Three Months!

This month has brought a lot of new experiences for little Miss Emma.  After traveling to Texas and Virginia to meet our families, I went back to work three days a week. Emma is staying with our good friend, Sue, on the days I'm at work. Sue has a very large, fun family including two teenage girls who adore babies, so Emma is not suffering from lack of attention. Sue's oldest daughter, Stacy, had a baby, Ellie, one month before Emma was born.  Stacy stays at home with Ellie, but they live 5 minutes away and come over to Sue's house almost every day. So Emma and Ellie are already BFFs, which is the cutest thing!

On my first day back at work, Emma got her first infection and fever (because I obviously needed more mommy-guilt for leaving her that day!!).  She was doing fine at Sue's all day long, but by the time Dan picked her up that afternoon, she wasn't acting well and refused to eat, which is unheard of.  So he made an evening appt. with the pediatrician, and when I got home from work, we headed to the hospital.  They thought she had a mild ear infection at first, but they also tested her for a urinary tract infection, and did a culture that showed that the UTI was the real cause of the fever. She had a fever for 5 days, and was pretty miserable. Two doctors visits, two catheters, one shot of major antibiotics, and 10 days of regular antibiotics, and she's back to her sweet, smiling, laid-back self.  We are praying she doesn't have to go through that again anytime soon! Everyone told us it would be "hard" when our baby got sick.  They forgot to say that it would rip our hearts out and leave us emotional wrecks!

We spent a few more fun days at Disneyland this month, since our annual passes expired on 4th of July.  We took her there that day and wondered how she would deal with the fireworks.  Turns out, they were no big deal.  Loud noises don't usually faze her, so the big bangs didn't scare her.  She is more bothered by the dark, but I think there were enough people there to entertain her and distract her from the darkness during the fireworks show.  Girl loves to people-watch! 

Also, I have started to *slowly* run again after a year off. It is painful for me, and I'm sure for the other people who have to watch me shuffle my way down the path.  I'm taking Emma out in the jogging stroller a couple of days a week now.  She will often sleep through the beginning of the ride, and wake up on the way home. She is not used to seeing me all red-faced and sweaty and just stares at me from the stroller with concern, wondering if she should call 9-1-1. But hopefully I'll be able to keep up with her by the time she's running around.

Some facts about Emma at three months old:

• The most frequent comment we get from strangers is "she looks like a baby doll!" And from a distance, she totally does look like one of those bald-headed, blinky-eye dolls. A flight attendant didn't know she was "real" until midway through our flight when she saw Emma move.
• Her hair is s-l-o-w-l-y growing, and so far it looks like we have a strawberry blonde in the family. We'll see if that's her true hair color, and if her eyes stay blue-gray or change colors later.
• I know it's not intentional yet, but she says "mom" already! Unfortunately it's only when she's crying and fussy and she says it in a super whiny voice, along with other random baby sounds. But I still answer to it. :)
• When she's crying and wants you to know she's serious about it, she throws some snorts in there. It's hysterical, but we try not to laugh in her face since it just makes her more mad (and snort harder! ha!)
• Sleep is getting better and better. She goes down for the night between 10:30 and 11:30 and sleeps between 4-5 hours, then wakes up to eat and goes back down for another 2 hours or so. Dan and I have worked out a shift schedule: Dan goes to bed early and I'll stay up with her and put her to bed.  I get up with her if she wakes up in the early morning hours. After 4:30-5:00 a.m., Dan will get up with her. The worst is when she wakes up at 4 a.m., because it was *that* close to being Dan's turn! :)
• She's discovered her hands! She loves putting her entire fist into her mouth, along with anything she can grab onto. It's funny when when she opens her mouth wide and then bops herself in the eye instead of getting it in her mouth. So close!
• She also loves holding her bottle now when we're feeding her, but she's not very good at it yet. She usually shoves it out of her mouth, so we'll move her hands away, but it doesn't take long before they're right back! When she's relaxed, she'll put her left hand on top of the bottle and exercise her fingers. It looks like she's practicing her fingering to play the trumpet. 
• She can entertain herself for a pretty long time by holding and chewing her burp cloth or blanket, which is convenient since we always have both handy. She isn't able to grab anything thicker than a blanket, so we don't have to worry about bringing toys along for her yet.
• She still hates tummy time with a passion. I don't know if this child will ever crawl. 
• If you catch her just as she's waking up and before she starts crying, she gives you the most beautiful smiles.
• Not that I'm keeping score, but I think Dan gets more smiles than me at this point.
• When we sit her in her Boppy pillow, she works and works at sitting up, only to start crying when her head takes her too far forward and she ends up in an awkwardly cramped position
• She has the most fair skin ever, so it's a constant challenge to keep it protected/covered since we live in perpetually beautiful weather.

Stacy (Ellie's mom) made these adorable picture collages of the girls playing together at Sue's house

All dressed up for Independence Day!

Emma still loves sleeping in her car seat, usually with her hands up like she's being robbed. We keep the car seat in the snap and go stroller we borrowed from friends in her bedroom. That way, we can rock her or wheel her around the house if she's drowsy but not quite asleep. We have made many, many figure 8s around our tiny living room in the wee hours of the morning.

She still loves her bath time! It's a great way to relax her at the end of the day.

This is what inevitably happens when she tries to sit up. She's a little top-heavy right now - ha! On the plus side, it gives her a great view of her sweet toes.

At Disneyland, we took turns waiting with Emma so we could ride the more extreme rides that I wasn't allowed on during pregnancy. Here I am, all alone, having the time of my life on Space Mountain! Woo hoo!

On 4th of July as we were driving up to Disneyland again, she had her own personal firework explosion in her diaper. So we converted the back of the trusty CR-V into a changing station.

We *may* have scarred her forever by taking her on the Haunted Mansion ride. At the end of the ride, a hitchhiking ghost hops into your car, who you can see hovering over Emma's head.

Her first fireworks show! I think she was trying to see what was going on behind us.

We spent some time on the bay during 4th of July weekend. We were trying so hard to get her to smile for the camera, and I finally got this smirk out of her. :)  She'll smile right to your face, but I think it throws her off when she sees a camera or phone suddenly appear.

Our precious 3-month old! She's just getting more and more fun!