Frenulum? I hardly knew'em!

Today was the day that Kristen has been dreading - poor little Luella had her frenulum clipped! For those of you that are unfamiliar with what a frenulum is: it is the oral tissue that connects your tongue to the bottom of your mouth. If it extends too far toward the tip of the tongue it causes a condition referred to as "tongue tie." Being tongue tied can cause difficulty nursing (which we are not really having) and speech problems down the road, not to mention the inability to lick an ice cream cone! After a consultation with a pediatric ENT wherein he pronounced her tongue tie "moderately severe," we decided to go ahead with the procedure while she's still young enough (and the frenulum thin enough) that the clipping is a relatively simple procedure. (Waiting until toddler age or older requires stitches and sometimes general anesthesia)

So, this morning we set the alarm for 5:45 to ensure that Luella was able to get a little nibble before she was forced to fast prior to the procedure. We rolled into the doctor's office at 8:15 and they stuck Lu in a cozy backboard papoose, lifted her tongue, applied a topical anesthetic, and - snippy snippy. Mom opted to sit this out in the hall, so Dad watched and did some creative camera work (sorry for the crappy photog - trying to be like an undercover, investigative reporter). When the smoke cleared and the dust settled, all was fine. After the doc applied pressure to her tongue for 1 minute, Kristen came in and Lu breastfed like a champ. I think that Kristen was more affected by the procedure than little Lulu was. To make sure all was well, Luellabelle and I took momma K-mizz out for ice cream.

"I swear, I swear , I do declare...

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... that my first Gourds show was an ass ton of fun," says Lulu.

She got all dudded up in her cute clothes (read: overalls), made sure that she had her noise canceling ear muffs and a little spending money for snacks and what-not. We took the scenic, one hour drive up to Morristown, TN to catch the boys at the Rose Center. It was a rip roaring good time, even though little Lulabelle slept though three-quarters of it - guess the ear protection worked!






Afterwards, Luella Marie demanded to go back and hang with the gents. (Don't you dare call her a Backstage Betty!) As always, they were kind and allowed for a few photo ops. We cannot wait for the Spring - hopefully the sun and our favorite Austin band will return!

Rollin!

I know I haven't posted yet about our trip back to Texas to introduce Luella to family and attend my brother's wedding (to an amazing gal), but I promise I'll do so soon! I'm waiting for pics from the wedding - we were so caught up in the festivities that we forgot to take our own. Suffice to say we had an amazing time and miss everyone already. I'll write more about the trip sometime in the next few days.


In the meantime, I wanted to post because we've had an exciting week of milestones. On Friday, Luella smiled at me for the first time! She's been very stingy with them since, but it was just beautiful and I can't wait for more.

And today, Luella turned 7 weeks old AND rolled from her stomach to her back during tummy time! This picture was taken just afterwards. Hooray!




And I'm not the only one excited about tummy time - the dogs are totally digging the fact that Luella is spending more time playing on the floor! (Don't worry, they're always supervised, and actually won't even go near her unless we invite them.)

Crazy Hair

This was taken an hour or so after Luella's bath. Her hair always looks crazy just after being shampooed. It doesn't stay that way for long - the top of her head gets kissed a million times a day, and the fluff gets tamed very quickly.

Her eyes are starting to lighten up, and it looks like she's going to have Allen's blue eyes. They're beautiful!

Little Big

She may not fit in our living room chairs yet, but Luella is growing up fast! We had our one-month doctor's appointment today, and she now weighs 7 pounds and is 18 and 3/4 inches long!

For those of you who don't like to do math, she's just over 50% heavier than she was four weeks ago! Woohoo!!

Music and Milk

Luella's music appreciation lessons have officially begun! While we play recorded music for her all the time (her favorite musician is currently Ben Sollee, and we're working on getting posters for the walls of her bassinet) today Allen finally picked up the mandolin for the first time since she joined the outside world. She LOVED it! She sat there, eyes open and totally alert, listening until he finally had to put the mando away and head to work.




Also, she's still eating and sleeping well. In fact, she usually eats so well that nursing sends her into a stupor. She's been making us laugh by pulling away from the breast and falling back onto the pillow to pass out, limbs akimbo. I think she's a bit melodramatic, but the effect is impressive. Note the growing double chin - we hope to have a chubby baby on our hands very soon!

Where's Luella???

Can anyone find the little bitty in the photo? Don't look too long - might cause seizures.