Favorite nap position

After feeding, Eliana usually goes into a food coma for about 5 minutes. Then she wakes up and becomes alert for about half an hour. After that, she starts fussing and needs to be soothed to sleep. Eliana's favorite position for that is tummy to tummy with her Mommy. It takes between 5 minutes and 45 minutes to get her to sleep, and after that...she'll be out cold for 1-3 hours.

Grandparents' visit...

Last week, Eliana's grandparents from Elvin's side flew in from San Jose, CA. This was the first time that Yeh-yeh (grandpa) and Nai-nai (grandma) got to see Eliana. They showered attention on her and spoke a mix of English, Portuguese, and Chinese to her. This either thoroughly confused her or is helping her become trilingual...or maybe a little of both.

Yeh-yeh, Nai-nai, and Eliana...

And here are all four grandparents...

Eliana's weight gain...

We just came back from Eliana's 2-week appointment with her pediatrician. The doctor said that they expect most babies to get back to their birth weight at the 2-week point. Our Eliana, however, weighed in at 8 lb. and 12 ounces. That's 1 lb. and 2 ounces over her birth weight. Do we have a future competitive eating contender?

Because I'm sure you'll all be asking for it, here is her weight all graphed out for you, starting from the day she was born until today. (At this stage in her young life, I figured she's not that sensitive about her weight, so I didn't think she'd mind be posting this.)

Hanging out with Eliana

So we've been told that Eliana is a very mild-mannered baby (so far.) When she cries, it's usually for a reason, like "I'm hungry and need some grub!" or "Why in the world did you wake me up for?" Otherwise, she's been sleeping at 3 to 4 hours at a stretch and been gaining weight like gangbusters.

Besides eating and sleeping, she does spend quite a bit of time looking around, swinging her arms around and--with her legs--kicking at an invisible soccer ball. (We hope that someday she'll be on the women's World Cup team for the U.S.) She also enjoys making a variety of grunts, loud exhale sounds, and squeaky noises.

Here's a look...

Eliana's first week

Eliana has had a long week, beginning with being born and leaving her cozy womb, to taking her first car ride, meeting some of her cousins, and moving in with her Mommy and Daddy.



Eliana has learned how to sleep through her Daddy's snoring and her Daddy has learned how to sleep through Eliana's screaming. (Mommy has a hard time sleeping through either.) We are adjusting well as a family.



Here's a video summarizing her first week...

Little hands and feet

At the hospital, they took a stamp of Eliana's tiny hands and feet. Some of the impressions went onto the birth certificate, we believe, and others were for us as keepsakes. She has long little fingers...

While she was taking a nap...

Eliana is holding Daddy's finger.

Waking up routine...

About every 3 hours, Eliana has to go through her wake up routine. She instinctively knows to do her calisthenics, especially after we take her out of her swaddling. She stretches her arms and legs out straight, contorts her face in a myriad of expressions, and gradually starts wimpering...which soon turns into shrieking if we don't get her some food!

First smile?

We're not sure, but we may have caught one of Eliana's first smiles. Or it could just be muscle spasm. What do you think? (As a bonus, the video also show's Eliana doing her freaky one-eye-opening maneuver.)

Eliana's first bath

Well, technically, this is her second bath, since her first was at the hospital after she was born. But this is her first bath at home. Since Elvin had no idea how to give a baby a bath, Emily did it all and Elvin just took pictures.

"I'm not sure I'm going to like this..."

Washing her hands.

"This isn't so bad...I think."

Washing the wispy hair...

New hairdoo..

Getting my hair combed.

Now I'm all clean!

Eliana's Talents

As any proud parent, we think Eliana is pretty special. But to prove it, here are a few of her talents on display.

The Yawn

She has mastered the art of yawning and uses it frequently.



The Tongue Action

Her tongue is a wonderful thing. She has complete mastery over it, as you'll see. The nurses tell us that it's a cue she's hungry. But we know she's just showing off.




The Blank Stare

Eliana has gotten very good at the blank stare. She uses it to ignore her parents when they are trying to tell her something important. In the future, she'll use it when her parents ask, "Eliana, have you finished your homework yet?" [stare...stare...stare]




The Dozing Off

She's gotten pretty good at dozing off. She'll probably use this in college lecture halls.



The Suck

And last, but not least, is the suck. It's one of her favorite hobbies. Currently she doesn't know how to suck on her thumb, so settles for others' fingers instead.

As you can see, even though Eliana is only 4 days old, she's a very accomplished baby!

Eliana is here!

Eliana Mei-En (美恩) Yuen arrived on Monday, July 14 at 12:30 am after not wanting to come out for a long time! Besides being a week overdue, Mommy was in labor for 30 hours. Mommy is tired but resting and Eliana is taking turns between pooping and sleeping. And crying, of course.

We spent a little extra time at the hospital to let Emily recover more. The staff were wonderful and taught clueless Elvin how to change his first diaper.

Eliana was 7 pounds and 10 ounces, and 20 inches long. Her favorite food is whatever we feed her. Her favorite activity is either eating or sleeping and her least favorite thing is getting her bottom wiped with a cold baby wipe.

By the way, Eliana's middle name is also her Chinese name. "Mei" means beauty and "En" means grace.

If you live in the area, let us know if you want to stop by sometime, we'd love to introduce you to her.

More pictures...

Eliana is getting her feet stamped.

The new addition to the family.