Gabriela is Two Weeks Old!!!

Wow - so much has happened since we last blogged! Gabriela turns two weeks old today! She also celebrated her first Chanukah yesterday with Mommy, Daddy, and Grammy Michele. But let me back up and let you know a bit about her activities last week.

When we left off last, Grandpa Arnie was coming to stay with us for the night. He showed up with several home cooked meals made with love by Grammy Michele - boy, were we happy and well fed! Grandpa was quite the champ - he took over for the late night feedings so that Lisa and Alex could get more than a couple hours of sleep at one time. We never heard a peep from Gabriela - as soon as she so much as whimpered, Grandpa Arnie was up and ready to tend to her needs. I believe she will have a lifelong love for bluegrass music as Grandpa was playing the music all through the night to soothe her!

Aunt Dee Dee gets a cuddle!

We had a visit from Gabriela's Aunt Dee Dee (Daniella) - their first meeting! Daniella just finished the last of her finals at San Diego State University and came home for the winter break. On her way home, she and Babushka Maya visited last Friday and we had some yummy Italian food together. We look forward to other visits from Aunt Dee Dee while she is home from break.


We took Gabriela on her first errand Saturday afternoon. We forgot that this was the weekend before Christmas and foolishly ventured off to our local Babies R' Us/Toys R' Us store. It was packed and there were long lines but Gabriela was an excellent shopper and really handled it all well (actually, she just slept the entire time).

We had a lazy start to our Sunday morning and shared some cuddle time with Gaby.

Gabriela's first Chanukah - lighting the candles...

Sunday evening was the start of Chanukah. We had a bit of a challenging day - Gabriela was a bit on the cranky side for much of the day and no matter what mommy or daddy did, we couldn't console her. It was a big change from her usually mellow self. We ruled out all the obvious causes (hunger, wet diaper, etc.) and eventually concluded she was either really gassy or just overtired. The solution was a long drive with daddy through Playa del Rey, Manhattan Beach, and Redondo Beach. By the time they returned she had fallen asleep and took a long and well-deserved nap! While she slept, Grammy Michele arrived and the three of us made a great dinner including excellent latkes fried up by Alex. We lit the candles with Gabriela and sang the blessings while she listened attentively. Grammy Michele brought her a Chanukah bear - it's head was bigger than hers and may have been a little scary at first (see photo below).

The Chanukah Bear was a little intimidating!

It's hard to believe that Gabriela is two weeks old already! I think back to what we were doing that weekend before she was born - Alex and I hosted the annual family Chanukah party (a little early since I was supposed to give birth during Chanukah) and Uncle Jeff and Cousin Dan helped Alex install the car seat base in his car (we thought we were well ahead of the curve by doing it so early!). The next day, we went to the gym and worked out, had our friends over for lunch, and procrastinated on packing our bag for the hospital even after 'Aunty' Gayle warned us how important it would be to do so before going into labor ("sure, sure - but we still have two weeks" is what I said!). I was far more focused on making my list of "projects" I was going to get done before Gabriela arrived. And I spent time organizing my music on iTunes - which, as it turned out, was a good thing as having my soothing music to listen to during labor was a major saving grace!

We just threw this picture in because she just looked so cute in this outfit!!!!

We look forward to sharing stories of more fun days with all of you in the near future!