES her toes! She especially loves her toes when she is naked. You take her diaper off and her legs shoot up to her face instantly. I guess with all that chub, the diaper makes it hard to reach (he, he). I adore her chubby little legs.
Her thumb is a close second in the things she loves, followed by bath time. She is all smiles while getting ready for a bath. Then she splashes like a maniac the whole time.

Get a load of that leg chub!

Alyssa started sleeping through the night (10-11 hours) at 6 weeks. Hallelujah!!! And then promptly stopped sleeping through the night at 9 weeks. Boo!!! As of now, she goes to bed at around 7pm and sleeps for an hour or two. Really, it is more of an evening nap. Then she's up until about 11pm. She sleeps from 11pm to 4am, eats at 4am and then goes back to sleep (usually) until about 8am. Her night time sleep schedule is just about the only thing I have to complain about. It would be nice to have those hours free in the evening...but it could be worse, so I'm not complaining too loudly.

Alyssa is getting quite chatty these days. She especially loves to talk to Sadie. She is also giggling and laughing up a storm. She will smile and laugh for mom and dad, but Sadie can get her laughing and squealing like crazy.

Here is a short movie in which Alyssa demonstrates her laugh, her chats, her toe/thumb sucking, and her boredom for rolling... alas, these are not the best she can do. She seems to be a bit camera shy.

Alyssa started rolling over right around Christmas time. She can roll both from back to front and front to back. She practiced this little trick like crazy for a week or two. Once she mastered them she was totally over it and hardly rolls over at all any more. She does like to scoot herself around in a circle so she can see what is going on around her.

Alyssa has excellent hand/eye coordination. She reaches and grabs for things she wants. She can pass objects from one hand to the other and then she can pretty accurately get those objects into her mouth. Anything and everything goes into her mouth! Except...a bottle or a pacifier. She is pretty particular about getting all her food and comfort straight from mom. She is pretty easy going for most of the time, but in this one area she is very stubborn. It will be interesting to see if this stubbornness extends to other areas as she grows. We tried giving her rice cereal, as to extend her sleep time at night and as an alternative to breastfeeding so we might be able to leave her with a babysitter a little longer. She took one bite of that stuff and refused to open her mouth again. After me continuing to try to feed it to her she started refusing to even look at me. (ha, ha, silly girl!) So, then I tried to have Ryan feed it to her. She did only slightly better for him. She started holding his hands and helping him to put the food in her mouth. Apparently she is not only stubborn, but independent too! That lasted a minute or two and then she was done!

Sadie is the best big sister. I love seeing the two of them play together. Sadie is also very helpful to me. She is almost always willing to get things like diapers or wipes for me. She is always willing, and wants, to play with Alyssa and get toys for her. I love holding and cuddling with both my girls. As Sadie says, "We are all friends together, mommy and her cute girls."

LOVE THEM KIDS!!!!