tess had her 18 month check-up today -- which was really a sick patient visit, and actually occurred now that she's 19 months, but that's not the point -- the point is she's a genius. but we all knew that. and in honor of her intellectual brilliance, i wanted to make a list of the words she says... or at least try to remember most of them, because there are tons!
mama
dada
tess
nana
grandma
bubba (for bubba, the fish remote control holder at my parents' house, and the name of her new beta fish)
kitty
dog (or more frequently "woof woof")
shoes
socks ("sha")
sit (which sounds like "shi")
up
down
upstairs
outside
all done
more
tractor
stop
please
no
yeah
out
shh shh (fish)
two
twee (three)
woah
uwo (hello? - while holding the phone)
eyes
nose
toes
shirt (sounds like "shi" also)
eat
pass (for paci)
baby
uh uh uuuuhhh (for the theme song to "elmo's world")
cheese
milk
juice
on
off (sounds like ot)
eh eh eh (said quickly so as to sound like a nicker - means horse)
most animal sounds
ouch
hot (also more like "ot")
ice
bubbles
and that's all my tired mommy brains can think of this late at night!
Showing posts with label tess. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tess. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
supermom strength
ok, so you know how they say moms have super-human strength when their babies are in danger? well, it is definitely true.
this morning, i packed tess up in the car and headed out to get the new scotty cd (which is AMAZING), and the whole way back she was fussing and whining and just like... moaning, and i knew it was because naptime was coming up, and she's fighting off a cold (and losing), so i was trying to be understanding, but it was realllllly draining to hear that for 15 mins straight.
so we got home and pulled into the driveway, and one of the songs was coming to a close, so i decided to leave the music playing while i got her out of her carseat. i had been distracted because of the droning on and was thinking about the great weather, the great cd, and how we were finally home so tess could take a great nap. i opened the door and got out, and started walking around the back of the car to get to the passenger's side to let tess out -- and then realized that the van was moving.
and it was rolling straight towards the house. shit! talk about panic! not only is the car NOT supposed to be moving, but it's definitely not supposed to be traveling into the side of the house -- with my daughter in it!
so many things were running through my head. how did this happen? did i forget to put it in park? i always put the emergency break on, did i forget? oh no, it's about to hit the driveway light! wait, it's about to hit the house! wait, tess is going to die!!! and why hadn't i already opened the passenger door with the electronic button like i usually do? i could just grab her out if i had... and on and on and on. but these thoughts all ran through my head in the course of less than a second because before i knew it, i was running to the front of the van and pushing on it trying to get it to stop.
oh dear, i said to myself, this thing is heavier than i thought! ...which didn't make any sense, because of course it's heavy, IT'S A MINIVAN -- made of steel, with my child inside! shit!
so i pushed harder. and in another second, the rolling stopped. great! now what?! the thoughts started streaming through my brain again, if i let go, it'll keep rolling. if the car is off, will the break still work? how fast do i have to run and grab the door and jump in before it runs over the driveway light and starts barreling into the house?! i know, i'll push it uphill away from the house and THEN run! so i did.
i pushed the van, with a curb weight of 4,255 lbs, from the standstill that i was holding it at, backwards a foot or two and then sprinted around the side, grabbed the door, flung it open, and smashed my foot into the brake pedal, stopping the car. and then i hear tess laughing.
apparently, mommy freaking out and running around the van, pushing on it, and sprinting and jumping into it like a madwoman on fire is hilarious. glad i could make ya smile, kid! and also, you can call me supermom.
this morning, i packed tess up in the car and headed out to get the new scotty cd (which is AMAZING), and the whole way back she was fussing and whining and just like... moaning, and i knew it was because naptime was coming up, and she's fighting off a cold (and losing), so i was trying to be understanding, but it was realllllly draining to hear that for 15 mins straight.
so we got home and pulled into the driveway, and one of the songs was coming to a close, so i decided to leave the music playing while i got her out of her carseat. i had been distracted because of the droning on and was thinking about the great weather, the great cd, and how we were finally home so tess could take a great nap. i opened the door and got out, and started walking around the back of the car to get to the passenger's side to let tess out -- and then realized that the van was moving.
and it was rolling straight towards the house. shit! talk about panic! not only is the car NOT supposed to be moving, but it's definitely not supposed to be traveling into the side of the house -- with my daughter in it!
so many things were running through my head. how did this happen? did i forget to put it in park? i always put the emergency break on, did i forget? oh no, it's about to hit the driveway light! wait, it's about to hit the house! wait, tess is going to die!!! and why hadn't i already opened the passenger door with the electronic button like i usually do? i could just grab her out if i had... and on and on and on. but these thoughts all ran through my head in the course of less than a second because before i knew it, i was running to the front of the van and pushing on it trying to get it to stop.
oh dear, i said to myself, this thing is heavier than i thought! ...which didn't make any sense, because of course it's heavy, IT'S A MINIVAN -- made of steel, with my child inside! shit!
so i pushed harder. and in another second, the rolling stopped. great! now what?! the thoughts started streaming through my brain again, if i let go, it'll keep rolling. if the car is off, will the break still work? how fast do i have to run and grab the door and jump in before it runs over the driveway light and starts barreling into the house?! i know, i'll push it uphill away from the house and THEN run! so i did.
i pushed the van, with a curb weight of 4,255 lbs, from the standstill that i was holding it at, backwards a foot or two and then sprinted around the side, grabbed the door, flung it open, and smashed my foot into the brake pedal, stopping the car. and then i hear tess laughing.
apparently, mommy freaking out and running around the van, pushing on it, and sprinting and jumping into it like a madwoman on fire is hilarious. glad i could make ya smile, kid! and also, you can call me supermom.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
a new era - tess goes to daycare!
well, here i sit in caribou coffee, in the middle of the morning, with no child running around my feet, tugging at my legs, or fussing because she's sick of being here. i have been looking forward to this, and to having time to blog, and to tess getting enrichment with friends of her own age and other adults who know how to teach her things for so long, and i won't have many days that i can do this, since she'll just be a tuesday/thursday daycare kid, and i'll be working those days, but i just wanna run back to bright horizons and pick her up! i know it's a great place, and i know she'll do great, and i know i should just enjoy it! but... my baby girl is growing up! ::sniff::
last night i ran out to walmart in the middle of the night to pick up supplies for her "school" like diaper rash cream and sunscreen (both of which we have, but i needed to get more to keep there), and i realized this is the beginning of a new era. following rules of a school, having two sets of supplies, writing her name on everything, having to drop off and pick up on someone else's schedule, eat on their schedule, sleep on their schedule, "no toys on the climber", take turns, "mine" and "his" and "hers", oh so many changes for my sweet girl. i hope she's not overwhelmed. i hope her sharing, caring, giving attitude doesn't change from these kids pushing her around, and i hope she loves spending time with her teachers... but not more than she loves spending time with me! but i hope she doesn't have separation anxiety! oh the concerns that run through the head of a mother.
i honestly have peace, though, that everything will go just great. these thoughts that flit through my mind are covered by the belief that God has a hand in all of this, and i trust Him with my girl - she is His, after all, and though i can't comprehend it, his love for her is greater than mine could ever be. i know His hand has been in all of this because of how it just fell into place. i interviewed, was offered a job, found out about an opening at daycare, got the hours i wanted at work, got the first month's tuition together, and got her all enrolled just as smoothly as it could have been. and last year, we were looking at waiting up to 8 months just to get her in any spot, let alone a part-time one!
well, i guess i should be somewhat productive during this time off that i have before starting near full-time work next month, so i'm off to catch up on my reading for the mission trip i'm going on to cherokee in two days! until next time :-)
last night i ran out to walmart in the middle of the night to pick up supplies for her "school" like diaper rash cream and sunscreen (both of which we have, but i needed to get more to keep there), and i realized this is the beginning of a new era. following rules of a school, having two sets of supplies, writing her name on everything, having to drop off and pick up on someone else's schedule, eat on their schedule, sleep on their schedule, "no toys on the climber", take turns, "mine" and "his" and "hers", oh so many changes for my sweet girl. i hope she's not overwhelmed. i hope her sharing, caring, giving attitude doesn't change from these kids pushing her around, and i hope she loves spending time with her teachers... but not more than she loves spending time with me! but i hope she doesn't have separation anxiety! oh the concerns that run through the head of a mother.
i honestly have peace, though, that everything will go just great. these thoughts that flit through my mind are covered by the belief that God has a hand in all of this, and i trust Him with my girl - she is His, after all, and though i can't comprehend it, his love for her is greater than mine could ever be. i know His hand has been in all of this because of how it just fell into place. i interviewed, was offered a job, found out about an opening at daycare, got the hours i wanted at work, got the first month's tuition together, and got her all enrolled just as smoothly as it could have been. and last year, we were looking at waiting up to 8 months just to get her in any spot, let alone a part-time one!
well, i guess i should be somewhat productive during this time off that i have before starting near full-time work next month, so i'm off to catch up on my reading for the mission trip i'm going on to cherokee in two days! until next time :-)
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
so, i'm a little behind in the updates...
holy moly, what a whirlwind these few weeks have been! let's see... where to begin...
ok well 8 weeks of puppies turned into lots of visits to the vet, an emergency visit that had us weaning the puppies at 3 weeks, puppies living with me without their mama for 1 week, then puppies moving on to another foster and mama coming back to me until she is adopted! oyoyoyoyoy! meanwhile, andrew, tess and i took our first family vacation all together alone (without grandmas involved) and had a great time, tess has turned 13 months (why do moms count in months?! why am i succumbing to the trend?!), my work schedule is changing, i'm interviewing for another part-time job, we're looking into part-time daycares, there were tornadoes tearing through the state, i fell down concrete stairs and nearly broke my ankle, tess got her first cold (and passed it on to us), we went to several museums and even joined one, OH! and my house looks like laundry, dishes, trash, and baby toys EXPLODED in and around it! sheesh! mayhaps this is why i haven't blogged? on the other hand, sure would have made some fantastic material to read about... oh well.
would you like some details about our many events? here goes!
ok so the adorable puppies:
continued growing and doing well, being adorable and sweet, and growing like CRAZY! poor iris was taking such good care of her 10 little ones and trying to heal up her sad body. our friend liz was generous enough to watch the whole gang (including our two crazies) while we went out of town for a long weekend to boone!
we took tons of pictures, which you can see in my facebook album, and had a blast! we drove up late thursday night in hopes that tess would sleep through the drive. we got a later start than we'd planned, and instead of leaving at 8 or 9, we left at about 10:30, which meant we didn't get in to boone until about 2am. luckily, we'd planned to stay in a hotel room that night, so the late arrival time wasn't a big deal for our accommodations... unluckily, that was where our "planning" ceased to work anymore. tess slept for a good hour into the drive before waking up and deciding she was going to stay awake FOR THE REST OF THE DRIVE. she was so out of it and so exhausted that she just sat there staring in front of her like a zombie and occasionally whimpering pathetically but refusing to sleep. it was so sad! then, about 45 mins from boone, she decided she was no longer ok, and we had to put the elmo movie on for the rest of the ride. also, andrew - not being much of the night owl, was about to fall asleep and run us off the road, so my swollen, bruised, nearly broken ankle and i had to drive almost the entire way.
so we got in around 2 and got to sleep around 3am. here's a picture of tess from the next morning:
such a tired baby!
but the rest of the weekend was wonderful! i hobbled around, we swam in the hotel pool, we ate at great places, we hung out with old friends like the newells (who were generous enough to welcome us into their home for the rest of the weekend) and crystal, sue treated us to a birthday celebration with newer friends like andy, kelley, and lucas, we explored king st, drove around our old haunts, and on the last day, took a trip up grandfather mountain!
when we got back home, we had to settle back into real life - boo! and we hadn't been doing that for long before we went out andrew's theater picnic and returned to find iris looking literally like death. andrew called me out because i was propping my ankle up, and he'd gone to take her for the last walk of the night, and he said, "i think she had diarrhea" - so i got off the couch and went out to check on her, only to find her crashing. she had no eyes because her body had had an inflammatory response and made her 3rd eyelids turn red and puff up to cover her eyes. when i peeled those back, her eyeballs were bloodshot and she couldn't really see. her gums were white and tacky, and there was diarrhea everywhere in her whelping box. i freaked out and called the vet and took her in (in my pj's because it was 10:30 by the time we left) as fast as i could drive. we got her all set up with catheters in and bloodwork running, fluids, plasma, and antibiotics going, x-rays and ultrasounds done, and basically if we had gone to bed earlier that night, she would have been dead by the morning. her overwhelmed body had gone into septic shock possibly from her worm infestation (which we hadn't been able to get rid of due to the puppies also being infested), a mastitis we found developing that night, or possibly other things - we didn't really know what caused it, but we treated it. unfortunately, that meant the puppies had to be weaned - which caused the mastitis to get worse, and eventually lead to 3 of he breasts having to be removed. the puppies stayed with us for a week while waiting on an spca foster who is more used to taking care of orphaned puppies, and iris was returned to us.
the whole experience was a harrowing and exhausting tornado of stress. and on top of that, then raleigh and the surrounding areas were hit by... tornadoes.
i was actually working the whole time the storm was going through, and the crazy people at work kept coming in to while the storm was going on! during the minutes that the worst of the storm was passing right through, past work, and we'd gotten the call to "go to a safe place" this crazy lady came in and insisted we trim her cat's nails - WHILE THE TORNADOES WERE PASSING WORK! what is wrong with people!? i cannot understand people sometimes, but we did it. ridiculous. anyway, work was unscathed, as was our house, and everyone in our family, so we were very blessed to be spared minus a few branches and one of our walkway lights.
and speaking of work - i tried to get more hours recently and was basically told that there were enough people working and they didn't have hours for me (even though the doctors and my coworkers were all in favor of me working full time again), so i gave up for awhile and just figured it wasn't time to work more. however, i browsed the local listings and found that a nearby mobile vet was hiring a surgery tech position for tuesdays and thursdays. i got in touch with them and was set up to meet with them, when they stopped responding. i took that as a sign to pursue other things and let it go. recently, however, they contacted me again to tell me that the person they'd hired was pregnant and they needed to re-hire the position. so, while i'm a bit put off by their flakiness, they are nearby, seem nice, the job is appealing and part time, and i'm going to go in to interview with them tomorrow morning. i'm excited byt going to be very selective to ensure it's a move i want to make. i'd continue working at oberlin as i am, but i'd work there as well.
that led us to resume our search for a good, affordable daycare for tess. i still really want her to be at bright horizons, as they've impressed me like no other place has, but they are not only expensive, but also apparently impress everyone else because they ALWAYS have a waiting list. so we bit the bullet and put her on the waiting list there and have looked around at other, closer, cheaper places. the problem with places around here is that they're cheap but... you get what you pay for :-/ meaning they aren't as clean or interactive as i'd like, they know nothing about organic or even homemade food, and the idea of cloth diapers is completely alien to them. however, we may put her in one short-term while we wait for an opening (potentially september) at bright horizons.
soooooo, that's the long of the short of our april whirlwind world, and i hope to be more regular about updating during may!
ok well 8 weeks of puppies turned into lots of visits to the vet, an emergency visit that had us weaning the puppies at 3 weeks, puppies living with me without their mama for 1 week, then puppies moving on to another foster and mama coming back to me until she is adopted! oyoyoyoyoy! meanwhile, andrew, tess and i took our first family vacation all together alone (without grandmas involved) and had a great time, tess has turned 13 months (why do moms count in months?! why am i succumbing to the trend?!), my work schedule is changing, i'm interviewing for another part-time job, we're looking into part-time daycares, there were tornadoes tearing through the state, i fell down concrete stairs and nearly broke my ankle, tess got her first cold (and passed it on to us), we went to several museums and even joined one, OH! and my house looks like laundry, dishes, trash, and baby toys EXPLODED in and around it! sheesh! mayhaps this is why i haven't blogged? on the other hand, sure would have made some fantastic material to read about... oh well.
would you like some details about our many events? here goes!
ok so the adorable puppies:
continued growing and doing well, being adorable and sweet, and growing like CRAZY! poor iris was taking such good care of her 10 little ones and trying to heal up her sad body. our friend liz was generous enough to watch the whole gang (including our two crazies) while we went out of town for a long weekend to boone!
we took tons of pictures, which you can see in my facebook album, and had a blast! we drove up late thursday night in hopes that tess would sleep through the drive. we got a later start than we'd planned, and instead of leaving at 8 or 9, we left at about 10:30, which meant we didn't get in to boone until about 2am. luckily, we'd planned to stay in a hotel room that night, so the late arrival time wasn't a big deal for our accommodations... unluckily, that was where our "planning" ceased to work anymore. tess slept for a good hour into the drive before waking up and deciding she was going to stay awake FOR THE REST OF THE DRIVE. she was so out of it and so exhausted that she just sat there staring in front of her like a zombie and occasionally whimpering pathetically but refusing to sleep. it was so sad! then, about 45 mins from boone, she decided she was no longer ok, and we had to put the elmo movie on for the rest of the ride. also, andrew - not being much of the night owl, was about to fall asleep and run us off the road, so my swollen, bruised, nearly broken ankle and i had to drive almost the entire way.
so we got in around 2 and got to sleep around 3am. here's a picture of tess from the next morning:
such a tired baby!
but the rest of the weekend was wonderful! i hobbled around, we swam in the hotel pool, we ate at great places, we hung out with old friends like the newells (who were generous enough to welcome us into their home for the rest of the weekend) and crystal, sue treated us to a birthday celebration with newer friends like andy, kelley, and lucas, we explored king st, drove around our old haunts, and on the last day, took a trip up grandfather mountain!
when we got back home, we had to settle back into real life - boo! and we hadn't been doing that for long before we went out andrew's theater picnic and returned to find iris looking literally like death. andrew called me out because i was propping my ankle up, and he'd gone to take her for the last walk of the night, and he said, "i think she had diarrhea" - so i got off the couch and went out to check on her, only to find her crashing. she had no eyes because her body had had an inflammatory response and made her 3rd eyelids turn red and puff up to cover her eyes. when i peeled those back, her eyeballs were bloodshot and she couldn't really see. her gums were white and tacky, and there was diarrhea everywhere in her whelping box. i freaked out and called the vet and took her in (in my pj's because it was 10:30 by the time we left) as fast as i could drive. we got her all set up with catheters in and bloodwork running, fluids, plasma, and antibiotics going, x-rays and ultrasounds done, and basically if we had gone to bed earlier that night, she would have been dead by the morning. her overwhelmed body had gone into septic shock possibly from her worm infestation (which we hadn't been able to get rid of due to the puppies also being infested), a mastitis we found developing that night, or possibly other things - we didn't really know what caused it, but we treated it. unfortunately, that meant the puppies had to be weaned - which caused the mastitis to get worse, and eventually lead to 3 of he breasts having to be removed. the puppies stayed with us for a week while waiting on an spca foster who is more used to taking care of orphaned puppies, and iris was returned to us.
the whole experience was a harrowing and exhausting tornado of stress. and on top of that, then raleigh and the surrounding areas were hit by... tornadoes.
i was actually working the whole time the storm was going through, and the crazy people at work kept coming in to while the storm was going on! during the minutes that the worst of the storm was passing right through, past work, and we'd gotten the call to "go to a safe place" this crazy lady came in and insisted we trim her cat's nails - WHILE THE TORNADOES WERE PASSING WORK! what is wrong with people!? i cannot understand people sometimes, but we did it. ridiculous. anyway, work was unscathed, as was our house, and everyone in our family, so we were very blessed to be spared minus a few branches and one of our walkway lights.
and speaking of work - i tried to get more hours recently and was basically told that there were enough people working and they didn't have hours for me (even though the doctors and my coworkers were all in favor of me working full time again), so i gave up for awhile and just figured it wasn't time to work more. however, i browsed the local listings and found that a nearby mobile vet was hiring a surgery tech position for tuesdays and thursdays. i got in touch with them and was set up to meet with them, when they stopped responding. i took that as a sign to pursue other things and let it go. recently, however, they contacted me again to tell me that the person they'd hired was pregnant and they needed to re-hire the position. so, while i'm a bit put off by their flakiness, they are nearby, seem nice, the job is appealing and part time, and i'm going to go in to interview with them tomorrow morning. i'm excited byt going to be very selective to ensure it's a move i want to make. i'd continue working at oberlin as i am, but i'd work there as well.
that led us to resume our search for a good, affordable daycare for tess. i still really want her to be at bright horizons, as they've impressed me like no other place has, but they are not only expensive, but also apparently impress everyone else because they ALWAYS have a waiting list. so we bit the bullet and put her on the waiting list there and have looked around at other, closer, cheaper places. the problem with places around here is that they're cheap but... you get what you pay for :-/ meaning they aren't as clean or interactive as i'd like, they know nothing about organic or even homemade food, and the idea of cloth diapers is completely alien to them. however, we may put her in one short-term while we wait for an opening (potentially september) at bright horizons.
soooooo, that's the long of the short of our april whirlwind world, and i hope to be more regular about updating during may!
Sunday, March 20, 2011
tess the turtle turns 1!
holy moly. today, my tiny baby that was born yesterday (or so it feels) turns ONE YEAR OLD!!! hallelujah, we're all still alive.
and in honor of this momentus change from baby to toddler, i've changed the blog's title from andrew, emily & baby tess, to just plain tess. crazy. it's all so unbelievable.
a- i can't believe i actually procreated (if you knew me back in high school or college, you understand the irony of that statement), and
b- i can't believe that it's been A WHOLE YEAR since she was born!
i literally remember it like it was yesterday - being told that i was going to be induced, sitting in the rocking chair on the porch and trying to compose myself, knowing that our life here, as a family of two, would never be the same. and i was right.
being tess's mother this past year has been the most crazy, wonderful, stressful, enlightening, trying, amazing, wild ride of anything in my life. we have dealt with an early arrival, jaundice, the bili light, and seemingly thousands of heel sticks, acid reflux - and 3 different medicines, diet changes, etc to try and ameliorate that, a child who HATES the car with a fiery passion, co-sleeping, no sleeping, nap strikes, and more. but we've been blessed with the sweetest, smartest, super observant, loving, funny, sensitive, silly, most amazing child in the world. and i would not trade it for anything.
yesterday, we had tess's first birthday party, and i think it was a real hit! several of her baby friends were there, including madeline mhoon, graham cutchin evans, elena mccombs, emily rodrigues,
and our cousins nathan and randi ogan!
(their respective parents were also there) we had a blast playing with crayons, chalk,
bubbles, sand in the sandbox, stickers, eating cake and cupcakes,
and having a cookout picnic in the yard! i wish i had more pictures, but once again, i was too busy living the party to photograph it. andrew got some good ones of tess and her cake, and i know my parents got some of the baby interactions, so once i collect more photos, i'll post them to our flickr group.
we had lots of friends and family help us set up and decorate. then, we handed out gift packages for our attendees, which included fun things to play with at the party. we wore our sunglasses, colored in our books, blew bubbles, pretended to play ring toss and other party games
(but mostly just held on to them and threw them around).
we went out to the new sandbox - a temporary one while we're waiting on our new swingset.
we watched tess destroy her smash cake (and i think she would have eaten the whole thing if we hadn't cut her off!) - she is truly her mother's child.
then we had a cookout picnic in the yard, complete with sausage dogs, hot dogs of all varieties, barbecued chicken (made by chef rick welch!), fruit salad, chips, animal crackers, goldfish, cookies, and much more!
last, tess opened her presents from her generous friends. she got lots of contributions to the swingset fund, a car and furreal kitty from nana and grandpa (the hit of the day!), a turtle bouncer from emily r, some dolls and books, and a walker/roller toy from mom and dad! everyone headed home, and family helped us clean up, though there are still chips, cookies, and sundry other junk food options taking over my kitchen!
we are so appreciative of all of our loving friends and family who blessed us by coming out to celebrate and helped to put a great exclamation point on tess's first year!
thank you! we love you!
Friday, March 18, 2011
time change, teeth, toddling, and two days till a year!
well hello friends! it's been awhile, and yes, i MISSED the 11 month update! ugh, how do you make it almost a whole year and miss month 11?? you have a crazy 11 month old, i guess! [as a sidenote, i started this blog yesterday, obviously, so you'll have to excuse the fact that it's getting posted one day before her actual birthday.]
in a month's time, SO much has happened in the development of tess. she's gone from 0 teeth to 4, with several more right under the gums! she's gone from crawling and "cruising" with an occasional attempt at walking, to preferring walking as her mode of transportation - which leads to lots of falling, and subsequent scrapes and bumps, but luckily she's a tough girl. she loves playing with ALL her toys... at once. but especially the ones that make music so she can dance to it - and yes, she knows what "dance" means! she will dance when the music comes on, dance while in the stroller, dance while eating, and light up when you ask her if she's going to dance - sooo cute!
if you know her, you know that she knows what she wants. for example, this morning she wanted a clementine - NOW! she has this very annoying (you can say that about something your kid does, right?) sound that she makes when she wants something, and it gets louder and more persistent until she gets it, like a fire alarm. it's sort of like, "uh uh uuuh", or "ah ah ahhh" but very short and sharp. and then when she sees someone she wants to go to (or a bottle or food) she makes this very small round mouth and goes "ooooooo" "oooooooo" - but the oooo-ing is not annoying. anyway, once i translated the persistent ah ah into "i want a clementine", it was so adorable to watch her holding her baby orange in her two baby hands and trying to peel it open herself!
she's doing lots of things herself these days, or trying to at least. the other day, i found her trying to put on her own socks. she already finger feeds herself whenever possible, and just this morning, i found her trying to undo the child lock on the cabinets. this is extra-impressive considering that the way it works is to hold the "key" (really a specific magnet) up to the location on the cabinet that you've attached the child lock (not visible from the outside) and holding it there while you pull open the door. i had left the key within her reach, and she was holding it to the cabinet and pulling as hard as she could on the handle! she's just so bright and observant, i have to be careful what i do in front of her already!
i have lots more to tell you about, blogworld, but it will have to wait till our next entry, because i believe the FIRST BIRTHDAY PARTY!!! deserves its own blog ;-) stay tuned!
in a month's time, SO much has happened in the development of tess. she's gone from 0 teeth to 4, with several more right under the gums! she's gone from crawling and "cruising" with an occasional attempt at walking, to preferring walking as her mode of transportation - which leads to lots of falling, and subsequent scrapes and bumps, but luckily she's a tough girl. she loves playing with ALL her toys... at once. but especially the ones that make music so she can dance to it - and yes, she knows what "dance" means! she will dance when the music comes on, dance while in the stroller, dance while eating, and light up when you ask her if she's going to dance - sooo cute!
if you know her, you know that she knows what she wants. for example, this morning she wanted a clementine - NOW! she has this very annoying (you can say that about something your kid does, right?) sound that she makes when she wants something, and it gets louder and more persistent until she gets it, like a fire alarm. it's sort of like, "uh uh uuuh", or "ah ah ahhh" but very short and sharp. and then when she sees someone she wants to go to (or a bottle or food) she makes this very small round mouth and goes "ooooooo" "oooooooo" - but the oooo-ing is not annoying. anyway, once i translated the persistent ah ah into "i want a clementine", it was so adorable to watch her holding her baby orange in her two baby hands and trying to peel it open herself!
she's doing lots of things herself these days, or trying to at least. the other day, i found her trying to put on her own socks. she already finger feeds herself whenever possible, and just this morning, i found her trying to undo the child lock on the cabinets. this is extra-impressive considering that the way it works is to hold the "key" (really a specific magnet) up to the location on the cabinet that you've attached the child lock (not visible from the outside) and holding it there while you pull open the door. i had left the key within her reach, and she was holding it to the cabinet and pulling as hard as she could on the handle! she's just so bright and observant, i have to be careful what i do in front of her already!
i have lots more to tell you about, blogworld, but it will have to wait till our next entry, because i believe the FIRST BIRTHDAY PARTY!!! deserves its own blog ;-) stay tuned!
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
chomp, chomp, chomp!
we have teeth!
one day last week, i'm trying to remember which day, i looked into tess's mouth and saw more than just bumps beneath the gumline, i was pretty sure i saw teeth! but, i put my finger in there and didn't feel them, so i was a little confused. i know the gums become rather transparent when babies are close to getting their teeth, but i was sure this was more than just transparent. it wasn't until later that day, when tess had begged to drink from my glass, that i heard the "tink tink tink" of her little baby tooth on my glass - i was right! there was a tooth in there!
it was really hard to see until today though. this afternoon, as we were having our lunch of spaghetti noodles with alfredo sauce, when i got a really clear view of one tooth clearly above the surface (lower right incisor) and its pair (lower left incisor) just barely under the surface! dr. mann said that when she started getting teeth she'd get them all at once, and i guess he's right! we've started a new song when she's eating - i go "chomp, chomp, CHOOOOMP!" while i make my fingers look like a chewing mouth that chomps its way to her and tickles her neck. she LOVES it!
tess is learning what these new teeth thingamajiggers can do, and today, as she was gnawing away at her teething cookie, she began scraping it across her teeth, looking quizzically at me as if to ask what was going on and why the cookie was scraping off into her mouth instead of just gliding over her gums as it had before. then, the most interesting thing happened when she bit down, and the cookie broke! she was excited for sure! teeth are quite remarkable to one who's gone almost a year without them!
as i type this, she is enthralled with her one and only tv show, the dvd of "baby's first noises" by the baby einstein company. you have no idea how thankful i am for them! it is really the only thing on tv that interests her (which i take as a positive thing, so she's not glued to it any time it's on), but she enjoys watching it each afternoon with her teething cookie and apple juice, and it gives mommy some much needed mental break time (since my sweet angel DOES NOT SLEEP during the day, and so i rarely get a break then)!
i would post an adorable picture of her chomping away at that cookie or sucking down her noodles or even of the inside of her sweet little mouth - but i can't find my camera!!! i am so bummed! all these milestones and nothing to show for it :-(
one day last week, i'm trying to remember which day, i looked into tess's mouth and saw more than just bumps beneath the gumline, i was pretty sure i saw teeth! but, i put my finger in there and didn't feel them, so i was a little confused. i know the gums become rather transparent when babies are close to getting their teeth, but i was sure this was more than just transparent. it wasn't until later that day, when tess had begged to drink from my glass, that i heard the "tink tink tink" of her little baby tooth on my glass - i was right! there was a tooth in there!
it was really hard to see until today though. this afternoon, as we were having our lunch of spaghetti noodles with alfredo sauce, when i got a really clear view of one tooth clearly above the surface (lower right incisor) and its pair (lower left incisor) just barely under the surface! dr. mann said that when she started getting teeth she'd get them all at once, and i guess he's right! we've started a new song when she's eating - i go "chomp, chomp, CHOOOOMP!" while i make my fingers look like a chewing mouth that chomps its way to her and tickles her neck. she LOVES it!
tess is learning what these new teeth thingamajiggers can do, and today, as she was gnawing away at her teething cookie, she began scraping it across her teeth, looking quizzically at me as if to ask what was going on and why the cookie was scraping off into her mouth instead of just gliding over her gums as it had before. then, the most interesting thing happened when she bit down, and the cookie broke! she was excited for sure! teeth are quite remarkable to one who's gone almost a year without them!
as i type this, she is enthralled with her one and only tv show, the dvd of "baby's first noises" by the baby einstein company. you have no idea how thankful i am for them! it is really the only thing on tv that interests her (which i take as a positive thing, so she's not glued to it any time it's on), but she enjoys watching it each afternoon with her teething cookie and apple juice, and it gives mommy some much needed mental break time (since my sweet angel DOES NOT SLEEP during the day, and so i rarely get a break then)!
i would post an adorable picture of her chomping away at that cookie or sucking down her noodles or even of the inside of her sweet little mouth - but i can't find my camera!!! i am so bummed! all these milestones and nothing to show for it :-(
Saturday, January 22, 2011
ten months of tess!
i know, i know, i say it every month, but HOLY COW! can you believe that my tiny baby is just two months shy of a year old?! i absolutely can't!
i started writing this blog on saturday night, which would actually have been ON TIME for her 10 months, but the internet died sunday, and we didn't get it back until yesterday, so i'm just now getting around to the post. oh well! c'est la vie when you have a kid!
i'm trying to think of what all has changed between 9 months and 10 months. since i've been working and trying to take a little time for myself here and there, i feel like i'm missing stuff (or just don't know every little minuscule detail of every single day). but there are definitely two developments tess has made, first off...
she can climb the stairs. every single one of them. talk about mommy freaking out. apparently when i went to work on saturday, tess started trying to climb up them with daddy, so he TOOK HER TO THE TOP OF THEM??? (no clue why this was a good idea) to see if she could actually climb them... and she could. then (as depicted in the video), the next day, i decided to see it for myself, and she literally climbed up each and every stair, ALL the way to the top. i nearly had a heart attack. now i'm thinking that in addition to the baby gate between the living room and the rest of the house, we need one at the top AND bottom of the stairs! it's going to be like living in an aqueduct.
oh, and it's not the second major development, but another thing she has begun doing is pulling things down on herself rather than pulling herself up... like the grate in front of the fireplace. yowza.
but the second major accomplishment is...
drumroll please...
on 1/26/2011
tess took her first step!
i doubt she's going to be full-on walking anytime soon, but it was very exciting nonetheless! she has been trying to span the gap between pieces of furniture recently, and i see her reach from one piece to another and ponder how to make the distance, but always, she either does some sort of dive to the floor, or she sits down and crawls. this time though, it was different! tess was standing, holding on to the large ottoman in the living room, like she usually does, pulling things off of it, like she usually does, and trying to hand them to me (a relatively new trick). so she grabbed an envelope, and reached to give it to me. i reached out, but had not yet grabbed it, or her hand, when she took one step towards me and then plopped down on her bottom. it all happened so fast that i had to process a moment before i realized that she had taken the step all on her own. i started squealing and clapping and telling her what a great job she'd done, though i'm sure she had no idea what was going on. it was pretty awesome, and i was so excited that i got to see it! of course, i have no picture or video, since it was a total shock, but i'm sure we'll get something soon enough.
as far as daily life goes, tess eats TONS of organic baby food along with cheese, puffs, yogurt, pasta, and some of pretty much anything i'm eating. we nurse in the morning, sometimes in the evening, and sometimes during the day, but she drinks 6oz formula bottles several times a day as well. and all that leads to TONS of pooping. i mean this kid is a poop champion. in a 24-hr period, she poops no fewer than 3 times, usually 4. people talk about their kids "getting backed up", and the other day when i told mom i was giving her cheese, she asked if that would happen - i started cracking up. we can only hope such a thing would happen! i mean i'm not complaining about having a child with an amazing digestive system, but 1-2 a day would be just fine with me!
sleeping and napping is off and on. most nights she sleeps from about 7:30pm until 7am, waking once or twice, but a week or so ago, we had several sleepless nights when she woke up practically every hour. andrew and i blamed it on teething, but so far we still have yet to see those suckers make their triumphant entry into the world. she's also been napping pretty regularly between about 10 and 11, depending on when she wakes up in the morning. unfortunately, as that nap has gotten longer, the afternoon one has begun disappearing, apparently backwards of what most kids do, but this is tess we're talking about.
she is now wearing 9-12 month clothes, which seems right on track to me, since she is between those months, and yet supposedly she is still a shrimpy. oh well, so are her parents.
as far as stats go, we're majorly estimating this month:
head - who knows. cute though! starting to grow SOME hair :-)
length - maybe half an inch longer than last month? not much taller though. :-/
weight - based on our scale/weigh, add baby and weigh again method, we're going with 18 lbs. we WILL make it to 20 lbs by birthday!
...and now the beast has awakened, so i must go keep her from climbing the stairs or pulling things on top of her head. perhaps pictures to come? we shall see!
i started writing this blog on saturday night, which would actually have been ON TIME for her 10 months, but the internet died sunday, and we didn't get it back until yesterday, so i'm just now getting around to the post. oh well! c'est la vie when you have a kid!
i'm trying to think of what all has changed between 9 months and 10 months. since i've been working and trying to take a little time for myself here and there, i feel like i'm missing stuff (or just don't know every little minuscule detail of every single day). but there are definitely two developments tess has made, first off...
she can climb the stairs. every single one of them. talk about mommy freaking out. apparently when i went to work on saturday, tess started trying to climb up them with daddy, so he TOOK HER TO THE TOP OF THEM??? (no clue why this was a good idea) to see if she could actually climb them... and she could. then (as depicted in the video), the next day, i decided to see it for myself, and she literally climbed up each and every stair, ALL the way to the top. i nearly had a heart attack. now i'm thinking that in addition to the baby gate between the living room and the rest of the house, we need one at the top AND bottom of the stairs! it's going to be like living in an aqueduct.
oh, and it's not the second major development, but another thing she has begun doing is pulling things down on herself rather than pulling herself up... like the grate in front of the fireplace. yowza.
but the second major accomplishment is...
drumroll please...
on 1/26/2011
tess took her first step!
i doubt she's going to be full-on walking anytime soon, but it was very exciting nonetheless! she has been trying to span the gap between pieces of furniture recently, and i see her reach from one piece to another and ponder how to make the distance, but always, she either does some sort of dive to the floor, or she sits down and crawls. this time though, it was different! tess was standing, holding on to the large ottoman in the living room, like she usually does, pulling things off of it, like she usually does, and trying to hand them to me (a relatively new trick). so she grabbed an envelope, and reached to give it to me. i reached out, but had not yet grabbed it, or her hand, when she took one step towards me and then plopped down on her bottom. it all happened so fast that i had to process a moment before i realized that she had taken the step all on her own. i started squealing and clapping and telling her what a great job she'd done, though i'm sure she had no idea what was going on. it was pretty awesome, and i was so excited that i got to see it! of course, i have no picture or video, since it was a total shock, but i'm sure we'll get something soon enough.
as far as daily life goes, tess eats TONS of organic baby food along with cheese, puffs, yogurt, pasta, and some of pretty much anything i'm eating. we nurse in the morning, sometimes in the evening, and sometimes during the day, but she drinks 6oz formula bottles several times a day as well. and all that leads to TONS of pooping. i mean this kid is a poop champion. in a 24-hr period, she poops no fewer than 3 times, usually 4. people talk about their kids "getting backed up", and the other day when i told mom i was giving her cheese, she asked if that would happen - i started cracking up. we can only hope such a thing would happen! i mean i'm not complaining about having a child with an amazing digestive system, but 1-2 a day would be just fine with me!
sleeping and napping is off and on. most nights she sleeps from about 7:30pm until 7am, waking once or twice, but a week or so ago, we had several sleepless nights when she woke up practically every hour. andrew and i blamed it on teething, but so far we still have yet to see those suckers make their triumphant entry into the world. she's also been napping pretty regularly between about 10 and 11, depending on when she wakes up in the morning. unfortunately, as that nap has gotten longer, the afternoon one has begun disappearing, apparently backwards of what most kids do, but this is tess we're talking about.
she is now wearing 9-12 month clothes, which seems right on track to me, since she is between those months, and yet supposedly she is still a shrimpy. oh well, so are her parents.
as far as stats go, we're majorly estimating this month:
head - who knows. cute though! starting to grow SOME hair :-)
length - maybe half an inch longer than last month? not much taller though. :-/
weight - based on our scale/weigh, add baby and weigh again method, we're going with 18 lbs. we WILL make it to 20 lbs by birthday!
...and now the beast has awakened, so i must go keep her from climbing the stairs or pulling things on top of her head. perhaps pictures to come? we shall see!
Friday, December 24, 2010
9 month tess and merry christmas!
well, it's christmas eve, and several days past tess's 9 month birthday, but i've been busy living life instead of writing about it! i do apologize for my lack of posting, but between baby, family, and work, i just don't have a lot of time for me - since blogging is pretty much something i do for myself, though i appreciate that you all partake in the reading :-) but that's ok, i wouldn't have it any other way right now.
sweet baby girl is getting so old so fast! she had her 9 month pediatrician appointment this week, and her doctor, dr. mann, basically told us she's a genius (which we already knew). she's way above average for all of her developmental milestones and, in his words, "one of the most social 9 month olds i've seen in a long time." yep, that's my kid!
she loves pulling up on anything and everything. 
she looks like a rock climber, looking for her next hold and pulling herself along every obstacle. she lets go with one hand, then the other, standing for a few seconds on her own before falling on her bottom. 
[behind her baby gate prison]
she eats tons of solid foods, including most all fruits, veggis, and starches, chicken, turkey, and beans, and now some dairy like cheese and yogurt. 
she looks like a rock climber, looking for her next hold and pulling herself along every obstacle. she lets go with one hand, then the other, standing for a few seconds on her own before falling on her bottom. 
[behind her baby gate prison]
she's still breastfeeding in the morning and evening, but she drinks bottles of formula during the daytime. she's sleeping through the night, with few middle-of-the-night awakenings, and goes to bed around 7:30 and wakes up around 5:45 but will snuggle in the bed for an hour or so nursing, cuddling, giggling, and playing with mom and dad. i love it. it makes me so sad when i have to get up early for work and can't take advantage of snuggle time, but i recognize how blessed i am to get that time with her most days.
tess loves playing with toys, reading books (especially books that play sounds or songs), being tickled, singing the "eensy weensy spider", making faces, squealing and shrieking with joy, meeting new people, waving, clapping, and dancing with mommy or daddy.
she says the words mama and dada and knows what several other words mean including no, hungry, and eat. she can pick up little pieces of food with her fingertips and get it into her mouth. she CAN use a sippy cup and hold a bottle for herself, but prefers for mom and dad to do it. she LOVES bathtime, and she does ok for naps. naps have been a challenge her whole life, but as i type, she has been sleeping for almost 2 hours, the longest morning nap i think she's ever taken in her crib! she's moved into a convertible carseat - in "cowmooflauge" print, and we hoped it would help her enjoy car rides more... it sort of does, maybe. i think she's more comfortable in it, but as long as she's rear-facing, i think she'll be unhappy in the car. which, according to dr. mann, will probably be until she's about 18 months due to her weight.and on that note, 9 month turtle stats!
height - 26.25 in (10th percentile)
weight - 16 lbs 5.5 oz (15th percentile)*
head circumference - 43.5 cm (45th percentile... for her huge brain)
*she hasn't gained much weight since her 6 month visit, which both surprised and concerned me, but dr. mann said it's ok because she is still fine for her height/weight ratio, and she must have been using most of her energy to grow tall instead of wide. still though, i'm going to be pumping her full of formula and food to make sure i'm not starving my poor baby! ...and also to get her in the front-facing weight range as early as possible!!!
these days we have a more normal-ish schedule, definitely for bedtime and wake up time, but her first nap is usually somewhere between 9:30 and 10:30, she eats solids 3x/day, and her second nap is usually around 1:30 or 2:30. occasionally there's a quick third snooze around 4ish, but not every day, and usually that one is in the car traveling somewhere. other than that, we spend our time playing, hugging, dancing, and going places (usually like wal-mart for exciting things like dish detergent). i'm working 2-3 days a week - monday, saturday, and every other wednesday or thursday, so i'm up to 20-30 hour a week at work (which i think i already explained before), which i enjoy. unfortunately, during the weeks that i work 30 hours, the house usually ends up a wreck, and that's embarassing, but what 'ya gonna do??
the only two areas tess seems to be behind in are her teeth - still none showing, though the doctor said when they start, she'll probably get lots all at once, because they're all right there; the other being hair. i don't think she's officially "behind" per se... but i would love to clip a little hair thing in there (no huge bows please, but a little one would be sweet!), but alas, her strawberry locks are probably 2 cm at longest!
[tess helped decorate!]
[and helped pick out and bring home her first tree!]alright, well the turtle has awakened, and i must get back to the christmas eve festivities! have a blessed christmas weekend!
"For God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." John 3:16
Thursday, November 25, 2010
8 months of tess!
but baby girl continues to grow and change and develop! she's already crawling, pulling to standing, trying to balance while standing on her own, and walking across the room if you hold her hands. she's so advanced ;-)
[the progression of a stand]
naps are still a struggle, more so now that the crib is down so low. she hasn't yet figured out how to put herself asleep for a nap, so she usually nurses to sleep, and then trying to put her all the way down in the crib wakes her up. we're working on it, but it leads to many napless or short nap days.
[tess sitting with her new friend, vanessa]
tess now eats 2-3 solid meals a day, but i think she still gets most of her nutrition from nursing and the occasional formula bottle (when mom's not around and neither is pumped breastmilk).
[i love big-girl food!]
tess also makes funny faces, sweet noises, and shrieks with joy - usually at inappropriate times. so we've decided taking her to a fancy french restaurant at this point is out, but she's so cute when she does it that i have a hard time not smiling and laughing...
even last night when we were out at a restaurant - bad mommy! and right now she's being so cute that i can't keep typing and must go hang out with her!
[at madeline's party, with mommy and my party hat!]
weight - about 20 lbs, we think
height - per andrew's measuring tape, about 26.5 in
we have no idea how that measures up against the "percentiles" but i know she's just perfect!
Friday, November 5, 2010
turtle funnies!
ok two funny tess stories, really quick (like if i twittered, i believe these might be tweets).
last night, tess woke up several times during the night. the last time, it was about 7 am. she usually sleeps till 8 or 8:30, and i was exhausted, so i was going to let daddy handle this one, when the crying girl - who hasn't said any words AT ALL in like two months (i even double checked with the doctor the other day to make sure it wasn't a problem) - says, "aaahhhmaaaahh!" i turned to andrew incredulously, "did she just say mama?" he said it sounded kinda like it, and then, like clockwork, she says, "MAAAMAAAAAAA!" CLEAR AS DAY. no doubt about it. andrew laughed and said, "yep, that was definitely mama." HOORAYYYY! and also... crap! how can you let daddy take this one when she calls your name?? it was mama duty again. at least she's adorable :-)
second funny - this morning, i had gotten in the shower (since andrew was still home, and i don't know when i last showered! eep!), and i encouraged andrew to try setting tess on the potty when they got out of bed. well, he begrudgingly brought her in and set her on the little potty. no pee. he encouraged, i encouraged from the shower, and he gave up and picked her up. i looked out from behind the shower curtain just in time to see a 3 inch poo hanging off her bum, and andrew about to stick his arm in it! "THERE'S POOP HANGING OFF HER BUTT!" i nearly shouted. andrew had her back on that potty so fast, and we were all laughing and shocked. poor tess looked a little scared, so i hope we didn't scare her from using the toilet, but holy poo! poop in the potty?! at 7 months?! my child is a prodigy. hehehe :-) i know she isn't *really* potty trained, but seriously, how cool is that??
and yes, i took a picture, but no, i won't be posting it... unless you want it!
last night, tess woke up several times during the night. the last time, it was about 7 am. she usually sleeps till 8 or 8:30, and i was exhausted, so i was going to let daddy handle this one, when the crying girl - who hasn't said any words AT ALL in like two months (i even double checked with the doctor the other day to make sure it wasn't a problem) - says, "aaahhhmaaaahh!" i turned to andrew incredulously, "did she just say mama?" he said it sounded kinda like it, and then, like clockwork, she says, "MAAAMAAAAAAA!" CLEAR AS DAY. no doubt about it. andrew laughed and said, "yep, that was definitely mama." HOORAYYYY! and also... crap! how can you let daddy take this one when she calls your name?? it was mama duty again. at least she's adorable :-)
second funny - this morning, i had gotten in the shower (since andrew was still home, and i don't know when i last showered! eep!), and i encouraged andrew to try setting tess on the potty when they got out of bed. well, he begrudgingly brought her in and set her on the little potty. no pee. he encouraged, i encouraged from the shower, and he gave up and picked her up. i looked out from behind the shower curtain just in time to see a 3 inch poo hanging off her bum, and andrew about to stick his arm in it! "THERE'S POOP HANGING OFF HER BUTT!" i nearly shouted. andrew had her back on that potty so fast, and we were all laughing and shocked. poor tess looked a little scared, so i hope we didn't scare her from using the toilet, but holy poo! poop in the potty?! at 7 months?! my child is a prodigy. hehehe :-) i know she isn't *really* potty trained, but seriously, how cool is that??
and yes, i took a picture, but no, i won't be posting it... unless you want it!
Thursday, November 4, 2010
rashes, and diapers, and potties, oh my!
we went in to the doctor's office today (to an appointment i almost missed because i was having so much fun chatting on the phone with christin!) to check out a bit of a diaper rash, that apparently could be caused by... our well water?! ugh, this never ends with the water! so we'll have to see if that is actually the cause or not. we got a prescription for "magic butt paste" - yes, that is what it says on the prescription pad, so we may go get that and see if it works... or we may not, since the rash was mostly gone by the time we got to the appointment. it's like your car, never makes the noise when you're at the mechanic!
but anyway, the diaper rash looked sort of like a yeast infection (on the skin, not an internal one), so we followed dr.google's recommendation and used the lotrimin af on there twice a day for a few weeks. i figured this was ok since it's what they had me use when they thought i had a yeast infection on my breast, and it was ok, but i don't know that it did anything - either time. with tess's rash, we tried lots of things, no disposables at nana's house, using disposables in case it was the cloth, using the lotrimin, and the most recent recommendation by nurse jennifer, going nakey-butt all day yesterday and using just water to wash. that was a blast! i'm serious, it was so adorable to see her little naked butt crawling all over the floor all day.
i laid towels down so i wouldn't have to shampoo the whole floor, and we had a great time. we had several bird baths in the sink to rise the diaper area, not using soap, and she even took a nap with no diaper on. the interesting thing about that was that she didn't pee in the crib! so, i thought, i should sit her over the potty when i pick her up and see if she pees in there. well, when i tried to hold my sleepy little girl over the big person toilet, she got confused and started to cry, so i decided i'd just hold her while i used the rest room and i'd try again when she was more awake. well, as soon as i sat down and peed, she peed... all over me... and the toilet... and the bathroom floor! it was hilarious. i had to strip down, and we both took a bath!
at the end of the night, her diaper area, which had been open to the world all day, looked WORSE than before! i decided i'd take her in to the doctor. first thing this morning, before even getting out of bed, i made an appointment. however, last night i had an idea to try having her use her own potty after waking up from sleeping, especially if she's not peeing [much] in her sleep. so i got her very own little potty, and this morning, first thing, i walked her straight to the bathroom and undid her little diaper, and set her on her tiny potty. i said, "ok, go pee-pee!" AND SHE DID!!! right in her tiny little potty!
[image from her post-nap pee this afternoon!]
it was the sweetest, cutest thing i've seen (relating to a bodily function). so perhaps we'll try doing this after naps just for fun. don't worry, i'm not deluded and somehow thinking my 7 month old is "potty trained", but it's fun, and why not get a jump start?
so as i took her to the changing table to put on a diaper... the rash was GONE. but i kept the appointment, because i knew if i canceled it, the rash would come back, and i'd be mad. so, we went in, and she weighed in (with clothes on) at a whopping 17 lbs! what a big girl! and we got the prescription for magic butt paste. :-)
but anyway, the diaper rash looked sort of like a yeast infection (on the skin, not an internal one), so we followed dr.google's recommendation and used the lotrimin af on there twice a day for a few weeks. i figured this was ok since it's what they had me use when they thought i had a yeast infection on my breast, and it was ok, but i don't know that it did anything - either time. with tess's rash, we tried lots of things, no disposables at nana's house, using disposables in case it was the cloth, using the lotrimin, and the most recent recommendation by nurse jennifer, going nakey-butt all day yesterday and using just water to wash. that was a blast! i'm serious, it was so adorable to see her little naked butt crawling all over the floor all day.
i laid towels down so i wouldn't have to shampoo the whole floor, and we had a great time. we had several bird baths in the sink to rise the diaper area, not using soap, and she even took a nap with no diaper on. the interesting thing about that was that she didn't pee in the crib! so, i thought, i should sit her over the potty when i pick her up and see if she pees in there. well, when i tried to hold my sleepy little girl over the big person toilet, she got confused and started to cry, so i decided i'd just hold her while i used the rest room and i'd try again when she was more awake. well, as soon as i sat down and peed, she peed... all over me... and the toilet... and the bathroom floor! it was hilarious. i had to strip down, and we both took a bath!
at the end of the night, her diaper area, which had been open to the world all day, looked WORSE than before! i decided i'd take her in to the doctor. first thing this morning, before even getting out of bed, i made an appointment. however, last night i had an idea to try having her use her own potty after waking up from sleeping, especially if she's not peeing [much] in her sleep. so i got her very own little potty, and this morning, first thing, i walked her straight to the bathroom and undid her little diaper, and set her on her tiny potty. i said, "ok, go pee-pee!" AND SHE DID!!! right in her tiny little potty!
[image from her post-nap pee this afternoon!] it was the sweetest, cutest thing i've seen (relating to a bodily function). so perhaps we'll try doing this after naps just for fun. don't worry, i'm not deluded and somehow thinking my 7 month old is "potty trained", but it's fun, and why not get a jump start?
so as i took her to the changing table to put on a diaper... the rash was GONE. but i kept the appointment, because i knew if i canceled it, the rash would come back, and i'd be mad. so, we went in, and she weighed in (with clothes on) at a whopping 17 lbs! what a big girl! and we got the prescription for magic butt paste. :-)
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
7 months!
holy cow, can you believe it's been 7 months (and 1 day) since my sweet, sweet baby tess was born?? for some reason, 7 months seems SOOO OLD! maybe because it's now older than half a year? i have no idea, but wow!
i've been trying to write this post for 5 days now, and life keeps getting in the way, but we got the coolest 7-month-iversary present on saturday (when she was technically 7 months and 3 days) - baby girl started crawling!
she looks like an inch-worm, and she still prefers that you just pick her up and put her close to whatever she wanted, but i'm so excited that she's made this milestone! we tried to get a video, but she started fussing during it, so i'll wait till we have a better one. the funniest thing is that the one thing that motivated her to actually crawl wasn't mommy or daddy, or even something really cool like the dog... it was my coffee mug! some days only coffee can motivate me to move too! like mother like daughter, i guess.other fun facts about the 7 month turtle:
-she loves sweet foods like oatmeal, prunes, peaches, apples, and squash, and has tepid (at best) feelings towards veggis like carrots, green peas, and green beans.
-she loves chewing on things. some of her favorites include any fruit mommy is eating, her pink pleather mary-janes, and her new rubber giraffe that nana bought her.
-she picked out her first baby doll at the store. it has long blonde hair and a pink dress. she cried and was afraid of most of the other ones, especially the freaky ones that move giggle creepily when you walk by.
-she has begun yelling and shrieking in response to excitement - at parties, to mommy, daddy, nana, and grandpa, and it's so loud it'll hurt your ears.
-she is becoming more selective about who she will go to and be content with in groups. she prefers people she knows and those who are interesting to look at but not too in-your-face.
-she hasn't been babbling much in a while, which makes mommy nervous, but all the other experienced mothers out there are telling me it's because she's working on so many physical milestones (like crawling!) and trying to pull up and walk.
-she can sit up well on her own now, and doesn't seem to notice when she tips over and SLAMS herself into the floor. it freaks mommy out!
-she loves music and pianos/keyboards, so we've gotten her one of those to play with.
-she has a book called "whose nose is that?" which she loves, because it has noses of animals which you lift to reveal the whole animal. her favorites are the puppy, pig, horse, duck, and cat.
-she loves textures, so she enjoys books like "tails" with different textured animal tails, and a new one we got her with textures around town (like a brick, a sidewalk, a tree, etc.) she also loves looking at and touching different carpets and the wicker laundry baskets.
-she is wearing clothing anywhere between 3-12 months, depending on the brand, but most of them are in the 6-9 month range.
-i have no idea how much she weighs or how tall she is now, other than to say she seems HUUUUGE to me!
getting into a daily schedule and nightly sleep schedule has been challenging this month. we start getting pretty established, and then mommy goes to work and that messes it all up. she usually likes to nap in the morning sometime between 10 and 11:30am and then again between 2-4:30pm, and occasionally she'll take another one during dinner, but that usually messes up the night time if she does.
she has a nightly bedtime routine that starts with a solid food meal around 7:30, followed by a bath (usually by daddy), a last nursing, and then she goes down into her co-sleeper around 8:30 or 9. recently, we're trying to wean her off night nursings so she'll sleep longer, but it hasn't been going too smoothly. i hear it takes a little, but two nights in a row she woke up at 1:30am and wanted to stay awake until 3am. also, each night before i go to work, she doesn't want to sleep at all. so sunday night, i got less than 3 hours of sleep because tess and i didn't get to bed (and sleep) until after 3am, and i'm supposed to get up at 5:45am. i slept through my alarm and was 30 mins late for work. hopefully soon this sleeping thing will get worked out. we're trying to have andrew comfort her during the night now, because when i'm near her, all she wants to do is nurse herself to sleep, and she refuses to just be patted back to sleep by me, but she'll do it for andrew. i know we just have to stick with it, but i'd really love to sleep for more than 3 hours straight during the night!
we have also started using formula occasionally, when we're out and about, because it's easier than always nursing or keeping breast milk frozen or cool. it also makes me feel a little better because i'm not doing any iron supplements with her (don't really thing she needs them), but the formula has iron added, so she's getting some that way. however, that doesn't seem to agree with her digestive system so well, because recently she's gone from pooping once or twice a day to much MUCH less frequently. eek! we keep loading her up with prunes, but i may have to find out if there's anything else we can do, as she seems quite uncomfortable at times.
well, she's awake now, so i must go play! ... and clean the house, and do laundry, and make lunch, etc, etc, etc.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
nights
tess's nights have been interesting. when she was just home as a newborn, she hardly slept at all, especially compared to other newborns, and during the night she would eat on her regular every two hour schedule. holy cow.
then with the bili-light, which weighed so much that it would pull over her bassinet, she started co-sleeping with me on the couch near the outlet that we'd plugged the box into. she started going longer, every four hour stretches.
the co-sleeping continued for some time, and at 3 months, much to my dismay and probably due in part to the reflux, she was STILL co-sleeping, BUT she had begun sleeping for long stretches at night. 6-7+ hours, followed by 4 hour stretches, and she slept until 10:30 most mornings. people looked down on me for sleeping with my girl, but at least we were sleeping!
then somewhere between 4-5 months, we began changing her over to the co-sleeper (a bedside attachment, similar to a pack-n-play, but smaller), and the sleeping went to waking every 2 hours, with a possible 3-hour stretch in there. ugh. by the middle of the night, we resorted back to co-sleeping in the bed because i was just falling asleep nursing her. waking time became erratic, sometimes 5:30am, sometimes 7 or 9 or 10:30 with no detectable pattern. yuck.
at about 5.5 months, we'd developed a pattern, put her down around 9:30, she'd wake up around 12:30, then it was a 4-hour stretch, and then every two hours until around 9:30am. not ideal, but at least it was a pattern. however, that little sleep began wearing on me, and so andrew started trying to do a middle-of-the-night-formula bottle, which sometimes led to another 3-4 hour stretch, and sometimes didn't. her waking time again became erratic. and that's how it's been until about a week ago.
we decided it was time to move tess to her crib (upstairs - eek!) because she's getting a bit large for the co-sleeper. night 1, it worked like a charm, she went to bed up there, had a middle of the night bottle, and got up in the morning. HALLELUJAH! we were so excited. i tried to get her to nap in the crib the next day, but she just kept waking up SCREAMING and sounding like she was terrified. after several (hours of) attempts, i finally let the poor thing sleep in my arms, where she continued to wake up screaming until she felt that i was still there. we tried again that night, and only screaming continued until i just felt horrible for her and gave up. she would not sleep without being IN MY ARMS for that whole night. i felt like we'd gone back in time because we'd tried to push her to hard. i was heartbroken.
then, yesterday we went to the fair, and so there were no beds for naps. since we were there for 9 hours, not counting travel time, she spent some time in the stroller, slept in the carrier, and slept in her carseat on the way back. last night, we put her down in the co-sleeper, and she didn't wake up except to eat. early in the morning, i was tired and started falling asleep while she nursed. rather than staying in my arms, she rolled over and literally DOVE headfirst into the co-sleeper (don't worry, it's about 2 inches lower than and attached to the bed), and when i tried to straighten her back up, she did it again. so i laid her back in it, and she went to sleep. the next time she woke up, i fed her, started falling asleep, and she did the same thing! so i laid her down (not on her head), and she slept until we woke up for the day!
it's amazing when your baby just TELLS you what she is ready for! clearly, she wasn't ready to be all the way upstairs in her big-girl crib, but she didn't want to stay in mom's bed (which we are all thankful for!) anymore. what a smartie! i guess we'll do the co-sleeper until it's unsafe, which won't be long with the way she's moving around now, and then have to try making the move to the crib again.
then with the bili-light, which weighed so much that it would pull over her bassinet, she started co-sleeping with me on the couch near the outlet that we'd plugged the box into. she started going longer, every four hour stretches.
the co-sleeping continued for some time, and at 3 months, much to my dismay and probably due in part to the reflux, she was STILL co-sleeping, BUT she had begun sleeping for long stretches at night. 6-7+ hours, followed by 4 hour stretches, and she slept until 10:30 most mornings. people looked down on me for sleeping with my girl, but at least we were sleeping!
then somewhere between 4-5 months, we began changing her over to the co-sleeper (a bedside attachment, similar to a pack-n-play, but smaller), and the sleeping went to waking every 2 hours, with a possible 3-hour stretch in there. ugh. by the middle of the night, we resorted back to co-sleeping in the bed because i was just falling asleep nursing her. waking time became erratic, sometimes 5:30am, sometimes 7 or 9 or 10:30 with no detectable pattern. yuck.
at about 5.5 months, we'd developed a pattern, put her down around 9:30, she'd wake up around 12:30, then it was a 4-hour stretch, and then every two hours until around 9:30am. not ideal, but at least it was a pattern. however, that little sleep began wearing on me, and so andrew started trying to do a middle-of-the-night-formula bottle, which sometimes led to another 3-4 hour stretch, and sometimes didn't. her waking time again became erratic. and that's how it's been until about a week ago.
we decided it was time to move tess to her crib (upstairs - eek!) because she's getting a bit large for the co-sleeper. night 1, it worked like a charm, she went to bed up there, had a middle of the night bottle, and got up in the morning. HALLELUJAH! we were so excited. i tried to get her to nap in the crib the next day, but she just kept waking up SCREAMING and sounding like she was terrified. after several (hours of) attempts, i finally let the poor thing sleep in my arms, where she continued to wake up screaming until she felt that i was still there. we tried again that night, and only screaming continued until i just felt horrible for her and gave up. she would not sleep without being IN MY ARMS for that whole night. i felt like we'd gone back in time because we'd tried to push her to hard. i was heartbroken.
then, yesterday we went to the fair, and so there were no beds for naps. since we were there for 9 hours, not counting travel time, she spent some time in the stroller, slept in the carrier, and slept in her carseat on the way back. last night, we put her down in the co-sleeper, and she didn't wake up except to eat. early in the morning, i was tired and started falling asleep while she nursed. rather than staying in my arms, she rolled over and literally DOVE headfirst into the co-sleeper (don't worry, it's about 2 inches lower than and attached to the bed), and when i tried to straighten her back up, she did it again. so i laid her back in it, and she went to sleep. the next time she woke up, i fed her, started falling asleep, and she did the same thing! so i laid her down (not on her head), and she slept until we woke up for the day!
it's amazing when your baby just TELLS you what she is ready for! clearly, she wasn't ready to be all the way upstairs in her big-girl crib, but she didn't want to stay in mom's bed (which we are all thankful for!) anymore. what a smartie! i guess we'll do the co-sleeper until it's unsafe, which won't be long with the way she's moving around now, and then have to try making the move to the crib again.
Friday, September 24, 2010
half a year?!
tess the turtle was officially half a year old on 9/20, and i kept meaning to write a great blog about it, but i just haven't had the time! i think tess (because she was a little early) tends to have her growth spurts right at or after she's supposed to, so this week has been her 6 month dr's appointment, shots, and growth spurt starting, along with teething, has led her to be a tad clingier than normal, but we're doing well and enjoying each other. right now she's sitting in my lap and my arms are just long enough to type this without her kicking the trackpad :-)
here are the stats:
24.75 in. long - around 20th percentile
15lbs 9.5oz - just under the 50th percentile
head - around 50th (who even remembers the measurement?)
AND i took the sweetest picture of her on my cellphone yesterday, but i have no idea how to hook up the bluetooth to get it on the computer, so we'll have to see if i can get it on here!
here are the stats:
24.75 in. long - around 20th percentile
15lbs 9.5oz - just under the 50th percentile
head - around 50th (who even remembers the measurement?)
AND i took the sweetest picture of her on my cellphone yesterday, but i have no idea how to hook up the bluetooth to get it on the computer, so we'll have to see if i can get it on here!
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
teething turtle
this is what teething + frozen homemade pears looks like in the korhonen home:
yay for the new mesh feeder thingy!
yay for the new mesh feeder thingy!
Friday, September 3, 2010
oh holy parenting, batman!
holy moly, it's been a while! i know you think i'm a slacker now, but in all honesty, i just haven't had TIME! i have no idea how some mommies are able to blog as much as they do! what i have really come to understand is that each family situation is different, and that all babies are different. some babies are very high needs, and some are low maintenance, and it's no reflection on the parents - several parents even have different babies of different temperaments, which is further proof of this.
at first, i felt like my needy baby was "all my fault" - and other parents did not help that, they kept telling me things like not to attend to her every time she cried or she would be "clingy", or if i would just do the thing they did (swaddle, go for a car ride, force her to cry it out, etc) then she'd be "fixed" - and i just needed to be "stronger" and resist her manipulating me or i'd spoil her. well meaning as they were, they were wrong, and they were wrong to make me feel like i was doing something wrong by following my child's cues. (there were other parents who supported me and empathized, and i'm not referring to them here at ALL!)
the truth is that tess was a challenging newborn. she was induced early, and she was going to get those last few weeks back with mom!
but we coped, and we loved on her, carried her, comforted her, slept with her, and attended to her needs. and slowly, starting at about 4 months, she began to relax. she started to be ok on her own for 30 seconds, then 1 minute, 2 minutes, long enough for mom to go to the bathroom alone, long enough for mom to make coffee alone, and we started to get into a groove.
i don't say all of this to shame parents who make different choices for their babies, nor to i say it for a pat on the back, but i say it so that those of you who are in the last weeks before becoming the proud mommies or daddies of newborns will know that i support you. when your little one emerges into this huge world, YOU are their best advocate. YOU have been with them since they began forming from tiny cells. YOU have a gut instinct that tells you what's right for your child, your family, and your situation. and whether it's what worked for us or what was a total flop for us, i support you.
looking back, yes it was the hardest thing i've ever done, but i wouldn't have it any other way. i feel like i know my baby. i can usually tell why she's crying, when she'll cry, and how to make her stop, and because of that she doesn't cry much, she smiles and laughs a LOT, she loves people and isn't afraid of strangers (though i hear that happens later), and is passing developmental milestones like they're going out of style! but more than all of that, i LOVE her SO MUCH, in a way i've never loved anything else in the world.
at first, i felt like my needy baby was "all my fault" - and other parents did not help that, they kept telling me things like not to attend to her every time she cried or she would be "clingy", or if i would just do the thing they did (swaddle, go for a car ride, force her to cry it out, etc) then she'd be "fixed" - and i just needed to be "stronger" and resist her manipulating me or i'd spoil her. well meaning as they were, they were wrong, and they were wrong to make me feel like i was doing something wrong by following my child's cues. (there were other parents who supported me and empathized, and i'm not referring to them here at ALL!)
the truth is that tess was a challenging newborn. she was induced early, and she was going to get those last few weeks back with mom!
[attitude from the start!]
she demanded to be held and snuggled ALL THE TIME, she was sick - first pretty severe jaundice, then true reflux, which made it all harder, and she HATED being confined to a carseat for any length of time. and she screamed. ALL the time. not just fussed or cried, she screamed. when i was post-partum and hormonal, people kept acting like i was stressed because i was depressed, not because we were having a rough go at it, and they were wrong too. my husband and my mother can attest to that. to top it off, she didn't sleep like a newborn - most of them are sleepy little bundles of mush who nap every 2 hours, but not my child! there were days, at 3 months, when she didn't nap but once a day - and only for 30 mins! a friend at work (who has 3 sons) upon hearing her sleep habits said, "she naps like a 9 month old!" but we haven't gotten to 9 months yet, so who knows what will happen then!
[when you have to carry them everywhere, you get creative!]
but we coped, and we loved on her, carried her, comforted her, slept with her, and attended to her needs. and slowly, starting at about 4 months, she began to relax. she started to be ok on her own for 30 seconds, then 1 minute, 2 minutes, long enough for mom to go to the bathroom alone, long enough for mom to make coffee alone, and we started to get into a groove.
[one of the first times she noticed the mobile in the swing]
slowly, she has started to be ok in the car, sometimes napping, and recently even just playing with her carseat toys alone. she has started being able to sleep without nursing first (sometimes), she has started some solid foods, she's still working on the teeth that have been threatening to come in since she was 2 months old, and just this week, she has begun sleeping on her own, and i didn't have to hear her scream in her bed for hours and days on end. because all of this attention to our baby has taught us a lot about what she can handle.
[homemade squash is my favorite!]
monday night when i laid her down in her crib, she did cry, but i knew she'd be ok. after going to sleep, she stayed asleep, and even after nursing sessions, was fine to go back to her crib. tuesday night, she was sleepy but had opened her eyes as i put her down - not a peep. last night, i laid her down and she fussed for a second, but i gave her the pacifier and patted her back, and she was down. and it only took 5 months :-)i don't say all of this to shame parents who make different choices for their babies, nor to i say it for a pat on the back, but i say it so that those of you who are in the last weeks before becoming the proud mommies or daddies of newborns will know that i support you. when your little one emerges into this huge world, YOU are their best advocate. YOU have been with them since they began forming from tiny cells. YOU have a gut instinct that tells you what's right for your child, your family, and your situation. and whether it's what worked for us or what was a total flop for us, i support you.
looking back, yes it was the hardest thing i've ever done, but i wouldn't have it any other way. i feel like i know my baby. i can usually tell why she's crying, when she'll cry, and how to make her stop, and because of that she doesn't cry much, she smiles and laughs a LOT, she loves people and isn't afraid of strangers (though i hear that happens later), and is passing developmental milestones like they're going out of style! but more than all of that, i LOVE her SO MUCH, in a way i've never loved anything else in the world.
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