Shall we start with a fun fact? Let's. My precious baby is now closer to 1 year than to being born. Isn't that mind-blowing? No? Just to me? Sorry to get you jazzed for nothing. :c)
On to the challenges. I have to say- sometimes I can't even believe Miss Em is the same baby I brought home from the hospital and shed so many new mama tears over for those first few months. This month I don't think she threw a fit in the car once. She's become a pretty solid sleeper. I feel like a lucky Mama. I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop. Juuuuust waiting.
Hey Mom- remember how you felt deathly ill yesterday and you're still not feeling 100%? Guess what? That doesn't mean I'm going to make this photoshoot any easier on you. I'll let you get this one of me laying down as a freeby. Then all bets are off. Ready? And go...
Despite having shed our previous challenges, this month was not without some new ones. Our poor little love bug was sick 2 times. She had her first ear infections about half way through the month. Sweet girl was not happy. Not happy at all. It was somewhat a parenting fail because it probably went on a little longer than it should have. On Sunday evening (September 15th) after we took pictures with Shawna we noticed that she was developing a little cough and that her nose was pretty runny. We happened to have her 6 month check up the next day. So we mentioned it to the doctor and he said not to worry unless she started coughing up something yellow. Roger. Look for something yellow.
So the week wore on and she wasn't sleeping very well, was pretty fussy and just generally not acting completely like herself. But she wasn't coughing up anything yellow. (Have I mentioned I'm a rule follower?) We also weren't sure if she wasn't sleeping well because she was reverting (she had only been sleeping well for about a week) or thought potentially she was teething. We chalked up the very runny nose to something like allergies. She's had nearly a constant runny nose since she was about 3 months old.
Did you see how fast I flipped myself into a seated position. Are you impressed? You look impressed.
Finally on Saturday September 21st my Mom pointed out that the drainage from her nose WAS yellow. So we decided that Ryan should take her to the Urgent Care clinic in Conroe the morning of Julie & David's engagement party. Luckily they diagnosed it quickly, we got her some antibiotics and she was back to herself within about 48 hours. Moral of the story? Yellow doesn't have to be coughed out. That bit of advice is free. Next one I'll charge you.
The next "sickness," was the bubnoic plague that I mentioned in my birthday post. Luckily her only symptoms were being a diaper dirtying MACHINE and one vom sesh. She acted mostly like herself the entire time though she did eat a lot less than normal. Probably because she was worried about how that food would come back out. I was with ya, little one!
I watched you spend 2 minutes writing that with a sharpie even though the smell was making you want to vom. Do you want me to slobber on it and make the marker run? I'll take that "No, no, no," as a yes. Thanks.
Of course, with this new found mobility she is showing more and more interest in and awareness of the world around her. In the past months if you put toys down in front of her she would play with those and potentially anything within about a 2 foot radius around her. This month her radius has expanded to full rooms. She can spot the remote on top of the couch from across the room. She can see your iPhone on top of the side table. She can find Lola's toys nearly anywhere you try to hide them. It's so much fun to see her set her sights on getting something and then making it happen.
That was pretty neat how I tore the calendar, huh? I can show you how if you want. So glad we're always on the same page.
You can also tell that her vision and ability to discern detail has improved. She is obsessed with patterns and things on t-shirts... which works well because that's about all her Mama & Daddy wear at home. She will stare at shirts and pull on the material for 5 minutes. She also really loves to look at the covers of her books and the pictures in them. As a bookworm in my childhood life, I'm going to pretend this means she will be a reader until she proves me wrong. Whatever helps me sleep at night right?
In terms of personality she still seems to be very sensitive to and in tune with what others are doing. I hope that trait blossoms into a fantastic little compassionate heart. She also seems to display a little bit more of a fearless nature than I know I, and I presume cautious Ryan, had as a child. When she pulls herself up, she just let's herself fall right back down. She doesn't think about how to do it. If my genes are in there at all, this will probably subside over time. Of course, it goes without saying, Emery continues to be the consummate skeptical baby. New foods? Skeptical. New smells? Skeptical. New noises? Skeptical. New people? Skeptical.
Hey this is cool. If I pull on this side, I can get even more of this in my mouth and make the sides of all future months crinkle up with slobber at the same time. I'm so efficient!
Last, and the total opposite of least, Emery exhibits real signs that she loooooves her Mama & Daddy. It's so gratifying and I hope that when she's 16 I can remember to close my eyes and think back to her reaction to us walking in a room. She sits up real straight, gets the BIGGEST open-mouthed grin you have ever seen and starts flapping her arms. Then she usually starts crawling towards us. It's the best feeling in the world. Best. Feeling. In. The. World.
The School Stuff
This month at school her teachers shared a couple of stories about Emery during the day that made me lauuuuugh. The first was that one day at school they had a fire drill. They said that they were wheeling all the babies out in their cribs. Most of the babies were just sitting in their cribs or laying down. What was my child doing? Pulling up on her knees with her hands on the bars looking all around. They kept trying to lay her back down and she kept going right back to what she was doing. No one does anything without skeptical baby watching it go down.
Phew, wearing you out is pretty exhausting. Think I'll sit still here for just a fraction of a second.
The second story requires some background. Usually when I pick her up in the afternoon, after I give her more kisses than is probably appropriate, I start putting her in her carseat and I usually tell her what we're doing. Also, in each of the baby's cribs they have a poster at the end of the bed with pictures of their family for them to look at during nap time. Okay, so one day when I'm picking her up we are going through the normal routine and I'm telling her what we're doing, "We're going to go home, we're going to eat. You're going to get to see Daddy and Lola." When I said Lola her teacher said, "oh yes, Lola. Yesterday during nap time I look over and she was making like this *gesturing petting the picture of Lola*." So. Stinking. Cute.
Other than that, her teachers mainly just comment on how closely she watches things. This month they said she really cries when they leave the room unless they make eye contact with her and tell her they'll be right back before they do it. Haha. She's a little character. Writing this post when I am, I already know that she has to move on to the Infant B class. Typing that makes me cry. I'll save that for a different post though.
Awesome. Feeling refreshed. Think I'll head straight for that plantation shutter.
The Stats
- Height: 27.5" inches (88th percentile)
- Weight: 17 lbs 9 oz (69th percentile) Not much weight gain this month because our little angel has been sick.
- Head: Ummm.. bigger than last month? :c)
- Diaper size: 3
- Clothes: 6-9 months.
- Milk: Still eats pretty much every 3 hours, give or take 30 minutes. She has either 3 or 4 six oz bottles at school.
- Solids: Baby girl eats rice cereal like a pro. This month we started introducing other solids as well. We started with veggies at many of my Mama friends' suggestion. We have tried peas, carrots, squash and sweet potatoes. I feel like we're a bit behind because she was sick 2x this month and had no tolerance for trying new things. Thus far I would say she has inherited her Dad's lack of vegetable interest. The only veggie that was met with marginal success was squash. Mama is going to give in and start fruits here in a few days.
- Firsts:
- First real sustained crawl (September 8th, see below)
- First night in her own bed (September 10th)
- First syllable babbling - Da Da Da (September 14th)
- First ear infection (September 21st)
- First time pulling up (October 5th)
- Games: I continue to try getting her interested in Peek-a-Boo and am always met with skeptical baby looks. Maybe next month. She does think it's really cool when we peek around corners or pop up over furniture and all of a sudden she can see us. Otherwise not a lot of structured games- just a lot of playing on the floor with her toys. That and chasing her around the living room. Trying to keep her confined to her play mat is like herding cats.
- Favorite Toys: Water bottles, my iPhone, anything of Lola's
- Songs: Lately I've been singing a lot of Redneck Crazy to her. Because I think it has a good lesson? No. Because it's always stuck in my head. Duh. And she really finds my dramatic hand motions during the chorus particularly entertaining.
- Sleep: I just re-read last months' sleep blurb. Gosh what a difference a month can make! She's (knock repetitively on wood) been a very good sleeper this month with the exception of when she was sick. She normally goes down between 8 & 8:30 depending on when Mama & Daddy get home from work and get things moving. On weekdays she normally sleeps until about 5:45 or until I wake her around 6:15. On weekends she will wake up any time between 6 & 7. It really is glorious. I hope this sticks!
- Other Notables: I probably haven't made much mention of it here, but Em's eye color has been quite the topic of discussion in my family. Nearly since birth they've been a beautiful gray color. Ryan & I, as brown eyed babes, are 100% positive Emery's eyes will be brown. However, they're taking their sweet time in turning. My Dad tries to convince us each time he sees her that maybe they'll be green or gray. This month they're starting to be brown in the center. Em's hair color has also been a hot topic. Ryan's Dad has red hair, I was a blonde child/baby and Ryan has dark brown hair. Hence Ryan's ombre commentary. This month I would say I'm starting to believe it will be light brown.
Mom, you look sweaty. Is it something I did?
Adorable! She's growing so much!
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