First Big Smile!

Victoria gave me a huge smile today! Actually she gave me several and I was lucky to catch one on camera.

Climbing!

Katerina loves to CLIMB! When we were in Oswego this weekend visiting my parents, and Aunt Aileen, we went to the park. Katerina loved climbing up a metal ladder and then slide down a big slide. It made me nervous, but she had no fear!

Sleeping!!

You forget how wonderful sleep is until you get a taste of it...and then sometimes it makes you feel worse--like when you take a nap that is too long and afterwards you feel more tired than when you started.

Last night, Victoria went to bed at 9pm and woke up again at 3am, then again at 6:30am. That is the first time she has only woken up once during the night. Just a few days ago she was going to bed at 10-11pm then, up at 1am then again at 4am! Good job Victoria--but why do I still feel so tired?

Victoria is One Month Old

Victoria Ann is one month old, weighing in at 10lbs, 3 oz and 22.5 inches long. She is doing great!

Some milestones:

She is starting to be distracted by a toy, or a person talking to her.

She MAY have given us a REAL smile or two...it occurred at 3am when she wouldn't go back to sleep as if to say "haha...you need to stay up and rock me."

She is starting to coo too, which is the most wonderful sound to hear.

Here's our standard- Mickey Mouse picture.

Getting ready for baby Christakis

I have not been on this blog for months and months...but wanted to share a few anecdotes about how the Christakis family got ready for baby Christakis.

First, we refinished the basement into a play room/guest bedroom. We can't remember our lives without it!

Next, Katerina needed to move to her new room and her big girl bed. We did that over July 4th weekend...it was 5 days of torture. She didn't want to sleep in her new big bed (full size). Mike would lay with her until she fell asleep. Then in the middle of the night she would walk into our room crying.

In order to go "cold turkey', we had to dismantle the baby room, took the mattress out of the crib, took the pictures down from the wall and told her the bed was broken! Then, we decided to put pillows under the sheets to make the bed "smaller", and we put the gate up at her bedroom door.

That worked. The first night, she got out of her bed, cried for about 1 minute at the door/gate, and then there was silence. Mike and I were shocked and actually we got a little nervous. Why didn't she cry longer? Mike had to go peek to make us feel better that she was alright--and she was--laying down in her bed. Phew!

We then bought little items needed here and there. My last day of work was September 2, right before labor day. I had one day off on the 6th--went out to buy another monitor for the baby's room, a lamp for Katerina's room and buy some more diapers. And I did it just in time, because I went into labor around 3am the next morning.

We went to the hospital on the 7th at 11am (we waited a little too long in my opinion), but then a few hours later at 2:24pm Victoria Ann Christakis was born!

Expecting!!

We are expecting a new arrival on September 8. We are looking forward to growing our family and watching Katerina interact with a new brother or sister.

Katerina doesn't really understand much yet, but if you ask her where Mommy's baby is, she will point to my belly. Sometimes she will give the baby a kiss too. It's really sweet.

More to come soon!

Katerina's First Story

Katerina told her first story last night. She thought it was so interesting that she repeated it again tonight, several times. After the 3rd or 4th time she told me the story, I decided to record it. But before you watch the video, let me put this in context so that you can understand her story.

On Saturday, Katerina was outside playing in the driveway with Mike as he cooked our steaks for dinner. They were playing with a bouncy ball. Apparently Katerina threw the ball and it landed in the snow. Katerina was a bit distraught that she couldn't reach her ball. Since neither one of them was equipped with boots on, Mike went and got a broom to pull the ball towards them. He picked up the ball and gave it back to Katerina, who was extremely pleased! Here is Katerina's version of that story.