Photo Dump

So I have been pretty stingy about sharing pictures of Aria publicly.  It's kind of hard to explain why.  As we've shared, she does have some physical deformities.  While they're not hugely obvious at first glance, it is definitely hard to miss.  So I've only posted a couple pictures of her, ones that hide those deformities a bit.  I'm definitely being a protective mama bear.  Let me say up front that I am in no way ashamed of her deformities, and in fact have come to find most of them quite charming and part of what makes her HER.  However, the first time I saw my daughter at 4 days old, I had a really hard time seeing past all the physical things that were different about her.

First family picture, taken within minutes of meeting my daughter.

To be fair, the first time I saw her, she had her skull wrapped because they were doing an EEG of her brain.  That would unnerve any parent to see your newborn like that.  Plus she was so extremely swollen, and had a million tubes and wires coming out of her, and her machine alarms kept going off. . .it was all very overwhelming and scary.  

Also, again. . .I had never met her, really.  The tiny sedated body lying in front of me in no way resembled the feisty little baby I had come to be familiar with inside my belly.  So all I had to go on was the physical stuff at first.  

Within days that changed, as I spent time with her and started to have a relationship with my baby.  Although to an average observer she seems to never change, just sleeping all the time, we've spent enough time with her that we have a good feel for the spirit inside that imperfect body.  We know her stretches, the different faces she makes, how to read into the way she's breathing on any given day, etc.  Now when I look at her, I see her cute button nose, that gorgeous thick head of hair, her squishy little cheeks, and fingernails so small they almost disappear.  When I look at Aria I don't see her deformities anymore.  I just see HER.  

So, I am very careful about what pictures I share, and what pictures I allow family to share.  Because I want everyone to see what I see when I look at my daughter.  Just a beautiful baby girl.  So here are a bunch of pictures that I love.  Enjoy :)

Love how this pic captured the pure happiness on Mike's face.  He always looks goofily happy like this when he first lays eyes on her each day.

She doesn't/can't open her hands so we're constantly wedging our fingers into her tiny palms in order to hold her hands.  I love seeing Mike's large hands next to her itty bitty ones.

I've come to really love how her cheeks always look so cute and squishy because of the way her ventilator pushes them up.

Because of muscle contractions in her arms, she can't straighten them.  Usually her arms are bent with her hands curled up on her chest somewhere, but this day she had them pulled up very cutely under her chin.

Ahhh I love this little girl.  I love that this picture captures that.

Mike is completely smitten by this little lady.  It's so adorable.

I had Mike take this picture because this was the most comfortable Aria had ever looked while I held her - her body was relaxed and nestled into me.

One of my absolute favorites because you can see the utter delight on my face.  This is one of the few times she cracked an eye a millimeter and my sister happened to capture the moment.

I love this one because it was my view of her - I snapped this pic with my phone while cradling her.  She's nestled nicely into my arm.