Hangin' with Grammie...

Today, Paul, Ginger and I headed down to Temecula for a multi-purpose visit. Paul and my Dad (referenced as Opa from here on out) went to a hot rod show, and Ginger and I hung out with my mom (Grammie) at their house. I absolutely LOVE their house, they live in an awesome community called Harveston, and right outside their front door they have a beautiful lake, and a really awesome (HUGE!) playground. There is also a pool complete with splash fountains that shoot up from the ground, for kids. It's clean, and there are a ton of young families and kids playing every time we visit. I just know that we'll be spending a LOT of time at Grammie and Opa's house with Ginger.

I was thinking back to my visits to my grandparents house when I was a kid, and aside from an old exercise bike, and a few board games, there wasn't a whole lot of kid stuff that kept us occupied. Ginger is going to have it MADE, she'll think she's going to the happiest place on earth every time she visits Grammie and Opa's house!

Anyhow, here are a few shots I took of Ginger snuggling with Grammie! (She's still dealing with the sniffles, poor girl!)

First "rush to the doctor" trip...

Well, it was inevitable- our little girl was bound to need to see a doctor outside a normal visit at some point, and what a story it was. The night before last, my mom and dad came up to spend the night and see Ginger, and right after an (unusually large) evening nursing session, Ginger decided to spit up. She usually has a little spit up here, a little there, but this was the motherload- it was probably at least an ounce or two, and it came out both her mouth and her nose. It was enough so that it landed on my pants and pooled on my lap.

Since then, my poor girl has barely been able to breathe! She has been heavily congested, and you can even hear it in her chest- it absolutely breaks my heart to see her this way. So, after a night of sleeping in mommy and daddy's bed (and her sniffling, snorting, coughing, and crying) we took her to the doctor's office today. Turns out this isn't all that uncommon, spit up coming out of her nose (but I swear this was like a full feeding coming out, not just a few drips). All we can do is give her saline drops and use a bulb syringe to try to coax out all of the mucus.

I now understand the pain that others have described to me when they see their children in pain. I see her in tears and it just kills me. I think I've told her "I'm sorry" about a thousand times now (because of the unusally large feeding, I should have seen the signs that she was full).

Oh, a mother's guilt...so it begins.

too cute!! First smile caught on video!

Ginger has been flashing some smiles lately, but they're so hard to capture on the camera. I finally was able to get one, and just take a look at this cutie pie. She's just waking up from a nap, and is responding to my high pitched baby talk (please excuse the annoying sound of my voice, but it gets her to smile!)

Ginger's pumping some iron (kinda...)

I was reading online the other day that an activity gym is a great investment for early development of your baby. I had a babies r us gift certificate, so yesterday we picked one up, and had Ginger try it out last night. She loves it! I didn't think she would lay there for more than a few moments without crying, but she hung out for several minutes and actually played with the toys! I was tearing up watching her, realizing that she is growing really, really fast and isn't a teeny tiny newborn anymore. Her eyes now catch lights, mommy and daddy, and a few other things that intrigue her, and it's awesome to watch her try to start to understand that her arms are attached to her and can be helpful in grabbing things!

Also, isn't her little Valentine's day outfit so cute? A word of advice to other new moms- go to Babies'R'Us on the actual holiday, and you can pick up a cute outfit for next to nothing on clearence! This cute little heart tee was only $1.50, regularly priced $12.99! And the pants were a hand-me-down from Jovita and baby Dixie, gotta love it.

Ginger's voice...

is soooo cute. We can't wait to hear her giggle and laugh, but until then, check out this video clip I took of her yesterday. In between hiccups you can hear her little voice coming through, and it is just adorable.

Our little angel's first photo shoot!

So, in the same building as our 4D ultrasound location, there is a photography studio that specializes in maternity and baby photography, called Barefoot Photography. Because we got a particular package at the 4D ultrasound, we qualified for a free photography session (usually a $75 sitting fee). We have good friends Kymberli and Al that are photographers, but they just had a baby and we knew they were pretty busy, so we decided to check out these gals who were local. When we arrived, I was surprised to see that they had 3 photographers who were working together. It made sense, when you think about it, because one of them is getting the next prop area ready, one is posing Ginger (and whispering to her, singing to her, etc) and the other is taking the shot. They worked in conjunction like this the whole time, and I just don't see any way they could have taken such amazing shots without all of their hands on deck. I was BLOWN away by how talented these ladies are- not just in the taking of the photos, but in how they handle getting babies in these poses. Literally, they are baby whisperers and I wanted to hire ALL of them to be nannies to Ginger once I saw how they were able to soothe her and keep her quite and flexible for so long! Turns out that each of them have 4 kids a piece- that makes 12 between the 3 of them- and it shows. We ended up picking a package that included return visits with free sittings over the next year, so we look forward to her 3 month, 6 month, 9 month, and 1 year shots. Paul said that next time around, we're going to bring in a paint bucket, and dress her in some paint splashed osh kosh overalls and a painters cap, to put in Daddy's garage. Oh, and he said we've gotta figure out how to get the hot rods into the studio :)