Crusty Van Crusterson

We decided Briz' new nickname will be Crusty. Her tear ducts have not completely developed, so instead of crying tears, she gets all this goop in her eyes. We had to go back to the doctor to check to make sure she didn't have an infection. Apparently, there's not much I can do about it, except wait for it to get normal. Her thrush improved for a little while, then came back, and now its improved again, so hopefully it will go away for good. And she's still working on the whole digestive system. She still has a little bit of a hard time figuring out how to get rid of the gas she gets after she eats. She think she wants to eat all the time! But she's getting much quicker at burping after she eats. Hallelujah! And once she does that, she's much more content and happy. Our doctor said that babies react differently to gas. Some babies develop collic, and other babies, you would have no idea they are gassy. And Brizban is just sensitive. In other words, she called our little girl a wimp. Uh oh! Drama already.

But she's developed perfectly. She now weighs 8 lbs. 1 oz. It's so sad, she's starting to outgrow some of her preemie onesies. She hasn't started getting chunky yet. She's getting longer and leaner. She lifts her head up all the time and literally almost rolled herself over the other day. She does not ever stop moving! And the happiest moment so far, she smiled while awake yesterday for the first time. We can't get enough of her, even when she is gassy and uncomfortable :) But she has slept 5 hours a couple nights in the last week, so that makes me love her even more!

In my own personal feat, I ran 1 mile a few times this last week. I was very proud of myself and very out of breath after I did it. It's all very sad, but baby steps!

Briz on her changing pad. She normally doesn't like it when I change her diaper, but she was very happy this time, so I thought I would take advantage of it and take a picture.

Just relaxing on Dad's stomach. I love this little pose.

This is one of her favorite positions. All curled up on her tummy. She is still so tiny. Nick's phone is about half her size in length.

She does this really funny thing where after she's crying and we put her on Nick's chest, she hides. We can't move her, she's like clenched in this position. It''s like she's saying, "Just leave me alone! I don't want to be here! Life is just way too hard!"

More Pics

2 Weeks Old

Briz is a little over 2 weeks old. She is more and more awake each day. And she is getting fatter by the moment!

Unfortunately, as soon as we got rid of the jaundice, we developed a case of thrush. It was pretty painful while I was nursing. But luckily, its gotten better pretty quickly. For a while I was a pumping machine. I at least now know that she will take a bottle pretty easily. She likes to eat so much that I don't think she cares where it comes from!

With Sierra after her bath.

She pooped about 5 seconds after this. Doesn't she just look guilty? What? what did I do Mom???

Before this picture, she was flipping me off. She then moved to put a finger up her nose.


One of her many poses, while stretching out on the couch. She's all limbs, like her Dad.

These are a bunch of the faces she makes while she's sleeping.

She loves being outside.

Around One Week

Brizban has had some adventures in her first week. I've posted a bunch of pictures of her, all of which are her around one week old.

This is just after her first real bath. Her umbilical cord fell off about day 7 or 8, so we gave her a bath right away, and of course she loved it.


Total relaxation!

A big yawn.

Hanging out with the fam.

Working those eyebrows and the double chin.

Her first Sunday. We took her to sacrament meeting in Portland on Mother's Day. I only took her cause I knew I would either get a flower or candy and I couldn't miss out.

Her first real outing (excluding walks with mom and running to the store). We went to Ann's baby shower to get ready for her cousin Ruby to be born.

Relaxing with Papa.

The doctor told me to take her out in the sun a little bit to help with her jaundice. This is one day after one of our walks. She was basking in it. A little sun baby :)

This one I'm sure you don't want to see, but these are my eyes about a week after delivery. And now, 2 1/2 weeeks after, they are almost completely cleared up.

Adventures with Poo

I apologize because I don't have any pictures to post. My cord to upload pictures is at my parents' house in Portland, so as soon as I get that, I will add some new ones.

Briz has started to show her little personality, and it's fun to watch all of her little idiosyncricies. Even though she's improved, she still has a hard time going to the bathroom. After and/or in between feedings, I have to rub her tummy and burp her for quite a while until she either farts, burps, spits up, or the best of all of them, takes a little dump. And as I mentioned previously, I still get excited when she goes to the bathroom, mostly because I know how content she will be after (aren't we all).

Last week we went to the doctor to check on her jaundice and I discussed with the doctor my concerns about her bowel movements. He said, if its been a really long time, I can give her my own baby enima. So I went home and tried it. I stuck a q-tip up her tiny rear end, and I was not prepared for what would follow. It was literally projectile poop. Luckily, my hand eye coordination kicked in, and I held up the changing pad to deflect the poop coming straight at me. But me and my mom could not stop laughing, because it was unbelievable how much crap came out of a tiny little person. My mom, being the wonderful grandma she is, stuck her hand in front of the poop to stop it, so she had poop all over her!

The other day, Nick and I were gone most of the afternoon to run some errands. So I took her to the car to feed her. She would not wake up, so I decided to change her diaper quickly. I just had her on my lap, and thought, oh, this could be dangerous. But then I thought, it will be fine cause she hardly ever poops, and it takes quite a bit of effort on her part before she does. The second I took off her pee diaper, she went everywhere all over my jeans! It was a huge puddle o' poo just sitting in my lap. I used pretty much a whole thing of wipes to try to clean up the mess. But I went into the doctor with brown all over the front of me and smelling really bad.

Brizzy's favorite thing is water. If she hears water, she's happy. I think its hilliarous because she could be crying really hard and if I turn on a faucet near her, she instaneously stops. She absolutely LOVES her baths, and makes little cooing noises the whole time. The only part she hates is when she gets taken out of the bath. She is more and more awake every day. When Nick and I hold her under our chin, she'll pull her head back and just look up at us. It's so cute. And she's a little piggy; she loves to eat! Last Wed. we went into the doctor and she was 6 lbs. 10 oz. We went back in on Monday, and she was 7 lbs. 8 oz. Yikes! She gained 14 ounces in 5 days. The doctor didn't seem too worried and said that more than anything she's been playing catch up since she was so small. But the girl likes to eat. I guess she takes after her mother :)

B Rizzle

Briz is now 5 days old! It's already gone by so fast, and she changes so much every day.

She's doing really well, but still trying to catch up. Since she was a few weeks early and had jaundice, her digestive system is a little bit behind, and her tummy has been getting upset. It breaks my heart to hear her sad little cry. And I had no idea I could get such elation from hearing her poop. It's like a sigh of relief. Every time I hear that big squirt, I want to jump up and do a dance :)

We think she gets cuter and cuter every day and love her more and more. I am starting to feel a little couped up in my house and am anxious to be out and about, showing her off. So if anyone wants to come visit me, please come!!!!

Here are a few more pictures.

I have a few videos of her, but I can't find the cord to upload the videos to my computer. I'll work on it, because its more fun to see her little face and expressions.

More Pics

I am currently in the NICU in the hospital, uploading all of these pictures and typing these blogs. We had to go to the doctor today for a follow up appt. and they determined that she needed to get her bilirubin levels tested. So then we went to the hospital, where she got her foot poked for bloodwork. It was the saddest thing holding her, just letting her scream and get hurt. I was trying really hard not to cry. They called us back quickly after and said we needed to spend the night in the hospital, so she can sleep under a light to try to get rid of the jaundice. She's doing a great job, and its the hardest thing for me to just not hold her. But she'll be fine, and I can't wait to just be at home again.

So since I have a little bit of time, I'm taking advantage of it and posting a bunch of pictures. This is my last post for at least a few days! Okay, I make no promises, but its my last post for today at least. Here are some of my favorite pics so far:

You can tell she's a little jaundice here. She's pretty orange, but you can also see how light her hair is. She loves cuddling with Dad right by his face.

We were trying to get her dressed to go to the doctor. Not much fits her right now. We have a few preemie onesies that work, but other than that, she looks like a little gangster. That's the look we were going for in this picture. None of her hats fit, so I went with the classic little bow instead.

I wonder where she gets her long fingers from!

Chubby little cheeks!

I love this picture because you can see how tiny she is in her bouncy chair.

Her going home from the hospital outfit.

So sweet.

This is the only picture I will allow posted of me because I've had a couple days to recover and you can't see my face very close up. Here we are ready going home from the hospital.

She's so little in her car seat! I am in denial that she's going to get any bigger.



She loves being burped. This is just after her bath that I gave her at home.

I love these pictures because you can see how long her arms, hands, fingers, and feet are. She uses her arms and hands a ton to express herself. It's funny because she'll do something with her hands or feet, and I'm like, I remember that from when you were in the womb! Her fingers are like half the size of mine!

She's doing a dance move.

She's either saying What's up! Or she's demonstrating how she will one day have the ability to palm a basketball.

Her toes make us laugh because they are all the same lenght. Her pinky toe is the same size as her big toe! They look like fingers.