Happy Halloween!

We had a great weekend in the suburbs! Loving our little girl as she continues to grow and beome so alert and aware of so many things! As you can see she doesnt just like but loves her thumb!!

Return to work and nearing 3 months old!

This momma headed back to work on monday. Luckily today (tuesday) was my day off, so it was a nice way to ease my way back in. Thank goodness for Ellen. I was so happy that she came the night before so i could get her all prepared (not that she needed it) but I think she knew it would make me happy to come early. I did pretty good. Monday started for me at 3:00 am. Francesca woke up to eat, although i tried to go to bed the anxiety of going back to work kept me from getting any more sleep. I got back to work and as usual the atmosphere was crazy and everyone was busy busy busy. Yet somehow when i asked what they wanted me to do it didnt seem like there was anything for me to do, but review charts, ugh, yuck. I wanted to see patients and of course most of the day I was stuck in the office. By the afternoon I had already talked to Elle a few times and just as I thought she was doing a great job and was sending me lots of photos of Franki smiling away. I missed my Franki a lot though. It might have been easier if I enjoyed my job more. Hopefully soon I will have a job I like more. Maybe tomorrow i will get to see a few more patients! It was nice to catch up with some of my friends in the PICU. I did spend a bit more time in the PICU than I normally would because of course I forgot one piece that I needed in order to pump. It is a good thing that I work in a hospital where they have all the supplies I need! Otherwise I was going to head home because I cant go the whole day without pumping. Overall it was a very uneventful day. I definitely have mommy brain adn forgot how to do some things ( I have only worked in this job for four months before leaving on maternity leave) and well lets face it when your pregnant your memory is just not as sharp as it normally is. I am sure the next few days I will get back into the swing of things. I definitely just think about getting my work done while I am there so I can get home to my girl. Let me tell you I enoy my time with Franki even more not that I am back to work than I did when I was home. I will be utilizing all of my time off to get as much loving and fun with my franki, daddy , and Hulk! Wish me luck the rest of the week!

Francesca is almost 3 months old! I cant believe it! She is growing and changing everyday. There was a reason that she did not take the pacifier in the begining and that is becuase she is a thumb sucker. She recently found her thumb and she loves it! It was about three weeks ago that she really started to figure out how to get her hands to her mouth and it was only a matter of time before she figured out how to suck on her hand and then shortly after found her thumb. She is now a great self soother which has increased her amount of sleep overnight! I put her in the crib starting last week and since then she has done great. She loves to have the crib to move around in. She only gets up once during the night to eat and it is usually between 3 and 5. She is sleeping about 7 to eight hours. We usually get her to sleep around 7:30 but she likes to cuddle til about 9. I have tried several times to put her down into the crib at 7:30 after reading to her and feeding her. She will be passed out and the second I lie her down she is awake and crying. I pick her up and she snuggles on my chest until about 9 and from there she sleeps soundly in her crib until its time to eat again. She is still such a sweetie. She is always smiling and has started to laugh. Her laugh sounds like she is inhaling a lot of air, it is very cute. She thinks that it is really funny when we eat. As tyler and I eat she has a huge grin on her face. She must be thinking about eating. She is starting to grab things in front of her and is much more aware of everything going on around her. With everything that she likes to do her attention span lasts about 20 minutes. She has really started to look at the television. So we will put a children's show on the laptop and let her look at it. She really enjoys shows with songs. The first show we watched was the princess and the frog, it's got great music and she loves listening to it. Her face has a smile the entire time she is watching and listening to it. She also has finally started to notice Hulk. She will follow him with her eyes and watch where he is going. She absolutely loves the changing table. It must be the view that she gets of our faces. She can be crying and immediatly stops when you put her on the changing table. She absolutely hates tummy time. She usually cries the whole time, but has really started to lift her head and shoulders up, its almost like the more she cries the better she does becuase she lifts her head to search for whoever put her on her stomach! She is one smart little cookie. The other day in her sleep she rolled from her back to her stomach. We have yet to seee her roll over while she is awake but everyday she gets closer to doing this, its only a matter of time now especially with her kicking those legs and wiggling those arms aroound! She is really doing so wonderful. I cant wait to see all the things she will learn this next month. Her is a view into our happy happy babies life!

A New Vision

This weekend is a weekend dedicated to raising self esteem in young girls. This is an amazing campaign and Francesca only be close to 3 months old, but raising and promoting self confidence in today's society is going to be crutial. I want to raise Francesca to be true to herself and to embrace herself as who she is! Great Campaign! Please share with family, friends, children and women everywhere!

Baby Dedication

We couldnt have asked for a better day. The sun was shining, the trees in the back yard were a variety of beautiful fall colors and the air was a perfect fall crisp with the sun shining brightly on family and friends. It was the perfect Sunday to pray  for Francesca and to unite/dedicate our little girl to God and to the church. Our family and friends gathered for the perfect little sunday afternoon. I wish I had a picture looking from the inside out that captured this day. We were blessed to have the same pastor that married Tyler and I come to my parents home. Although we do not attend his church do to the distance from our home, he seems to just understand where we are in our lives both religiously and spiritually. He successfully made another moment in our life very special and personalized. Tyler and I feel very honored to have had him be apart of Francesca's special day. He preached a little about the difference between baptism and baby dedication and choose a few stories from the bible that outline this. The purpose of a baby dedication and why we chose this over baptism is because we want our children to be able to develop a personal relationship with God and with the right guidance choose to follow the God that they feel comfortable following. Baby dedication is the starting place for developing this relationship. Eric stressed that a baby dedication is just as much about Francesca as it is about everyone who chose to be gathered  with us on this day. Each person in her life will be commiting to helping her be all that God wants her to be. There was a few points that Eric had in this cerememony that hit home for me and I wanted to share them with you all. The first thing he said that we could do to help Francesca to be all that she will be is to Love one another. We must be an example to her and show her what real love is. Tyler and I must be as one and help her to feel the security that we feel when we are together. I have always felt that this is very important in a child's life. Love can be shown and heard through so many differnt forms of communication, words, gestures, feelings, emotions, etc. I think that both Tyler and I have the love for eachother that this commitment takes. Eric's words were a great reminder to both Tyler and I to remember how conneted we are. Ty and I have not had much time together since Francesca was born, and Sunday was a gentle reminder to spend more time on us as well as our little girl. The second thing that was pointed out was to teach our children well. Teach them to follow the rules, to listen to god, be there example, help them by involving there lives in the church, help them be around people that you know will teach them valuable things and also help them find and follow God. And last but not least to spend time with our children. He stressed that teaching children takes time. This part really got me thinking: Time is of so much value, I firmly believe that we must spend our time surrounded by the people that we love, those people who make us laugh and bring joy in to our lives. Surround yourself with great people the ones who trully make everyday enjoyable and worth living. Too many times, time is cut short, so we need to make the most of the time we have an spend it with those that are willing to live everyday. You dont need money to be rich in life, it does not buy happiness, it does not make good parents, it does not shape your future. What you do need and what I have been working on lately is living a rich life, which for me is filled with my small family and my few really good friends and there families. Love one another and your life to will be rich. We are so happy to have all these good people in our lives. Aunt Ellen and Uncle Arch were chosen as Francescas Godparents. They were chosen because we have love and trust in them that they will help us raise her, encouage her throughout life, be a good example for her to follow as she goes through this thing called life. We trust that they will put themselves in her life and make her better. I am so thankful for having them both in Francescas life now and into the future. Eric made sure to recongnize our Angel Great Grandma Rossi who passed just a little over a week before Francesca was born. One of my favorite Proverbs says: Grandchildren are the crown of the aged. We can only hope that Francesca will bring as much joy into the lives of others and My grandma Rossi did. I cant stress enough what a beautiful weekend it was. I am thankful for everyone who was there. Tyler and I have decided that even though the church in lake zurich is far from where we live that we want to be able to learn from Eric and the people at his church. We want to become more involved so that we can teach Francesca the right things. We are going to make and effort to become more involved in his community and in our own faith as we realize how improtant it is in todays society.

Here are the pictures from my camera! ENJOY

                                                    MoMa and Franki

                                                        Aunt Kathy and Franki

                                                                Proud Daddy

                                                          The GODFATHER :)

                                                             Papa, Arch, Ty ,and Kurk

                                                           The GODMOTHER :)

You know your a mom when....

You know you are a mom when..

For the last five years the smell of breast milk has made you sick, actualy even the thought of breastfeeding kinda grossed you out. Now your so used to the smell you actually kind of like it (it reminds you of your little love bug) and you whole heartedly believe that breastfeeding is one of the greatest things a human body can do and you love it!

You no longer wear pretty necklaces due to the fact that your child is either attached to you in a wrap or a sling or your carrying them around and well what used to be fashion just gets in the way..hey Franki is much cuter than any necklace I have ever had!

You used to look at websites like Nordstrom, Arden B, Victoria Secret, now your favorite bar consists of pampers (for pamper points of course), babies R us, GapKids, and any other baby website you can possibly think of!

When at the store you actually get super excited when you see that the pacifier your daughter likes has come out with a new design ( of course we have to buy it , even if we have 10 at home already). The new design is just so cute.  (Hey its the little things in life that make us happy, rught?)

You go to target for a couple of necessities and end up with at least 2 new outfits for your peanut!

Your baby is only 2 months old and your already planning the first baby food you will make.

You secretly wish that the clothes your little girl is wearing came in your size, everything just looks so comfy and cute!

Your day revolves around your little one, who cares if i havenet had time to brush my teeth and its already noon ( this has actually only happened twice) :)

Even when your exhausted at 12, 2, 4, 6 when they wake up to eat, when you see that smile your whole world is turend upside down and your heart melts just a little bit.

You cant remember what your life was like before she was in it and in truth really dont want to. Your whole life seemed to begin when she came into our life.

There is so much more, but theses where things that were fresh on my mind today. I love my Franki soo much! and I love everything about being a momma!

Franki has had a full week of Fall, Football, and Baseball! Enjoy some of her adventures below!

2 Months!

I cant believe how quickly the time has passed. Francesca is already 2 months old and growing right on track! She is now 9 llbs 15 oz and 22 inches long! Both of those only put her in the 25th percentile for her age. Her head is 14.5 inches which is the fifth percentile! She has a tiny little head! We happen to think this is probably why her head is so strong, she doesnt have a big noggin to carry around! We have had quite the eventful month, yet she continues to thrive and grow just as she should. This month she started really having control over her head. She can sit in the jumperoo and in her bumbo chair and hold her head up high. I can put her forward facing in the baby wrap and she absolutely loves to be able to face forward so that she can look all around. She is always on the move, her legs/arms are in constant motion. When you hold her up she immediately holds her own weight on her feet and mimics walking by picking up her feet. Her eye coordination continues to improve and she tracks both people and objects 180 degrees. She is still working on that hand/arm coordination although it is getting more precise by the day. She often hits herself in the head while trying to get her hands to her mouth. She does this wind up motion each time she tries to get her hands to her mouth and occasionally during her wind-up she catches her ear and she holds onto it. It is pretty funny to watch. Her personality continues to shine through. She loves to smile. Her favorite time of day is the early morning when she first gets up. All you have to do is talk to her and she her whole face lights up. I love that you can tell when she is going to smile because first the corner of her eyes have a slight upturn just before she smiles. She has that sweet little smile in that her whole face shows how happy she is. She still loves to be held. I think during our few bumos in the road she got used to the loving feeling of being held 24/7. So we are gradually trying to get her back to taking naps in the swing, bouncy, crib, or pack and play and not in her Mama's arms. I have found myself only getting things done when i strap her in the baby wrap. She sure loves to snuggle right up. The entire month her sleep schedule is slowly improving. She has even had one 6 hour stretch of sleep! The chubbier she gets the more she sleeps overnight and this makes for one happy baby and happy Mama! She continues to love being on her playmat, although she only hits the hanging toys by accidents, she does enjoy to look at all of the different things and to look at herself in the mirror. Every morning I have been reading her a new book. The past couple of weeks we have started to read Halloween books. I can usually keep her interested for about five minutes while reading to her. Now that she is getting more visual acuity she seems to enjoy looking at the pages in the book. She loves to dance! Tyler and I have always been big on playing music for her and it seems to instantly relax her. The other nigh t we put zac brown band into the CD player and we took turns swayying, swinging and dancing to the music. She was busy smiling and enjoying all the movement. I am determined to make her a country loving girl! So I still play country music, however I have started to play some Disney Music on my Pandora and that always seems to help lull her to sleep. She loves being naked (she takes after her Aunt Elle on this one!). I think next time she is crabby I may just try stripping her down and letting her be that is how much she seems to enjoy it. I think part of it is that she knows that being naked means that bath time is approaching! Today I had so much fun with her in the bath. Normally she gets her bath at night, in her little bath tub, because she enjoys the water so much i decided to try a different approach today. I put her in the bath with me. I held her while she was able to kick her legs and swing her arms. I let her back float by supporting her head in the water. We spent about twenty minutes in the water. SHe absolutely loved it! I cant describe hotw happy she looked. I think it will serve two purposes putting her in the bath with me occasionally. It will get her used to the water so she will love to take swimming lessons next year and it puts her back into her old element where she got to swim around everyday.  I know I am one proud Mama, but she is so special I cant help but tell you all about her new accomplishments and to document all of her achievements over the past month!