Codina Photography

I can’t believe this is my first year celebrating Mother’s Day as a mama myself.  Last year at this time I was already pregnant but I didn’t know until a couple of days after (May 14th to be exact last year).  Being a mother really changes everything.  Since I was little my momma always told me that I one day would understand her love for me and that was the day I’d become a mother too.  She was right.

I can only hope to be as good a mother to Andres as my mama is to me.  Thank you for bringing me into this world and for loving me unconditionally.

Happy Mother’s day!

 

It’s true! Time really does fly when you have a yummy little munchkin in your life. Andy turned 4 months old on May 1st and he’s seriously the funnest baby on the block! He’s so alert and playful now and really has both Arturo and I wrapped around his little finger. Sometimes at night right before we go to bed Arturo and I start talking about how we miss Andy who has been sleeping by then for a good 3-4 hours. Then we proceed to tell each other – “Hey, do you want to wake him up? No, no way. But let’s just peek in his room to see him for just a minute”. Then we both go into his room and slowly lean over the crib to see our peacefully sleeping angel…then we both back out with the fear that he’s going to all of the sudden open his eyes and stare at us like a scene out of horror movie, creepy music and all. It makes for a pretty good laugh every time. This happens a few times a week and we love it.

Andy is full of personality and he’s a very happy baby. He smiles all the time and strangers are his favorite to flirt with (especially women!).  He’s very ticklish and anything will send him into a laughing frenzy – we love this because it makes us laugh along with him too. He rarely ever cries (only when he’s very tired) and if he does he’s very easy to console. He’s the kind of baby that makes you feel like you’re a great parent and we’re very lucky for that.

This month was full of adventure and fun for him. He took his first airplane ride when he was just 14 weeks old to visit his family in Florida and he was great the whole trip. He got to meet everyone and flirt around with all the ladies. He went out every day while we were in Florida and met more people in those 10 days than in his entire first three months of life. He loved (almost) every minute of it. Exhaustion got to him often because he was just so excited to be out and about that napping was definitely out of the question no matter how hard we tried. But it’s ok, he still had lots of fun and got to bond lots with his grandparents and his auntie. He was very spoiled by lots of attention from everyone and was just loving all of it.

We got the opportunity to baptize him when we were in FL. He did great the entire time and did not cry AT ALL…not even when they poured the galon of water over his head. “Water? Oh yeah, i love bath time!” was the look on his face as this whole thing was going on. We had a great time that day and we were very glad that his entire family (most of it anyways) was present at this special occasion.

Andy also got to hang out with everyone the following day at his little cousin’s first birthday party. He was having fun being passed around among grandparents, cousins, uncles and aunts, and especially his great grand mother who was just thrilled to meet him. We’re SO glad that we got to spend so much time with family and friends while in Florida. Our trips there are usually 4-5 days long and we’re always struggling to see everyone. This time around we had 10 whole days so we got to do everything and see everyone. It was great!

After we got back to Phoenix we had a little trouble for a day or two getting Andy used to his routine. Immediately after though he started sleeping for ~10 hours each night and it’s been glorious since then! The last 2-3 weeks he’s been going to bed around 8pm and he sleeps until anywhere between 5-7am. It is SO NICE people! I finally feel rested for the first time in 4 months and it’s such a nice feeling. I wake up energized and ready to take on the world. So energized that I even pick up my huge diaper bag and we’re out and about the entire morning just Andy bean and I. And it’s fun. It’s oh so great to hang out with him. We go to the mall, walk around for hours, run other errands, and just have fun. Too bad it’s getting too warm for long walks outside because I would otherwise love to do that. Anyways, I’m hoping the sleep thing sticks around a little longer. I know it’s bound to change soon as sleep regression and growth spurts go hand in hand and I think we’re due for one soon…if not one starting today because tonight for the first time in 3 weeks he woke up at 3:30 am. And not in a usual slow, gentle complaining he does when he’s waking up….no no, this was an all out super cry that woke me up from deep sleep within 1 second and I’m pretty sure my blood pressure spiked up because it scared the crap out of me to the point I almost fell out of bed. But we’ll see…let’s just hope that was only due to the fact that he had managed to pee outside his diaper and he was all wet all around and possibly cold because of that. Let’s hope for that…yeah. Let’s see what tonight has in store for us. :)

The other great thing that took place earlier this month is the fact that he started to fall asleep on his own! Oh yes! This is huge! Before at night we’d have to sit there and rock him to sleep for a good amount of time. Then once he was asleep we had to play the game where you put him in the crib and cross your fingers that he doesn’t wake up during the transfer from comfortable arms to stiff bed. It was a nightmare! But now it doesn’t matter anymore. I feed him, rock him and sing to him for a good 10-15 minutes, turn on his white noise (his favorite is ocean waves!), put him in the crib with a good-night kiss and he doesn’t seem to care.  He just starts doing his typical bed acrobatics where he rolls around back and forth, does a little cooing, and he’s out within 10 minutes. SO NICE.

Anyways, today we had Andy’s 4 month wellness checkup at the pediatrician’s office. He’s doing great and luckily he seems to be a very healthy baby. He was 16 lbs 12 oz and 26.5″ tall. All around in the 90-95th percentile with a head circumference of 45cm which puts him in the >97%. Big brains I hope! We got the ok from the pediatrician to start him on solids now so we’ll be introducing cereal once a day and see how he likes that.  Then in 3-4 weeks we’ll start vegetables and fruits and I’m so excited to do that! Can’t wait to make awesome yummy foods for him! It’s going to be lots of fun. :)

I return to work on May 21st which is just 2 weeks away. That means that I’m taking Andy to daycare for just a couple of hours starting this Wednesday. I won’t even go into how I feel about this because I may not be able to finish writing this post. I would be a stay at home mom if I could, no questions asked. But unfortunately that is not the plan any time soon. I will be having Fridays off for 2 months so that will at least help a little bit so I can have three day weekends with munchkin at home. We’ll see how things go. I know it’ll be a huge adjustment but time will pass and we’ll get used to it just like everything else…at least that’s what I keep telling myself.

Ok, I now leave you with the pictures for the visual entertainment part of this post. Enjoy! :)

 

Nothing, and I mean nothing, can keep this little one from keeping his legs up in this position. I tried so hard to get a picture with his legs down to capture the true growth but he wasn’t having any of that. We don’t have many pictures during weeks 13-14 because this was our trip to Florida and I really didn’t take many pictures with the big camera. :(

The following pictures are all from after we returned from Florida.

He loves toys now more than ever before. He grabs them and brings them to his mouth all the time. They must taste yummy.

Here he is laughing uncontrollably as usual.

Andy is really starting to want to sit up now. Anytime he’s leaning on us he starts moving his torso into an upright position and gets mad if you don’t prop him up enough. Can’t wait for him to sit up all the way on his own but we have at least another 2 months to practice that. :)

Given his obsession with putting everything in his mouth we introduced Sophie the teether and he LOVES that thing. It’s his favorite toy so far and so she rides along with him everywhere we go nowadays. He just grabs her and goes at it chewing on her legs and face all the time. Also worth noting that we transitioned Andy into size 3 diapers when we got back from Florida that week and he also started wearing his 9 month old clothing. A couple of 6 month outfits still fit then but by now I’ve pretty much transitioned his entire wardrobe to 9 months. Porkers!

Love, love, love this black and white picture. May have to print it for the wall as part of this collage I’m planning on printing for our bedroom.

It’s hard to tell in these pictures, but his eyes are starting to transition from the gray/blue color he was born with into something else. It’s too early to tell but I can start seeing patches of greenish/brownish in his eyes. Still hoping for daddy’s hazel eyes so we’ll see.

My favorite!

 

I’ve started reading to Andy pretty often now and have been doing this for a few weeks. He seems to enjoy the books – mostly because of the fun, bright colors as he has no clue what I’m talking about obviously. But it keeps him entertained for a good 20-30 minutes and he tries to grab the pages as we go along. It’s pretty neat!

These were all taken last week on May 1st, his official 4 month anniversary..

And so I tried to put him in a bunch of cute little knit hats I have from my old days as a baby photographer. Unfortunately none of them fit because even though they were all sized for a 6 month old Andy’s head is too big (as evident from his >97th percentile head circumference at the dr’s office today). But yes, i have since ordered a new hat off Etsy (sized for a 1 year old haha) that should be arriving soon. Because you know…all babies need pictures in silly knit hats!  In the mean time, here he’s sporting a stylish fedora hat his auntie gave him.

And as evident from this picture, he gets tired of hats pretty easily. So imagine that.

Someone really enjoys the bumbo seat nowadays.

 

That’s it. Hope you enjoyed. I will try to post a few select pictures from my recent obsession with Instagram. You can follow along @ufsalsiee on Instagram or view the pictures at http://ourstoryinpictures.tumblr.com/

 

Thanks for looking!

Ingrid

P.S: after having photographed so many babies before, i have to say photographing your own child is super easy so far. He’s almost looking at the camera in all pictures – must be because mommy is the one behind the lens and not some weird photographer lady. I know this is bound to change soon when he’s old enough to realize what’s going on and then he’ll be all like – Mom please, put that thing away.

I know I say this every month but I really can’t believe it’s been three months already since our little munchkin was born!

Everything is starting to be very different now. With him being three months old now we’re finally out of the awful first few months of life where he’s so delicate and tiny.  He’s now a lot bigger and stronger and he holds his head pretty great which allows us to handle him with more ease.  With a more mature stomach we said good-bye to gas attacks but we welcomed daily explosive poop. It’s a routine for me to ‘pre-treat’ his clothes after the poop explodes out of his diaper which is pretty much daily…and sometimes multiple times a day too. They really need to make a diaper that goes all the way up to the neck that way we avoid those up-the-back poop catastrophes!

Andy continues to be a really good baby. He usually only cries when he’s hungry (or when we do tummy time!). He’s always chilling, smiling, and now laughing out loud too! He surprised me with his first laugh on his 12 week anniversary this past Sunday. I was on the couch playing with him and kissing his face when he let out the most precious laugh I have ever heard in my life.  It took me by surprise and then my heart melted. Since that day he’s been slowly laughing more and more every day. We discovered he’s ticklish around his thighs and he laughs non-stop when you tickle him there. We’ve been exploiting that so we can hear his sweet laughter. He’s a pretty happy baby and we’re so lucky for that!

He continues to hate tummy time. It’s a miracle he holds his head up as nicely as he does with how little time he spends on his tummy. I try my hardest to let him play on his tummy every day but when he cries desperately to come back up I just cannot allow myself to torture him any longer.  :(  Oh well. We’ll continue to try.

Now the part that changed tremendously for us this past month was his sleep schedule. See we had a good thing going for us back then. He was sleeping…I was sleeping…Arturo was sleeping…even the dogs were sleeping! I knew I was jinxing myself when I was so proudly saying he was doing 6-8 hours every night in his crib and not waking up until 5am.  Well, around week 9 he decided he was no longer having any of that and he started waking up every 3-4 hours at night. Oh no you didn’t!  And the worst part is that I could not for the life of me get him to stay in his crib after he’s up the first time in the middle of the night. He’d feed and then I’d try rocking him back to sleep for a good 45 minutes. When finally asleep in his crib again I would go to bed only to be woken up again after 30 minutes. Not sure why he was doing that. So I tried to get him to stay in his crib several nights in a row, still waking up every 30 minutes to an hour each time. Welcome back sleep deprivation! So I started bringing him downstairs to his swing in the middle of the night after the first wake-up call.  Ohhh that swing. Thank you Fisher Price! He’d spend the rest of the night sleeping in it, uninterrupted for a good 6-7 hours! And me? I hit the couch next to the swing and passed out.

Anyways, I’ll stop rambling now and let you enjoy the huge amount of pictures I’ve taken this month.

One of the few times he did NOT cry during tummy time. Instead he proceeded to eat his hand. Love how well the lighting shows his true hair and eye color.

Back when my mama was still here.  Giving him a bottle as I quickly snapped some pictures before heading out for Zumba class.

Andy loves daddy time!

Took some time that Saturday to go to the Gilbert farmer’s market and get some organic produce – our favorite thing to do as of late. Here’s me with babe in his stroller/carseat.

Once in a while I give him a bottle too.

Andy continues to be obsessed with his hands. So the little wrist elephant really is convenient!

He also loves the elephant mobile by his crib.  Also very convenient when I need to some picking up around his room (or go to the bathroom! haha)

Here he is after a crying bout during tummy time. Hence the red eyes and face. Poor thing.

More hand loving. This was on St. Pattys day. Too bad I didn’t get a picture of his whole outfit.

That week we also started using his bouncer for the first time. I didn’t like it before because his head was still a little bit wobbly. He now feels more secure here and he LOVES to play with the toy attachment the bouncer comes with (not pictured).

Love this face!

Andy loves playing in his activity mat. He bats at toys once in a while but our faces (our mouth more specifically) continues to be his favorite object to launch for!

Love my naked baby! So yummy!

 

Ready for a night out on the town. People, lock up your daughters!

Then at night time during the week this is usually what happens. Arturo gets home and we’re upstairs playing on his mat. Then Arturo gets on the floor with us and he spends quality time with Andy.

Notice poor doggies by the door. We don’t let them inside Andy’s room so they always sit by the door just waiting to see if there will ever be a day where we call them to play with us.  Not for a while furry babes!

More of what goes on when Arturo gets home each night…

Then after 20-30 minutes it all ends like this: daddy on phone, baby staring at hands, dogs passed out by the door.

I told you he was obsessed with his hands…

Love those little fat legs!

And his hair when it’s dirty…

But more than anything I love his little man hands!

And today Andy turned 3 months old. :)

 

And FINALLY some pictures of him and I together. Yaaaaaay! Happy momma over here. :) Thank you hubs for taking these.

 

Hope you enjoyed.

 

 

*images taken with iPhone and edited via Instagram*

the one we always carry in our pockets (or purses!).

We take so many pictures with our phones on a daily basis. It’s always on us, at all times. Needless to say I capture more pictures with it than with my big SLR…because you know…that thing is huge and bulky. Not that I don’t love my SLR, of course I do. But the iPhone goes with me everywhere and it takes pretty fantastic pictures. With the help of some awesome apps all the photos are easily transformed with cool colors and vintage tones. Who needs Photoshop anyways?

So with that said I’ve been meaning to find an easy way of sharing and storing our iPhone photos. With Instagram I realized I could automatically upload to a Tumblr account. So voila! ourstoryinpictures.tumblr.com was born. Every picture I edit through Instagram will go up there automatically without any extra effort from me. I love the idea of a central location for all the iPhone pictures – from a storage standpoint and from a “I dont want to forget a thing” standpoint too (because otherwise they just stay there on the phone…forgotten).

I’ve managed to convince Arturo to upload his own photos there too since he takes just as many as I do.  It’s like a family photo blog! Me likey!

Here’s a small sample of random iPhone snaps throughout the month.  These are mostly of Andy but I’ve been taking lots of other random photos throughout the day too. Anyways, hope you enjoy!

 

 

Andy turned two months old yesterday. It feels surreal to think we’ve now been parents to him for two whole months. It feels like a really long time but a very short one too. Weird!

Our little munchkin keeps getting bigger and bigger and with every passing day we discover something new about him.  He doesn’t cease to amaze us with all his little facial expressions, coos, and energetic movements. He continues to be a REALLY good baby. We are so lucky! He loves to sleep!  He takes at least 4 long naps during the day and plays vigorously in between them. Around 6 weeks or so he started sleeping a bit longer, around 5-6 hours consistently every night. Now at 8 weeks he’s up to 6-8 hours. A typical night would be feeding at 10, in bed asleep by 11 and up again around 6am as of the last 3-4 days. It’s pretty much impossible to get him to go back to sleep once he’s up in the morning so the plan is to continue on this schedule to see if he keeps extending the hours in the upcoming weeks and then we’ll move up his bed time earlier to 7-9pm.  I’m usually ok and ready to go around 5-6am although I have to admit I miss staying in bed past 8am, especially when it’s cold outside and Arturo is still asleep dreaming in la-la land. I just want to crawl back into bed so badly but I must do my mommy job!

Andy is truly a happy baby. He only cries when he’s hungry or when he’s got gas. Ay that gas! It pains me to see him suffer. It comes and goes. Some days are great and some days are bad. I’ve had to watch my diet a lot and I’ve been writing down what I eat the days he has gas issues. Let’s just say black beans are NO GO for him! Who knew my diet could affect the breast milk so much and pass on to him. So yeah, beans are banned from this house for the time being!  Things should continue to improve over the next couple of months as he gets older and his system has time to mature.

So here’s his 2nd month of life in pictures. Hope you enjoy!

No official week 5 picture because I dont know what happened…lack of camera action that week I guess for which I definitely made up later. But at least here’s a picture of him in his car seat during a short outing to Joe’s Farm Grill to pick some fresh oranges, taken February 4th.

 

 

Week 6 was amazing.  We noticed a huge change in him as if he grew an entire inch all of the sudden and a lot of clothes stopped fitting.  He became a lot more engaged with the world around him. A lot more active playing with his toys and lots of smiles and coos for us.  He smiled at me when I picked him up from his crib one morning for the first time which totally melted my heart. Now he pretty much does it almost every morning. He stops crying the second he sees me and smiles the entire time while I unswaddle him right before feeding. He sure knows how to get mommy to wake up happy and stop wanting to go back into bed.

A big change was also how well he could hold up his head all of the sudden. One morning he just raised his head as I was carrying him on my shoulder and it kind of freaked me out a bit. He would NOT put it down. He kept staring at the room around him as if he was discovering things for the first time from a different angle. His head is still a little wobbly but he has been holding it up better and stronger each day.

 

He got to 12 lbs that week. The number on the scale was so perfect that I decided to capture it. Also to capture his then-emerging fat rolls which we love.  Since then his fat rolls have continued to progress and are really starting to make him look like the little Michelin man.

 

Andy bean loooooves bath time! He stopped crying during his bath around 4 weeks or so and he’s loved it since then. He actually cries when you take him OUT of the water! :( Sorry little man.

 

 

Hello chubs!

 

Week 7 is when I really went crazy with the camera!

 

Andy loves to stare at the toys on his play mat. He really much rather be in this position than face down. Tummy time = no fun time. He really dislikes it and starts crying. We try to keep him tummy down for at least 3-5 minutes at each play time during the day but I figure he gets plenty of tummy time when I carry him on my shoulder or lay him on my chest.

 

 

His swing is his favorite place to take his early morning nap. I bring him downstairs and he plays and falls asleep in his swing while I make breakfast and catch up with the interwebz.

I love him in this onesie. He looks like a little soldier. I felt bad retiring it earlier last week when we suddenly discovered it was too short.

 

 

And he reaaally digs the birds and mirror on the swing.

 

His view.  Not sure how entertaining looking at yourself in the mirror could be but he seems to be fascinated by it!  Whatever works little man!

 

Here’s chubs sporting yet another failed mohawk attempt!  I think this is the first time I put him in size 2 diapers because he kept exploding (both pee and poop) out of his size 1. They are a little big but they at least contain all the mess now! Yay for not getting peed and pooped on multiple times a day!

Love those little feet. Daddy’s toes for sure!

 

Andy’s been slowly losing his hair over the last month or so.  He had a couple of weeks there where he definitely had daddy’s bold spot but he’s starting to get new hairs, especially noticeable around his forehead.

 

Here he is with my mom ready to go on a quick outing to run some errands.  Did I mention my mom is obsessed with him? He loves her too. He goes into a smiling frenzy when she talks to him.

More pictures of Andy and his grandma.

 

Andy is now 8 weeks old. He’s been discovering his hands over the last few days.  He’s started to stare at them and then attempts to stick his thumb in his mouth. It’s pretty funny to watch.

He loves to play on the floor with daddy when he gets back from work at night. It’s their little special time together. Daddy also bathes him and gives him his supper bottle.

P.S – did I mention he’s the perfect photographer’s child? He always looks at the camera for mommy. Am I lucky or what? I know this will probably change completely when he’s older and gets annoyed every time I put the camera in front of his face.  In the mean time I will continue to enjoy his focused attention as I photograph him! :)

 

I love the men in my life!

 

And finally yesterday was his official 2 month anniversary. At his pediatrician check up today he was just shy of 13 lbs and 23″ long – measuring at the 75% percentile across the board.

 

 

 

And there you have it. Hope you enjoyed.

 

Ingrid