Sick little girl

 

 

Cecily has caught a cold this week. She's really feeling okay, she's pretty happy, she just has a bit of a cough. Her Mama, on the other hand, is exhausted.

 

 If you hear Cecily cough during the day, it sounds like a poor little girl who isn't feeling very well, but for some reason, during the night, that same cough sounds (to my over-developed imagination) like she's choking to death. So, although Cecily is sleeping remarkably well these past few days, I've been climbing out of bed every time she coughs to check that she's okay. So I haven't slept much lately.

 

 The first night, I brought her to bed with me so I could be close to her, but I don't think that Keith slept very well with her so close. And while I'm willing to sacrifice a little of Keith's sleep for our kid's safety, I don't think I should do so just because I worry too much.  Last night, I set the pack-n-play up in the bedroom.  Seemed like a good idea, but she refused to sleep, at all.  So, after two hours of trying to get her to go down, I gave up and put her to bed in her crib...she went right to sleep.  And I did too, I guess you get tired enough and you stop indulging so many worries.

 

I took her into the Doctor this morning.  Although she's a little wheezy, they're not too concerned, it's not Asthma, just a lot of chest congestion.  Her oxygen levels are a little low, but not enough to worry about.  So, if we have another bad night, we'll go back in tomorrow, otherwise, she should be fine and we just have to wait it out (and spend a lot of time with the NoseFrida).

 

On the plus side, she's up to 13 lbs, 12oz, that's up 7oz since last Wednesday, and she's moved up to the 5th percentile!

 

 

2 1/2

It's hard to believe, but our little guy is 2 1/2 already.  It feels like just yesterday he was a baby.

He's becoming such a big kid.  His naps are starting to become somewhat spotty, which is why he's nearly falling asleep on the kitchen counter here:

Parker has always loved music, but just in the past few weeks, he's actually started singing himself.  Now, when he's in his room, we often hear him singing a random mash-up of "Twinkle Twinkle", "The Itsy-Bitsy Spider" and "Jesus Loves Me".  This video is probably just for the Grandparents, but it's pretty cute for posterity:

Parker LOVES being a big brother.  He loves giving big hugs & kisses to his "little Cutie Sessie".

He continues to be a total mimic, who wants to be just like Mama and Daddy.  He loves to help clean the kitchen, wiping up spills and using the broom.  Here, he's wrapping blankie up like a sandwich.  ...totally reasonable.

Parker has an ever-expanding vocabulary and he is always cracking me up with the things he says.  Nearly every time you ask him if he wants something, his response is: "Umm, yes please."

We started potty training a month ago and he's doing a great job.  We are still putting him on the potty fairly consistently, and he's still having accidents three or four times a week, but he's getting better & better about telling us when he needs to go.  I feel like he's becoming more confident since we started.

Meanwhile, in some ways he's reverting back to being a baby.  He's not unaware of the attention Cecily is getting, so he often wants to eat her food, sit in her high chair, or sleep in her crib.  But if this is the worst of his "acting out" over the new baby, I'll take it.

He is such a great little man and we love our boy!

Seven Months!

Our baby girl is seven months old!

She's growing up so fast.

After we figured out how to feed her, Cecily has been eating just about anything we put in-front of her.  She LOVES feeding herself, and she's getting better & better at getting it into her mouth rather than in her lap.  She's been eating sweet potatoes, kale, raisins, peaches, avocado, and all manner of puffs.  While it's easier to serve her this way (just put the food on her tray and let her go to town), it can be harder to come up with ideas for what I can feed her,  You can steam and puree just about anything, but not everything is as easy to get into bite-sized cubes.  I might try putting a spoon and a bowl of puree in-front of her and seeing what happens, it's not like our walls & floors are pristine right now anyway.

This is one of those just-for-the-Grandparents videos, but Cecily has started talking:

Cecily loves her big brother.  Although I am constantly telling him to get off her, she actually loves it.  She's become a grabby little girl, so the two of them are constantly stealing each other's binkies & blankies.

Cecily has become a very happy little girl.  Although she still has her screaming moments, it's usually with a reason, and most of the time she is happy & smiling.

Look, she's smiling!  It's like she's a new baby.

Cecily has caught a cold this week and is pretty snotty and drooly.

But, colds aside, she's been in a great mood.

Cecily is still rolling everywhere.  I think she still has a way to go before she's crawling, but for right now, she's getting pretty efficient at getting where she wants to be.

 

I still don't see any teeth in our near future, but our little girl is a drooly-chewy-mess.  She will grab anything and put it in her mouth.  Well, except, you know, for her binky when she's crying, but everything else.  I bought the two of us one of those teething necklaces this week, she loves chewing on those little beads.  I might have to buy them in every color.

 

We love this little girl, and we have a little party every time we see her smile.  What an amazing difference to have a happy baby!

Self-Portrait

Cecily's 6-Month Appointment

 

We took Cecily in for her 6-month appointment this week.  Her stats:

Weight: 13 lbs, 5.5oz (3.48%)

Height: 24.5" (2.35%)

Head Circ: 41.9 (29.07%)

 

She's tiny, but she's proportionate.

 

We've been trying to get Cecily to eat a few more foods.  She's a little more willing after the whole poop episode on Sunday, but it's still a struggle and she seems to spread most of it across her face.

 

But, last night, we made a remarkable discovery.  It's not that she doesn't like food...  It's that our little Miss Independent is unwilling to eat anything that she doesn't feed herself.  Seeing how she's not so great with the spoon yet, baby food doesn't really work for her.  I finally fully understood this last night, so I chopped some pears into tiny pieces and put them on her tray.  She went to town and ate them all.  Apparently we're just going to skip the whole baby food phase.

 

Cecily is rolling all over the place, and loves putting anything in her mouth.  Combine those two things and I need to start vacuuming more frequently.

 

We've decided to take her off the Prevacid and go back to the baby Zantac.  The Prevacid didn't seem to work any better, and at $250/month, it ought to work pretty darn well.

 

She's getting much more coordinated and can usually manage to get her binky back into her mouth when she chooses.  That really is one of the more important life skills for a baby.

 

It is so nice to see this little girl smiling again!

 

We're still not sleeping much at night, most nights she wakes me up at 10, 12, 2, and so on until about 8am.  But every once in a while, she'll skip the 10pm wake-up and sleep until midnight.  On those nights she sometimes even skips the 2am, which is great since it then lets me sleep for just under 4 hours straight.  Those are the good nights.  But, most nights, I average 1.5-2 hours at a time. 

 

She's averaging three or four 30-45 minute naps during the day, they're not great, but at least they usually don't involve the hours of screaming that they did a few weeks ago.

"Mama, I go to work now."

 

I'm not certain that this t-shirt really goes with the patent leather heels, but whatever.

Parker & Cecily

Parker loves his baby sister.  He has several "pet" names for her, the cutest is "Baby Girl" which he says with a little accent, so it sounds like gerr-ril.  But he's also been known to call her Cranky Cessie and Screaming Baby.

 

 

Yesterday, he wanted to carry Cecily around on his shoulders.  It was just about the cutest thing ever.  I didn't get any very good photos since as soon as she was settled, he would take off down the hall.

 

They both seemed to enjoy it.

 

I spend an incredible amount of my time saying "Parker, no squishing Cecily", or "Please get off your sister".  But, to be honest, she doesn't really seem to mind.

 

Cecily probably smiles more for Parker than any other person.

This week, Parker's been trying to teach Cecily how to crawl.  I don't think she's moving quite fast enough for him.  I, personally, think she's moving fast enough already and you can keep your lessons to yourself thank you very much young man.

 

I can't wait to see how these two play together when she's a little bit older.