pictures

I love these pictures...



Sophia wanted to read a book to Arianna. Aria was really good about it, she just layed there listening for a long time.



Tummy time for Arianna. Everybody else was in the kitchen so Ari got some alone time on the floor. She had fun for a while. Then she got mad, but she was lifting her head all around, then she was exhausted, so she took a nap!

tired girl

Sophia has recently given up napping. It seems to be the tradition of Hopper children to give up one nap before the birth of a new baby. Normally it is the child immediately older than the new baby that gives up a nap, and it is usually the morning nap and the afternoon nap continues. This is what Alexander did to continue the tradition. Sophia threw her nap in as a bonus.

So, she is no longer napping, which for the first several weeks of her naplessness meant that she would fall asleep at the dinner table.

Yesterday she took it one step further.

Just a normal day

For some reason, this hat/glove/scarf box is a favorite toy around here. I cannot tell you how many times this scene happens ever day. This is not a passing craze either, the girls played with these things last summer, and they still are. We could pick up hats 10 times day. I don't know why it is such a draw, but it sure is fun for them. Alexander gets all decked out and then comes to find me and say "Nnnigh" meaning nice, cause that is what I usually say to him, so now he just says it for me.






Isabella was cleaning her room last night and came to drop something off to me, looking like this. She says "the baby likes to be close to her mama"


This is from a lamp that was in the closet. The closet has no door so at least once a week one of them comes out dragging the lamp around. Yesterday it was a microphone. The shade was a hat.


This is Aria's response to the whole thing.



Reading stories.

Bath time

Arianna got a bath on Saturday, that was our excitement. Everyone was very interested to gather around and watch! Her hair was so cute after her bath but apparently I never took a picture of it. It was so light and fluffy it was sticking up for days!

lots of help and an audience.





I just think this is a cute picture. Alexander's face shape is changing to be like Faron's. There both just adorable.

1 week old

Arianna is 1 week old today. It's hard to believe it has gone by this quickly, but it is also hard to imagine that it has only been a week. She has a couple of "long" awake times every day, usually after her first meal in the morning, and then one before bed time at night. Other than that she mostly eats and sleeps. When she is awake she is very alert and looking at everything, when she is asleep she is able to sleep through the chaos of 3 siblings running circles around her bed!

Night time has not been too bad, for most of her nights she only wakes up twice, though she has had a couple of nights of having a hard time falling back to sleep after she eats. I'm sure we will get it worked out though.

I am feeling pretty well, the first week is always the one to just get through, by 2 weeks I am pretty much back to normal, and I am looking forward to that. Faron and I are very aware of the smallness of our house this week, there's nothing like being cramped in a 900 square foot house with 4 kids 4 and under, and a mom who can't do much. We'll make it, I'm sure.

Here are some of Aria's one week pictures.


laying on Mama and Papa's bed



in a not quite so serene moment



Playing with her toys for the first time

stuff

Isabella and Sophia were discussing the fact that someday they will be bigger like Papa, and what they will do in that day.

When Sophia is big, she will be able to put on movies all by herself. (can you guess what we haven't done for a couple days?)

Isabella, however will be buying toys, all day long, every day at Toys R Us, and watching movies all night. When I asked her how she was going to pay for all the toys she said she would be working at Toys R Us.


Alexander has recently discovered that just because he understands what I am saying to him, that doesn't mean he has to do it. I'm sure this is a wonderful and necessary part of his developmental process, however it is very inconvenient. He use to be such a compliant child. "Alexander, come here" and he came. "Alexander put that over there" and he did. No more.

He has also discovered (just as his sisters did at his age) that while I am recovering from this c-section, I cannot pick him up, or chase him down, so I am not really that much of a threat. Sometimes smart kids are not so great!

Arianna has settled into a routine of eating and sleeping. She actually has a couple long awake times during each day. After she wakes up in the morning she eats and then is awake for about an hour, she looks all around at everything and is held by everyone. This morning we got out a baby gym for her to lay under and look at all the toys. She enjoyed it very much, looked at everything for a long time. She even reached out and swatted at some toys.

Tuesday

Isabella picked out Arianna's clothes yesterday. Actually she had them picked out the day before that and was just waiting to get to put them on her. Isabella loves picking out clothes, she often gets Alexander's clothes for the day, but now she has a little doll to dress too!



SISTERS!



All the hopper kids!



Sleeping soundly.

More pictures

We got home from the hospital this afternoon, right at the begining of the next wave of the ice storm, so we walked in and Grammy and Pop headed out to try to beat the storm home. We have had a pretty good first day home but we are all ready for bedtime now! Here are some more pictures of Arianna's first days.


In the hospital


We didnt' have Arainna's bassinet set up yet, so she borrowed her big brother's bed for her first nap at home.


Love holding my new baby sister



Isabella has been calling her "Ari"


Alexander loves Arianna! He is always trying to hold her and kiss her. He calls her "Nah-nah"






This is the outfit and blanket that all the girls have come home from the hospital with. Arainna got to put it on today and join the ranks.



Taking it all in

Day 0 has arrived! We have a new baby Girl!

Arianna Ilaria Hopper was presented to us at 9:30 am on January 12, 2007. What a baby girl this is! She was a whopping 7 lbs. 14 oz. and 20" long. She has been able to carry on quite a conversation! She is able to tell us when she is hungry and when she wants to go to sleep. We see her cute little mouth going and her toung shoots in and out just like Schmanny's. Then after a good feeding, she will gently lay her head down and tell us that she is ready for a nap when she refuses to keep her eyes open.