Lucy @ 12 Weeks

Our sweet baby girl officially turned 12 weeks old today! She is not a tiny baby anymore!!

Can you believe that this little peanut:

Has turned into this amazing 12 week old:

The past few weeks have really flown by and this mama goes back to work tomorrow. :(

I am sad to leave my little Lucy at day care! I wonder if she will miss me as much as I will miss spending my days with her! Today Lucille and I spent our last day of maternity leave cuddling all morning. We went to our last Mother-baby hour at Meriter (how quickly Lucy went from being the youngest kid in the group to one of the oldest!), and we also went through some of Lucy's drawers to put away some of the clothes that she has grown out of..

Here are some pictures of her wearing her sweet yellow gown and her knit hat that she got from the hospital.

Lucy, we love you so much and we can't wait to watch you as you continue to grow!

Sunday at the Conservatory

On Sunday Daniel, Laura, Lucy and I paid a visit to the Olbrich Gardens Conservatory. It was a hot and balmy way to spend a January afternoon; we were able to see lots of great plants.

You can see the humidity in the air as Dan feeds Lucy. I guess that she doesn't need to be wearing her leg warmers, huh?

The Storm family in the Conservatory!

And the ladies -- Laura, Andrea & Lucille!

Laura comes to visit!

Last weekend my dear friend Laura came to visit from Boston!

It was so fun to introduce Laura to Lucy and to spend time with her. We had a wonderful but pretty low-key weekend. We had brunch with Melissa.

We attended Mother-Baby hour at Happy Bambino! We weighed Miss Lucy who is now a whopping 12 pounds! Look how happy she is on the scale. :)

We went shopping and just hung out at home and played with Lucy.

Lucy reviewed her flashcards.

We went to Friday night fish fry at Avenue Bar. It was both Laura and Lucy's first time at a classic Wisconsin fish fry. Fish, fries, and Old Fashions...Yum!

Laura, you are the best!! Thank you so much for coming to visit!

Bathtime

Can you believe that Lucy is almost 3 months old and yet we have never posted any classic bathtime pictures? That is about to change! :)

When Lucy had her first couple of baths she hated it! She screamed the entire time. She now loves her time in her little tub.

Here is our little peanut drying off!

Love you Lucy!

Latest and greatest on Chief

Chief just had his 1 month follow up visit with the vet after being diagnosed with Addison's Disease. Good news is that his kidney panel and electrolyte lab values were all normal. So he just had his monthly Percorten injection and we were sent on our way. :) Chief has been taking a daily dose of prednisone to keep his Addison's symptoms at bay - it has worked wonders! No crazy vomiting, anorexia, or lethargy for the past 4 weeks! Yay. The bad thing is that it causes him to be a total food hound and he is also more hyper than usual. He wants to eat all of the time. Chief has never really been a food motivated dog but now he is wild about food - we can no longer keep anything on the table or counters. He will gobble it right up. He also got into Lucy's dirty cloth diapers recently. I will spare you from the details but it wasn't pretty. The vet says that we can start tapering his prednisone to lower the dose which will make him less hungry and it will also help his body to distribute his newly gained weight better. When Chief was at the height of his Addisonian Crisis he weighed only 55 pounds. He gained 13 pounds in the past month and now weighs 68 pounds which is much closer to normal for a male Large Munsterlander. Chief's weight is really centered around his belly and chest and is more fatty weight than muscle. Our vet said that lowering his prednisone dose and more exercise would solve the problem. We still can't believe what a dramatic recovery our Chief has made in the past month! We love you Chief!

Lucy's Photo Session

We had Lucy's 2 month pictures taken 2 weeks ago and we just got the proofs! I am so excited! They are beautiful!!

Take a look:

http://kendrastoltz.zenfolio.com/

Choose Andrea Storm under the Proofs, the password is ksp1

Our Growing Girl

Just a couple of recent Lucy photos to show off our growing girl! The first one is of our little peanut wearing a 6 month onesie. Yep - that is a 10 week old wearing a 6 month sized onesie. She has such a long body, it is crazy! I had Lucy in a 3 month onesie the other day and she looked like a speedskater! It was a tight fit. :)


We tried out the Bumbo chair for the first time this weekend. Thanks for the chair Grandma Nola!It was so cute! She looked like a big kid in her little chair. Lucy has a pretty strong neck but it is still unreliable so you have to watch her closely. We know that Lucy will love sitting in this chair - watch for more photos in the future!

Passport Photos

Lucy and I went to Walgreen's this week to get her picture taken for her passport. All I have to say is yikes!! It was not pretty. Lucy h-a-t-e-d being awkwardly held in front of a white screen. She screamed and cried as the unfortunate Walgreens employee tried everything he could to distract her. He probably took 20 photos and only one was remotely close to making the cut - she is required to have her eyes wide open so that you can see her eye color. She still looks angry in the photo!

Can't wait to travel with you Lucy! Hopefully you are better behaved on the plane ride than you were taking your passport photo! :)

A new computer at the Storm household

After ~6 years my trusty ibook laptop was just not hacking it anymore! It was completely out of storage space, its internet was officially slower than dial up, and the delete key no longer works which makes one a very careful and/or creative typist. :) So we decided to get a new desktop computer. Here is a picture of Dan setting things up:




The best thing about our new computer is that we can use FaceTime! Lucy was able to call her Uncle Brad and her friend Laura to chat face to face this week. How fun!

One thing to note - if you ever Face Time the Storm family - the backdrop to our conversation will be guns! Dan's gun cabinet is in the office and it is directly behind our computer/camera. So you will get to see our little Lucy's smiling face and just over her shoulder will be her Dad's gun collection (which Dan claims is woefully incomplete). Good stuff. :)

If you have access to FaceTime - please feel free to touch base with us! Our account is under ahstorm@gmail.com

Daddy's Little Deer

Last Sunday, the Storm family ventured out to watch the Green Bay Packers v New York Giants game! We don't get Fox at our house for some reason (a salesperson at Best Buy told us that the Madison Fox station does not a have a strong signal and that there are pockets of the city that will never get reception regardless of how much money they spend on an antenna...) so if we want to see a big game, we need to go to a local establishment. We aren't technically Green Bay fans but it is easy to get sucked into the excitement in Wisconsin!! Green Bay does have one of the most awesome and loyal fan bases ever. These guys are diehards. Since we don't own any official green and gold clothing, we decided to dress Lucy up in Wisconsin's other offical colors - camouflage. :) Thanks for the sweet outfit Auntie Mallory!!

Our baby girl ready for adventure!

Daddy's Little Deer - Lucy and her papa.

Lucy and mama

Despite having the cutest cheerleader ever, Green Bay still lost! Maybe next year they can reclaim their Superbowl champion title!

Lucy's 2 month Check Up

We had Lucy's 2 month check up last week. We are happy to report that she is a healthy and growing baby girl. She had her first round of shots and handled them really well. Here are her latest stats: Weight - 11 pounds 7 ounces (64th percentile), Head Circumference - 39.3 cm (63rd percentile) and Height - 24 1/4 inches (97th percentile). She is a tall girl! She is already growing out of clothes because her little body is just too long for the legs in some of her her baby outfits.

Here is a sweet party dress that our little peanut is just about to grow out of...

Lucy is able to coo now and make lots of great faces. Here she is talking to her mama:

Yawning...

And sticking out her tongue:

Love you Lucy!!

Snowy Day

We have been waiting a long time for our first real snowfall in Madison this year!

It has been unseasonably warm this winter which is nice in some ways because we don't need to bundle Lucy from head to toe to take her from the house to the car and we don't worry about slipping on snow covered sidewalks. But...we do miss the snow! Dan and I have not been snowshoeing at all this season! The dogs love the snow too and they are sad that they have not been able to romp around on the frozen lake this winter.

It finally snowed about 5 inches last Thursday! In honor of the big event, Lucy wore her snowflake/tutu outfit. So cute!! Thanks Aunt Kathy and Uncle Chuck!

We also read the book Snowy Day together. A Classic. I loved this book when I was growing up. I think that Lucy liked it too. :)

Our little snow princess.

An Update on Chief

Here is the latest and greatest on our dog Chief!

After another round of vomiting, shaking, and rapid heart rate last Tuesday morning (insert major frowny face here) we finally visited our regular vet clinic in Madison - Lakeview. They reviewed all of Chief's *paper* medical records from his time in Fargo. :)

(Side note: Chief and Scout do have electronic medical records via Pet Portal. :) Dan and I use it to print out immunization records, check out their appointment schedule, etc. We'll probably use it a lot more in the future to help manage Chief's Addison's symptoms)

The vet confirmed that all of Chiefy's symptoms were classic Addison's and she gave him a big shot of mineralocorticoid and kept him at the clinic all day to get fluids. He was one dehydrated doggy! In a few weeks our pup went from 75 to 55 pounds! He was a lot of weight to gain back! In addition to the shot, Chief will need to take daily doses of Prednisone for the rest of his life. When we picked him up on Tuesday afternoon he was already starting to perk up. He is eating (only wet food and a few bland treats at this point), he is starting to play, and is acting much more like his usual self for the first time in weeks!!

The other day I was sitting in Lucy's room and feeding her while sitting in the glider and Chief came in to sit at our feet. It was perfect.

Chief is definitely still on the mend. He is working to gain weight and to have more energy. But he is getting better each day and we feel so lucky that he was diagnosed with a treatable illness!!

Lucy @ 2 months

Our baby girl continues to grow! She is so amazing. Lucy is getting more and more alert. She is starting to really watch the world around her. She loves music, she watches faces and babbles and coos at us. Her are some recent pictures of our Lucille:

Leaning on Daddy's legs:

Sitting in her chair:

Thanks for the cute and girly outfit grandma Nola!

Lucy has been congested lately which has a negative impact on her (and our!) sleep. Based on a recommendation from the mother-baby group that we attend, we bought the Nose Frida which is a Swedish tool that you use to suck boogers out of your babe's nose. No worries - there is a filter so you are not in danger of eating anything gross. It works pretty well! Lucy hates it but it seems to do the trick.

Our bright eyed baby girl!

Lucy turned 2 months old on Sunday. She now weighs 11 pounds! We can't believe our little sweetheart has already been with us for 2 months. :) She is the best.

Christmas at the Storms!

At long last - here is our post on Christmas at the Storm residence in Fargo! We did have a wonderful week, despite dealing with lots of vet visits and stress over Chief's illness! Everyone was eager to spend time with Lucy. :)

Lucy is just starting to smile!! It is so adorable. It is also like a rare animal in the wild and very difficult to capture on camera! Here is a shot of our girl with a small smile. Love it. She is wearing her Christmas party dress.

Cleaning up after opening presents!

Caroling? Nope! :) Daniel sang Led Zepplin tunes while Brad accompanied on the piano.

On Wednesday, Lucy and I visited the Smeby side of our family in Moorhead, Minnesota. Cousins Isabelle and Sydney were so excited to meet this new baby girl. They could not wait to hold her. They admired her tiny fingers and toes and her sweet little face. Sydney's quote of the day was as follows: "Lucy gets her tallness from her Daddy and her cuteness from her Mommy." Yep - that's right! :)

A group photo with Grandma Sharon, Auntie Carrie, Cousin Caren, Auntie Connie, Uncle Glen, Isabelle, and Sydney.

Here is a picture of my cousin Caren and me. She is expecting a baby girl in May so next Christmas Lucy will have another little girl to celebrate with!! When we were growing up, Caren used to send me bags full of her hand-me-down clothes. They were the best! It was like Christmas morning to get Caren's things. If she wore them before - I knew they were awesome. :) We are so excited for you Caren & Ben and we can't wait to meet your new baby girl.

As part of our holiday traditions, we always celebrate Daniel's birthday in Fargo. This year he turned the big 3-2! We love you Dan/Dad!! Hope you have a wonderful year.

Lucy spent lots of time stretching, cooing, and cuddling with her grandparents and auntie and uncle.

Snuggling with Aunt Amelia!

(Side note: Thanks for the very soft and cuddly blanket cousin Caren!)

Lounging with Uncle Brad

While Chief was sick, Scout was by his side. She snuggled next to him when he was wrapped in blankets. When Chief was in his kennel with an IV running, Scout was on the other side peeking into his crate. These dogs really do care about each other! It is so cute. We love you Chief and Scout!

Our good friend Jen and her son Colby stopped by to meet little Lucy! Jen is my best friend from childhood and Dan's friend from college. She is the reason why Dan and I met! She lives in Fargo but will be moving back to South Dakota soon. Good luck with your big move Burns family! We wish you the best.

We had a quiet New Years Eve at Ken and Nola's house. Lucy definitely wanted to ring in the year! She was up late that night! :) She also had a huge blowout that evening that necessitated a bath. I had to carry her upstairs from her changing pad to the bathtub which required inserting the lower half of her body in this plastic bag to contain the craziness! We love you Lucy! We had such an awesome 2011 and we can't wait to see what 2012 brings. Happy New Year everyone!

Thanks Storm family for the great week! We love you guys!