4 month turtle update!

tess the turtle had her 4-month visit on july 23rd - two days after daddy's 28th birthday! ...though i had full-on mommy brain and thought his birthday WAS the day of her appointment and so actually missed the day - bad wifey :-/

here are the stats:
weight - 13 lbs 11 oz and 50th percentile!
height - 23.25 in (4 inches larger than her birth height!) and in the 15th percentile - shorty like her mama :-)
head - 40ish cm? i think? and 30th percentile - who cares about this one?

tess is also still very strong for her age, and has decided that rolling over and crawling are lame, and she would like to skip to standing and walking. she spends most of her day trying to stand, and does a pretty good job! she has the musculature down, she's just working on the balance, and when you lean her a direction, she takes steps. i know, she's a rockstar.

she has been to the pool several times and loves "swimming" by doing doggy-paddle motions. she hasn't gotten the breath holding part down though and still tries to drink the pool. she doesn't like sleeping alone, and while we can get her to nap in her bassinet or co-sleeper, if we try to do it at night, she wakes up at least every hour, and this makes mommy miserable, so she's still sleeping with me.

[please ignore that this pic of me is horrible.]

i am TRYING to work on it, but when it comes down to it, i'd rather get 6-7 hours of uninterrupted sleep with her than 45 mins of sleep with her in the crib. she does the cutest thing though, and if she's sleeping on my chest and i start laughing, she laughs with me. it's precious and unlike anything else in the world.

tess is still breastfeeding without any formula supplementation and has begun eating every 3.5-4 hours (instead of every 2 - hallelujah!) and is grabbing at our food every meal! we have tried rice cereal several times (ok'd by the pediatrician) mixed with breast milk, and she LOVES eating it, but she does seem to spit it all up each time. not so sure what that means, but last night, she begged for some of my butternut squash, so i let her taste some off my finger. she not only LOVED it, but she did not spit it up. perhaps we shall switch to veggis soon? that was also pediatrician ok'd.


speaking of the spit-up, we have officially stopped the prevacid. i got sick of giving it to her, and she got sick of taking it, so we decided to try to go without it, and while she still spits up a lot more than some babies, she doesn't scream afterwards, and the doctor said as long as she's not in pain, we're a-ok. thank goodness, that was obnoxious! tess still screams the whole time for most car rides, despite everything we've tried, and since we live out in the middle of nowhere, we are toying with the idea of getting her a portable dvd player for the car rides. i HATE the idea of "babysitting" my child with a tv, but it is absolutely torturous for me to hear her so upset and screaming for 45 mins straight (and no, it doesn't matter how many times we stop, once you click those straps and start driving, the screaming resumes).

lastly, tess has now turned into tess the TALKING turtle! she loves to coo and shriek and babble, she loves to interrupt mommy on the phone, she loves to smile and giggle and chortle, and she is especially talkative on the changing table - perhaps she just feels freer? who knows, but we love to listen to her! she's just the best, most precious and adorable thing that's ever happened to us, and we are so blessed to have her!