JAMSquared

Jessica has reached a pivotal point in her short life. She is a quarter of a year old today. Time has truly flown by. It seems like only yesterday she was born, but the speed at which she has grown makes it seem like the three months it is.

She now has excellent neck control. This comes from sitting up in her super seat and tummy time. We haven’t made it to 10 minutes of continuous tummy time, but Jessica enjoys tummy time for 5 minutes or so at a time and she gets tummy time 5 or 6 times a day. She can push herself up and stay up (i.e. no face in the activity mat) and this has definitely increased her enjoyment of tummy time.

I still haven’t been able to catch her on video rolling from tummy to back, but stay tuned as I’m sure I will eventually.

Jessica has quite the grasp. She will consciously hold onto something as well as grip something placed in her hands. This is where lots of hair isn’t always a good thing. Once, she grabbed a hold of her hair and pulled it making her upset. The more upset she got, the tighter her grasp. It took some effort for James and I to uncurl her fingers from around her hair. Fortunately, there has not been a repeat of this situation, at least not yet and hopefully there won’t be.

Jessica loves playtime. She grabs a hold of the hanging toys. She moves around by rolling and scooting and has even gotten herself completely off the activity mat this way.

She smiles a lot and has recently started laughing. It is adorable how she will laugh and then you will laugh and then she’ll laugh more and this back-and-forth laughter is a lot of fun. Jessica also “talks” to us and her cooing and babbling is just too cute.

We’re starting to get into a routine. She sleeps really well at night. Our pediatrician currently doesn’t want her to sleep more than 8 or 9 hours between feedings, so I wake her up before I go to bed to feed her. I really don’t think this is necessary, but it’s convenient for me so it’s not really too big a deal. I figure if I didn’t wake her up to nurse her, she’d wake up around 7:30-8:00 AM instead of 9 AM and I wouldn’t get as much sleep, since I try to get ready for the day before she wakes up in the morning. Daytime naps are bit trickier, but we’re getting there.

She is quite accomplished in moving around in her sleep. You can see she turned herself almost ninety degrees from her initial bedtime starting position. In this way, she’s very much like her Daddy. Her Mommy sleeps in one position almost the entire night, while Daddy moves around a fair amount in his sleep.

Naps typically start with a pacifier, otherwise I don’t think she would fall asleep. Night-time sleeping doesn’t require a pacifier, but I often find her in the morning with her thumb or thumb and some fingers in her mouth. Sometimes, I think she must keep herself occupied this way until I come in her room in the mornings, because she doesn’t cry in the mornings. Hopefully, thumb-sucking won’t become a bad habit, but I’m glad she can pacify herself.

It has been difficult to get her in the nap routine. On occasion, I will put her in the swing and that works really well and can get guarantee a long nap.

Shortly after Christmas, we went ahead and started putting her in 3-6 month sleepers since her night-time diaper and her long legs made it difficult to change her diaper in the middle of the night. This last week, I started packing away her newborn and 0-3 month clothes, more for length than girth. Her pants no longer look like capris. It was a little sad packing away the clothes since some outfits she only wore once, but she doesn’t have quite as many 3-6 months cloths so they should get a lot more use.

Jessica enjoys meeting and interacting with new people, although the last hour or so before bed time usually finds her not so open to people other than Mommy and Daddy. Last week while Jason, Julia and Aspen were in Park City, Utah, Bella stayed with us and they got along great.

One of my goals for 2010 is to do something crafty at least once a week. Last Friday, I made two of the following cards for a sketch challenge on the All That Scraps Weekly Wednesday Challenge blog. I have some male birthdays coming up and these cards will be perfect for that. My next project will be thank you cards for the Christmas gifts we received.

Stamps: C.C. Designs It’s My Birthday
Cardstock: Stampin’ Up Whisper White, Always Artichoke, Ballet Blue
Designer Paper: Stampin’ Up Uptown
Ink:  Stazon Jet Black
Markers: Stampin’ Up Ballet Blue, Always Artichoke, So Saffron, Creamy Caramel, Close to Cocoa
Tools: Spellbinders Nestabilities Classic Scalloped Circles Large, Standard Circles Large

The title of this post could be interpreted two different ways. One: Wow, baby! Or two: World of Warcraft baby. The  following pictures make the second choice more correct. Will, our friend and former guildie, gave Jessica this adorable onesie for Christmas. In World of Warcraft, BOP stands for bind on pick-up. It refers to gear or items that drop and bind to you on pick-up, meaning you cannot sell it to another player in the game. I think it is rather fitting onesie, because Jessica is definitely bound to us as we are to her. Thanks Will for giving two gamers untold amount of laughter as we watched Jessica in her little onesie on Saturday.

It’s been a while since you’ve seen a card posted on this blog, almost 3 months. I haven’t stamped much since Jessica was born. These Christmas cards, sent to 72 houses across America, have really been the only cards I’ve stamped. I actually started these cards back in August with the intention of finishing them before Jessica was born, but I only finished stamping and cutting out the little red trucks prior to her birth. James wants me to go the easy route for 2010 and make photo Christmas cards (like the birth announcements I sent out). I enjoy making Christmas cards almost as much as I enjoy receiving Christmas cards, but maybe he’s right. This years cards didn’t go out until after Christmas, so maybe I should go the photo card route or trim down my list of recipients. What do you think?

Stamps: Stampin’ Up Time for a Tree (wheel), Loads of Love, Loads of Love Accessories
Cardstock: Stampin’ Up Very Vanilla, Always Artichoke, Mellow Moss, Real Red
Ink:  Stazon Jet Black, Stampin’ Up Always Artichoke

I can’t say that I’ve been a Longhorn football fan my whole life. I’ve really only been one since 1999 (prior to that I didn’t really care). However, we’re starting Jessica off young. Look at her in her GDU (Jason vernacular for game day uniform). Her daddy is so proud. Hook ‘em Horns! Beat Crimson Tide.