Botello Family Christmas!

Wow! Things have been so hectic the past few weeks. It has been so great, though. Siena definitely had a wonderful first Christmas, and just having her with us proved to be the best gift ever! I totally loved seeing her excitement every time she tore into the wrapping paper. She got really good at opening them, too! I am going to try to put a few of our top pictures on here. There are just so many! I want to try to give you a glimpse of how much we all enjoyed the time together. We found Siena a small tree to start for next year. I thought silver and pink would be a cute color scheme.

Here's a video of her playing with her phone Aunt Freda and Uncle Rick got her. She loves pressing buttons on the remote control, cell phone, or keyboard. So, she loves this thing! Thank Freda and Rick!

I love the fact that, now, Siena's bottom two teeth have come in enough that when she smiles really big, you can see them. It makes her look even more adorable, and big! So, here's my favorite "tooth" shot.

She is learning to use her tongue, too. So, when she gets tickled, she'll start sticking her tongue out after every laugh. She does it so quickly, it's hard to get a picture, but here's one.

Tommy also took Siena to the pediatrician yesterday for her 6 month check up. I was excited because, for once, I wasn't the one sitting in on the torture of shots! Tommy said she did wonderful and was smiling at the nurses after 5 seconds, though. She had her vaccinations and also her first round of flu shots. Siena now weighs a whopping 20 pounds, 12 ounces and is 27 1/4" long! I really need to find that growth stunt potion! Any help would be appreciated.

Baby's First Christmas!

First of all, I just want to apologize for how long it's taken to sit down and blog. Things have been going great, but it's just been busy like most people's lives around this time of the year. We have officially started going through the teething phase for about a week and a half now. Her first bottom two are coming through. You can see the tops pretty good now. I feel we are still blessed with the best baby. We have experienced some crabbiness with her, ALOT of drooling, and some fighting sleep at night. It really hasn't been as bad as some of the stories I had heard, though. I hope it continues to be this easy with the remainder of her teeth!

She loves giving kisses right now. By kisses, I mean, grabbing both sides of your face, pulling her open mouth to you, and latching on! It's the funniest thing. I did happen to get a video of her doing this to my mom. As you can tell, Mom thought it was hilarious!

Here's another fun video of us giving Siena some melt away strawberry yogurt bites. They taste just like strawberries; so we assumed that she would enjoy them. Boy, were we wrong! Please note that this was about the 4th attempt on getting her to like them, and she made this face every time!



As for Siena's first Christmas, we have made sure to get lots of pictures of her in all of her Christmas attire. We had so many photo ideas that it was hard to narrow it down. We took a pretty good amount of them here at the house, but we did opt to have some taken with a photographer so we could have some family shots. I also put a picture of her opening her first Christmas present. She's really been enjoying ripping paper here recently. What perfect timing for Christmas!

5 Month Milestones!

It's so hard to believe, but our baby girl is now officially 5 months old! I would say that this month, I have observed more milestones and changes in Siena than any other. It has truly been amazing to see the baby that she is growing to be. Milestone #1: She is now ROLLING OVER!! Well, she can roll from back to belly, but not back over. She gets aggravated that she can't do anything after a while of being there.

Milestone #2: She laughs and smiles so much! Recently, it's seems most nights between 7:00 and 8:00, EVERYTHING is hilarious. On the top of her giggle list, is the dogs. She loves to watch them move and play with each other. Here's a clip of the first night that we noticed it.



Milestone #3: She's definitely found her feet. She's actually started grabbing them. I just love seeing babies grab their feet!

Milestone #4: She is starting to sit up on her own. She typically can't sit up long, but the fact that she can balance herself unassisted for some time is great this early!

Observation #1: Siena is sooo loving. She just adores burying her face into your shoulder when you are holding her. She also likes pulling her baby into her face and holding it for a second. The newest thing she's into is giving "kisses." This includes slobbering all over your face from one cheek to the other! It's messy, but I just love them!


Observation #2: I'm amazed that she is already starting to reach for things. She reaches for the dogs all the time when they are near her, and she will actually pet them! I guess she likes feeling their fur, but she'll rub on them and "talk" while she's doing it. It's so sweet.

Observation #3: Now, when Siena gets super excited, she is starting to scrunch up her nose and breath harder, while kicking her feet and swinging her arms. It's adorable to watch, but hard to get on camera. Here is a picture of her face, at least.

Observation #4: Little things like the fact that she is already ticklish on her belly are just neat to take note of at this point. It's usually a great way to get her laughing. Of course, I could go on and on with other miscellaneous things. It's just all of these little things together that make up our beautiful, sweet girl. We are so thankful and praise God every day for allowing us to be her parents. We have SO much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving. We are very blessed with wonderful family and friends. You all mean so much to us! We hope and pray you have a safe and blessed Thanksgiving!

Baby Got Bling!

Okay, the topic of ear piercing at a young age has always been a toss up for me. I have heard that getting a baby's ears pierced before they can find them goes over well. (And looks adorable, by the way!) On the other hand, I wondered who in the world would want to torture their baby more than they have to. After all, we are already forced to let a nurse put some needles in their thighs every two months! Also, I always thought it should be left up to our little girl whether she even wanted holes in her ears.

What made me decide to take my child to Wal-Mart and punch holes in her ears was pretty funny. I remember back when Mom took me to get mine done. It was back at the old Wal-Mart in Athens. (before Wal-Mart got so big and added all the extra stuff.) I remember sitting on the stool at the jewelry counter, watching some woman mark my ears. I vaguely remember only getting one done before deciding that I didn't want to go through that pain again! Mom tried walking me around, looking at toys, and promising a new Barbie if I would just get the other one done. That sounded great until I was perched back up on that stool with the same woman coming toward me with a piercing gun! Yeah, that's right. It took my mom three attempts/trips to get it done. (I clamped down and refused the second time, too.)

One great thing is now they have two women that can do it at the same time. One pinch and it's over with. I just figured she is easier to hold down and can't scream, "You're a bad Mommy!" at me yet! I still felt bad; but I'm so glad I did it. Siena really did great! She didn't like me holding her head still while they were marking; so by the time they used the guns, she was already aggravated. She did cry, of course; but, after about 5 minutes, you wouldn't know she just had them done. My friends Tracey and Tamson insisted on documenting the "occasion" by recording and taking pictures. So, here's a few pictures so that you can share in the "joy" of that night.

The Many Hats of Siena...

Before we took Siena to Boo at the Zoo, I decided to go through her hats to see which would go best with her outfit. In the process, I learned a few things about Siena. First, she has a big head! Also, I saw how much she's grown just in the past 4 months. Remember this cute hat from the hospital?

Well, this is what it looks like now...

Yes, I thought that since it was big on her at the hospital, it might fit her now. Boy, was I wrong!! At this point, the hats just started looking more hilarious. I had to take pictures and give each of them a catagory that best describes what I thought she looked like in them. Here were a couple of my favorites:

I call this her "thug baby" look:


And this one, Siena Woo Who (Yeah, we like to read Dr. Seus to her alot):


After going through all this, we finally arrived at a winner:


She stayed warm and looked so adorable all bundled up! Well, I hope you got a good laugh out of this blog. There's never a dull moment with her around! Have a great day!!

Boo at the Zoo & First Halloween..

Okay, so it's taken a little longer than anticipated to get a blog done about last weekend. We fell in love with a kangaroo costume at Babies R Us. They actually had it on sale half off! Siena was the cutest little kangaroo! Just when you thought she couldn't get any cuter, she did! LOL..


We took her to Boo at the Zoo. We had a good time strolling around to look at all the exhibits. Maybe it was because of the colder season, but we didn't see as many animals out as we anticipated. After her little power nap, Siena woke up to see some penguins and later, a camal. She loved looking at them. She just had a blank stare on her face. We are even more excited to take her back next year, since she'll be able to enjoy the animals even more.

She also had a four month check up this week. She now weighs 17 lbs. 9 oz. and is 26 1/4" long. She is in the 99th percentile in both her weight and her length. The pediatrician said that he's not concerned because when you put the two together, she's in the average range. I also got the wonderful experience of holding her legs down while the nurse gave her the second round of shots. Neither of us liked that! We also are thinking she is not as far along on the teething process. Her slobber production has slowed down a little and she isn't favoring her gums as much. So, it may be a while before we see the first tooth coming in.

Last night, we took her "trick or treating". We went by lots of family and friends to show her off. She enjoyed it but wore out pretty quickly. Luckily, she was able to take naps between stops.

A New Frontier

Life has been good in the Botello household besides one new little detail. Siena has begun teething. She actually hasn't been too bad, but she is definitely a lot more fussy. I guess I'm just not used to her acting this way. A few nights have been rough, but I feel we are starting to get the hang of it. She always wants to put her fingers in her mouth. Teething rings work sometimes, but I guess in her book, fingers work best. Her bottom gum is swollen and now is proceeded by tons of slobber, but we have yet to see any teeth poking through. Also, her eyes are getting lighter. We really feel they will be hazel like Tommy's, but I'm still holding out for green or dark blue.


We also broke out her Johnny Jumper since she is starting to sit up well. Unfortunately, with her teething, this is all it looks like.

She is content the whole time she's in it, but she rarely does any jumping yet. She does love twirling around, though.

She has also started sitting in her walker, now. Her feet can hit the floor now! She loves playing with her toys on it. She can move in the walker, but it tends to be more backwards than forward.

On a side note, we're really excited to take her to Boo at the Zoo this coming weekend. We haven't picked up a costume for her, yet, but you can bet we will be posting some pictures of her all decked out.