look what I can do!

I should probably cross off "crawl" from the last post.... she really only crawled twice that day and only once since, so she really isn't a crawler (which is fine with me...much less chasing around that way!)

But she can stand up to things and walk with her walker! I think she's going to walk before she really crawls. She loves to stand and pull up (and wants to do it ALL DAY LONG...on Mommy, of course!). She dosen't really know how to get down yet, so she cries after awhile when she's had enough and realizes that she's stuck!

We're still struggling with eating. She had her nine month check up this week and the doctor is sending us to a nutritionist, because she's dropped to the 10th percentile for weight. She's supposed to be able to give me tips to get her to eat better, and maybe some sort of nutritional supplement or something to get her to gain weight. Last night we were so proud of her--she ate an entire container of baby food for the first time ever...but then she threw up in bed, right as she was going to sleep. What a mess! So much for eating a whole container. Maybe her tummy is just too small!

Despite the eating issues, though, she's full of smiles and is as happy as can be (most of the time).
She loves music, and anytime one of her toys starts playing music she gets a huge smile on her face and starts to "dance."

some new tricks

I forgot to mention yesterday that she's added some tricks to her repertoire!

Let's see....she can now
1)clap her hands
2)dance to music
3)crawl!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, the crawling just happened this morning. She really didn't want to be sitting on the floor where I had put her, so she started coming toward me. She's been doing that for weeks, but she never gets further than putting her hands on the floor, leaning towards what she wants, then doing a nose dive. But today she crawled two crawls before doing a nose dive! Progress!! She's been practicing all morning, too. She hasn't done more than two crawls at once, but hopefully that'll improve with practice.

Now we've got our work cut out for us...........

Happy New Year!

Whew! What a busy couple of weeks it's been in our little world...lots of traveling, presents, food, presents, more traveling, and did I mention presents??? We're going to have to get a bigger house to accomodate all of the toys!!!

Let's see...I'll start with December 22nd. That night we pretended that it was Christmas eve at our house. In my family growing up we always got to open one present on Christmas eve, and it was always new PJs. So I continued the tradition and on her first Christmas, she got some new PJs, too.



However, she didn't get to open them because Mommy didn't wrap them. But she DID get to open a present--it was the book, "Twas the Night Before Christmas."

Mommy and Daddy had picked it out together for her and we chose this one because we liked the pictures the best. After bathtime and putting on the new PJs, she opened the present and Daddy read the story to her before bed.

The next morning was going to be our Christmas morning. She woke up wanting to eat at 5:00 AM, and Daddy wanted to get up then to open presents! We were both so excited about giving her her presents. But we put her back to bed and waited until she got up around 7:00 to open the presents. How many times will that happen--that we're waiting for HER to wake up Christmas morning!?

Daddy went downstairs to turn the lights on while she got up and got her diaper changed. Then we went downstairs and saw everything Santa had left. She opened her stocking first and loved the different chewy balls Santa had put inside. She also got a little tamborine in there that she really likes. Then we started the presents. She was more concerned with eating the paper than what was actually inside, but she did enjoy seeing Elmo and chewing on his eyes! Her big present this year was a toy box that Daddy made for her. It's not quite finished (it still needs to be stained), but it is all put together so Daddy brought it in for her to see Christmas morning. He did such a beautiful job on it.



After playing for a little while and taking a nap, we got packed up and left for Grandma and Grandpa's house up north. Riding in the car with her is always an adventure....she sleeps for the first 1 1/2 hours, but the final hour is always a crying fest. Ugh. No matter what we do, she cries. But we made it to Grandma's and she perked right up, enjoying a whole new set of toys and people to play with.



The next day, Christmas Eve, she got an even bigger treat--her cousins came to visit! She hadn't seen them since the summer, since they're in North Carolina for the year, so everyone was so glad to see her and Emma especially was so excited to have another girl to play with. She was so good with her--playing peekaboo, bringing her toys to play with, and giving her hugs and kisses.

Christmas morning she opened the stocking at Grandma's house--more fun things to chew on!! She got to see Grandma get her big present from Grandpa--a new car!!! It was a huge surprise to Grandma, but we all knew she was getting it. She was shocked. After that excitement, we packed up and went to Granny and Papa's house. There she saw lots more cousins and had several presents to open. She started to get a bit overwhelmed with all of the people and noise, but she was a trooper. She slept in the car on the way back to Grandma's after lunch.

Then we had Christmas at Grandma's, which always means lots of fun, presents, and a BIG mess! She got better at opening her presents as the day went on, but especially enjoyed the ribbon on the package her baby doll came in from her aunt and uncle and cousins.

We stayed for a few more days and then came home to our house again. It was nice to get back into her routine and have her sleeping in her own bed.

Last night we had a party....not really a new year's eve party, because it was only from about 3:00-7:00 pm, but we wanted to have a Christmas party, and there weren't any dates that worked except for New Year's Eve! It was fun to see our friends and have the kids get together to play. Everyone enjoyed the new Christmas presents, and she did a good job of sharing her toys!

So there you go...a recap of the last couple of weeks in the world of weed. It's been tiring, hectic, but fun. I'm ready for things to return to normal for awhile, though!

what's up in the world of weed?

It's been awhile since I've updated. Life has been busy the past couple of weeks. This week it has finally died down a bit. The best news of all is that except for two nights, our little one has slept through the night for about a week and a half now! Hallelujah! I had forgotten what it was like to wake up and actually feel rested, like I had slept that night. It's so nice to wake up in the morning and feel energetic. I don't think I've felt that feeling since before I got pregnant!

Today we had to go to the pediatrician because I was worried about her lack of weight gain. In two months she has only gained one pound, two ounces. I talked to the doctor about how to get her to eat more--food just doesn't seem too exciting to her. The doctor told me to go ahead and give her pretty much whatever we eat, with the exceptions of a few things babies aren't supposed to have until they're older. So tonight she was thrilled to eat pancakes with her oatmeal and pears for dinner. She loved them! And at lunch she ate a ton of yogurt--I think that's her new favorite food. The doctor said to give her that every day for lunch because it's high in calories. I had given it to her a couple of times in the last week and she liked it, so I'm sure she'll love lunch from now on!

Let's see....what else is going on....we're getting ready for Christmas. Every day she likes to sit on the floor in the living room, look at the Christmas lights on the tree, and play with this curly ribbon that we've now turned into her toy. It fascinates her for about 20 minutes a day. Today it was so warm and sunny that I took her outside and she got to swing on her new swingset for a little while. She loved looking at the shadows on the ground and watching the wind blow the tree limbs a little bit.

That's the update from our house. I probably won't write again until after Christmas.

family pics

We had family pictures taken yesterday. These are just a few of them. Enjoy!!

oh christmas tree...

Here's her first Christmas tree. We rushed through dinner last night so we could put it up while she was still awake. She loved watching us put the lights on, because they were lit up and strewn all over the floor. But when we started putting the ornaments on, she started getting sleepy and fussy. I really wanted to keep her up so we could get some pictures, so I picked her up and she started "helping" me put the ornaments up--which means she tried to grab every single one out of my hands and put them in her mouth. She didn't succeed too often. Her new "Baby's First Christmas" ornament was the first to go up, along with one we made with her handprint (I bought a kit to make it). I'm not sure what I'm laughing at in the pictures...I wish SHE was laughing too!












After we were finished we put her Santa hat on and took pictures. She tried to pull the hat off the whole time and ended up with it over her eyes.















This is one of my favorites....it looks like she's giving us attitude about having to wear this hat over her eyes.

happy thanksgiving

I just wanted to share pictures. Some are from thanksgiving and some are from this afternoon on her new swingset. Daddy just put it together this afternoon and it was such a nice day that we took her out to give it a try.

Here's a brief update on how things are going....she's been sleeping better, grunting much, much less, and smiling lots and lots. She's been a happy girl the last week or so, and was such a good girl over the holiday weekend.

a weekly update

I haven't updated because there's not much to update you on....she still has a cold, is still teething, and is still waking up multiple times at night. This, too shall pass....

During the day she's my happy, smiley girl, most of the time (except when she does her very loud, very annoying new little grunting noise to get our attention). She's discovered the joys of playing with pots and pans while Mommy cooks supper, though she doesn't quite get that you're supposed to bang the pan with the spoon to make the most effective noise, not drag the pan or the lid along the floor.

She's learning to drink from a sippy cup. I read a tip in a magazine that said to practice it in the bathtub, so if it dribbles, it doesn't matter. So that's what we've been doing. In addition to getting clean, she's also getting hydrated! She's getting better, and knows exactly what to do with the cup now when she sees it, though I have to help her hold it.

She's also begun eating Cheerios. She's getting better at picking them up with her thumb and index finger, but still needs work on getting it from the high chair tray to her mouth. She takes it up there, so she knows where it's supposed to go, but she either drops it in her lap at the last second, or it's stuck to the palm of her hand and won't go into her mouth. More Cheerios end up in the high chair seat or on the floor than in her mouth, but she's learning!

That's the update. Hopefully by next week I'll have good news that she's over her cold, sleeping better, and no longer grunting (her dad and I really don't like this new development!).

the streak really IS over...

The last two nights she's gotten up in the middle of the night. She has a cold and she's teething again, so I guess that's why. Oh well...the sleep was nice while it lasted.

Here's our precious girl...Daddy took the day off from work today. He was out raking leaves and wanted to take her pictures in the leaves. She loved them and couldn't stop trying to shove them in her mouth. Yuck!

And here she is in the "birthday chair" where we take her picture every month on the 9th, her birthday. She was seven months old yesterday.

I was wrong!!!

I've never been happier to be wrong. The streak ISN'T over! She did sleep last night. Yes, it was difficult to get her to sleep, but she slept all night long until waking up to eat this morning.

She still has a cold, but it doesn't seem as bad as it did last night when I wrote.

Hooray for being wrong!

the streak is over...

It's been a week since I last wrote. I thought I'd have good news to report, but I waited too long. She slept through the night for five nights in a row. It was a wonderful thing. Then today she got a runny nose. It ran and ran and ran some more. By the time it was bedtime, she could hardly breathe as she ate her last bottle. She went to bed a little early because she skipped her third nap (I think it's phasing out now), and went to sleep without too much fuss, but woke up coughing and then crying every hour or so. She went back to sleep each time until about 9:45. There was no going back to sleep that time. I went in to console her and she was WIDE awake. She got to come in and sit with Daddy while he watched TV while Mommy found the cold medicine. I don't know how much good it does, but I'm willing to try anything. It took me 45 minutes to get her back to sleep, after lots of coughing, sneezing, wiping her nose, suctioning out her nose, more crying, wiping her nose, whimpering, rubbing her eyes, staring at shadows on the wall from the night light in the hall, wiping her nose, fussing, coughing, spitting up, wiping her face....you get the idea. It was a long 45 minutes. Poor little girl. Now it's way past my bedtime, but I'm wide awake and waiting for her to start crying again any minute.

So the streak is over.... no more full night of sleep for Weed tonight.

Halloween

Here's another Halloween picture where she actually smiled. She "helped" pass out candy for about 30 minutes with Daddy (meaning she wore her costume, looked cute, and squirmed in Daddy's arms while he passed out candy), and then Mommy took her up and got her ready for bed--she was exhausted.

our lil' pumpkin

Happy Halloween!
(She wasn't cooperating so you can't see much of her costume....we're going to try and get a better one later today.)

surprise photo shoot

I went to Babies R Us today to get some diapers (which I didn't end up buying after all) and while I was looking around a girl from the photo place within the store stopped me and asked if she could take my baby's picture. She said she was training and needed practice, and they'd give me a free portrait if I let her practice on us. So I said yes. Sadly, I had only dressed her in a sleep and play today because I hadn't planned on going anywhere but the grocery store, so though in my opinion she always looks cute, she wasn't dressed particularly "cute" today! :(

So the girl tried and tried and tried to get her to smile, but she was stubborn. Actually, I think the girl was trying too hard--she smiles at people who smile at her, but this girl was squeezing really loud toys, talking way up high in a squeaky voice, trying to tickle her with a duster....it probably works on some babies, but not mine. Just give her a simple old smile and say hi and she'll usually smile. So she wasn't smiling much today, and the pictures didn't turn out so well. I picked the only one in which she was smiling....a little odd, but the girl wanted to try a winter picture with her winter hat on, because she had seen it sitting in our cart and thought it was so cute. Here's the picture.




The other pictures were fall pictures (I didn't get to choose the props or backgrounds). She didn't smile for a single one of them, but this one was the closest to a smile she could get. I guess beggars can't be choosers...it was free, after all!

So we were at Babies R Us much, much longer than I had planned, I didn't get the diapers I had gone for (I decided the sale wasn't that great of a sale after all!) and I didn't even make it to the grocery store! By the time we left I had a tired, fussy baby, so I had to get home, feed her, and put her to bed. The grocery store will have to wait for another day.

pretty pictures

Here are pictures from the fall foilage excursion last weekend.


This is our little family....she wouldn't smile because there was no one behind the camera getting her to laugh! (we set up the tripod and set the timer)

Here is Mommy and a happy baby girl. She loved looking at the shadows that the sun made through the trees.

This shows the beautiful trees. Of course we have WAY more tree pictures than family pictures....if you know my husband, you know this is always the case.

She loved her ride up the trail on Daddy's chest! Daddy loved watching her enjoy the outdoors with him.

a tooth and a "word"

After weeks and weeks of teething, there's finally some evidence of it all...a tiny little white speck has poked through on the bottom of her little gums. She doesn't seem too bothered by it, though she is pursing her lips a lot more and sucking on them--I don't know if that has anything to do with the tooth or not.

And today she said her first consonant-vowel combination that was at all recognizable. She said "ba ba ba." Yeah, I know, what does that mean???? Nothing....but at least it's progress from the "ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" that she's been doing for months now! She also makes this "ng" kind of sound--I can't even imitate it, but it's kind of like the "ing" sound without the "i." The "ba" was quite exciting to hear. Daddy thought he heard her say "ma ma ma" this morning, but he said it hasn't been confirmed, so he's holding out hope that it wasn't and that she'll say "da da" first! :)

Yesterday we all three went on a hike up to the top of this ridge that overlooked the beautiful fall leaves. She rode in the baby bjorn on Daddy's chest, facing outward so she could see where we were going. She loved it, and babbled and squealed up a storm the whole way. Daddy was glad to be hiking and to have things to take pictures of, she was happy to be outside and having a fun ride, and I was happy to be with my happy daughter and happy husband and enjoying being a family. It was a gorgeous day here--maybe the last warm-ish, pretty fall day we'll have. Snow is on the way, I heard. :( I'm not ready for cabin fever. Anyway, I'll post pictures of our excursion in the next day or so.

back among the living

I feel like I've missed a week. Last week was spent almost entirely at home because first my little one was sick and then I caught it from her and was out of commission for a few days myself. I'm finally feeling a little more normal today and may even venture out to the grocery store this afternoon if I have time....currently there's apple pie baking in the oven (a surprise for my husband), so I can't go until that's done, but by then my little smiley girl may not be so smiley anymore and won't do well at the grocery. We'll have to see how that all goes. I may have to wait on the grocery store trip, though it will probably be postponed until Wednesday since tomorrow's outing is a trip to the pediatrician for her 6 month visit (more shots....yuck!!!!), and she'll likely need a long afternoon nap to sleep off the shots. Thus, no grocery store, in all likelyhood. But even if I don't get to go, at least I'm feeling better and have gotten some things accomplished today.

Still no teeth popping through those little gums. You'd think with all of this teething, there would be teeth, but no. She's still waking up in the middle of the night--I don't know if it's seeking comfort for the pain, seeking food, or just seeking company. Letting her cry is so hard, but last night, since I had taken cough medicine that knocked me out, I went to check on her, let her cry, closed both of our doors so I couldn't hear her very well, and fell back asleep. I had only meant to let her cry for an hour (torture when I have to listen to it--I feel like such a horrible mommy), but because I fell asleep, after an hour and fifteen minutes my husband said, "Oh my gosh, how long has she been crying like that?" I realized that I had let her go past what I had planned. Then I really felt like a horrible mommy. I went in and fed her after that, thankful that she still wanted to look at me after that!

picture day!

She turned 6 months old on Monday. SIX MONTHS!! It's hard to believe she's been with us for a whole half of a year. The time has gone fast. I'm trying to savor every minute and not let the sleepless nights and frustrating moments wish her childhood away.

So I took her to get her 6 month pictures taken today at a new place in town. It's a chain that a friend told me about in her hometown in Illinois. They didn't have one here, but they have one up where my parents live, so I was going to take her up there, but then I found out they just opened one here two weeks ago! Awesome! I was really happy with the job they did. They took tons of pictures and they let you change their outfits. It's a nice place.

So in this picture she's wearing the pinafore that my mom wore in her 6 month pictures and I wore in my 6 month picture, so now she's wearing it in her six month picture! Let's hope I can keep it nice for her daughter's 6 month picture!

I also had her in a pink and white sailor dress with lacy socks and black patent leather shoes. I loved those too, but only got it in a wallet size. When I scan it it's way too small to see, so I can't put it on here. Maybe I can work with it and try to figure out how to make it look bigger, but until I do, you'll just have to enjoy this picture. It was quite a chore to get her to smile, but we managed to get a few of her smiling.

sleep

Finally...she slept through the night again last night. Hallelujah!

I, however, couldn't fall asleep until after 2:30 AM, which is completely ridiculous. I have no idea why, because I'm totally sleep deprived and all day long that's all I want to do is sleep. So even though she slept, I'm still exhausted...but at least we're moving in the right direction and ONE of us is sleeping!

Just a picture of her on the changing table, just because.....

big girl bath!

Teething continues to take its toll on a tired Mommy, but I don't want to write about that....let's write about something happier.

Since she's sitting up now, we've moved up to the big girl bathtub! No longer will she be laying in the little baby bathtub in the sink. She has the whole big bathtub to explore now. Before this, she wasn't ever sure that she liked baths, but she has quickly changed her mind. Water to kick and splash? Toys? Sitting up? All at the same time??? Could life get any better? (Well, maybe if there was a bottle of formula involved, but you can't have everything).

Here she is wondering if this bath thing is really all it's cracked up to be....

...and then she found the toys to play with......












...and realized that big girl baths are the best things since....(I can't say sliced bread because she's never had it...) ....since sweet potatoes! (her favorite food, I think).