Family Pictures :-)

So here's the thing. Gianna is adorable, easy, hands down, obvious. I'm not modest about her cuteness at all, and I don't really think I really need to be as a parent. If someone tells me that my hair looks nice, I say thank you and that's very sweet of them. When someone tells me Gianna is cute, I say, YES I KNOW, RIGHT?! It's okay that I want to munch on my child's cute chubby arms and smother her with kisses all day. Anyhow, I digress. We took family pictures on Sunday in this nice field by a park in Tyler. Gianna is like 115% cute in person. When we're playing together, it's like non-stop smiles and giggles. However, you bust out another other than a human face (say, an iPhone or camera) and she's throwns on a ridiculous awkward face (cough cough like me cough cough) (it's almost like it's on purpose...) like this:

 or this.........

 orrrrrrrrrr this..............

 

 

 You get the point. 

So, needless to say, I was already thinking, okay, she’s going to stare at the camera. No big deal. She’s still stinkin’ cute and that serious face is totally Gianna anyway…really the essence of her already well developed personality. What I didn’t expect though is for my poor baby to have HORRIBLE ALLERGIES while we took the pictures! SO SAD! She had like 5 sneezing fits of 4 sneezes each in 30 minutes! And she got a runny nose! And was fussy and crying! I felt so bad for her, but she was a trooper. 

Chris and I had to seriously pull out all the stops...we sang our infamous duet rendition of “A Whole New World”, as well as other ridiculous songs that have words that rhyme with Gianna (mama, llama, pajamas, piranhas…we’re open to new words if y’all can think of any. Piranhas is always awkward to fit it. Little Gianna loves to wear her pajamas. Little Gianna doesn't get eatin’ by piranhas….Yeah. We need new material). There was standing, bouncing, and other countless end-baby-tears techniques employed as well. 30 minutes, 20 sneezes, a runny nose, and some tears later, this is what we got! Tiffany must be a miracle worker.

 

 Photos by TKPhotography

 

 Chris and I even took a couple sans bebe!

 This is the epitome of our relationship, summed up in one picture.

 

 

 Soooooooooooo sweet. Be still, my heart!

 My absolute favorite!

My sneezy baby! At least here we look like concerned parents, instead of laughing at her or something LOL.

 Okay, I lied. Maybe this is my favorite.

 Or this one. My sweet planking baby :-)

 

 Chris isn't intentionally choking Gianna here. LOL. She's just so wiggly!

 Those eyes are heart stealers!

 HEY! Yeah, you! I'm lookin' at YOU!

 It's our favorite ab-work out/pastime (workout for me, pastime for her). She was getting CRANKY so I had to pull out all the stops :-)

 She's just too much cute. Too much. 

 Hahahahaha. Gianna's face is priceless. She is about to sneeze I think.

As you can see, we have learned 3 lessons from this experience.

1. Don't take pictures in a field with Gianna

2. Gianna, like her mama, needs to learn to make nice, not awkward, faces at the camera.

3. Gianna is cute, even when she sneezes. 

Month 4 in BabyLand: G flung herself out of her swing and smiled about it...

I've had this post ready to go for like...........2 weeks now (since Cinco de Mayo), but our internet went out and I didn't get a chance to post!Now, I get to turn it into a 4 month post bwahaha. Annnnnnnnnnnnnd somehow this has turned into the longest post ever.

As always, an interesting and eventful month in BabyLand...full of old and new Gianna antics!

Okay. Backstory. I'll often put Gianna in her swing if I've got to do a quick task that I can't just sling her up for, like hanging clothes outside on our laundry line. (I'd ram her into the railing for one, and I usually stand on a chair to reach the top line) For these short tasks, we stopped bothering to buckle her in because the belt is kind of tight on her (big cloth diaper butt and thunder thighs #babyprobs). On this particular day, I was hanging cloth diapers to dry outside. I came back in and Gianna had fallen asleep. I didn't want to rock the boat, so I left her as she was and went into the next room to type up something on the computer.

After a short time, I heard Gianna start to fuss a bit, and I thought to myself finish this sentence and get her before she starts crying. I walk into the living room and look at the swing. Gianna is not in the swing. Gianna is on the floor, face down, in a bizarre perpendicular orientation to the swing. She looks up at me and smiles. Yep.

Chris wanted to understand how she did it, so one morning he was cleaning up (yes, my saint husband cleans the dishes before going to work) and kept a close eye on her and left her unbuckled. She apparently wiggles herself down until her head is where her butt should be, her legs are dangling off, and then arches her back to then fling herself forward. Cool stuff. Obviously, Chris did not let her fall out. So yeah--the buckle is a non-negotiable now even if it is tight on her thunder thighs.

Its not a huge surprise though. We knew she wasn't normal pretty early on. After a quiet first day out of the womb, Gianna really stepped into her personality very quickly, like a mini-human, seemingly skipping the soft, limp, sweet newborn phase.

She's been an expressive one from the get go:

 

 

She was never really calm and asleep like those adorable normal baby pictures where the baby is like a soft smushy naked limp noodle, easily craft-able into whatever position you want (and ohhhhhh how I tried to get one like that)

Normal baby:

Gianna:

She has been rolling over since she was 2 months 

(I finally caught it on camera in April woohoo!):

She tries to fling herself out of the Bumbo (this is after a few minutes of flinging, too, she's worn herself out):

She Houdini's her way out of her super tight Velcro swaddle in 1 minute flat:

 

And at the end of the night, she sometimes goes from this:

to this:

  

Yeah, this is what I woke up to at 6:30 this morning. At 3 am, she was completely swaddled normally after I fed her. Crazy legs. It must be the crazy legs.

She is a wannabe superman:

She. Never. Wants. To. Sit!!!!

Long gone are the days of sitting on mama's lap. It's standing or cry.  Tough choice, right? I'd bet we spend at least an hour a day standing because she won't bend her legs.

Oh, she also recognizes songs on different instruments (voice and flute, for instance) and her eyes light up when she realizes she knows it. This I love.Oh gosh, and we have to keep the TV away from her, she's like a zombie when she sees it. We pull out youtube "A Whole New World" during car trips when she gets grumpity (grumpy+uppity) and like 75% of the time she zones and falls asleep.

On Cinco de Mayo she really "found her voice"....

And again on May 14.....

(see this is the benefit of waiting to post something, I suppose...more footage lol)

Here is what my mom has to say about Gianna and her antics:
Mom: Good, do new learned tricks today?
Me: Yeah she "planks" in the air like superman...we hold her up in the air and she holds herself parallel to the floor
Mom: Oh please don't push that child or she will try to fly solo!!!
Me: Oh and she can also escape her swaddle in 5 minutes
Mom: Lol you poor fools!!!!
Mom: And I mean that in the nicest way!!!!

I will admit though, Gianna is pretty fun, and definitely entertaining. We will probably think our next baby is super developmentally behind and abnormally calm, when in reality, he or she will be completely normal. Or heck, maybe they'll all be like Monster 1. God only knows... ;-)

Is there a patron saint of babies too old for their britches? Oy vey. Pray for us!

 Oh, this girl! 

In other baby news, on Sunday we took family pictures! I'm so excited to see the final result. We took the pictures in a field of wild flowers and tall grass and Gianna had sneezing fits the WHOLE time and a runny nose. So apparently, she's got allergies, just like me.

This month Gianna graduated from her infant insert in the bath tub, to butt bumper, to normal ole’ baby bath. She looks like a giant in here now!

 With booty bumper

 Giant baby

  The weather has been so nice, we’ve been going to the park a lot, too, as you can see.

 

 
Long gone are the days of aimless baby arms, this girl goes for it now. But of course, we’re not limiting ourselves to toys…Gianna is an equal opportunity grabber, which includes my hair.

  

So much for sweet baby belly kisses. 

Last weekend, my mom came to visit and it was super hot outside (And to imagine, in 2 months, 90 degrees will feel "cool"...). Gianna is hot natured and was like a whiny sweat ball. The apartment pool is still too cold, though, so, I blew up the baby pool I bought her and we let her get in right in the middle of the living room. 

It has begun. Gianna has baby tooth buds. I can only see them when she cries, so I only have blurry pictures of that lol. She has started sucking her bottom lip in to massage her gums though.

 She also loooooooooooves ice. I made ice pops for her :-)

Going to be a "fun" next few months :-) But in all seriousness, it will be. Minus the teething.  Oh and like always, just some other pictures that make my heart melt. (and usually laugh)