Swimming Lessons

I found this amazing site online by a guy from England who chronicled his daughter's swimming lesson journey from 6 weeks old! He was very detailed about the different exercises that they did with the babies - even to the point of creating diagrams. So, I wrote up a swimming curriculum for Ariella that will take her at least through 2 swimming seasons. She's already done 4 "lessons" with us now, and she seems to enjoy it. And, actually the morning after the 2nd lesson (where Tyree noticed she had tried rolling when she was on her back), that was the morning she started to be able to roll over from her stomach to her back for the first time. He thinks it's helping her physical development outside of swimming, too.

She's done quite a few underwater swims and is learning how to swim on her front and back. It's so cute how she kicks her little legs in the water. And, she's definitely getting more exercise doing the variety of moves rather than just having me hold her in the water, moving around. Plus, I feel more purposeful with her. And, it keeps her from getting bored. So, I'm very excited with this for her.

Pumping

After several tearful weeks of very painful pumping at work, I finally figured out a solution. It's two-fold. First, I needed a smaller sized breast funnel. The standard 24mm size was too large for my nipple and was sucking too much of the areola into the shaft. So, I got the 21mm size. But that didn't fully solve the problem. I have also found that I can only pump one side at a time. I'm not sure if it's because I can't position the funnels properly when doing 2 at once or if the suction on the pump works differently, but if I only pump one side at a time, I can avoid the horrible soreness after pumping.

I'm now down to pumping twice a day at work, which also helps reduce soreness, since I'm not pumping so ofter (I just have to keep an eye on my milk supply). And, I've settled on leaving 5oz, 4.5oz, and 4.5oz bottles (so 14oz total). So far I've always been able to pump more than what she needs to eat during the day. Today, though, my pumping sessions have been a bit lack-luster, so I'll have to see how my second session goes. I still have plenty extra from yesterday, but I prefer to be able to pump the 14oz today. If my supply is tanking, though, I can always go back to 3 sessions per day.

3 Months Old!

Happy 3 month birthday, Ariella!

She has grown so big so fast. I joke that it's my super-charged breast milk. I weighed her this morning (with just me, and with both of us), and she weighed 14 lbs 12oz. Time has flown by, yet it almost seems as if nothing existed pre-Ariella. She is our whole world now, our precious little baby.

Ariella is smiling, and cooing, and even laughing so much lately! She really is a happy baby. We've already had to switch her clothes to the next size. So, she's in the 3-6 month size now. She's in the Stages 1-2 sized diapers, but will be moving to the size 2 diapers in a few days. Ariella has pretty good head control now, and she likes to try to sit up on her own (although she's not quite there yet). She's gotten quite vocal (lots of "ah-baah" sounds). Her smile, though, just melts us. And, sometimes when she does a happy, giggly smile, I'll start singing "happy days are here again", which she really seems to like. And, Tyree has named her little stuffed bear "Theodora". So, I have a song for that, too - "My name is Theodora, and I am your friend. I love you Ariella. Friends until the end." And, I have Theodora kind of dance by her, and Theodora gives her a kiss on the I love you part. It's a cute little thing that Ariella seems to like.

Just Between Friends Baby Consignment Sale!

Tyree, Ariella, and I went to the spring Just Between Friends baby consignment sale! We went on the last day of the sale, where almost everything was 1/2 price. And, there was still a HUGE selection of the cutest clothes! I bought so many clothes for her. $127 worth - and with some of the things selling at $0.50, that came up to a huge quantity. Probably the average price was $2. I even got some of the most beautiful dresses for $10. And, some of the things still had the tags on them - so essentially brand new!

I also got 2 board books, one about opposites, and one about the letters of the alphabet.

With all these pretty new clothes, I'll have to figure out when to schedule her next studio portrait picture shoot!

Swimming!

Ariella's been swimming twice so far! And, she's really enjoyed it. This latest time, we got a float thing that we can sit her in, and I was able to really swim it back and forth across the pool (so I got a lot of exercise). Plus, it has a canopy to shade her from the sun. The only thing she doesn't like is that it hasn't been quite warm enough, so she's gotten a little cold towards the end of the swimming sessions. The pool is heated, so the water is plenty warm. It's just the air temperature outside that needs to be warmer. Come on Summer! Hurry up and arrive!

First Mother's Day

Tyree did quite well for my very first mother's day as a mom. We had take-out from Tony's West (I had an egg-white ham omlette with pancakes - yum)! And, he had a card for me from him, and one from Ariella. And, he had presents from the Things Remembered store - an engraved heart locket, and engraved silver jewelry box, and an engraved silver picture frame.

We went over to Abuela's house for a visit to give her the cards we had for her. And, then the rest of the day was very relaxed! I had originally wanted to swim and BBQ, but the weather wasn't good. So, it was really nice just to stay in and relax with the little one and hubby.

Baby Reading Programs

I just bought 2 reading programs for Ariella - MonkiSee and Your Baby Can Read. They both come with DVDs and flashcards (and the MonkiSee one comes with digital flashcards that Tyree has put on his iPad for her). They use the whole word method for learning to read, and babies can start with it at 3 months of age (once their visual paths have developed enough). So, we'll start her with these shortly, and hopefully she'll be reading early! The most important part is that she have fun with it.