Lulla Cate {One Month Old}

Look who turned ONE MONTH old today!  

Caution: You may want to brace yourself for some serious cuteness.

This is the outfit we opened on Christmas morning--the one that revealed we were going to be blessed with a little girl! Blessed, we are.

Here I am, once again digging in my heels as I watch yet another baby of mine grow up too quickly. "They" were right--time sure does sail by quicker with the second one. Boo hoo.

But instead of wallowing in my wonder of how an entire month has passed by when it feels like just yesterday that a little "Jumping Bean" fluttered inside my belly, I will suck it up, lift my heels out of the dirt & tell you what our sweet little Lulla has been up to during her first precious month of life. 

* She's growing like a little weed. I'm not quite sure of her exact weight right now {I'm guessing somewhere around 8 pounds}, but at her two week check up, she weighed in at a whopping 7 pounds, 11 ounces {she had gone home from the hospital at 7.4}. But don't worry, we're taking care of this growing thing--we had a heart to heart, she & I. At 2 a.m. the other morning, just after her bottle & just before she fell into a milk coma, she promised me she'd stay little forever. Oh, how I wish. 

{Even though she is growing way too fast, she still feels sooooo tiny to me in comparison to what Meatball felt like. It's fun having an itty bitty girl who can actually wear her teensy newborn clothing}.

* This little girl is a spitting image of her daddy. It's funny because in my mind I have always pictured my daughter being a little blonde headed, blue eyed girl. I've pictured a little girl who looks just like me, who looks just like I did as a child. I've pictured a little girl who looks just like our Jett Jett, with his blonde streaked hair & deep set eyes. But out she came out with her head full of dark hair & her features resembling those of her daddy's {except those lips-those are mine--all mine. Both of my babies have my lips & by golly I'm claiming them!} & my heart did leaps. She's not what I expected & I absolutely love it. And you should just see that Daddy of hers well up with pride every single time someone tells him how she looks just like him. 

 * We hit a little bump in the road around day eleven. Nothing serious in the grand scheme of things, but enough to have this momma up at 2:30a.m., crying on the phone to the doctor, contemplating a trip to the E.R. Not fun. Turns out, at just eleven days old, Lulla had developed a milk allergy & a simple switch of formulas would be the remedy. Even though it was a very expensive switch in formulas {think double the price--ouch!}, we are so very thankful it was nothing more serious.

What can I say? I'm a total sucker for baby toes. 

* Her nicknames. Oh goodness, there are so many-- Lulla Beans, Beans, Lulla girl, Sissy, Lu-Lu, Sissy-Boo, Sugar Plum, Sugar Plum Fairy, Lump of Sugar, Sack of Sugar, Sisserini, Baby Cakes, Lulla Cake--just to name a few.

Yeah, I suppose we kind of go goo-goo over her. Can you blame us?

* Remember when I was worried about the little wiggle worm that partied it up in my uterus once nightfall settled in? Yeah well, she's still at it. It's safe to say, we aren't getting much sleep around here. It's not that she's wide awake at night or that she's up crying--in fact, she rarely cries at all--usually only when she's hungry. Instead, all night long she lays in her bassinet & grunts, squirms & wiggles-- I'm talkin' all. night. long. It sounds as if she is on the verge of waking up & crying any second, yet she never lets out a wail--just continuous movement & noises coming from her bassinet. It's just enough to keep me on pins & needles, wondering if I should or shouldn't allow myself shut my eyes & enough to have me praying for just the smallest stretch of quiet, sound sleep.  It's funny how well a mother can know her child, even before that child ever actually enters into the world. All along I knew our little Lulla was a mover & a shaker.

In spite of the sleepless nights, expensive formula & phone calls to the pediatrician, this month has been nothing short of amazing. In only a matter of 30 days, this little girl has slipped in & changed our lives, transformed the way life looks like for our family & we could have never dreamed it would all be this good.

It's been a month that has expanded our hearts, a month that has deepened our love tanks, a month that has us eagerly anticipating the many more that lie ahead {even if it did whizz by just a little too quickly}.

Oh, how we love life with Lulla Cate.