Hi!  As you know I have been trying to come up with a new title for the next chapter of the documentation of O!

Not too creative, but this is exactly what it’s about www.ournewlifewitho.wordpress.com will be our new blog, so hop on over and continue to share this journey with us!

Thanks again for all of your support and thanks to Krystal for being so open to us sharing this journey with others!

And of course a special thanks to my sweetie Rick for starting us on this documentation of our journey!  It really helped to keep track of it all and I think some day Olivia will really enjoy reading it!  Thanks again Love!

LOL!  She is growing so fast!  I am still loving being home with O!  She is so fabulous and I thankfully, because of our good Lord and my dear husband, I get to enjoy Olivia every minute of everyday!  Even when she is cranky!

She is still in the 97th percentile!  At 20lbs. 13ozs. and over 28 inches with a size 3 shoe at 7 months!  Her legs are so long!

Two days ago I noticed suddenly it seemed that her speech changed from screeching and squilling to  more letter sounds like baba, gaga, sorta dada!  She has had “mama” down for some time, which of course I love!  So we are working on Dada!

It used to be “MAAAAA!” when she was upset, but now it’s “mama”!

She is eating very well, still salivates over food and from time to time I do give her small tastes of whatever I am eating, but for her official meals she is eating twice per day and she has a meat, with a veggie and cereal and then gets some oatmeal and a fruit for dessert!  The little piglet has not rejected anything!  I read on Circle of Moms things like, “my baby won’t eat veggies or meat or only a few things”, not Olivia Isabella!  She is a good eater, I think we may need to up it to 3 meals a day soon

I probably don’t give her enough floor time, but she is rolling front to back and back to front with ease, and she sorta scoots.  Mom and I found her a walker, they actually started making them again, we tried it in the store and she loved it!  So of course her Tita got her one and she loves it here at home too!  She is roaming the kitchen and chasing the dogs!  Baxter is very good, he will actually sit next to her and allow her to reach over and grab him, usually by the ear!

I do have to stop her when she tries to eat him, though! LOL!  Katie just tries to stay out-of-the-way!  You have to remember she is 14 years old!

We also set up the labor spa that we had for Krystal and have been putting O in at night!  We also went swimming at my sister’s and she did great in and out of her floaty!  I think she really likes it, splashes around, kicks her little legs! And of course drinks some water :}

I had gotten her two little bathing suits, but did not notice they have no snaps!  They are supposed to be 18 months, now mind you she is 7 months, but I could not get them on!  So she wears Morgan’s old bikini, which is adorable, but it’s for a 3-year-old and so I put it away thinking we were a long ways from using it!  It’s a little big, but not much!

Rick and I are great!  Enjoying her ever-growing giggles!  It is the best sound!  And my big girl can’t fall asleep just anywhere anymore, because she won’t miss anything for sleep, but I think we are getting more into a routine.

I had thought we might move her into her own room soon, but I keep putting it off.  Then the other night I was sitting in her room, after Rick and O had gone to sleep (I’m reading “The Help”, it’s great if anyone needs a summer read), anyway, I am sitting there and out comes a scorpion!  about 2 inches, blonde….freaked me out!  I never wake Rick, I take care of it myself, a spider, bugs, noises, whatever, but this scorpion ran at me when I tried to get around it to go get a shoe to kill it with and it freaked me out! So I had to yell – whisper to Rick, who  bravely got up killed it and went back to sleep, as I read for another hour to calm myself down!  It’s from the irrigation, but we had never in 12 years seen one inside the house, much less in my baby’s room.  So with that said, I think Olivia will sleep in our room until she goes to college and at that point I might go with her – LOL!  Poor thing!

I better get to bed!  Good night!

Update on stats – Olivia had her 6 month appointment on Monday and as usual Dr. Jones said she is pretty darn close to perfect!

She weighs 19lbs. 10ozs. and is now 28 inches tall!  The piglet gained almost 2lbs. in a month!  and grew 1 inch, 2 consecutive months in a row!  I had thought at our last visit that she was slowing down and would now be gaining about 1 lb a month, was happy that the infant car seat would last us approximately 5 months……haha!  At this rate she maybe out of it in1 to 2 months!

She has met all of her milestones and is a little ahead at times as well!  She is working on rolling from back to tummy and transferring things from one hand to the other.

She had her two vaccines and for the first time had a little bit of a reaction!  I guess the overheating the other day was good because we were prepared with acetaminophen, otherwise we would not have had it, because I had just tossed the unopened recalled Tylenol.

So she has been a bit stuffy and started coughing during the night.  I checked on her every time I heard her cough, but she would continue sleeping so I didn’t even touch her.  Then at 3 am she had a hard cough and had her eyes opened, so I picked her up and she was burning.

Thankfully I had read my “What to Expect Book” section on fevers  the other day, because she was almost 103*.  So I stripped her PJs, gave her some water and juice and put a lukewarm washcloth on her forehead and neck and by almost 5 am it had come down to 99+.  Our peds office has a 24hr. nurse line and at about 5am I decided to call and see what her dose of acetaminophen she could take if it came back.

So it took about 24 hours, but by today she was good and pretty much back to normal.  She still has a cough, but I and the doctor agreed, think it’s just the stuff in the air and the drainage from the congestion.  Poor baby can’t blow her nose yet!

We are up to two feedings at the doctor’s recommendation and are on carrots this week, sweet peas are next and hopefully tomorrow we will try out, for the first time, a sippy cup!

We missed the sign language class this morning, because she feel asleep as I got ready…. what to do?  She was tired from the coughing, so I let her sleep ~  She looks so adorable, how could I ever wake her!

Her fever reminded me of how lucky and Blessed we are that I am home with her, that I didn’t have to call in to work, or rush her to Day Care in the morning and that I could be with her the whole time to see what was going on first hand. Thank you Lord!

Next we are preparing for Olivia’s first camping trip!  In the trailer of course!  She will be going with us to the wildlife education camp we volunteer for every summer (for the last 13, maybe 14 years) ~ so she will get initiated into Wapiti Camp!  That should be fun, she has never been away from home and I think she will find many fascinating things to look at!

Write again soon, good night! And again thanks for keeping up with us!

Can you believe 6 months have gone by!  We sure can’t!  It is going by so quickly! Ahh!

Olivia had her first fever yesterday, thankfully I think she just got a little overheated, because we were out all day and she isn’t “sick”.  Even with a fever she is so easy it’s hard to believe.  She is doing great!  Has started eating rice cereal and has done a week of sweet potatoes, which she seemed to like with her cereal.  I’m not sure what we will try next.

She looks like such a big girl in her high chair!  She sat for a little bit in a high chair at a restaurant yesterday, it seems like she shouldn’t be ready to do that at just 6 months, but she loves it and plays with her toys on the table.

She is so much fun, she is really interactive now and has so many expressions!  The one thing I have noticed is that she now “scares”.  I was calling for Rick and yelled out several times and she reacted, and the hair dryer now scares her too!  Good thing I don’t have to dry my hair everyday, these days! LOL

My Mom has now officially retired, so it’s nice because we have gotten to see her almost daily and Olivia really enjoys her!  Mom has brought her a ton of books and Olivia just loves reading.  She is also getting into music and loves to dance with me around the living room or in any room really.  We water the plants with Daddy everyday and she loves folding clothes and vacuuming! Lol Poor kid, hope we don’t make her too domestic!  The vacuum really keeps her attention and usually hums her to sleep.    She looks really funny, hanging in her “hip hammock” on me, like a monkey, but asleep – lol!

She is wonderful, I can take her anywhere – shopping, appointment, etc.  Even at the grocery store, she sits in the cart and enjoys looking at everything, she is just amazing!

Rick and I continue to  truly enjoy her.  I still can’t imagine what I did before she came into this world!  So Happy Birthday Baby Girl!  6 months!  Wuhu!

Olivia was Baptized today!  She looked beautiful and did wonderful, as usual, with the ceremony.  We are attending Saint Mary Magdelene Catholic Church and Fr. Greg is great!  We feel very comfortable there.  Olivia kept smiling at Father and even got a hold of his robes at one point!

She was surrounded by her family and a few close friends and it was very satisfying to watch her become part of the Faith that we have both had throughout our lives!  It is always emotional for me to attend church, I usually cry ,  I think it is because I am so grateful for the many Blessings that  God has bestowed upon us!  Even before we were given the gift of Olivia, I have always felt very blessed, that is why I never really felt desperate.

Anyway, it was a beautiful day and I know that between us and her official Godparents – Mary and Bart and her unofficial Godparents Bill and Bea – Olivia will always be surrounded by love and people who will help guide her down a path of faith!

So again Thank You Lord for Blessing us so!

Olivia got her ears pierced today!  It was a bonding moment for us!  She did wonderfully!

Of course she cried, but less than 2-3 minutes and was happy trying on hats to move on from the piercing…lol!

My sister Bea went with us and we were remembering when we took Morgan at 3 months to get her ears pierced and how traumatic it was for Morgan, for Bea, for my Mom and for me, thankfully Olivia’s was not like that!

With Morgan, the girl told us to hold her down and hold her head and keep it from moving……so Morgan was screaming bloody murder!  I didn’t remember, but Bea says I held her.  It turned out OK and Morgan is even more Beautiful then she was then and she is almost 14!  It went by in a blink!

Thankfully we had Lynette at Claire’s at the Scottsdale Fashion Square, she is the Manager!  She said she has done hundreds of piercings and she was very good….she said “Do not hold her head, she will be more relaxed on her own”, and sure enough!  The other thing she said was that she would do one right after the other and not to try to console her in between and I agreed, it’s like vaccinations, they need to be quick, quick, quick!

My precious looks even more precious and thankfully she is already used to me cleaning her ears and did very well with her first cleaning.

So our girl is ready for anything with her first Bling!

Of course we know we are Blessed, but it’s always good to stop and acknowledge that we don’t take it for granted.

I can’t say enough about what a JOY Olivia is!  Even on her cranky days, she is still wonderful!

This week I had a woman in the grocery store randomly come up and say “she is a really good baby, isn’t she” and she sure is.  Her and I go through the grocery store with no problem, either she sits in the cart and looks so laid back or if she is tired I put her in the “Hip Hammock” and like a little monkey she just hangs on!  Rarely does she protest and she has even fallen asleep in her hammock or her Moby wrap!

Tonight I was on a FB sight Circle of Moms for babies born in December and again it affirmed how lucky we are!  Moms are having trouble with tantrums or prolonged crying, not sleeping through the night, lots of crankiness due to teething, lack of naps, failure to thrive and not making it through the night on one diaper.

Olivia sleeps through the night, makes it on one diaper, sure cries – but I would not call them tantrums, she is definitely thriving at just about 17 lbs., and even though we think she is teething and at times gets a little fuzzy, she is still so easily entertained or redirected!

She seems to have taken a step forward with her motor skills this week and she is grabbing everything!  She is loving her activity center and her jumpy and of course feels tortured with tummy time, but is so strong while she is on her tummy!  Her bedtime routine is easy, she waits for her Daddy to get home about 6pm and then by 6:30 – 7:00pm she gets a bath, which she literally asks for and then she drinks the last of her milk (currently 34-36ozs total for the day) and she falls asleep!  Sometimes she will get up again to drink more milk if she hasn’t gotten it all in for the day and then back to sleep.  Now yesterday she only took two small naps during the day and I think was overly tired so she didn’t fall asleep until 10pm, but that is really very rare.

Her favorite currently is shrieking!!!!!  All day!  Today I swear for a constant minute or two she just screamed for fun!  LOL  She would scream and then look at me, and of course I couldn’t help but laugh, so she would scream again!  I tried calling Rick so he could hear her, but the minute she saw me on the phone she was quiet of course.  She is a riot!

Her and Baxter are becoming better friends and I guess I am allowing Baxter to get up close and personal with her, which we were not doing before.  She gets a real kick out of it now and is just fascinated by watching him!  Kate who will be 14 this summer comes by to say Hello, but she isn’t getting too close.  She knows those little hands can jump out and grab her at any minute!  LOL

Rick and I still take a picture of her every day!  And we are getting ready for her Baptism and celebrating Mother’s Day!  It will be nice to actually be a mother to more then my furry children this year!

Almost 5 months old, and we are having a ball!!!!!  I am so excited to be able to be a part of Olivia’s life!  And what is even better is that our family is also so grateful and excited to also be a part of her life, she is just surrounded by LOVE! Morgan and Willie despite being teenagers and busy with their own schedules are wonderful with her and of course my Mom, sister and brother-in-law just adore her!  And Mary and her boys are so good with her!  We took her to Roller Derby with them and she just loved hanging with them!

It really is Fabulous!!!!

And don’t think we have forgotten Krystal and her family………even though we don’t see and talk to each other as much as we used to, it’s great to know from them that they are doing wonderful and have happily gotten back to their lives!    Krystal and the kids look so good, and Nathan is doing great in school – it’s a great reminder and great reassurance that God truly put this plan in place!

We are so truly Blessed!

Haven’t posted in forever!  I guess Olivia is so much fun, I really don’t take the time to get onto the computer these days and I don’t want to stay up late to do so, just happen to be up today!

Life as a full time Mom is going great!  Olivia is such a happy baby!  She wakes up smiling and even when she is cranky, it’s really nothing   I am truly Blessed, because it makes life so pleasant.  We have been enjoying the nice weather and keep the doors open so we can go in and out all day.  We leave the house at least a few times a week, but it’s also nice to have full days at home, it’s so peaceful!  I am used to the hub bub of a hospital, patients and constant crisis and wow I couldn’t even imagine the peacefulness that would come with motherhood!  Some might ask if I miss it……well I guess for split seconds at times I do, just because on a daily basis I spoke to upwards of at least 40 plus people in one day and now it’s just O and I chatting away about laundry and dogs and errands!

O is doing wonderfully!  She is in the 96th percentile for height and weight at 26 inches! and 16lbs. 11 ozs.!  Her head has grown 3 inches since birth at 16 1/2 inches and she is wearing 6-9 month clothing!  It’s hard to keep up!  She loves to stand and feels very proud of herself, as well as I make a big deal of it too! LOL  She is still enjoying her baths and barely fits into the sink, but part of the enjoyment is looking at herself in the mirror!

Her hair is now starting to fall out, but she has the cutest curls over her ears! The pediatrician doesn’t think her teeth will be in soon, but she sure is drooling and loves to have her gums massaged, you can tell it’s a real pleasure, LOL!

We had a very nice first Easter with her!  Just the fact that we went to church as our own little family was a joy!  Then we picnic’d with my family and it was all very low key and relaxing and we all really enjoyed admiring her!  My sister got her a beautiful dress and little black patten leather shoes!  OMG she was just adorable, what more can I say………

Rick is mesmerized, as I guess he will be for life and we both take a picture of her pretty much everyday.  Rick put together an awesome collection of her pics for the last 4 months, I will ask him to attach it.  It goes by very fast, just like life, but you’ll see we are truly enjoying our little girl in everything she does…….tummy time,chewing on her own hands, to reading her books, riding her pony that her Auntie Marcia got her, going hiking, hanging with family, you know it’s endless!  So hope you enjoy it!

First Four Months

I sometimes forget that we had to do some legal paperwork, because she has been our child since long before she was created, but the legal stuff is done and it was very easy, expensive, but easy – thankfully!  Krystal is part of our lives and she and her family are doing very well!  She looks great and we stay in touch.

I want to change the title to the blog, because it’s now about O and not the surrogacy, so we’ll link them together and make for the next chapter.  If you have any thoughts as to a new title, let us know.

Well, hoping all is well with you and that you all may be as Blessed as we feel we are!

I was happy to see Rick posted the new pics!  Isn’t she gorgeous!  She really was a trooper, because at night she usually tries to eat and sleep to get ready for bed, she is not the most interactive, but her pics turned out great!

2 weeks ago we had our 2 month appointment with Dr. Jones.  Olivia got her first two vaccines!! Ouch!!  It was so sad to see the giant eyes that appeared as the shock of that first shot hit her!!!  I have never seen such big tears!!  It took her a little bit to recover and I was glad I made the decision not to do the regular shot schedule!  We are actually going with Dr. Sears’ alternative vaccine schedule, so she will get 2 vaccines every month, instead of 6 or 7 every 2 months and the order in which they are given is a bit different.  The shocker was that Oliva weighed 13 lbs 2 ozs at 2 months!!!!  And was 23 1/2 inches!!!

She is super health thankfully!  Never has had a cold or even a rash!  And she is just the best baby!  In the last two weeks she has really started liking bath time…..not long term and with toys or anything, but you can tell she really relaxes : )  It is very sweet!  She has also discovered her image in the mirror and she is a true girl….she loves looking at herself in the mirror!!!!  After her bath she will let me clean her ears and nose, but only if she is in front of the mirror!  LOL  it’s hilarious!

She also in the last two weeks made it through her first book almost twice!  It was “Mommy Hugs”  and she really examined the pages and interacted with me and when we were done the first time she looked like, “isn’t there more?” So we started again and she made it half way through, that is really “advanced” as Rick would say for a 2 month old!

Time just seems to fly!  She has already been to several happy hours with Mom, and Rick almost had to pick her up from happy hour, but she was having too much fun!  So she stayed! LOL

She and I have discovered the library and gotten our own library cards!  We even tried out Baby Time at the library.  It was fun, but a little overwhelming still for Olivia, so we took some of those ideas and we do our own baby time at home for now.  Some of her favorite’s are 5 Little Olivia’s jumping on the Bed, Itsy Bitsy Spider and El Niño Jesus cargaba su Cruz!

She has grown out of most of her 0-3 clothes and it has been so quick!  She wore some PJs last week, this week they were too tight!  She laughs and giggles a lot and is very chatty!  I think eventually Daddy will wear ear plugs at home, because between Baxter barking, Olivia talking and Mommy chatting with both of them, we will probably drive him crazy!

Oh, and this week she had her first trip to the Zoo!  Krystal and her kids invited us and it was fun!  Olivia was awake for the first 2 hours and then napped the last hour, which I thought was pretty good!

Rick and I are still adjusting to this new life, but I think it’s going pretty good!  Krystal seems to be doing well and we stay in touch and see each other once a week or every other week, so it’s nice to stay in touch.

Bax and Katie are used to Olivia now and are great with her!  They enjoy going for walks with her and just having her and I home almost all the time…………….

I am sure there is so much more I am forgetting to update everyone on, everyday there is something new.  New expressions, new adventures, new adjustments to feedings, naps, poopy diapers, at the end of the day we are ready for a good night sleep!  I have been surprised at how well I am sleeping.  It used to be that if I was not mentally exhausted from work, I could not sleep……I think now I sleep, because I am relaxed and content knowing my little one is right there next to us and I can hear her breathing   I no longer feel the need to check on her 3 or 4 times per night, but I clearly hear her if she is fuzzy.  I’ve learned that sometimes she just needs a quick pick up to burp or feel reassured or a too full diaper, but rarely does she totally wake up and it happens rarely.

Like I said she is just the best baby!  So inside and out she is truly precious!

So on this Valentine’s Day, we really felt warm just having Olivia!  Nothing more was needed!  We now have our true Valentine for life and we can’t squeeze her, hug her and kiss her enough!

Hoping you all had a wonderful Valentine Day yourself!  Enjoy life with those you love, because everyday counts more than we tend to remember!  Happy Valentine’s Day!

We have not been posting much lately, but things are going great. Olivia has her moments but mostly is a very happy baby.

Last Friday, we went to a friends house and had a photo shoot. Olivia was a real trooper. Here are a few of the pictures.