Category Archives: Check-Up
Happy 2nd Birthday Lily!
Happy 2nd birthday to my sweet little Lily pad!! Lily is about 23 pounds (8 percentile) and stretches about 34 inches tall (average percentile). At her 2 year check-up, she got a finger prick to test her hemoglobin and lead and the doctors said her levels are really good, and she got 1 shot in the thigh and she cried at first but then stopped and was a happy camper shortly after! She even said thank you to the nurses and waved bye and when asked how old she was, she’ll put up 1 finger and say “TWO!!” haha! Her pediatrician said she is developing really nicely and acts like a 3 year old instead of 2 year due to her openness to everyone and how cooperative she was. She listened really well and is talking so much, and picks up on language super fast! She’s starting to go through a mimic phase and will copy her friend’s actions and she loves to hold her friend’s hands! She’s getting smarter each day and is growing so fast! Where did the time go baby girl? She also started potty training 2 weeks ago and is making really great progress!! She’s at the point where she’s really good at telling us she needs to go and we take her and she actually goes! Her favorite phrase right now is “I go poopoo choilet!” I love the way she says toilet haha. “Choilet!” She talks so much now and her vocabulary is exploding! Just last week she knew the word “octagon!” We are so proud of her and all her accomplishments in her first 2 years of life!
On Friday, June 6, Lily had a little birthday celebration at her school. We had a special circle time with all her classmates where her teacher, Mr. Monica, showed her classmates 3 photos of her (1 of her at 1 months old, 1 years old, and now 2 years old). They had a special music box that plays the Happy Birthday song when you wind it, but Lily didn’t want to wind it so we just sang to her without that. Then we all went to sit down at the table where the kids got to eat sugar free cookies and apple slices! The sugar free cookies were actually pretty good, who would have thought? Haha. I also made origami lilies from various designed scrapbook paper, and used floral tape to tape down little party favor bubble wands inside the flower. I tied a gold ribbon and tag to the top of the bubble wand, and the tag says “Roses are red, violets are blue, blow some bubbles, Lily is 2!” All the adults seemed to really like it, they weren’t going to pass them out to the kids until they leave for the day, but I’m hoping they liked the bubbles, who wouldn’t? Lily also got to enjoy some refreshing watermelon before it was time to go home from school! She had a great day celebrating at school!!
On Sunday, it was Lily’s actual birthday, and that’s when all our family and friends gathered to celebrate our little angel turning 2 years old! I made all the desserts with the help of my lovely assistant Sarah! Desserts included milk and white chocolate mousse, tiramisu, panna cotta, chocolate kiss nutter butter acorns, macarons (green tea, raspberry, and fruity pebbles), and I made this balsamic mozzarella cheese tomato appetizers too. My aunt made chocolate dipped strawberries and had the creative idea of sticking them on the top of pineapples! My super talented and crafty dad made all the wooden dessert stands too! I also made Lily’s display cake as well! We ordered the usual lot of Vietnamese food (nem nuong, fried noodles, egg rolls, banh beo), and my family made some clear noodles, soy, fried rice, pasta salad and cut up fruits too. Lily had a super great time this year because she’s older and she had a blast running around the grass with the balloon sticks and playing with all the other kids! I love watching her play and laugh her little tooshie off. Her happiness is my happiness!
My friend Mieng also did a really nice photoshoot of Lily for me for photos to be displayed at her birthday party! I was also able to use them to print out thank you magnets to send to everyone as well! The photos came out better than I could imagine and I’m so grateful to have these beautiful photos that I can share and hold onto forever. So special thanks to Mieng for all your talents! We are lucky to have you! =) You can view more pictures from her birthday party from my simple camera and photos that Mieng took HERE!
Look at all the presents! She was so excited to open them but there was so much that she just wanted to play and got tired of opening them, so I had to step in and help her open them all haha. She’s really spoiled with so much love by everyone! She deserves all of it and so much more!
Lastly, Khoa selected a bunch of video clips from Lily’s past year and Jennifer put them all together in this lovely video! Thank you Khoa for combing through the hundreds of video clips and thank you Jennifer for creating this video that we will be able to share with Lily when she’s older! It’s so wonderful to be able to watch our sweet baby girl grow from being a 1 year old baby to a 2 year old toddler! Get ready to smile, laugh, and fall in love with Lily all over again in the video below! She is the greatest joy of my life! Lily I wish you the most wonderful 2nd birthday! I love watching you grow everyday, and you made me the happiest mommy in the whole world! You brighten my days, my life, my soul. Baby I love you so much with all of my heart, forever and beyond!
Lily Turns Two from J.N. on Vimeo.
Happy 21 Months Lily!
Happy 21 months Lily (over a week ago…)!! Lily weighs at about 21.3 pounds and stretches about 32 inches long. She’s lost some weight because she was sick for a couple week, poor baby had early stage pneumonia =(. She had a cough for a few weeks and then she got a fever at school one day, so Khoa took her to her pediatrician. She start wheezing when she breathed and that’s when the doctor said she had early stage pneumonia since her left lung wasn’t so clear. She had to be on antibiotics and breathe through the nebulizer 3 times a day for about a week before her lungs cleared up! Afterwards, her appetite slowly came back! Lily likes to say “thank you”, “all done”, “mommy”, “daddy”, and can sign “different” very well now. she also likes to say phrases like “what is this?”, “what is that?” and point to her drawings and saying “I did this!” a lot too!! She can also point to us and say “this is dada, this is mama” then point to herself and say “this is Lily (yiyi)”. It’s amazing to hear her speak so much! She likes to point up in the sky when she sees an airplane or helicopter, and she also likes to take selfies in my phone and totally ham it up with facial expressions! She sometimes wake up from her naps babbling and cracking up with herself haha!! She’s such a happy spirited baby, she lights up our lives! She’s getting smarter and smarter each day!
Lily also loves to sing!! Twinkle Twinkle Little Star is one of my go-to songs when I lullaby Lily at night, and usually she just rests peacefully in my arms while I sing it to her, and then place her in her crib. I haven’t noticed until recently that she can sing along to the song now, and I assume her school taught her some dancing motions to go along with this song, along with Ring Around the Rosie! I was able to capture it and she’s so cute when she tries to sing along, her favorite part must be the “up above” line haha! She also babbles a lot with some audible words here and there. She’s starting to get really good at repeating words now too and can hum to tunes to several songs! I can listen to her and watch her all day!!
One of her favorite things to do is to play outside. She loves the slide and slides down it like a pro! She waits for her daddy to count to three and then she slides down! She’s so full of energy and is non stop, I love seeing how happy and active she is! She also insisted on wearing her sunglasses outside! She’s a smart cookie for wanting to protect her eyes! She actually kept them on the entire time!! She also got to walk Luna for the first time!! She did great and insisted on walking Luna from the park all the way home! She did so well! She’s so cute walking her furry best friend, but man, she’s growing up fast! Check out these videos of her playing at the park and walking Luna!
Today is also St. Patrick’s Day! Lily is all dressed in green, and found the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and is sharing all her treasures! Dressing her up is fun, but she also loves to wear hats and look pretty too! If you tell her she looks so pretty, her face will light up!! She loves playing with jewelry and beaded necklaces and she can put them on herself with ease now too. She’s so girly haha.
Happy 19 Months Lily!
Happy 19 months to my sweet little Lily pad! Right now Lily weighs at about 21.25 pounds and stretches about 31.5 inches tall! I realized I forgot to post her 18 months, but her stats hasn’t really changed TOO much in the past month. Her weight was in the 1st percentile, she fell off the charts, so that’s a little bit worrisome, but she seems to be healthy overall. We’re giving her pediasure at night so that she can retain some extra calories, since her weight percentage needs to be higher than her height percentage. We’re trying to give her more red meat and that’s a hit or miss right now, she tends to like chicken more than cows…haha. We had her 19 month follow up today and she gained almost 2 pounds from her 18 month check up, putting her back up at the 5th percentile, placing her right on the line of the growth chart. At least she’s not out of the curve so that’s very good progress! Other than that, she’s growing up to be a very bright and smart little toddler! She’s going to be moving up from the Infant Willow class at LePort to the Toddler class in a couple weeks! She already got a chance to play in the toddler playground and her teachers say she loves it. She’s becoming a pro at drinking from her little glass, and she knows to point out all her facial features when you ask her! She even knows how to say “eyes” and other words very clearly now!
Lily 18 Months
Lily 19 Months
We had her 2nd Christmas celebration and it was even more fun than last year. This year, she knows how to rip open the wrapping paper and is eager to find out what’s inside! She pats on the box once it’s open and wants us to open the toy for her so she can play with it! So smart! She loves her new kitchen set from my parents, and she also really loves her new Trike from us! The video below is of her seeing and riding her Trike for the first time!! Also, Jennifer and Andrew came to stay with us for 5 days for Christmas, and she was super nice enough to take our Christmas pictures! You can view all the beautiful pictures HERE! We’re so lucky to have such a talented sister to capture these yearly photos for us, thanks sissy!!!
Lily also got to go to Vegas for the first time! We managed to sneak in a picture of Lily hitting the slots at the airport, she was very intrigued! Haha, but it was only for 30 seconds and then we wiped her hands right after that to clean all the germies off!! We had a very local experience at Vegas since I didn’t want to take Lily to the casinos where all the second hand smoke were, so we did a lot of local things around Alvina’s community like taking her to park, and then we visited the Container Park, the Children’s Discovery Museum, and we even got a private tour of Zappos where Alvina works!! We also got to see AMAZING Christmas lights at the cactus garden at the Ethel M’s Chocolate Factory as well! I’ve never seen soooo many lights in one place before, it was so cool! Lily loves looking at the lights and pointing at everything and saying “woooo”!
Happy New Year – 2014
Lastly, I leave you with this super cute video of Lily dancing with her teapot in her jammies and a video of her running off with a new toy she wanted at target! Enjoy!
Happy 15 Months Lily!
Happy 15 months to my precious Lily pad!!! Lily weighs in at 19.6 pounds (6%) and stretches 29.25 inches (13%) tall with a head circumference of 17.5 inches (12%). She’s still small for her age but at least she’s growing at her own pace, and she can finally be switched to whole milk now! Yay time to save some money haha! She also still takes 2 naps a day, and it can be from 1 hour to 3 hours or more! She loves to eat porridge along with yogurt, bananas, and fruits like strawberries! She loves snacking on crackers, goldfishes and cheerios! She has a lot of teeth growing in too, lots of molars in the back!! She’s starting to pick up sign language a lot more now too, she’s currently able to sign “milk”, “eat”, “more”, “wash hands”, “please”, “thank you” and “cracker”! She loves to “talk” and say “hi” and “bye” and of course she’s an expert at saying “mama” and “dada”. Whenever she sees something new, she holds it up and says “what’s this” or “what’s that”! It’s so amazing how much she’s starting to understand as well. I’ll tell Lily it’s time for a bath and she’ll start walking to the bathroom, or when I tell her lets go wash her hands, she’ll sign wash hands and start walking to the bathroom. I set up her double stepping stool and she’ll start to climb the steps, andI turn on the water and she reaches for the water! She’s so smart! She also knows to sit in her chair when she wants to eat and sometimes she’ll go to her chair first and sign eat and wait for me to bring her food!! It’s so amazing watching her grow and develop! I’m always so proud of her and love her sooooo much!!! Happy 15 months my Lily pad!!!
Lily can now also go down the slide all by herself!!! She loves the slide and roaming around the playground!! She’s so cute, we love watching her play and having a great time outdoors!!
Also, Lily loves to walk everywhere and explore! Check out this video of her walking everywhere at her grandparent’s house (Ong Ba Noi)! It’s amazing how much energy she has in such a tiny little body, there’s no stopping her!! Go Lily go!!
Also, check out this super cute reaction to me (her mama) picking her up from school yesterday!!!!
Lily’s 1 Year Check-Up
Lily (1 year and 2 days old) got her 1 year check up yesterday! She weighed in at 18.1 pounds which is actually in the 5 percentile (so small!!!). Lily eats a lot too but I guess not enough! So the doctor told us to not give Lily whole milk just yet, but give her stage 2 (toddler 9-24 month) formula for about 3 months and add 5 more ounces of milk to her daily intake and reduce the amount of solids. Her head circumference is 17.5 inches (28%) which he said is good, and she stretches 29 inches long which is around 40%! Lilyd fell asleep while waiting for the doctor so when he finally came in, he was able to check her ear and nose while she was sleeping haha. He said everything else looks pretty good, we just need to work on her weight. It’s amazing how much she changed because just 3 months ago at her 9 month check up, she was almost about 50% in everything. I guess her metabolism is just too fast or something, time to fatten her up! haha. Next comes the shots! We decided to let her sleep while they give her the two shots she’s supposed to get, and this is what happens, poor baby, but what a trooper!! 2 minutes later she was smiling and happy again! Yay!!!
Happy 9 Months Lily!
Happy 9 months old my precious Lily pad!!! Lily had her 9 month check up today and she did great for the most part! She now weighs 17.15 pounds, stretches 27.75 inches long, and has a head circumference of 17 inches. She’s pretty much average on all point but slipped a tiny bit under average for weight. She had a finger prick test today to test her anemia level and it’s at 12.3, which is normal! She also got two shots today, poor baby! She cried but was very good afterwards. She kept wanting to chew the band aid on her finger from the finger prick, and when I didn’t let her, she kept crying. Poor baby, mommy’s sorry, I just want to protect you from the yucky band aid! She was a little more sensitive today than in the past, so I had to give her extra attention otherwise she’ll cry from the discomfort of the shots, poor baby =(. Here are some photos of her at her doctor’s visit today!
Enjoying the crinkly paper!
Getting her eyes and nose checked!
Enjoying the view of outside!
So sad!!! It pains to see her cry, but I feel bad cause she looks so cute!
I can’t believe our Lily pad is already 9 months old. She’s been out in the world just about as long as she has been in my belly, so amazing! I can literally stare at her and just watch her all day long and never be bored! Another thing that she’s accomplished is that she’s a baby model! (I will post more on this later). She is represented by Paloma Model & Talent, and she already had 2 jobs at Infantino modelling toys! Her picture will be on the packaging boxes for the toys, and those toys can be sold anywhere like Target, Walmart, Babies ‘R Us, Costco, etc! She had a job yesterday, and one of the moms of the baby models there told me something really special about Lily’s name. Her daughter’s middle name is also Lily, and she said the name is so beautiful and wonderful because you can’t say her name without smiling! It’s so true, and I love it!! Happy 9 months my little angel, mommy and daddy loves you to pieces!!!!
Happy 6 Months Lily!
Happy 6 months Lily! I cannot believe half a year has already gone by!! We had Lily’s 6 month check up yesterday as well, and she weighs 15.6 pounds, she’s 25 inches long, and her head measures 16.5 inches in circumference! Her pediatrician said she’s a very healthy and strong baby, and knows exactly where to grow since she was in the 50th percentile in all areas haha! She got two shots, and she was super brave and good! She didn’t make a peep with the first shot, but then 2 seconds after the second one, she let out a short cry and once I picked her up, she stopped! She’s so good! She eats 6 fl. oz. in every meal except once a day we give her 7fl oz. We started giving her solids 2 weeks ago, so she’s been eating about 1 oz of that a day as well. She is still sleeping through the night, about 10-12 hours at night. She is able to sit by herself a lot longer now, but sometimes she’s still wobbly so she cannot sit unsupervised. She’s still very strong and just the other day we moved her up 1 level on the jumper! She’s growing so fast, and her personality is slowly coming out more and more each day. She’s so cute, lovable and fun, we are both in so much love with this little angel. Happy 6 months Lily!!!
Lily’s 4 Month Check-Up!
Lily (4 months 3 days) got her 4 months check up today and got her shots as well (1 oral, and 3 shots). She did so well and only cried for maybe a minute!! What a brave baby!! She weighs 13.85 pounds (50th percentile), her head is 16 inches in circumference (50th percentile), and she stretches 25 inches long (80th percentile). She’s doing so great and growing nice and tall, good job baby girl!! The doctor said she’ll have growth spurts (she grew 3 inches in 2 months!) so next time she might not grow as much, but the important thing is she’s growing! =) She’s also really strong when it comes to standing on her legs and supporting her body weight as well, and she has a very strong neck and masters the push-ups during tummy time! When we went home, she took a nice long nap and was happy and playful when she woke up! She wasn’t fussy or had any fevers, way to go my Lily pad!!
It’s always painful and heartbreaking to see our baby cry, but here’s the video of her getting her 4 months shots. Don’t worry, the crying doesn’t last that long =). Mommy and daddy are so proud of you baby girl!!
Lily’s 2.5 Month Shot
Lily (10 weeks and 5 days old) got her Polio shot today and I am so proud of her! They didn’t check her weight or length or anything cause it was suppose to just be a quick visit to get her polio shot, but I’m guessing she’s probably over 12 pounds now! Also, use is officially wearing size 2 diapers now!! Our baby is growing so fast, make it stop!! haha. Enjoy her 9 week old and 10 week old photos of our precious baby dragon! Also, check out this video of our cute baby girl and her cute pouty lips!!
Happy 2 Months Lily!
Happy 2 months old to our precious Lily!! I cannot believe how fast time is going by, it seems like it’s on jet fuel on turbo mode or something, my baby only has 1 month left of being a newborn! *sniff sniff* Our little Lily pad is more alert these days, and stays awake for about 1-2 hours at a time, usually about twice a day (in the morning and in the evening). About 2 weeks ago she started playing on the floor gym and she absolutely loves it! She’ll lay there by herself even, and just stare at the dangly toys and wave her arms and kick her legs with joy and excitement! She loves to look around, she’s very curious and is attracted to colorful things and bright lights! She really like mobiles as well! 
She smiles more and is cooing a lot as well! Sometimes she even makes noises that sounds like little baby chuckles, it’s super cute! She’s getting longer and bigger, and her eyelashes are gorgeously long! She totally gets that from her daddy! =) She’s also starting to fill out the crib more, still small, but almost twice as big from 2 months ago! She sleeps on average of 4-5 hours a night, the other day she slept for 6 hours! She eats about 4 fluid ounces at each meal time and within a week or two, she will graduate to size 2 diapers! She moved up from newborn to size 1 diapers shortly after she hit 1 month! So far we haven’t had to buy any new diapers yet (knock on wood) thanks to all our friends and family who bought them for us! We are SUPER grateful for that! Also, last week her newborn clothes started getting tight. So we started to put her in size 3 month – 6 month clothes now. I got really sad when this happened because that means my baby is getting bigger! It’s bitter sweet! I will definitely store her clothes in a box, I’m too attached!! haha.
Lily had her 2 month check-up today! She came into the doctor’s office sleeping as you can see and then she eventually wakes up. She stretches 21.75 inches long (about in the 50th percentile), weighs 11.25 pounds (a little above 50%), and her head measures 15 inches in circumference (between 25-50%). After the nurse got all her measurements, Lily was waiting happily and patiently to see the doctor! As you can see, she eventually got bored and sleepy, very typical of Lily to be sleepy all the time haha. Doctor Wang finally came in to examine Lily and said she’s doing really great and is developing very well! His words were “she’s developing really really good!” haha! Way ta go Lily pad!!
Then, of course, what we’ve all been waiting for (except for Lily) Lily got her shots! The first one was an oral shot that supposedly tasted sweet, she took that no problem. I was surprised at how much there was of it, but she drank it like a champ! Then the next 4 shots were the ones I dreaded, mostly because I feared what she would have to go through phyically and me mentally. Khoa’s mom was told to hold her arms down, and right as she did that, Lily instantly knew something was wrong. I can imagine her thinking “why are you pinning me down and taking away my ability to flail my arms freely???” Lily instantly started to cringe 
and turn red, and then BAM, the shots to her thighs began, one by one, a total of four. I never heard her cry so much before and her scream sounded so painful it broke my heart! Soon enough though, it was over. Lily was still crying for a couple minutes after, but then in the end, she managed to give me a smile (picture to the right), her smile always makes me so happy. She knocked out for the next couple hours, and when we got home, she was really happy and playful, and then went back to sleep some more! She was only a tiny bit fussy before her dinner time, but after she had her meal, it was right back to sleep for her! Our precious little angel! You can see her battle wounds in the picture to the left.
Lily we love you so very much! Happy 2 months baby, you’re constantly our ray of light, our giant ball of sunshine, and a huge aura of happiness! Hugs and kisses to you Lily!!! XOXO!!
Below, you can watch how her shots went, it was taken in four parts. The beginning was how she was doing before her shots, then the oral immunizations, then the long anticipated shots, then how she was 3 hours later! Mommy’s so proud of you Lily, you are so brave and did so great! XOXO!!
Lily’s 1 Month Check-Up!
Lily had a full day of wellness today! I decided to take her to my chiropractor so I can get a much needed adjustment, and so he can give her some alignment as well!! She was getting hungry at this point so she was a little fussy but overall she was very good! Thanks so much Dr. Matt Demoss for looking after the well being of our Lily pad and for her first chiropractic experience!
After the Chiropractor meeting, we went to Lily’s 1 month check up! She now stretches 21 inches long, in the 50th percentile for height! She now weighs 8.45lbs, not as big as Khoa thought she’s be, but she’s getting bigger regardless! Yay for such great growth and progress! I didn’t add her to my insurance plan yet (I know…I forgot, it totally slipped my mind the past couple days) since I have to wait 30 days after her birth before I can add her. So she did not get her shots today, but the hep b shot will be given to her at next month’s appointment along with all the long list of shots she will be getting then! Overall, she’s a healthy baby, yay!!! Here are some pictures of our cutie pie at the Dr’s appointment and the last one is of her and her Ba Noi (Grandma), what a sweet photo! Enjoy!
Lily’s 2nd Check-Up!
Lily had her 2nd routine check-up today with her pediatrician and it went really well! She’s still really calm when we put her in the car seat, she didn’t even whine or fuss! Once the car starts rolling, she just knocks out! Lily now weighs 7 pounds and 14 ounces, just 2 ounces away from 8 pounds! That’s our big baby! She’s looking very healthy and strong and Dr. Wang said she is developing quite well mentally too judging by her arm and leg movements! We will be coming back after she’s one month old to start her immunizations! How exciting!
Two days ago, Lily received her first mail, her social security card! She is finally officially in the system, congrats my Lily pad!
Another fun update: yesterday during tummy time, I took her gloves off so she can explore the world with her sense of touch, and she started to suck on her hands! It was very cute, and then she started to suck on her arms! She just ate too so I guess her arms must be quite tasty. Enjoy this video of her nibbling on her arm during tummy time! I can’t get enough of her, what a cutie pie if I must say so myself! =)
