Darla...to date.

It has been nearly two weeks since Darla came to live with us. I cannot believe how insanely different life has been since we came home from Utah. The same week Darla was placed with us we put in an offer on a house and went into contract. It's a wonderful house and we're excited....nervous like any one who is buying a home, but also excited.

We haven't started packing yet because the wonderful lady we're buying from wanted a rent back period so that she didn't have to move out until AFTER escrow closes, so we don't even need to start packing until escrow closes either....which should be on November 5th....right before Adam's shoulder surgery. That's a whole different story altogether.

Back to the point....Darla!

Her little personality is so sweet already, she has started smiling but only seems to smile at me, which is so special. I cannot believe this little one can smile already...she'll be a month old this week and that is WAY earlier than any of my other babies started smiling. She loves to be cuddled and it instantly calms her everytime just to hold her. But she is not at all like Maggie was as a baby, which was a concern for us. Maggie as a drug baby was VERY clingy and screamed constantly if not held all the time. As a consequence i simply started wearing her in a sling all day and night until she got over that....after about three months. It was a long three months but well worth it because she has grown into a wonderfully intelligent and independant little girl. Darla, though, loves to stretch out and just sleeps wherever however, she is not picky at all. She seems to just enjoy taking everything in, in a lot of ways she is very similar to Catcher and she acts just like he did a few months ago.

Last week Elaine had a cough all week and no matter how hard we tried to isolate the babies from it there was no way around it....both babies are now sick. It appears to be RSV but we are watching it very closely and while Catcher is hacking quite hard and his appetite is decreased it doesn't seem to be hurting him too much. Darla on the other hand with her being so small...we are watching her very close to make sure it doesn't require medical attention. Catcher went thru RSV at a very early age and ended up in the hospital for two weeks....i REALLY don't want Darla to have to go thru that. She is still eating and sleeping pretty well so i'm not too worried...yet.

Last night both babies woke up a few more times than normal and i swear it's like they have a pact to wake up one right after the other. Inevitably when one wakes up and i take care of them and feed them and change them and put them back to sleep...just when i'm laying down to go back to sleep, the other one wakes up. It is getting a little tiresome but i know they'll get past this eventually....won't be this hard forever :)

Darla now weighs just under 7 pounds....she is growing fast already! She is very strong for such a tiny baby and can hold her head up already and grabs things to put in her mouth! She is practically ready for toys already!! Crazy!

Hopefully I'll get some pictures of the house to post on here soon....can't believe we are moving but hopefully this will be a house we will stay in for a VERY long time!