Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Happy One Month Birthiversary!

In case you were wondering the cupcake tradition will continue with Kaleia. We were just out of town and lacked Internet access last week.


The cupcake for this month is my attempt at a volcano, to represent one of our nicknames for our little girl: Mount KaleiaLeia. Serious rumblings can be heard and felt in her abdomen, usually resulting in a violent eruption from one end or the other. All this erupting made it difficult for her to gain weight the first month, putting her at only 10 1/2 pounds (half as much as she should have gained). She had an ultrasound to look for pyloric stenosis since it runs in Brian's family, but luckily it came back normal. So now we are trying some acid reflux medicine and changing Mama's diet. Although she definitely lets you know loud and clear when she's in extreme pain from her stomach issues , most of the time she is an even happier baby than her sister was.

In lots of ways she is like her sister at this age: she loves taking a bath, is mesmerized by light, and has amazing head strength. She also started cooing and giggling recently and it can melt your heart.

There are ways in which they are different though. While Magnolia enjoyed time in her swing and bouncy chair, Kaleia much prefers to be held. Magnolia was a "Papa's girl" from day one. He could soothe her when no one else could. But Kaleia and her Mama have the immediate connection this time. One of my--Shannon's--favorite memories from this month, took place one evening when she was ten days old. Kaleia was crying pretty hard and I propped her up facing me and softly said "Kaleia. It's okay." With each utterance she calmed a little more until finally she was almost asleep in my arms. Precious!

Overall, it has been an eventful month, for Kaleia and for us. Kaleia attended her first wedding, first birthday party, and took her first road trip out of state (to Idaho). Also during that first month Brian went to California for a week for school, and Bellingham had it's hottest spell of weather ever.

We're definitely still adjusting to the two-kid dynamic but after only a month we can't imagine our family without Kaleia in it.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

So Precious!! Thanks for sharing! and wow, a month has gone by -- auntie needs to come visit :)

long live the cupcake tradition! there is a wealth of cupcake books out there, but i recently looked through this one: http://www.marthastewart.com/photogallery/martha-stewarts-cupcakes?

Its a great one. Lots of the ideas are on this site too!! not like you need any new ideas, oh creative sis! But its always fun to get inspiration, right?! :)

love it! and keep the blog coming as you find time ... i hit refresh throughout the day... like 20 times :)

love,
alli

Margaret said...

Seems like first-borns are always the high-maintenance babies. Or is it just me?

Anonymous said...

What a wonderful post! It's so neat to see how Kaleia will be different/like Magnolia.

Happy One Month Birthiversary Kaleia!!!

(and by the way, they have that martha stewart cupcake book at Costco for $10 VERY COOL)

Amber