Ape-Ril to May

ANNA CAME TO VISIT US FROM THE LAND OF SPANISH FORKS. 

Here's a video of Baby Girl and her cousin playing together!

we had a great time... taking walks, playing in the hosewater, making juice, and just generally hanging out. It was great.

Baby Girl already knew how to play peekaboo.. but this week she started pulling the blanket up over her head herself! You have to go on facebook to see it though... I tried to capture it with my camera but she gets distracted and wants the camera instead.

I LIKE BIRDS.
I have kinda sorta started bird-watching. I just like knowing the names of things... Here's a video of our kitchen-window bird feeder and some unusual guests:

MY FAVORITE THING

Lots of people ask me for advice now on babies. I am not an expert, people. I only have one. But I nevertheless feel like I can put two cents in. So here's my advice for anyone who is going to be a new mom:

Keep some chocolate nearby.

Faster than a Jamaican Bobsled

APRIL ALREADY? WELL THAT's ALMOST GONE TOO.

I think this year is going by awfully fast. I just got used to saying Baby Girl was 6 months, and she'll be 7 months next week! Yikes. I can hardly remember what I ate for breakfast let alone what has happened in the last few weeks. This is like, the only photo I have.

 ok I guess I have these too:

I NEED TO TAKE MORE PICTURES

Not so I can admire them- just so I can remember my life! I wish I wish I wish I had more pictures of my teen and college years. Not that they were especially great but I feel like I'm losing my memories of when what happened and who was there. And pictures can be looked at more objectively than handwritten sentiments of the past.

I did have a journal in high school but- thank the hills- it is lost forever in a computer dump somewhere. No one needs to read that drivel. Not even my posterity.  

I had one in 6th grade that I wrote in EVERY DAY. But only because I WAS INSANE. If I didn't write in my journal, the world would end. I'm not kidding.

By the time I'm old and I have all my half-North-Korean grand children around my knee, all I'll be able to say is, "I was born, I bossed people around until I was 10, then I can't remember anything else. How did YOU all get here?"

I guess I'm just feeling nostalgic because I had a dream last night about being back in high school going to France on exchange again... only this time they made me take a test on what items at McDonalds had white meat. Dern Frenchies!

SO IN OTHER NEWS...

Baby Girl is *almost* crawling. Sometimes she gets like, 2 inches forwards. She gets up on her hands and knees and rocks back and forth.

 

She is also teething. Her two front-bottom teeth have been working their way up for over a week now. She is getting very clingy and whiny.. so I give her frozen grapes (in a feeder) and cold celery to chew on. 

I visited Tucson for a few days last week. I babysat the Woodsian chihuahuas and took LOTs of walks by the Rillito and visited friends.

I just started physical therapy (finally) for my back. According to the PT, I have a bulging disc in my L3 or L4. He has me doing ice/heat plus tons of exercises. By exercises I mean only like, laying on my back and pulling my knees up. Nothing very exciting.

My garden is looking great except the birds keep attacking it. They  eat my near-ripe tomatoes and pulled out my peas that were just getting started. 

so sad. too sad to use correct capitalization.

 I've also been making tons of baby food and freezing it ice-cube style. 

Oh and...my sis in law is having a baby girl today! 

TIMES AND SEASONS

I can't help but feel like some people will read this and think that I live a pathetic life being at home with my baby and making her food and growing a garden and little things like that. Maybe I only imagine that because part of my own brain has been trained to think that way. What they don't know (or what I remind myself) is that these have been some of the most deeply refining and defining months of my life. 'Nuf said.  

Cerebrate Good Times

BABY GIRL IS 6 MONTHS OLD NOW

 She can swing at the park..

And giggle.. 

 And she can sit up too- but I guess I don't have a picture of her doing that.

OH YEAH AND last week SHE STARTED SLEEPING AN AVERAGE OF an HOUR AND A HALF for naps instead of 45 minutes!!! I knew this would happen some day!

Adam caught she and I doing some of the same faces....

WHERE DID I LEAVE OFF... OH YEAH... TUCSON

The week after I got back, I didn't want to do anything. You know those times when you know what you're supposed to do, you know its good for you, but for some reason it feels like torture to do it. Thankfully, that has passed. Adam and I are now in "We can DO EEEEEEET!" mode.  Adam's work load for school is a lot less this quarter. He gets every Wednesday at home to study and get things done. Yesterday he took Baby Girl and let me sleep in till 10 am. That. Was. Amazing. 

In other Adam News, he is excited to go to the AOTA (American Occupational Therapy Association) Conference in San Diego at the end of April at the same time that I am going to go visit my sister in Tucson (for the Woods Family Trio concert). Should be great!

WE ARE WAITING FOR OUR NEW NIECE

Nieces and nephews are the best thing ever. I can't wait to see Jen's new little one! 

WE MISS OUR MAMA GINA

Adam's mom stayed with us last week. We had a plethora of good times. She has all the pictures and videos; Baby Girl playing with her pacifier, sucking on her "thingamabobber", growling to herself, wearing her St. Paddy's day dress, staring out the front window.... I guess I know how she feels now (about pictures, anyways). 

Gina is one of the sweetest people I know. She and I had a lot of good talks. I'm really lucky to have such a great mother-in-law :). 

One night, Adam and I had a date night while she watched the babe. We went to Biltmore Fashion Park because we saw that they show movies on a lawn there, and I've never actually been there. Well, we got there at 8 pm and ALL THE STORES WERE CLOSED... not that we could actually afford anything sold at Biltmore Fashion park... and the movie area was super crowded. Determined to have a good time, we strolled the promenade, looking for some opportunities for shenanigans. The apple store was open so Adam and I spent some good time in there. Adam wrote a silly two-paragraph sermon about Apple and the second coming of Steve Jobs on a Macbook in the store. I added to it the text of Genesis 1:1 except I did a search/replace with Steve Jobs as diety. We sat outside the store for 15 minutes waiting to watch one of the employees read it. Unfortunately, they looked at it for 1 second and then deleted it. Sadness. We decided it was time to get dessert elsewhere... and as we passed all the people watching "Rebel Without a Cause" on the lawn, we noticed it looked like James Dean's character was hurt or something... Adam yelled "WHY ARE YOU HURT????" and I yelled "DON'T DIE, JAMES FRANCO!".  

I guess we should watch the movie sometime... 

Baby on Parade!

VALEMTIMES

I guess I haven't written since the day of luurve. Every valentine's day, we order a pizza and watch a dumb romantic comedy since the Tatou Incident of 2009. That year, Adam convinced me to watch an Audrey Tatou (Amelie) movie called "I love you, I love you not" which I THOUGHT WAS GOING TO BE A CUTE ROMANTIC COMEDY BUT WAS ACTUALLY  A VERY DISTURBING THRILLER.  For his punishment, he had to watch Spice World, which I thought would be good revenge, except that it turned out to be actually a funny, campy movie with complete self-awareness of its ludicrousness. sooooo the punishment turned into an eternal one. I get to pick a romantic comedy, dumb-as-all-get-out, to watch every Valentine's day.

Somehow, this time, we ended up watching tv instead (oh wait, now I remember, Adam got up and left to go work on his computer halfway through the movie). Lame. At least there was pizza.

SWADDLE-ME-NOT...?

We said goodbye to the swaddle as I said in my last post... and tried to "wean" Baby Girl from it. The Gods of Google suggested to leave one arm out at at time or only swaddle her trunk for a while to wean her. That didn't work. From my point of view, I could tell from her writhing around that this would not be easy. From her point of view, she was probably like, "how can I sleep when I'm not encased in velcro?". 

I tried cold turkey as well...for about 8 minutes. I am just not a "Cold Turkey" type of person. I KNOW that there is a better way than just suddenly quitting  (especially with Baby Girl since she is so intense and stubborn), and I like finding out what that way is. Its the "green" personality type in me (I'm half blue half green- inquisitive and creative but avoiding as much confrontation and upheaval as possible at the same time!). 

Some people sell these "transitional" swaddles online that give the baby a sense of security but also greater range of movement- basically a scam, people. They want you to pay 50 bucks for a sleep suit that you will use for a few weeks or months of your child's life.  But they did give me an idea. I just took Baby Girl's wearable blanket and tied off the arms so her hands would be contained. To my surprise, it actually worked. She was a little unsettled, but rather quickly got over it. 

Just in time, too, because she has started rolling onto her tummy in her sleep. 

We still swaddle her once and a while if she hasn't had a good nap, and the infrequency of it seems to make her forget how much she hated being swaddled and sleep really well. 

In other baby news....

Baby Girl can now scoot herself around (sideways and backwards but not forwards) on the ground. 

She also eats solids.. but not very much because I don't want to accidentally wean her.  She started refusing to nurse in the day last week because I fed her too much, yet she woke up wanting full feeds all night. The Gods of Google told me that before 6 months, solids replace calories in a bad way instead of just adding to the diet. I'm sure that's not true for every baby but it seemed true for Baby Girl. 

We are still battling the nap monster but it seems to be getting better. and then gets worse. but then it gets better again.

She only wakes up 3 times a night to eat instead of 4 or 5 times (hallelujah). I could write a whole other page about her nighttime habits and what we've tried and not tried in order to change them. I think i'll just spare you...

Babies make us fools of us young parents. Yes they do.

MY NEXT CHILD WILL NOT BE THIS DIFFICULT

This is what I tell myself...

BABY ON PARADE

for Adam's spring break, we went to Tucson for a few days. We visited a lot of people and had a BLAST. If you are reading this and are sad because we didn't visit YOU then just know that we are sorry. We couldn't see everyone we wanted to see and still have a manageable child. 

Highlights from our trip include:

Seeing CJ and his family, hot dogs from El Guero, an awesome afternoon/night with my girlie pals and Baby Girl's future boyfriends, a day of french cuisine that started at Ghini's and ended with Ratatouille, seeing my cousin and her kids, finding a dead gecko in our juice, and visiting my awesome friends at the schools I worked at last year.  

IN CASE YOU CARE
I still have sciatica but its more annoying now than painful. Thank. Goodness.

Piano Lessons

PLAY ME A SONG, YOU'RE THE PIANO BABE

THE ETERNAL SWADDLING BATTLE HITS CRITICAL MASS

Why I sewed heavy duty velcro onto her swaddleme.

 Swaddling is supposed to make babies sleep sounder through the first few months. It did help, sort of.. it kept her curious hands at bay while I was patting her to sleep during her sleep training days. Since Baby Girl is 4 months, almost 5, and can fall asleep without help, its definitely time to get her used to sleeping sans swaddle. And thank goodness too, because she always seems to wiggle out of the thing. We have wrapped, double wrapped, sewed extra velcro on, and the limbs just keep popping out.
             -ok i'm going to go on a tangent here-
Even when they don't pop out, she STILL wakes up from her naps early. Google the 45 minute nap and you will come up with a bunch of names for it.
45 minute SNACKER BABY
45 minute PERSISTENT CATNAPPER
45 minute INTRUDER
45 minute NAP MONSTER

Its part of what I like to call the internet phenomenon of,
"45 minute nap Jihad". Mothers everywhere (i would say gender neutral "parentS" but lets be honest here) are fighting the 45 minute infidel on a daily basis. I am but one of the drove. Whenever I try something, like keep her up longer, or dim the lights lower, or feed her at different times, she naps through the 45 minute mark a few times, enough to make me feel smart and victorious and hopeful, and then BAM she says "yeah right, mom. THOUGHT YOU COULD BEAT ME?? Mwhahahahah! You will never take a shower, get dressed, AAAAND blowdry your hair AGAIN!".

IF THAT SOUNDS OBSESSIVE, WELL, BELIEVE ME, I KNOW
Which is why I've started some hobbies. I planted a garden, bought music composition software for my ipad, and am studying for the GRE again (my score just expired).

Baby girl is trying some new hobbies as well such as, extreme drooling and trying to fall out of things (arms, seats, baby baths etc).

Baby's new jumper- she's a little small for it still. 

What Am I, Crazy?!

THERE IS THIS THING I SAID I WOULD NEVER DO AGAIN

After an excruciating drive up and fly back from visiting family for Thanksgiving, I decided that I would not take a trip again until Baby Girl was old enough to appreciate audiobooks. This time it went fairly well, actually. Baby Girl fell asleep in her carseat with barely a whimper. She played happily with her baby toys. She sucked on her pacifier and gazed at the stunningly frozen landscape outside. It wasn't that bad at all. 

My sister Anna asked if my mom and I could come up to Spanish Fark to be with her when she got induced. I got a call late last Friday that she would be induced Monday morning!  I still had to go back and forth from the hospital to feed baby girl since she is so stubborn about bottles, but it worked out great and I didn't miss Baby S's arrival! She is a tiny thing (6 lbs 15 oz) but she is very sweet and cute and looks just like a girl version of her brother. Anna was so brave and strong and didn't give in when she was hungry and I told her to cheat and eat some of my vanilla wafers. When it was time to push, she had the baby out in less than 10 minutes. Good job, Sis!

MY 4 Month-old TURNS PAGES WHEN WE READ BOOKS

Adam didn't believe me, so I filmed it. 

(I really don't know if that's cool or not... but being her mom, I definitely think she's a genius!)

THERE ARE THINGS YOU LEARN BY BEING HOME ALL DAY. EVERY DAY. 

(I think I "re-learn" this lesson all the time): Don't wait until you "feel like it". Just do it. Sometimes you may feel like you need to rest before getting around to everything else, and you may even feel quite justified at getting a rest seeing as how the baby still wakes up 4x a night, but no amount of rest is enough to make you want to do something you don't want to do now. After two weeks of doing the things I don't want to do now first (instead of at 4pm...or, lets be honest, not at all) and resting afterwards, I feel 10x happier. I know... "duh", right? 

For da Gramas

OK FIRST THINGS FIRST.

Here you go, grandmas;

Lookin' 'dorable in her christmas pajammers!

 Almost smiling for the camera...

 Love the fat rolls.

She's got my eye color but those are definitely Adam's big eyes!

She can roll over but seems to forget just how she did it every time we put her on her tummy. Her favorite thing to do now is grab anything that touches her and try to suck on it. She still tries to have little conversations but its hard to keep them up when you have fingers in your mouth! 

THE HOLIDAYS ARE PAST AND GONE

and I really cleaned up this year!!! I feel pretty spoiled... Adam and his family got me an ipad, my sister bought me a whole bunch of new clothes, and my mom got me an autoharp. Then I got a fuzzy robe for my anniversary which I hardly ever take off because I get cold so easily. Now I can start a folk band with the autoharp, get the chords on my ipad, and wear a robe while doing it. Props to my peoples. Ultimate props. 

LISTEN UP, PEOPLE WHO ARE OR WILL EVER BE PREGNANT

when they tell you "don't lift heavy objects" for a few weeks postpartum, don't ignore the advice. You basically have no core muscles after giving birth. so DON'T. Its not worth it! I hurt my back carrying the baby in her dumb million-lb carrier on September 26th and the sciatica (shooting leg pain) has not stopped for one minute since then. I went to the Dr. again on Thursday and he thinks its a combination of tight muscles and a herniated disc in my spine. Now I have to go to a physical therapist for who knows how long and take handfulls of ibuprofen and tylenol every day. Do not let this happen to you!