Look How Big Renee is Getting!!!

Renee had her 4 month check up appointment yesterday.  Every time we go to the doctor they weigh her, measure how long she is and measure her head circumference to make sure that she is growing enough.  The doctor's have been concerned about her slow weight gain ever since she was 2 weeks old, but not any more :D  She is now in the 50th percentile for weight and 70th percentile for height of babies her age!  Yeahhh, no more weight checks every two weeks!!!

The doctor is always showing me a graph on where Renee fits in the growth categories as compared to all the other babies of the world, so I thought I'd make one that's just about her - no comparisons :D

(sub in famous boxing announcer voice here)  

"Weighing in at 13 pounds, 10.7 ounces, standing 2 feet and 3/4 inches tall, our very own Slobber Champion of the Woooooorld: Renee "Thunder Thighs" Truuuuunnellllllle!!!!"  (crowd cheers in the background)

                                    

Day Care

Renee has been going to day care for a little over a week now.  I wasn't sure how either one of us would do with the transition since we had been together all day, every day since she was born.  But, so far it's going great!

Her first day was rough.  Her primary teacher, Erika, noticed that whenever the room was quiet Renee was okay, but got very upset when there was a lot of noise from the other babies.  And as you can imagine, in an infant daycare with ~15 babies under the age of 1, the room is not quiet very often or for very long.  So, she did a lot of crying that day.  I almost cried leaving her there, but stayed strong, telling myself that she would be just fine, and I made it through the day without shedding a tear :D  I didn't even go and visit her, I didn't want to traumatize her (translation: myself) even more by leaving her twice in the same day.  Thankfully when I picked her up at the end of the day she was sound asleep in her crib (not screaming her head off like I imagined), which was very comforting for a worried mom who doesn't know how anyone else could possibly take care of her baby the way that she does!

Here's a picture of Renee and her primary teacher Erika on her first day.

Since then she has been doing great.  I drop her off every morning and hand her to one of the teachers, whoever is available to hold her at the moment, and give her a kiss goodbye.  And she looks completely relaxed with the situation, not caring at all that I am no longer holding her (something which was a major problem up to this point!).  She barely gives me a second glance as I leave; she is now much more interested in watching what the older, more mobile babies are doing.  I feel like if she could, she would say something like, "bye Mom, see you later!".
 
What's really great is that all the teachers love her (I mean, how could they not)!  They get a kick out of her silly baby babbling, goofy smiles and adorable laughing.  There is even a little friendly competition going on among them about who gets to take care of her more.

Other than day 1, her first week went great and when I picked her up on Friday, Erika handed me this:

Renee's 1st art project

(outside of the card)

 

 (inside of the card)

Renee "made" a Father's Day card for her Daddy, complete with orange construction paper and green baby hand and foot prints :D  It was so cute, I was jealous that I didn't get one!  Jeff will just have to share it with me!!!

First Post - A Better Blog

I have been struggling with the current design of Renee's web page for quite some time now.  Not that I think Jeff didn't do a great job building it, he did - it's awesome; especially the gallery page.  It's just that her main page is not a proper "blog", which is how I've been using it, and it's kind of a pain to update.  I could have had Jeff create some new blog-like page that would give me all the options I want, which he probably would have spent hours upon hours perfecting for me (thank you my love!).  Instead I am just going to stick with the principle that the simplest solution is often the best solution (Occam's razor, in case you were interested).

So, here it is: a user friendly blog to keep our friends, family and anyone else who stumbles across it, updated on the smiles, tears, drool and other interesting activities of our beautiful daughter Renee Marjorie Trunnelle.

We hope you enjoy and visit often!!!