More from last week...

Liliana is kind of a big deal, so she got her own post for this week, but we also did some other stuff this past week, so I'll write a second one, and share some more pictures. The picture above is our first family of four picture, taken as we were getting ready to leave the hospital. While we were in the hospital, PopPop took Ella to her regularly scheduled Kindermusik and dance classes, thanks for keeping it "normal," PopPop!

The girls are all ready to go home Friday afternoon. Liliana weighed 7 lbs, 9 oz.

Since we weren't expecting Liliana to arrive anytime before her due date we had scheduled the closing of our house refinancing to take place on Friday morning (the due date). Oops. So that afternoon after being discharged from the hospital, we stopped by the bank on the way home to sign papers. The bank is only 7 blocks from the hospital, but both girls had fallen fast asleep by the time we pulled into the bank's parking lot. 

Saturday was the big Iowa vs. Iowa State game. We went over to PopPop and Gra Dondie's house to watch the game. They didn't love the girls' outfits, but they did like the final score of the game. 

Liliana slept 4 hours in a row Saturday night, ate, then slept another 4 hours. Not bad at all! :)

Ruby has a new favorite place to lie down.

I love snuggling with Liliana. I don't get a whole lot accomplished in a day because I spend a lot of time just holding her or watching her sleep, but I don't care, I love it. Ella used to snuggle like this too, but now she rarely holds still long enough to get a good hug in, let alone a snuggle.

Tuesday night Liliana slept 5 hours in a row, only waking up to eat once in the night!

Monday we had Liliana's newborn pictures taken. Liliana is a much more laid back/go with the flow baby than Ella was and so got through her photo shoot in one try. Liliana was awake for the first few pictures, but then slept through the rest and nobody got peed on in the process of taking all the naked shots. Liliana did a great job. Ella was wound, she didn't follow directions well and was on our last nerves, but somehow we got some great shots of her anyway. Here are some of our favorites:

These next two pictures are of each of the girls at 5 days old. Can you tell they are sisters?

Ella

Liliana

If you would like to see more pictures from this photo shoot you can go to my Shutterfly Share site.

A nurse from the hospital came to our house for a visit Monday afternoon. Liliana weighed 7 lbs 8 oz, she was 20 inches long, her head circumference was 13 1/2 inches.

 Nearly naked big sister checks on her baby sister.

Ella totally ignores Liliana about 90 percent of the time, but the other 10 percent, she is very gentle, loving and helpful. I love that she helps Liliana get her binky back when it falls out of her mouth. I remember wishing I could teach Ruby this trick when Ella was brand new.

Ella has not called Liliana, "Baby Bow-Wow"once in the last week. If you ask her where Baby Bow-Wow is, she will point to Liliana, but if you ask her what the baby's name is, she usually says, "baby siser."

 Watch Dog. See, I'm not the only one who could spend all day just watching Liliana sleep.

One night this week we came home to find that Grandma Mary and Grandpa Mike had dropped something off in our yard.

It's A Girl!!!

Liliana Allie Lewis arrived Wednesday, September 7, 2011 at 12:07 in the afternoon. She weighed 8 pounds, 0 ounces and was 19 inches long. She has ten tiny fingers and ten tiny toes, fluffy brown hair and  long eyelashes. She is healthy and absolutely beautiful! We were very surprised by her early arrival, but are so excited that she is here!

I was updating this blog just before 1:30 Wednesday morning when my water broke. It took me a couple hours to convince myself that my water had actually broken and it wasn't just Baby kicking my bladder, and that I should probably go ahead and pack a bag and get to the hospital. After packing bags for Ella and me we dropped Ella and Ruby off at Mom and Dad's and arrived at the hospital at 4am. I felt a little silly for going to the hospital when I wasn't in any pain, but since Ella came relativley quickly for a first baby, I didn't want to hang out at home for too long just in case. I felt a little better when the nurses confirmed that my water had in fact broken, I wasn't just leaking urine, and that they weren't planning on sending me home without a baby. After our appointment Tuesday morning, Dr. Minyon was as surprised as we were to be at the hospital on Wednesday morning ready to deliver a baby.  Everything went very well and very quickly (only a few pushes in 7 minutes and she was out!).  Mom ended up winning the pool with several hours to spare!

From the beginning of this pregnancy to the end there were so many differences from when I was pregnant with Ella that I'd convinced myself for a second time that I was having a boy. And for a second time, I was wrong. Chris and I hadn't decided on a girls name, and so Liliana didn't have a middle name until we had to turn in the paperwork for a birth certificate right before we left the hospital on Friday. We were the same way with Ella. Liliana's middle name is Allie, after her great-grandma Alice, whom we call Grandma Allie. We'd also considered continuing the tradition of using Ose for a middle name, but we weren't wild about her initials being LOL. :)

Big Sister Ella with Little Sister Liliana

Before Liliana arrived, I was worried about what she would be like. I worried that since Ella was such an easy baby, we couldn't possibly be so lucky the second time around. I was sure this one wouldn't sleep well, eat well, would cry all the time or a combination of the three, I was wrong again, Liliana has been an even easier baby than Ella was and I didn't think that was possible. We are so spoiled. Friday night, the first night home from the hospital, she slept for 6 straight hours! Of corse I woke up in a panic, woke Chris to see if he'd gotten up with her, but thankfully she was still breathing, and still sound asleep. Liliana usually sleeps for 4 hours at a time at night, wakes up to eat quick and falls fast asleep for another 4 hours. Can't get much better than that for a newborn! Ella has started to wake up crying in the middle of the night now, at different times than Liliana. Don't know what that's about, but I hope it stops soon, she has always been a very sound sleeper, it is very unusual for her to be up in the middle of the night. Thankfully she is very easy to put back to bed, just remind her where she is, where we are, tuck her back in and turn her music back on.

Liliana loves to be held and swaddled, she looks toward me when she hears my voice and is already holding her head up for a few seconds at a time.

You Make Me Feel Like Dancing!

I almost had this post posted on time, I had just finished posting the pervious post, and I had the pictures uploaded to this post and I had just started writing when my water broke. So that is my excuse for the tardiness of this post, best excuse yet, huh! :) More about that later. Here is what happened during Ella's last week as an only child.

Since Ella enjoyed her summer creative movement class so much we decided to sign her up again this fall. Class started this Thursday. She did a great job listening to the teacher and following directions. She did not run wild around the studio at top speed, and there were no tears. She even held another little girl's hand and encouraged her to participate with the group.

That is Ella sitting on the right.

Gra Dondie and PopPop came with us Thursday night to check out Ghurtie's, a new frozen yoghurt shop in town. Ella chose her toppings, "numb-nufs (M&Ms), sprinkles on it!"

We closed the place down and Ella had to finish hers outside. Every now and then you should go for ice cream in your jammies.

Friday I was still waiting for the nesters to show up. One week to go until Baby's due date. I still needed to pack my bag, install the car seat, choose names, find going home outfits and clean my house, but I had no motivation or energy, so instead Ella and I watched Finding Nemo for the hundredth time this week. Until very recently, Ella could not correctly name one cartoon character if her life depended on it, we just don't watch tv or movies that much. She might be able to pick Ellen and our local news anchors out of a line-up but probably not Mickey Mouse or Elmo. She now knows Nemo, and I'm sure she will probably learn a few more in the weeks to come. :) I really enjoyed spending the afternoon snuggled up on the couch with my little girl.

Saturday we found going home outfits for Baby.

One of my high school girlfriends got married on Sunday. I was so happy that they decided to have their wedding in the Iowa City area. Their venue was no farther away from the hospital than our house is, not that I was expecting Baby to arrive yet, I was just happy there was no travel involved.

Last Family-of-Three Photo

Our friends Nile and Shannon

Ella LOVED the dance floor. She spent most of the night out there. She would run out and dance for a bit, then run back to me, wave and say "Hi, Mommy," and then run back out on the dance floor. I was exhausted just watching her.

Dancing with Daddy.

There was a photo booth with props to take silly photos.

And more dancing.

The must take leg shot with my friends.

Shannon, Liz, Clare, Katrina, Jenny, Cassie, Chrissy, Ella and me

Monday was Labor Day. My family placed their bets on when Baby Bow-Wow would arrive. Here is what everyone guessed. 

Mom- within the next 48 hours (by Wednesday night) 

Chris- Sept. 9 (Baby's actual due date)

Hallie- Sept. 10

Dad- Sept. 13 (Grandma June's birthday)

Me- Sept. 13 (date of Dr. appt. after due date)

Eric- Sept. 16 (late like Ella, but maybe just a little sooner)

Tuesday morning I had my last appointment with Dr. Minyon before Baby Bow-Wow's due date. I'd gained 23 pounds if you count from my pre-pregnancy weight (or 33 pounds if you count from my end-of-first-trimester weight). My belly was measuring at 39+ weeks. No change with Baby, still head down and showing no more signs of coming early than it was last week.

Tuesday afternoon I located the car seat base and installed it and the car seat into the back seat of my car.  Tuesday night we went out to Blackstone's to celebrate Eric's new job.

Where's Ella?!?

Thursday Ella and I went out for lunch, she was very entertaining.


Chris and I have been very bad at remembering to take belly pictures during this pregnancy. We finally remembered to take one this week at 37 weeks and 6 days.

Ella wanted to be in the pictures too.

When Ella stands right up against my legs she fits right under the baby bump.

Daddy's Eye View:

Mommy's Eye View...where's Ella?!?

It has been a while since I've been able to see my feet while standing up, but I didn't know that my belly was big enough to hide my 2 year old! Haha, yikes! :)

Chris found this lovely praying mantis on our back screen door. Ella spent most of the day avoiding the living room even after the bug was long gone. "Oh no, mantis!"

Ella helped Chris water the flowers in our garden and was concerned when she saw her wet footprint on the patio, "Ella foot!"

Chris furminated Ruby and gave her a bath this week. The amount of fur that has come off and continues to come off in clumps amazes me, how is she not totally bald? Does locks of love have a dog program? I'm sure we have enough spare fur here to completely cover another dog! 

Saturday Chris, Ella, Mom, Dad, Eric, Hallie and I went to the North Liberty Fire Department's Salute to Summer. It was probably the last time that we will all be able to pile into Mom and Dad's minivan and travel together. As soon as Baby arrives we will be one seat short. Ella got to go for her first solo ride on a real live pony. She loved it! She even had her picture taken by the local paper. Our local paper is kind of like this blog, it's only updated on Wednesdays, and with Labor Day coming up it won't be out until Thursday, September 8, but if her picture is in the paper, I'll be sure to include a link on my update for that week. 

Ella and Snickers

Ella and Sweet Pea

While we were there we ran into Grandma Mary and Grandpa Mike. We all took a picture in front of a fire truck.

Ella and Grandma Mary

Sunday afternoon we took Ella to the mall to get a present for her to give Baby Bow-Wow. We went to Build-A-Bear and Ella picked out a puppy, which we thought was a very appropriate selection for Baby Bow-Wow. 

She put some serious thought into which sound she selected for the puppy to make, in the end she chose barking over roaring. 

She helped stuff the puppy, gave it a bath, and then helped fill out its birth certificate. 

When we got home she colored a picture of sunshines, motorcycles, "vroom-vroom" (cars) and balloons inside a card for Baby Bow-Wow and then helped me wrap up the puppy.

This is the package we wrapped her binkies in a few weeks ago when she kept sneaking into her room to use the binkies she'd given up. If you ask Ella who the packages are for she will tell you, "Baby Bow-Wow, a-pull," meaning she is going to give them to Baby Bow-Wow at the hospital. Her word for hospital and her word for apple sound exactly alike. 

Ella and Daddy. I look forward to the day that I can lie down like this again!