Gabriela is 5 months old today!

Wow, it's been a little while since my last post. This past Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we went to NJ to celebrate Jeff's Mom-mom's 82nd birthday. Happy birthday Mom-Mom!! Gabriela rolled to her left for the first time; still only from back to front. Wednesday night she had a slight fever and was whimpering most of the night. All I could do was rock her and hold her. She finally slept for about a 3 hour stretch. I thought/think that she is teething, but no pearly whites yet. She still wakes up twice or three times between 9 pm and 8:30 am, but I'm used to that now. It'll be nice to sleep through the night whenever that happens!

This past Saturday we went to a cookout from one of the ladies that was in our birthing class. Her daughter Olivia was born on May 13th. Another couple also came that was in our birthing class as well. They have a daughter named Charli that was born May 9th. The three of them rolled around on the floor and us adults laughed and compared stories. It was funny, every time Olivia got near Gabriela, Olivia would start crying. At the end of the evening, all three of them were crying, it was amusing.

This past Sunday, Aunt Carrie, Uncle Sam, Grandpa and Abuela came over for dinner. As usual we all had a good visit. It's sad that we live far from family, but we have to make the best of it when we see each other. Speaking of family, next week, Aunt Robin, Uncle Juan Miguel, and cousins Brandon and Colin will be visiting for a few days. We're really excited about that and we can't wait to meet our new nephew Colin.

Lastly, some of you know that I applied for an online teaching job and was waiting a while to find out if I got the position. After thinking I didn't get the job, they finally called me to offer me a position this past week. So far I've filled out and read a lot of paperwork. The job will require me to work approximately 10-15 hours a week from home. I have to be online for 1 hour a week at the same time/day and the other hours I can work whenever I have time. Sounds good to me, but we'll see what it ends up being. I will be teaching Spanish, but they have not told me what level or how many students I will have either. Apparently I will be spending the next week training. There are some different software programs that I will have to use and become familiar with before I start the actual instruction.

Well, please check out webshots for more new pictures. Until the next blog!

Gabriela is 20 weeks old!

Hi everyone! Gabriela is 20 weeks old this week and weighs 16 lbs. 15.8 oz. Let's just say she's 17 lbs.!!! Of course she continues to bring joy to both her Dada and I. She appears to have the beginnings of "stranger anxiety". Whenever someone new is around her, she tends to clam up, although just briefly. She's still rolling over from back to stomach and working really hard to get from stomach to back, but has yet to master that skill. We've been trying hard to get her to take the bottle, but she's still winning that battle. As you can tell, she's not going hungry. I just bought her some 6-9 month sleepers because she's growing out of her 3-6 month ones.

This week cousin Mike and his girlfriend Agie came to visit. It was nice to see them and we even had Agie try to give Gabriela a bottle, but nothing. Not even for Abuela either! This is definitely going to be a challenge. Oh, back to Mike and Agie's visit. We also had my parents over for dinner with Mike and Agie and we all had a good time. My parents arrived from Spain safely thank god and Robin and the boys also arrived to Florida safely as well.

This Sunday Gabriela will be in a baby show, so pray that she takes first place, not that I'm competitive or anything, but I want her to win. Stay tuned for the results next week!

Gabriela is 19 weeks

Hi all! Sorry I missed last week's update. Well, I weighed Gabriela today and she weighs 16 lbs. 8.4 oz. She is of course growing nicely. Last Tuesday she had her second round of shots and they went much better; especially since I gave her tylenol earlier this time. The doctor said that she's at the 50th percentile for height (let's face it, she's going to be a shortie) and the 75th percentile for weight. She has reached her milestones and is doing more advanced skills as well, so we're very proud of her.

She has gotten the hang of rolling over more efficiently now (better than the videos show on webshots). This morning I found her on her stomach in her crib, which she hadn't done up until this point. She loves to roll over on the floor but we were surprised to see that she was sleeping on her stomach. She has also decided that she no longer wants to take an occasional bottle which makes things challenging for me. I've tried having Jeff give her a bottle while I was at the gym and I've also tried having my mom give her a bottle, and neither scenarios worked. I've done some research and I'm going to try a cup or a spoon and see if that works. I'll keep you posted!

Our trip to West Virginia this past weekend went well. Gabriela (and the rest of us) got to enjoy the beautiful scenary on our hikes and Gabriela got to meet her Great Granddaddy and Great Grandmommy as well. She loved smiling and cooing with her Great Grandmommy and Great Granddaddy, Great Aunt Aletta and Great Uncle Bob as well. It was nice for me to see the place that Jeff had such fond memories of as a kid. Now I can picture what he was talking about in his "camp" stories. It was also nice to have Granddaddy, Brenda, Aunt Carrie, Uncle Sam, and dog cousin Ella there too. We had lots of fun laughing and playing Scattagories not to mention hiking in the wilderness.

Check out the bulk of the pictures on webshots.

See ya next week!