Mia's First Christmas

About six months ago, Jeff and I were marveling at my ever-growing belly and could hardly believe that we would have a three-month-old at Christmas this year. Well, here we are! I am so grateful for our little girl, and I'm excited to share this first Christmas with her. After church this morning, Mia is spending her first Christmas Eve at her grandparents' house, and she'll spend Christmas day with her aunt and cousins a few hours north of here.

We love you all & wish you a very merry Christmas!

~Kristy, Jeff, & Mia

Tummy Time!

Mia is finally getting over the "trauma" of being placed on her tummy, and she seems to be able to lift her head and chest a little higher and a lot longer each day! Here is a video from today:

Peek-a-boo

Robin snapped this photo of Mia while we were at the Huntington Library gardens this week. I love her eyes here. This picture also reminds me of the neighbor on Home Improvement. :o)

New pictures in Mia's photo album!

Mia's connected!

Mia got her first cell phone for Christmas, so she's now plugged in & connected! For those of you gasping, you'll be glad to know it's a plush phone w/ cute frogs embroidered on the keypad. ;o) But it does look like she's taken to the idea pretty well!

Christmas portraits

Here are Mia's portraits for Christmas this year!

Developmental Milestones

	Mia	"Friday"
	(3 m/o human)	(5 y/o house cat)
Follows objects briefly with eyes	x	x
Vocalizes: oohs and aahs	x
Can see black-and-white patterns	x	x
Smiles, laughs	x
Holds head at 45-degree angle	x	x
Makes smoother movements	x	x
Squeals, gurgles, coos	x
Blows bubbles	x
Recognizes your voice	x	x
Does mini push-up		x
Can grasp a toy
Rolls over, from tummy to back		x
Recognizes own name		x
Turns toward new sounds	x	x
Rolls over in both directions		x
Is ready for solid foods		x
Sits without support		x
Mouths objects	x	x
Passes objects from hand to hand

A conversation with Mia

Here is a video of a conversation that Mia and I had this morning after her bath. :o)

Mia at 11 1/2 weeks

Here is another cute video of Mia with her mobile. She's very interested in it now, and she protests loudly when it stops playing. :o) She weighs in at 15lbs even now, which would put her above the 90th percentile even if she were already 3 months old... So Jeff and I have decided to stop contributing to her college fund and pursue wrestling scholarships instead. Mia's major hobby right now is sucking on her fingers. She's very good at it and actually managed to put my hand in her mouth yesterday. The funny thing is that what she is not good at is putting her fingers in her mouth w/o also putting them in her throat. Several times yesterday I heard her gagging and looked over to see a very surprised Mia. I'm hoping it's not too long before she learns that, even though the uvula looks funny, it is not a toy. ;o)

Had to share!

This was too funny to pass up... Pat and I were joking the other week that I needed some sort of device that would let me just hang Mia from the wall when she gets tired. She'd be out of the way and I'd know exactly where she was. The thing is that we were joking. Someone out there, however, had that same thought and wasn't... This is a Babykeeper...which allows you to hang your child from a wall!! And this one goes a step further in that it is designed to hang your child inside the stall of a public toilet while you pee, thereby scarring your child for life and ensuring that you spend the college fund on years of adolecent therapy. If you visit their website, you can see additional photos, including some of the hanging children serving as toilet paper dispensers. Very disturbing... Thanks to Erika for this one! :o)

Mia's photo album updated.

Mia's 1st Thanksgiving

Here are some pictures of a little blessing I am truly grateful for this year!

C-r-a-n-k-y baby...

Mia woke up on the wrong side of the cradle today, and she was in a bad mood all day long. Jeff and I have been taking turns rocking, swaddling, & troubleshooting since about 5:30 this morning. And it was only during two car rides and two walks with the stroller (including a lap around the block with Jeff between appetizers and the main dish of dinner out tonight!) that we got much of a break from her moodiness. I thought this day wore me out, but it apparently took its toll on Mia, too. Here's Mia trying to hide from the world when she finally fell asleep this evening:

Two months!

This was a big week! Mia had her 2mo doctor visit this week...which means she had her 2mo shots... :o( It never occurred to me when I was a kid that my mom hated these appts as much as I did (or more!). I had to hold Mia in my lap while she got three shots in the tops of her thighs. Mia screamed after the first & screamed bloody murder after the second. Then the nurse said, "You'll want to really hold her for this one b/c this one hurts." Great, so this is the one that hurts. I'll be sure to tell Mia... So after that shot Mia turned beet red from the top of her head all the way to her toes and didn't even breathe for about 15 or 20 seconds while she was building up to the scream. It was horrible. :o( Now I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to sell her on these visits when she's old enough to ask, "Am I going to get a shot today?" On the lighter side, Mia grew an entire two inches in the last 4 weeks and keeps gaining weight like a champ. She's now 23.5" and weighed in at 13lbs 7.5oz. That puts her weight in the 96th percentile for her age. ;o) Apparently breastfed babies around rounder in the first six months and leaner in the next six months than their formula-fed counterparts. And in other exciting news, Mia slept six hours three nights in a row this week and seven hours last night!!!!!!!!!!!! I woke up startled this morning and thought, "What was that?? Oh, it was a clear thought." Hehehe. I was really happy that her shots this week didn't mess up our little sleeping streak. ;o) This morning we did another 5k race, and I ran it 6 1/2 min faster than last weekend(!). It's so nice to see obvious proof that I'm getting back into shape. :-D

Mia lifting her head

Here are some pictures of Mia playing in her crib. She seems pretty excited to be getting her head up so she can look around. In the video below, she can't seem to decide what sort of mood she's in. :o)

Mia's first road race!

Mia ran her first 5k yesterday! Okay, well she didn't exactly run it, but she was along for the ride and definitely gave her out-of-shape mom something besides being out of shape to focus on! Jeff, my sister Heather, and I all ran the San Gabriel Turkey Trot 5k yesterday, and everyone had a great race. Heather's goal was not to walk & she didn't. Jeff beat his time goal. And I beat a goal I hadn't even set... The original plan was for Jeff & Heather to run and for me to walk. Well, the walkers were schedule to start 40 minutes before the runners, and we didn't make it to the park in time for me to pick up my registration packet. (And for once, it wasn't even the baby's fault that we were late! The city posted some amazingly inaccurate directions to the start of the event...) At any rate, I decided to switch my registration from "walker" to "runner" and just to trot at the back of the back. Well, I ended up running the whole thing (though very, very slowly). And Mia & I got lots of cheers out on the course, which was super fun & very encouraging. :o)

Out for a jog!

Mia and I have finally gotten out for a couple of runs. Our first trip was yesterday, and Mom was so excited to be outside again that we went again today...despite being really sore from yesterday still. ;o)

Mia w/ her mobile

Mia is newly aware of her mobiles. She has one on her swing that she now looks at, and this one in her crib elicited some genuine smiles from her today (albeit, before the video...).

New Photo Album

I've created a new online album that houses pictures of Mia since her birth. My plan is to keep adding more & more pictures to it. You can view all of the pictures as a slide show or you can download full-sized copies of all pictures. You can even download the whole album if you want. To view the album, click on the picture of Mia in the top of the right column.

Mia sleeps like her daddy

And if you know Mia's daddy, you know that his super power is that he can sleep any time, any place, & under any conditions. Mia had taken a rather long siesta in her swing, and we turned it off in the hopes that she would wake up an eat. You can see that it didn't work...