Happy 4 Months Bella!

Every month that passes I can't believe Bella is another month older. Sounds stupid to say but time is going even faster this time around.  Bella is still the same laid back and calm little girl. The only time she gets fussy is when she wants to eat, be picked up or her stomach is bothering her. So much of her personality is coming out! She is definitively going to be my talker. She will "talk" at length from time to time and will even sing along with you. She has the most infectious smile and laugh and loves to be tickles and play games. She smiles with her eyes and it absolutely melts my heart. I still think she looks just like Brayden when he was little. The resemblance is uncanny.

Bella is getting so big! She is gaining at a crazy pace despite all of her stomach issues. I had her to the pedes a week an a half ago and she was already 15 lbs! She has offically doubled her birth weight. We have her 4 month appointment on December 4 so I will have her exact height and weight stats.  Her stomach problems are an ongoing issue. Ugh I wish there were clear cut answers. I'm still trying to get her gastro appt scheduled, the office is driving me nuts by not calling me back. But she is currently on Prilosec (1.25mL), 2x a day and and Zantac (1.8mL) 2x a day for breakthrough pain. Even on both she is still refluxing and in pain but it's less than it was.  I'm still on the soy and dairy free diet and based on the mucous and color of her diapers I have a good feeling we will be doing more elimination. Thankfully the color and mucous in the diapers doesn't bother her so that's a good thing. At this point I'm willing to take it as far as we need to keep breastfeeding. She is doing so well and really relies on it as her comfort zone so I really don't want to take that away from her. Aside from the stomach issues, shes an amazing nurser and has made it so easy on me, so I'm extra determined to do it for her. 

Big smiles!!

She usually eats every three hours during the day, unless she's not feeling well. Based on what I can pump from one side she's drinking at least 4-6 ounces per feeding. She still hates the bottle. Ugh, she will sometimes take pumped milk from the bottle from Jason but has been refusing to take it from anyone else. That should be interesting since we have a wedding on the 8th. I'm hoping she drinks for my mom and katie!  

Silly faces :) 

She is still a good sleeper. She generally wakes up 1x a night. For a breast fed baby I will take it!! Although the times change she usually goes down to bed at 9 and will sleep till about 5 nurse and go back down. We tend to take her upstairs with us when we go to bed b/c we are co-sleeping so sometimes moving her wakes her up and that adds another feeding. But that's on me not her.  She tends to have a 30-40 minute cat nap in the morning , a long 3 hour nap in the afternoon and a cat nap after dinner.  It's nice at least for now her afternoon nap co-insides with Brayden's. I'll take it for as long as it lasts. 

Bella is doing really well developmentally. She's not nearly as advanced as Brayden was but she's right on track.  She's been trying to roll both ways, but is always getting stuck on her arms. I'm sure being the little chunker she is makes it tougher :)  She loves to sit! Her back is getting stronger but she still sits forward in her "monkey" pose to hold herself up. She does like playing on  her play may but will only lay on her back for short periods of time. I swear she thinks she is missing out on something so she needs to sit up. Plus laying flat doesn't do any favors for her reflux so I don't blame her.  She does like to stand and her legs are pretty strong.  She just tried her play jumper and really seemed to have mixed feeling about it.  I think she just didn't know what to make of it but had fun.  

Teething, boy did I NOT miss teething. So far she is a decent teether but only the future will tell. She has been teething for the last month despite not having any break through. We are using a baltic amber teething necklace and it helps with the pain, but the drool is a flowing! lol Here's hoping she is not a dramatic teether like her brother and they don't take forever to come in!!

Trouble!

Bella tried her first food on Thanksgiving! I don't think she is completely ready for food full time. We plan on doing things like with Brayden by skipping cereal and doing food led weaning with some puree. For her first meal we tried sweet potatoes with apple. Yes I know they're suppose to start with one food type but i was having a hard time finding an organic food that was one flavor. I plan on making all of her food like I did for Bray. Even making organic baby food, it is SO cheap! I really think making the food really helped Brayden find his love for a variety of foods so here is hoping!  In the mean time I will probably give her food sporadically until we get her stomach issues under control. Then I will start  more consistently. 

I think we seriously took 50+ pictures. Half of them she was trying to sit forward and falling or just wasn't looking. Gotta love bloopers lol