Ella Update

Happy New Year! Today we celebrate Ella's 3 month birthday - hard to believe, isn't it? I looked through some pictures we took the day she was born and it's amazing how big she has gotten! Some of her newborn facial expressions have remained though - including her smile and yawn. She has developed into such a beautiful little baby and each day introduces us to new Ella developments. For example, earlier this week she discovered her toes...really discovered them - you could see the "ah hah!" moment on her little face as she realized "jeez, these little toes are MINE!" She continued to move her toes and feet as her eyes followed them around. And the recognition doesn't stop with her feet - her hands also fascinate her and her hand movements have become so much more coordinated. She is constantly putting her fingers and thumb into her mouth and she has developed a habit of holding onto her ear during nursing. As parents, it's just remarkable and honestly, we could stare at her for hours with no regard to the passing time. Her ability to follow objects has also quickly developed; she follows each of three animals that spin around on her mobile and just this morning, she turned her head towards her daddy when he came in the room. She also smiles so much more and actually giggles! And her movements! Boy, does she kick and squirm! She exercises her legs all the time and works up to full kicking and moving which often puts her out of breath! But she loves it as she smiles all the time during it. And then there's the "whine." Tim swears she learned it from her mom, but she expels a noise with the tone that says "No! I don't want that. Listen to me! It's all about me!" We laughed the first time we heard it since we were not expecting to hear that kind of noise until the "terrible two" stage. We've got a sassy one! Surprised? And best of yet, she set a record sleeping time last night - 10 hours! She's our little sleeping beauty and wakes up smiling and giggling. Have we mentioned how blessed we are?
Here are a few recent pics from this past week:

Cooper goes swimming in the lake, regardless of the chilly weather...he was is doggy heaven!

Shaking off after his first of 10 swims!

Mommy had some fun with Ella while changing her - she's sporting a onsie on the head...she was too cute - this one deserved a picture!

Check out the chubs

Not planned, but mommy and Ella sport brown and white! We bought this outfit for her before she born - couldn't resist the stripes, just too cute.

Cooper and Tim - enjoying the new year's nice sunny weather!