Julia was born in July 2001.  She loves doing art projects, dancing, and playing with her little brother, Josh.

Biography

Born: July 2001 at 2:46pm EDT

Weight: 7 lb, 4 oz

Length: 20 inches

Jennifer's water broke at about 4:20 on Tuesday morning, and we were at the hospital by around 8 am. By that time the contractions were only a couple of minutes apart and lasting about a minute each. Jennifer was 3 cm dilated at 8:30 am, 7 cm dilated by 11 am, and pushing by a little after 2 pm. Everything was moving so fast that there wasn't time for an epidural. Julia was born at 2:46 pm. Everything went so well that 24 hours later, Mom and baby were happy to be discharged home.

And then...

Julia had some newborn jaundice that required phototherapy, so the family moved back into the hospital on July 14-15 to feed her and keep her under the UV lights. Her bilirubin (the cause of her jaundice and lack of appetite) dropped quickly and she has been doing well since.

Jennifer went back to work full-time after Labor Day, and Dean went back to working at home (though on a part-time basis) and taking care of Julia during the day.

Her first Christmas was fun, and Julia had a ball unwrapping the piles of Christmas presents she received! But the best part was the time she got to spend with her grandparents, both the ones from California she doesn't see often, as well as her Pop-pop down in Virginia.

Shortly after Christmas, on her 6 month birthday, we weaned her from breast milk to formula, and have been started giving her some solid foods too. She tolerated most things quite well, but her favorite new food was Cheerios.

Although she would pull up to a stand on just about any furniture she could reach since Christmas, she started crawling in earnest around Valentine's Day.

She took her first steps around May 30, 2002 and preferred walking to crawling by around her first birthday.

We started to teach her baby signs when she was around 15 months old and by 18 months she had a vocabulary of around 50 signs and growing.  She transitioned from signs to speech between 2 and 2.5 yo.  If nothing else, I think the baby signs helped reduce her frustration level.

Around the time she turned 2, we decided she needed to socialize more, so Julia and I started attending Russ Louch's wonderful Derwood Playground on Wednesday mornings and going to some local parks with other Montgomery County Dads. 

In November 2003, Julia started attending The Goddard School three mornings a week.  The first day I had more problems separating than she did.  After a few days, she realized that when I left her at school it meant she wouldn't see me for a couple hours and she would scream and cry and the teachers would have to hold her while I left.  After a couple weeks of that, she calmed down and we would only have the same issue again each time she changed classrooms.  But even during the times when she had a tough time separating, she was clearly enjoying school after she calmed down.

Julia has been using the computer since she was 2.  She quickly mastered the mouse and could do several of the activities in Gcompris.  When she was 3, she started using Tuxpaint and also started using the keyboard more reliably.

Julia with her doll/baby sister/daughter Erin.