Do not feed the bears!

I am not a bear!

Aerya at Four Months.

Aerya has now learned how to roll from her tummy to her back. She thinks this is great because she can now get out of tummy time - which she hates! She has also rolled a couple of times from her back to her tunny, but she gets quite upset when she realizes what she's done.
One of Aerya's favorite things to do is to jump in her jolly jumper. She will happily bounce away a half and hour jumping and spinning and looking at the world around her.

Trying to roll...

I know that if I just get this leg over here... No, wait, I mean if I just stretch over there... Nuh, uh, maybe if I...

Play time!

Aerya at Three Months

Aerya is certainly showing her independence and temper by her third month. She will only sleep with Mommy and Daddy, and will lay awake for hours in her crib. However, when she's awake, she's a joy and full of smiles!

Adventures in the outdoors

We had a great summer and tried to get out to enjoy it as often as possible.

Daddy plays football.

Derek plays flagfootball during the summer and Aerya came to watch a game and meet the boys.

Generations

Our trip to Chilliwack

At the end of August, Aerya and I went to Chilliwack with my Mom. We had a great time and Aerya was so incredibly good on the plane and throughout the trip. Some of the highlights certainly including visiting everyone and spending lots of time with GreatGrandma and Uncle Pat. But there was also bathing in the kitchen sink, our first plane trip, meeting JR (the dog) and watching GreatGrandma's squirrels.

Chubby Cheeks!

Tell me these aren't the chubbiest cheeks you've ever seen!

Peek a boo with Grandma

Aerya at two months

By two months old Aerya would talk and talk and then smile when people repeated what she had to say.
Aerya was sleeping about 1-2 hours during the day and about 4 at night - but only our bed!
We all enjoyed lots of time with the snuggli and playing with cow.

Aerya & Cow

Cow was Aerya's favorite toy for her first 3 months.
She would just stare at him for hours.

Aerya's Snuggli

The snuggli is a great invention. We could put Aerya in it and go for a walk and she'd be asleep in about 2 houses. She hated getting into it, but once we started walking everything was great!

Such a cutie!

More ever so cute pics.

Aerya at one month

By one month old Aerya could smile on her own and did so quite often. She was, and is still quite content most of the time and only cries when hungry or tired.
Aerya would sleep 2-3 hours at a time, but not in her crib. She would only sleep in someone's arms or sometimes in Mommy & Daddy's bed or her stroller.
Aerya's favorite toy was her black and white stuffed cow.

Little sleeping angel!

Aerya is a great sleeper, but until she was about 4 months old she really didn't like sleeping in her crib.

Little bit too small

Aerya needed to wear one of her cute outfits for her first outing (to the doctor's office), but she's a bit too small still..

Newborn Aerya

Here are Aerya's official newborn pictures. She has these incredible blue, blue eyes and dark hair and is so beautiful.

Her name is what??

Yes, we know her name is a bit unusual. We get tons of questions about her name, so I'll try and explain it while you browse these oh so cute pics.
Well, actually, there's not much to explain. We don't know how we came up with Aerya (pronouced area, like in math, or Area51). It evolved while I was on leave watching endless hours of TV waiting for our baby to arrive. We wanted something that Derek hadn't come across 18 million times in class. The middle name is easy, Rayne (pronouced rain) is my middle name as well, so we have Grandma & Grandpa Huggatt to thank for that wierd one. Believe it or not, we would have used Derek's middle name (Clifford), if we'd have had a boy (thankfully she's a she!) But seriously, she's so cute we could have named her Mud and it would have sounded sweet. And so long as Chad's fears of her becoming a large child with a name like Aerya don't come true, it'll all work out.

Coming home.

June 12, 2006.
After a bit of a hospital stay to allow me to recover, the Mitchell family was on it's way home. Just look how tiny Aerya is in her carseat!

She's finally here!

We never thought the day would arrive, but at 12:08 am on June 10, 2006 Aerya Rayne Mitchell was born. She was 8lbs and 20.5 inches long and so, so beautiful. While Aerya was such a strong trooper throughout our 28 hours of labour, I did not do quite so well. Thankfully, I've now completely recovered and am enjoying every moment with our new family.
Derek and Amber were amazing support people and they helped push me through the long hours. Though they do look very, very tired themselves!
My water broke at 8:00 pm on Thursday June 8 and we went right away to the hospital in Stony Plain because I immediately had strong contractions that were less than 3 mintues apart. Unfortunately, after 8 hours of this, I had only dilated one more centimeter (to 6) and would not go any farther so I got some ocitocin to help things along. I then pinched a nerve in my hip and needed an epidural for that pain. After another few hours with less than a centimeter of progress, we were transfered to the Sturgeon hospital in St. Albert. They gave me even more oxitocin, and I started pushing after 26 hours even though I was still only 8-9 cm. After 2 hours of pushing, they finally had to use a vacuum to get Aerya to come out. She must have just been so very comfy! Thankfully there were no problems whatsoever with her. As you can see, she's just perfect!