A New Camera!

You want me to do what?!

With monetary gifts from both my parents and Greg's parents for Christmas and our anniversary, we bought a really nice new camera. It is a Nikon D5200, a DSLR, and way out of our league! We also got an online beginners class so we can actually figure out how to use it! SO SO SO excited. I just love photography and have been wanting a nice camera and learn how to use it for a few years now. Greg has had the most time messing with it, I am finally done with school and so I will be trying to catch up over the next few weeks. So, our Tess Shrine continues, hopefully over the next little while there will be a considerable improvement to our pictures.

Smile? Like this? 

Or my blue steel look, like this? 

Just like that Tess...the million dollar smile that we adore! 

So, the last time I blogged this little beauty was about a month younger. So many things have happened since then. First, Greg got a promotion and we will be moving in about 2 months to Las Vegas! We are thrilled, great place for us to live and a great new job for Greg. We will be going house hunting in a few weeks. The market there is in our favor, thankfully! Second, I got my LPN and I will be putting school on a permanent pause while I make my priority and my time spent as a mom! I have not enjoyed how my time spent has not reflected my priorities...school, school, school, mom, school, school, school, mom and Greg. See what I mean? No fun, over the past week, since the 20th, I have truly enjoyed spending my time lovin' on my sweet baby. She means everything to us and I am excited for our time together everyday as we move forward with this job. Third, this girl is learning new tricks everyday! Goodness! At her 4 month appointment, she weighed 15 pounds 11 oz, and 26.2 inches! Still in the 97th percentile for height and 85th percentile for weight. Her head is 75th percentile. She has found her toes! And LOVES them. She especially loves it when we take off her diaper. It must hamper her flexibility a little because she goes right for her toes when we do. She sucks on them, grabs them, and seems totally entertained the whole time we are changing her. Her hair no longer sticks up! No bald spots in the back of her head, it's coming in thick and VERY blond. She is going to be a little toe head, except for this light brown little "tail" she has on the back of her head. It is the thickest and darkest part on her whole head. She has about 10-15 really REALLY long hairs that are about 5 times longer then the rest of her hair. I can't bring myself to cut them so her hair grows in evenly. The little hairs are just so cute, and just so long! It's a hoot.  She has the biggest, bluest, eyes. With expressions, smiles, and mimics that kill me. She now likes to grunt to get our attention, and she has a fake little cough too. She will also mimic you if you cough. So cute! She looks at her hands a lot and will grab anything you put in front of her. After she grabs it, it goes directly into her mouth.

Kind of like this. She still won't roll over. She has before but doesn't care to do it now! She is almost sitting up and has many times now but slowly falls over eventually. She makes gurgling sounds and will make them when she is mad too. It's funny, you can tell she is getting mad with the pitch she makes with the gurgling. She is little Miss Smiley and finds the world around her very interesting. So interesting in fact that nursing her and getting her to sleep sometimes is a challenge. A challenge I don't mind though. I love seeing her interest! She is very friendly and likes people but too many people can be very overwhelming and she typically likes to be with Greg or I if she feels like her crowd is getting too big. Which I love, then I get to be a baby hog and I have a good excuse! 

My friend, Kellie Rivera, and I love to chat. She had her baby about 9 days before Tess was born. They are little pin pals! We talk and send pictures. Her little girl, Avery Lynn, has started teething and she asked me about Tess. I hadn't noticed any changes with Tess. (Except of course that she went from sleeping 5-6 hours at a time to sleeping at max 4. Mostly sleeping only 2 hours and waking  at night now.) Then, Paige asked me if she had teeth. And I said no. A few days later, in church on Dec 22nd, Trevor pointed out TWO bottom teeth! My little girl is no longer a straight gummy! She has TWO teeth. They are so cute too. So fun to see new things like this and watch her grow. Her little personality gets cuter and cuter everyday.
I have always known that mothering would be a priority and I would stay home. I also have worked full time every since I can remember and thought that work would probably also be something I would end up doing along with my "child birthing" years. That just is not the case anymore. I hate that idea now! Not only do I realize the importance of making my family a priority by staying home to care for our children, but I WANT to be home, 100% of the time. I don't want to have anybody else doing what I want to do, which is nurture and raise our children. It's been an interesting realization and conviction I have come to. I would like nothing more then to put nursing on a far back burner of faith, family, and God, and come to it when my kids are out of the house. It was not fun to have somebody else watch her for these last 4 months. I am lucky, I had Angie. She loved Tess. I couldn't have done it otherwise. I am thankful now that I can hang out with my sweet baby all day! I can't imagine anything being better then taking care of her. She is such an angel!

Greg got some great shots right here. He has just been reading the manual until we can get started on a class. He is a natural. I love these photos. Tess also began eating rice cereal! We had her try it at first on 11/27. Right after thanksgiving and in front of an audience! She didn't like it, at all! I think she was a little overwhelmed by all the people and so Greg and I took her upstairs and she ate it like a champ. The funnest thing to see her eat more solid food for the first time. It was pretty runny, we added breast milk to it, so she seemed to be okay with it. Well, she has a love/hate relationship with it now. She will eat it, sometimes. But she definitely has to be in the right mood. I want her to eat it fairly consistently until I introduce her to anything else. Even today, we tried to give her some, but she hasn't had any for a few days. She wouldn't have anything to do with it! I don't blame her. It doesn't smell appetizing!

She finally graced us again with her laugh, over thanksgiving and was laughing while she was in the tub at Greg. He was splashing her foot. Then, later that night she laughed at Trevor and a funny face he was making. She still isn't a courtesy laugher but she laughs a lot more often now! She is a tough audience. Once we do get her to laugh at something, we don't stop until she won't laugh anymore.

She loves tummy time. She likes to balance on her stomach and kick her arms and legs like she is swimming. She is kicking and moving...CONSTANTLY! She is a wiggle worm if there ever was one!

Our  sweet little Tess. We love you! 

Ha ha! A great picture of a giant booger! She is definitely a talker and makes noise a lot! She is a little social butterfly if her audience isn't too big. She'll chat back and forth with you and mimic you in some ways.

She still loves her bath, she kicks and plays a little but mostly relaxes. I am looking forward to our bathing days when she goes crazy. I might regret saying that, but right now I am thinking it will be so cute! And, look at those chunky arms!

These are the first time I tried using our new camera....I love the way the blue tub accents her blue eyes.

Looking at dad...

Hello there bright eyes....

My favorite! Ahhh...melting....

Our healthy chubber....

I am going to hopefully find time to keep up on this blog more steadily. We have literally hundreds of pictures I want to include and print when we print our blog book! I hope I can get caught up her in the next couple of months! 

Daddy-daughter date! She is licking her coat. Ha ha! Anything near her mouth gets the taste test. They went to a work Christmas party. I was busy being tortured by studying. We had our 5th exam on a Friday and our comprehensive final the very next Monday. I didn't do anything but study for a couple of weeks. So, I couldn't go. But, these two cuties went and stole the show! I did well on both exams and my semester ended up very well! I was so pleased!

Like I said, this post is incomplete, but it is a start! I need to catch up on all the photos we have taken but I will get there. For now, this is an update with a lot of Tess pictures. She is, our life! We are so glad she joined our family! The scripture is true, my cup runneth over!