Pictures! Pediatrician!

I'm having so much fun with little Elise. Matt's taking the week off of work, and so he's wrangling Kalina while I wrangle Elise--who's turned out to only be a handful between the hours of 12 and 3 a.m. so far (although she's still so new that all she does is sleep, except between the hours of 12 and 3 a.m.). She's tiny and cute and it's nice that as a second-time mommy, I'm less freaked about every single cry and more able to enjoy even the frustrating moments since I know she'll grow so fast.


I could do without the poopy diapers, though.

Elise and Kalina could almost be twins, except for the fact that they were born more than 2 years apart. Nevertheless, I thought you all might like to see some more pictures, especially since there are so many cute ones.

They say that a hallmark of a second child is that they don't have as many pictures taken of them as the first child. Elise is making sure that's not a problem here, though, by being as adorable as she possibly can. These pictures are all a couple days old--there are lots more from the last few days that I'll post eventually, I promise.



At the pediatrician:

Elise had her first pediatrician visit today. The whole family piled into the car, and Mommy and Elise went to the appointment while Daddy and Kalina had much more fun at the museum nearby.

First, we talked about Elise and her habits. The doctor assured me that her rather common sneezes don't signify a cat allergy. Better yet, she told me that the middle-of-the-night screamfests Matt and I have been enduring (and Kalina, too, although she thankfully has never complained) should soon shift to daytime hours as Elise's clock syncs up a bit better with ours. Not that we enjoy Elise's screaming, but we'd much rather deal with it when the sun's up. Poor girl.

And then we weighed the baby. It was novel for me to weigh a child who didn't scream through the entire 2-second process (she saves that for between 12 and 3 a.m.). And better yet, Elise is doing great with gaining weight--she's up to 6 lbs., 1/2 an ounce, and the doctor was sure she'd be back to her birthweight soon. I think at that point we don't have to wake her for night feedings anymore, but she'll likely save us the trouble regardless.



Then we discussed the heart murmur. The doctor could hear it, but said it's very localized--she can only hear it if she has her stethoscope right over it. She's going to schedule us an appointment with the cardiologist, so we'll know more then. The biggest piece of news was that there was a section of the heart they didn't get a very good look at that could have an atrial septal defect as well. According to Matt, this isn't very serious. Overall, the doctor seemed unconcerned, especially since Elise is looking so healthy.

And that was it! We go back on Friday, mostly for another weight check.

And onto the pictures:

Photo 1: Sweetness. Doesn't she look like Kalina did?
Photo 2: Daddy and Baby in a moment of wakefulness.
Photo 3: Mommy savoring the same wakefulness.
Photo 4: Kalina gently touching her baby sister. Kalina is excellent at gentleness.
Photo 5: More cute wakefulness.
Photo 6: Aunt Nancy visiting.
Photo 7: I'm ready to go home!
Photo 8: Home at last! Mommy clearly chose her clothes for comfort this morning.
Photo 9: Family pic!
Photo 10: Grandpa holding Elise.
Photo 11: Kalina: "Put the baby in the crib." So we did. She yawned and stretched and was happy for a few minutes.