Christmas Day 2014

Christmas always starts out early for us. Mainly because our day is filled with lots of people to visit & well ever since I was little I remember starting before the sun was up. I think that came because my dad was always excited that he would wake us up early. 

Well 7 am came and we were up... 

Charli being cuddled

So as we began to start Kelly said why don't we start with the youngest. Kimmy gave us a gift at the family party on Christmas Eve for Charli. So as Kelly held Charli I opened it up. Well, as much as I believed that it was for Charli it wasn't. I had spent the last few days teasing Kelly that his sisters were probably helping him with Christmas (like usual). Well I was right. They tried to disguise it in Dora the Explorer & Disney Princess wrapping paper.. Well... after opening the first box their was a smaller box wrapped.. I started to unwrap it and saw this pretty little white box with a shiny clean Apple logo...

Ahhhh.... it was an iPad Air... what!!! Kelly said it wasn't going to happen. He lied. I did a giddy little dance on the couch and Kelly just sat and laughed at me. I was SO SO SO happy & surprised!

I sadly forgot to take pictures of Kelly opening things this year. 

I surprised him with a couple new belts, shirts. He also got a new bluetooth speaker for the garage since the old one doesn't work with our new phones or iPod. Kelly also went with me to get a boot dryer & warmer. 

A couple months ago his coworkers were asking if he had one and he came home and told me about them.. Well Mrs. Clause came through and he now will have dry boots every morning if he remembers to put them on the dryer.

Charli swinging away Christmas morning

After getting dressed and packed for the day. We headed to my parents for a breakfast and to watch them open up gifts. My mom got a really nice ring from Shane Co. I kept repeating the commercial and my mom recorded me doing it on video. I was shocked that my dad actually didn't have anyone really help him with my mom's gifts this year! (high five dad)

Then, we headed to Kelly's parents. Ate more breakfast and chatted with family. Then we started gifts and stockings. We got a gift card to Chili's & a giant bag of Mega M&Ms. They aren't regular M&M's they are GIGANTIC!!

Family Photo.

We had a great time hanging out with everyone and watching the excitement on the nieces and nephews faces when they told us what Santa brought them. I just couldn't help but get excited for next year when Charli will hopefully understand Christmas a little more.

Car Celfiè

We then headed to my grandma's house for lunch, games and more family.

My grandma has started a new thing at guessing how much spare change is in the jar.. well this year my sister Marci won. ( I was ticked!) .... the total was $200 bucks.. Are you kidding!!!

We played the candy bar game and hot dice with my cousins Sam & Josh. We then left to go to see Grandma Smith... at this point I was pretty darn tired... Kelly had a cold the week before and I was starting to get the congestion.

A little fourth generation picture with my Grandma West, mom, me & Charli!

Kelly reading Grandma Smith her gift for the year! 12 dates with us, she has to pick them..

There are already a few she wants to do. Do a session at the Ogden Temple, Go to Taggarts, Drive to her homestead... She is getting excited to go do things with us.

Aunt Vickie's gifts came a couple days late. My family looks forward to these gifts. Ever since I was a little girl my Aunt Vickie would send us Christmas gifts. She always does such nice wrapping with her tags & bows. 

It's always such a joy to open them and talk to her on the phone.. Just another Christmas Tradition.

I am so glad that my Aunt took us on as her girls when my Dad's Mom died shortly after my parents got married. 

Of course Charli had to get some Christmas pictures... I put her inside my stocking.

It was hard to get her out of it because she was just starting to straighten her legs out more.

But honestly the best gift that was given this year is this little girl. She is the world and more.

Love you bug!

Oh Sunday.

Today I finally made it back to church after missing the last 5 weeks. I really didn't like the idea of going by myself and Kelly staying home with Charli. Mainly because I wanted to go with Kelly. 

So thank you to my mom for watching Charli while we went to church for a couple hours. We ended up leaving early since Kelly is starting to get a cold. Plus if I had to be honest I wanted my baby back. It's hard to sit in church with everyone asking you how your baby is and how they want to see her and to not have her there sucked. But it's best if she doesn't go around the ward for a couple more months. 

Although I did love being able to hear the amazing talent in our ward. Our Ward choir is awesome. We have so many talented singers and musicians. I also loved the older couple that talked. I was very happy to finally see my Charli. 

After we got to my parents we snapped a family photo and then we hung out till we ate breakfast for dinner. I could tell that Charli had done a number in her diaper which ended up being a bath in grandmas shower because it was totally up to her belly in poop. Gross. Once again I don't know what I would do with my mom showing me ways of doing things and for always being so caring, patient and loving to our family. 

It was nice to sit and visit with Kelly's parents and grandma smith. We are so lucky to have such great people around us. I am truly grateful for each and every one of them. 

Lately Kelly and I have talked about how excited we are for when we can make this time of year magical for Charli. It has brought up our memories of Christmas when we were kids. I almost wish that Charli was a little older so we could that this year. 

I am excited for this upcoming week. I will be going to lunch with friends, finishing up some shopping, taking around neighbor gifts, seeing my family a lot, Chinese lunch on Christmas Eve, friend parties and of course spending time with my favorite people Kelly & Charli (I guess Nala too... I still love that little pup) 

I realized this week how lucky I am to have been born in a time that I could heal so well from having a baby and being surrounded with great medical staff. I am so happy that I have been able to feel back to normal so quick. I really can't wait to be cleared to start working out again and eventually get myself back into dancing. 

Last night Charli did a 6 hour stretch. She normally does about a 5 hours every night. I am so grateful for a baby who loves sleep and is so calm. It makes it so much easier for me and I know when she starts to wake up its a diaper change and feeding time. I use to think I would be so mad to get up in the middle of the night but once you wake up and see that sweet face looking at you their is a piece in my heart that just swells with joy. If I had to admit it's one of my favorite times with Charli. 

It is crazy to think that she will be 5 weeks old tomorrow. How can time go by so fast already?? 

One Month Old!

Its hard for me to believe that Charli is now a month old. It seems like we were just packing the car and heading to the hospital thinking I was in labor. Now I feel like I am a seasoned pro at being a mom, considering the two days in the hospital you feel like your in a dream the whole time. Now this little girl has transformed already and you can start to see her personality.

1st week home can't get over how much has changed in a few weeks.

1 Month Pictures:

Charli has been an awesome baby. She is so calm... she got that from Kelly, not me!

She doesn't like it when she isn't swaddled in a burrito. (She makes one darn cute charli burrito)
Of course babies are cuddle bugs and she definitely enjoys the cuddles. Plus it helps that everyone wants to just sit and hold her for hours.

She rarely cries and screams. If you want to hear her get mad simply take her clothes off do bath time or put lotion on her and you will hear it. I don't know what it is but she definitely could live without both of those.

Charli has done great at eating from supplementing formula, pumping and now nursing she really does great at it all. Also she loves having a binky. She also is really good at letting us know that she is doing business in her diaper. Between the facial expression and the noise its apparent that she has the Nelson gut.

A lot of people have asked if we are sleep deprived? Actually, no we are extremely lucky. Charli eats at about 11pm or midnight and then she is up around 3am. Sometimes there is an occasional 6 am feeding but she is so calm. I will take the 5 hour stretches and smile.
Charli always sleeps with her mouth wide open and will peek her eyes open and smile at you.

I know sometimes Kelly & I both make an excuse to get up and rock her to sleep in the middle of the night. Its pretty bad when we are the ones who want to be up rocking her even though she doesn't care.

I swear in the last two weeks Charli has doubled the growth of the hair on her head. We also noticed that her right thigh has a patch of dark hair. She also has a hairy lower back with a bunny tail right above her bum. By the way she has no bum. Her pants don't stay up and you would think a diaper would help.

I can tell that Charli could hear a lot while I was pregnant with her because when she starts to get a little fussy I can start singing a song or dancing with her and she just will stare at me. Although most of my family hates that I try to dance with her.

Charli is no longer in premie diapers & is now in newborn size. She still is wearing newborn clothes and a few 0-3 month onesies fit her. I still love playing dress up with her and putting bows on her even though Kelly & my dad absolutely hate it and always take them off.

Features:
Her eyes still are blue. We are kind of hoping they stay blue. She has darker hair but I think there are times you can see a little red hue. She still has one foot with an arch and the other is completely flat. Also, her second toe is longer than her big toe like her mom.

We noticed she has kelly hands and long fingers (Grandma Malone is excited for her future piano career!) Charli has attached ear lobes like her dad as well.

I remember wondering while I was pregnant how I was going to be a mom and what I would do, how would I be at doing it and being worried at failing at it. I look back and laugh now because it really is so simple and I think I stressed so much about worrying if I would have it all together. The best part about being a mom is you will never have it together but you can act like you do.

We sure love little miss Charli Kate. She has been the biggest blessing in our lives and I can't thank Heavenly Father enough for sending such a wonderful daughter to us.

Keep growing little bug but please never grow up.
Love, Mom

I'm So Fancy!

Seriously! Charli Kate is so fancy.

I couldn't help myself with this dress. Kelly & I had our tithing settlement this Sunday and since we are staying home from church I had to take Charli in her cute christmas dress.

I absolutely can't get over all the cute clothes this little girl has. She has been spoiled by so many people.

Kelly teases me that I need to remember that I don't just have to play dress up all day long. 

But its too fun..

I can't wait for Charli to be a little bigger so I can put her in more of her fancy wardrobe.

Tomorrow she will be 3 weeks old.. where has the time gone already? It feels like it should have been  months gone by now but it also seems like I don't want her to grow up.

The Big Sister Nala!

The first night we got home from the hospital Kelly's parents came and dropped off Nala. I can't thank them enough for taking care of her while we were at the hospital. I know she's a pain and always hyper. 

No one believes us that she really is a calm dog when she's at her house. The first thing they teased us about is how long until Nala will be gone. It kind of made me sad to think of Nala not being here but then I realized she was going to do just fine.

Charli started to make a couple noises and Nala just sat staring at her and unsure about what that little thing was. At one point Nala thought someone stepped on her toys that squeak but it was just Charli. My mom and me sat laughing at Nala's expressions.

First Time looking at Charli

Nala was still confused about what that little bundle was for a couple days but we got this picture of her just sitting next to Charli. She has done really good with listening to us and looking from afar. The first night home Charli was up a lot and crying Nala would sit in her kennel looking so confused at what that sound was.

We have had Charli sitting on our bed with the boppy pillow and Nala will just lay down far enough that we are happy but close enough she can still see the baby.

I am so happy at how good Nala has been with having Charli in the house. I think she will continue to be good with this change. She is starting to know the rules and I think she will be protective of Charli since she knows that we both are.

This is Nala trying to be far away but still close enough to see her. At one point her head was almost on top of Charli's forehead. It was quite funny.

We love our puppy Nala still and I am so glad she still gets play time in with Kelly every night. She has become more clingy some days. We have had her lick the pinky several times and try to attack poopy diapers. But I can handle that. 

2 weeks old

Charli is two weeks old! What!?

We went to her 2 week well check appointment today. 

Dr. Strasser showed us her growth charts for weight, height and her head. Her head has grown and so did her height. 

She also was back to her birth weight. 6 lbs. 12 oz.  after losing 9 oz.

Kelly thought she would weigh more than her birth weight. But I figured she would be back up to it.

We asked if we should wake her up every few hours still at night because the night before we let her wake up when she was hungry and that was a 6 hour stretch. Dr. Strasser wants her to not go any longer than 5 hours until she weighs a little more. So hopefully at her 2 month appointment. But how can we be so lucky to have a baby who loves to sleep and isn't up until she's hungry. People don't believe us when we say we actually are getting sleep!

Also the did her PKU test. Charli did really well until they pricked her foot. She was already hungry and that sent her a little over edge. They luckily didn't have to take as much as they did with the billirubin tests. 

Right as we had weighed her and put on a new diaper she started to poop. Which in a way was helpful because Strasser took a peek and said it was totally like it should be. 

She also was good with how much she's been eating. Strasser also answered some questions of breastfeeding for me and pumping for me. I had told her I wasn't nursing because of the billilights made it hard to do everything. She also told me about supplementing. I am glad to have such an amazing pediatrician. 

Charli is in the 27% tile for height, 9% tile for weight

She will probably always be a thinner baby from what Dr. Strasser is guessing since we are both thinner and taller.

Charli is still in preemie size diapers. I can't believe how a diaper can be so small but they are so much better than the size 1 diapers they first put her in at the hospital.

She did lose her small umbilical cord a few days after thanksgiving so we can probably start to use newborn size diapers soon. I was nervous to pull off the rest of the umbilical cord since it was loose and kind of hanging there but after a little moving around it came off. Dr. Strasser looked at her belly button and said its healing nicely. Yay. 

Sometimes she finds her hand and sucks on it

She has dark hair and blue eyes still. It seems like every day her hair is growing like crazy.

We also realized she has Kelly's hands (She has a inverted pinky like Kelly does). Also she has one foot that has an arch and the other foot has a completely flat arch. I don't have arches in my feet and Kelly has really high arches we will see what happens with that.

After eating and a blowout

Charli hates having lotion out on her at night.  It's the one time we can get her to really cry. 

Charli eats about 3 oz. every feeding. She does coo and little grunts/snorts. 

At night I will put Charli on my chest when she is done eating. She instantly will fall asleep and relax. It's so weird how she just loves being on mom. 

This week Charli had a couple blowouts and yet even though it was stressful by the end I sat back and laughed at it.

Charli also loves her binky. When she gets a little upset she will gladly take a binky. She even sometimes gets her hands up by it to hold it in.

We also ordered her birth announcements. I can't wait for them to get here!

We love Charli. It's crazy how much something can change so fast.

I forgot to post this picture of Charli in her thanksgiving outfit! :)