10 - 11 Months

I haven't written many posts in the last few months since we've been busy-busy-busy with work and life and all things Natalie. Despite my lack of posts, she's been growing up dramatically and reaching all kinds of milestones. She now walks while holding on to our fingers, and this has seemed to be all she's wanted to do for the last week or so. Most of the time there's no goal in sight - no object that she's trying to get to - she just wants to move. Jeremy "runs" with her and she gets so cracked up that she eventually collapses onto the floor before picking herself back up for more.

On October 8th while we were in Blue Ridge, GA for the weekend, she said the word "dog". Jeremy and I both heard it and looked at each other in disbelief, but then she said it again: "dog". She was looking at Jim and Chris's dog, Lucy. Apparently she doesn't think of Milly as a dog ;-). About a week went by before we heard her say it again. I had bought a painting of four dogs and hung it in our bedroom, and later when I was walking by the room with Natalie, she craned her neck trying to see the painting. I stopped and went into the room so she could see it, and she unmistakably said "dog!" with a big grin! She said it over and over again while trying to get close enough to touch the painting. Today she added "duck" to her vocabulary. We've had a lot of rubber duckies around the house lately, so she's been hearing us talk about the ducks. This afternoon Natalie and I were in Bath and Body Works and we came to a shelf with a bunch of rubber duckies on it, and Natalie said "duck!" (Really it sounds more like "duh", which is exactly how she says "dog", but I know she was referring to the ducks this time!). So of course I bought her one of the ducks :-).

And the biggest news of the day is.............. SHE HAS A TOOTH! Here at 11.5 months old, a tooth has finally sprouted, squashing my fears of baby dentures being on our shopping list in 2012. The first tooth to arrive is on the bottom left (from Natalie's point of view).

The past couple of weeks were spent nursing her first ear infection and a case of Hand, Foot, and Mouth virus. This wasn't a very good time for any of us, and we now know that she was teething on top of all this illness. Initially when she was sent home from daycare with a low-grade fever, we thought it was just from teething, so we gave her some Tylenol and sent her back to school. The next week she was sent home with a rash on her legs and we thought it must be allergies. Took her to the doctor and she was diagnosed with the awful HFMD (I hate it that they call it a "disease"... I prefer "virus") AND an ear infection. By the time she woke up the next morning, the rash covered her chest, arms, hands, booty, legs and feet. She was so uncomfortable and fussed quite a bit, but all in all, I'd say she handled it like a trooper. Jeremy stayed home with her all week (since I don't have any days off yet at my new job) and took care of her like a pro. She started getting much, much better after just three days, thankfully.

We've been busy planning her first birthday party. It'll be a circus party (without any clowns, thankyouverymuch), to be held at our house on the big day. I'm excited!!

Raspberries

Today Natalie and I had a raspberry blowing contest in front of the mirror in the bathroom. My baby loves to blow raspberries! I ran to get the camera, and then of course she took it down a notch, but I got this cute video out of it:

9 Months Old

Natalie is 9 months old today! She masterfully crawls around now, moving deftly on all-fours with her belly off of the ground. She had her 9-month doctor visit yesterday and weighed in at 18 lbs 6 oz (50th percentile for weight) and was measured at 28 inches (70th percentile for height). She's a perfectly healthy, beautiful baby girl who is growing and learning every day.

Despite her lack of teeth (she has not a single one yet!), Natalie's doctor advised us to start feeding her table foods, so today she ate some pulled pork and beef brisket (sans sauce) and she loved it! She also ate some green peas, which of course she's previously eaten in pureed form, but this time she just picked up peas and ate them. She also loves "puffs" - the cheerio-type snacks that melt in the mouth. We tried giving her lasagna cut up into tiny little bits, but that just ended up smeared all over her face, arms, legs, etc. It was a mess! But with a name like Lizza, she'll be loving lasagna in no time ;-).

We've had *huge* improvements at daycare! She's once again one of the happiest babies in her class and she doesn't cry anymore when we drop her off. Legacy opened a third baby class last week, so Natalie moved to a different classroom. Instead of being in a class with babies aged 6 weeks to 12 months, she's now in a class for 8-12 month babies. We were worried that the transition to a new room would set her back, but she managed the change fabulously. Luckily some of the babies that were in her last class moved to the new class with her, so I think that helped. One of her teachers is Hispanic, and I told her in my best Spanish that if she wanted to speak Spanish with Natalie all the time, that was just fine with me. She replied with a simple "perfecto", which made me really happy! I'd love for Natalie to get exposure to the Spanish language from a native speaker, instead of just hearing my broken Spanish in my American accent.

Nat has been super talkative for the last few days, constantly babbling combinations of "ba ba ba ba", "da da da da", and "ma ma ma ma". Jeremy swears that tonight she said "ma ma" with purpose, since she was looking at me when she said it. I have my doubts, but you never know!

She's started doing something quite funny but also disruptive to her naps - she tries to sleep sitting up! We saw it for the first time last weekend. I laid her in her crib for a nap and then checked in on her via the video monitor about 10 minutes later. She was sitting up in her crib, sucking her thumb and trying to hold her head up while it bobbled around under the weight of her exhaustion. It was so funny at first and then we realized that she wasn't going to give in, so we had to intervene by going in to lay her down. Her teacher told me that she did this at daycare this week and then I caught her doing it again in her crib at home today. Hopefully she'll figure out that she can't sleep sitting up and she'll go back to sleeping horizontally!

Here's a family picture we took this week:

Do the Inch Worm

Natalie is crawling! Well, she's inch worming. This has been a long time in the making, since her teachers at FIO were telling us back in April that she'd be crawling any day. But now at 8 months she's finally realized how to get where she wants to go, and it is very cute indeed! Here's a video I took of her tonight as she went after my camera case:



Now it's time to baby proof the house!!

Change is good. Life is good!

It's been a while since my last blog post, and a LOT has happened! Natalie's daycare (FIO) announced on June 9th that they would be closing..... on June 30th. We had three measly weeks to find a new daycare for our babe. Our top two daycare centers in-town had impossibly long waiting lists - one had 100 people on the list, and the other had a three year waiting list. Finding a daycare we liked that was also convenient just wasn't going to happen, so we decided that I would quit my job to stay home with Natalie until we figured things out. I started looking for jobs OTP (outside the perimeter, for you non-Atlantians) near Jeremy's office and where there are plenty of daycare centers with immediate openings. I posted my resume on dice.com and got a call the next day (on a Tuesday) from a recruiter about a job in Norcross, then had a phone interview with the company on Thursday, then was called for an in-person interview the following Monday. Ultimately, I had the interview on my first day off of work and I was offered the job the very same day! And they wanted me to start ASAP! I told them I'd need two weeks since we were faced with finding a house to rent in the 'burbs and most importantly, a new daycare for NatNat.

I spent the next few days driving around to look at houses and tour daycare centers. I was less than impressed with the first three centers I toured and was starting to get a little nervous. Then I found Legacy Academy at Berkeley Lake. It reminded me of FIO in that it really felt like a learning center, not just a daycare. Luckily, we also found a great house to rent just 1.5 miles from Legacy! The next several days were spent packing up our house in Midtown, and then we moved to the 'burbs that Friday. Then I started work and Natalie started daycare the following Monday.

WHEW! Now you understand why the blog posts have been few and far between ;-).

I wish I could say that Natalie transitioned to her new daycare seamlessly, but sadly that would be far from the truth. She has developed separation anxiety, which is perfectly normal and expected at her age, but no easier for mom and dad to take. Each morning last week, she started wailing when I got ready to leave her classroom. The first day was the absolute worst. She cried and reached for me until I started crying too and then showed up for my first day of work with puffy eyes and a heavy heart. The rest of the week she did a little better - she sat with the other babies and played while I filled out her journal and put her things away, but the tears came whenever I started to leave. We're hoping and praying that she'll adjust to her new surroundings this week and we can have our happy-at-daycare baby back!

We haven't taken many pictures lately, but here's a cutie from a few weeks ago when she had her first baby pool experience:

Fearfully and Wonderfully Made

Dear Natalie,

Six months ago today, you came into this world in what turned out to be a surprisingly laid-back childbirth. Maybe the tranquility in the room where you took your first breath influenced your relaxed attitude. Or maybe it's just your fine, fabulous genes that created your calm disposition. Either way, you are truly a sweet and easygoing baby girl, and that has made our job as your parents a very, very enjoyable one.

You are beginning to sit up on your own, and though you still require quite a bit of assistance, we can tell that you are close to sitting independently. You're able to balance when you move front to back, but it's when you teeter off to the side that you end up falling over. It frustrates you a little bit because you want to sit up and play with your toys, so we pick you back up and help you keep your balance.

You tried rice cereal a couple of weeks ago. We had planned on making it from scratch, but since your daycare uses Earth's Best rice cereal, we decided it would be a good idea to use that at home, too. You don't seem to care for it much. You usually "blow raspberries" and spray us with the cereal! But you open your mouth when the spoon gets near and you eat a little bit of the cereal. Today your Dad made a green pea puree for you and we fed you some of that. You weren't all too excited about it, but you didn't spray us with it either. We'll try again tomorrow! We're so excited about making veggies and fruits for you to eat and experiment with, and we hope that eventually you'll enjoy them as much as we enjoy feeding them to you.

We took you to the doctor today for your six-month checkup. You weigh 14 lbs 8 oz, which puts you in the 25th percentile for weight. This is great because you had fallen to the 5th - 10th percentile at your last visits, so it's wonderful to see that you're gaining weight and growing as a healthy baby should be. You also had to get some vaccinations today and you cried just a little bit, but overall you did a fantastic job.

Your daycare teachers still gush about you every day. They love you and treat you as if you were their own child, and that makes your Mom and Dad very happy! We have our first parent/teacher conference next week, and as I was adding your name to the signup sheet, your teacher Natalyn told me, "You already know everything Natalie does is perfection." That's love, my dear!

My first Mother's Day is two days away and I'm so proud to be your mama. You were fearfully and wonderfully made, and I love you very much!

Love,
Tu Mama

Here's a picture from your doctor appointment today:


Here's a picture of you with your teachers Reenita and Natalyn:



This is your first time eating green peas:




And this is you and your mama at Easter:

Fun Saturday!

We've had a beautiful Saturday here in Atlanta! We spent some time in the yard this morning, then came in to try feeding Natalie some rice cereal. We've done this before - the first two attempts were quite unsuccessful and she showed improvement the third time, meaning that she might have possibly swallowed a teeny, tiny bit of the cereal. This time was no different, but even though she's not exactly "eating" the cereal, we're still having a fun time trying to feed it to her :-). Here's a video I took at today's feeding:



We also enjoyed the day by taking a walk around our neighborhood, and we made a stop at Knight Park which is just down the street from our house. Natalie was strapped to Jeremy in the Baby Bjorn, which she just absolutely loves, and they sat on a swing at the playground. Our baby girl sure did look happy!

Five Months Old

Natalie is FIVE months old! She gets cuter every day, and each day it's impossible to think she could be any cuter than she already is :-). She had her weight check at the doctor's office on Tuesday. She's gained 20 ounces in the last month - so she's now 12 lbs 13 oz! Giving her an extra 3 ounces of milk a day really helped her pack on the pounds. She seems to want 6 ounce bottles at every meal now (she was getting two 5 oz bottles and three 6 oz bottles), so she'll definitely continue to gain weight with that kind of appetite!

She is really thriving at daycare, and this week her teacher Renita left me a voicemail AND called Jeremy to tell us both what a wonderful day Natalie was having. She said Natalie was on the older infant side of the room (where the crawlers and walkers are), sitting in a Bumbo chair in Spanish class and trying to clap her hands! She also said she'd been trying to hold her bottle, so they wanted us to bring some of the handles for the Born Free bottles so she could grab onto them. It was such a sweet call from her teacher, who sounded so proud of our daughter that my heart could have just burst. We also enjoy reading the comments her teachers write in her daily journal, like the ones below (she's already a star student as you can see):



Yesterday Jeremy and Natalie spent the day together, and we met for lunch with some of our former coworkers and Jeremy's good friends. Natalie was the perfect baby, sitting happily (and quietly) in my lap while we waited for our food. When they put my plate down and she stuck her hand in it, we decided to put her in her car seat while we ate ;-). She quietly hung out and played with Cookie Monster until we left. It was our first outing to a restaurant with her and we were really pleased at how well she did!

Last night I had my first solo outing since Natalie's arrival. I came home from work a little bit early and spent some time with her before she went to bed, then I met some girls for dinner in Midtown. It was so nice to get out for some time among adults!

Here are some pictures taken post-bath time last night:




How do you like those pink bunny slippers? Ha! So cute.

20 Weeks Old

Our little Natalie is 20 weeks old. She has officially found her feet - and today I caught her with her toes in her mouth! I can't believe she can fold herself in half like that. It reminds me of her ultrasound picture where she had her foot in her mouth.

She's still sleeping great at night; now she goes to bed at 6pm (if not a few minutes earlier) and sleeps until I wake her up at 7am. It's pretty amazing. We know there will be times when she stops sleeping so well (like the teething days), so we're definitely enjoying this while it lasts.

She's gone back and forth between sucking on her thumb on her left hand to sucking on her fingers on her right hand. Now she's back to sucking on her left thumb. We can tell when she's sleepy because she'll turn her head to the left and stick that little thumb in her mouth.

We're guessing her next milestone will be sitting up - though she doesn't seem close to doing that yet. She still loves tummy time and loves to roll over. Usually if we put her down on her back, she'll roll over to her tummy to play.

She has added a new sound to her repertoire - a happy screech! It's pretty funny. Sometimes when she gets excited she'll let out a big screech of joy. Last weekend we started taking walks carrying her in her Baby Bjorn, and she loves it! She'll coo and screech as we walk the roads of our little 'hood.



Here's a recent picture of her in an adorable outfit from her Aunt D, bib from our friend Erika (made by Erika herself!), and cow toy from Brooke & Sean, courtesy of the Peach Bowl:

Four Months Old!

Our sweet little nugget is four months old today! She had her four-month checkup with her doctor last Thursday and she got a clean bill of health. She has grown two inches since her last appointment on January 6th, but has only gained one pound. She weighs 11 lbs 9 oz and is 25.5 inches long. Her doc suggested feeding her an extra ounce of milk three times a day, so she's now getting three 6-ounce bottles at daycare. We'll take her back for a weight check in April to be sure the extra milk is putting some weight on her.

She still sleeps fabulously at night - she falls asleep around 6:30pm and I wake her up at 7am during the week. On the weekends she sleeps from 6:30 to 8:30 or sometimes even 9:30. She takes after her daddy in this regard ;-).

Her favorite new trick is to blow spit bubbles. Some days she starts right when she wakes up in the morning and continues throughout the day! Most of you probably saw this video on Facebook, but it's too funny not to post here too:



Her hair is getting longer and is long enough to clip a little bow in. Right now it's a light brown color with maybe a little Auburn coloring in it too. I snapped this cute picture last week:

15 Weeks

Natalie is three and a half months old now and is sleeping really well every night (last night she slept 14.5 hours!), playing with toys, and being an all-around happy baby! She's also no longer being swaddled for naps, which happened much more quickly and naturally than I thought it would. One day she fussed as I swaddled her, so I just unswaddled her and put her in a sleep sack instead. She slept like a champ, so we didn't turn back.

Here's a video from today of the little gal playing with her Kerry the Fairy toy:



Her daycare teachers still fawn over her, always telling us how she's so advanced and that we're blessed to have such a good baby. Jeremy says they probably say this to everyone, but I choose to believe it ;-). One lady in particular always tells us that she'll be crawling early. I think it's because of the way she constantly moves and kicks her little legs. She was laying on her back on the floor earlier and scooting herself around the blanket by pushing off of her heels!

Three Months Old!

Natalie is THREE months old! It's amazing how much she's grown and changed. I just watched her "exercise" video that I took when she was about two weeks old, and she looked so different. Her arms and legs were so skinny and she was just a tiny little spastic nugget. Now at three months old, she has filled out nicely and moves (at least at times) with purpose. Her head is fairly steady now and today she actually sat in her Bumbo chair! This picture was taken today:



In *very* exciting news, Natalie has begun sleeping through the night! Four nights last week, she slept from about 8pm to 7am without waking to eat. The first time this happened, I woke up in pure shock when Jeremy's alarm went off at 5:30am. I couldn't believe that Natalie had slept all night or even that I had slept all night! It was bliss to get eight consecutive hours of sleep, and especially four nights in a row! I hope she'll keep this up.

We were also very happy to see her play with a toy for the first time today! I put a toy key ring in her hand and she held on to it and tried to get it into her mouth. She succeeded at least once, and luckily I have video footage of this:



Today she surprised us by rolling over from her back to her tummy - we didn't think she'd do this until she's about six months old, but she decided to do it on her three-month birthday. She did it seven or eight times today. The downside to this is that if they see her do it at daycare, they become legally required to stop swaddling her for naps, which could be quite disastrous.

She's started wearing her awesome bumGenius diapers now while she's at home. We love them! I'm so glad that Jeremy and I both wanted to use cloth diapers, and I'm very glad his friends Ben and Desiree introduced us to bumGenius. These little diapers are cute and functional, as well as economical and environmentally friendly. The best part is that we can use them for future babies, so there will be very little disposable diaper purchasing in our future. Here's Natalie modeling her bumGenius (and showing off her chubby thighs):



Daycare at FIO is going really well. We really like and trust Natalie's teacher, Patrice. She's a sweet and fun lady who Natalie seems to adore, so that makes me a happy mama! I'm already a breezy mom who drops her off with a smile... who knew it would happen so fast? :-) That's not to say that I don't miss her a LOT, because I definitely do. I think about her all the time and watch her on FIO's web cam whenever I get a chance. But it is wonderful to know that she's being well cared for and loved at FIO. And Patrice told me that everyone who holds Natalie says that she makes them want to have a baby! Ha!

First Day at Daycare

Today was Natalie's first day at daycare and my first day back to work. This day has been dreaded since before Natalie was born, with the dread creeping further and further into my psyche as we quickly (all too quickly) approached it. If I was a drivers ed teacher and had passenger seat brakes, I would have slammed them on last week to slow things down a bit, but alas, here we are. And I'm happy to say that we made it, though it was not without tears. I cried on the way to the daycare, then cried again as we walked to her room, then cried again when I kissed her goodbye, then cried off-and-on all the way to work. The teachers and staff consoled me and assured me that every mom reacts the same way when dropping off their sweet bundle for the first time. In fact, I was told that it would be perfectly normal to cry every day this week, and then next week I would probably feel better.

Luckily, Natalie's teachers are very sweet ladies. When Patrice talked to Natalie for the first time, Natalie smiled up at her with her sweet flirty smile, and that made some of my sad feelings disappear. Then they put her in the swing and as she contentedly swooshed back and forth, more of my blues melted away. Then they put her on the play mat for tummy time and she looked just as comfortable as she does at home, so my heart lightened a little more. I'm still not totally tear-free, but I will get there. Each day will get easier and eventually, though it's still hard to totally believe, I'll be one of the breezy moms who drop their babies off with a smile.

Here's a photo of Natalie and Patrice:

Natalie the Flirt

Due to the Southeastern SnowIceMaggedon 2011, Jeremy worked from the safety and comforts home all week. His desk is in the living room, right next to Natalie's swing. Every time she was in her swing and he was at his desk she tried her best to get his attention. She cooed and she gooed, she smiled and laughed, she gurgled and blew bubbles. So intent was she on getting him to look her way, she even resorted to fake-crying at one point. She was determined to distract him from work and get him to pay attention to her! When her efforts paid off and she got a glance from her daddy, she'd smile and squirm in obvious delight. It was the funniest thing!

Natalie the Flirt is 10 weeks old today. Her personality continues to blossom and she's becoming a really fun baby! She's started to grab things more often. Sometimes when I'm changing her outfit, I'll think that it's snagged on something and I'll look down to find it in her clenched fist. I'm thinking she'll start grabbing onto toys and stuffed animals soon, but she hasn't done that yet. She really doesn't pay much attention to her toys except to watch them as I puppet them in front of her, but I don't think it'll be long before her legions of toys start getting some love and attention.

Rollin' Over, Part II

It was no accident, Miss Natalie knows how to roll over! She did it for us about six times this morning! Look at this sweet thing:

Rollin', Rollin', Rollin' Over

Natalie has been doing a great job holding her head up lately. She's been rather enthusiastic during tummy time, raising her head about 90 degrees and holding it there for extended periods of time. Today during an especially fun tummy time, I quickly left the room to get my camera so I could video her. When I got back into the room, she was in the process of rolling over from her belly to her back! It may have been a freak accident; I don't know... but it sure was exciting!!

Unfortunately I didn't get the big event on video, but here are a couple I took of her doing tummy time (it looks like she's trying to crawl already):



I love the look of pure determination towards the middle of this one:

Two Months Old!

Miss Natalie had her 2-month checkup today and weighed in at 10 lbs 10 oz. and measured 23.5 inches. She also had to get two shots (vaccinations) in her legs and she's not a very happy camper about that. It makes me so sad to see her in pain and hear her shrieks of distress. She is asleep on my chest right now, peaceful for the moment.

We also had our enrollment meeting at her daycare, FIO 360. I held it together until we went into the classroom and then the tears started flowing and there was no holding them back. Something about seeing the cribs lined up against the walls and hearing a couple of little babies crying just put me over the edge. Also, Natalie will be the tiniest one in her class and that made me a little sad too. There's really nowhere for the little ones to lay except in a crib or a bouncy seat, so I'll be happy when she can sit up by herself so she has more options. The daycare is really as nice as they come and I know she'll have good learning opportunities there; it's just incredibly hard to imagine leaving my little girl with strangers every weekday. Hopefully we'll get to know the teachers and soon enough they won't feel like strangers at all.

I didn't get Natalie's 2 month picture today, so I'll take one as soon as possible and post it!

Happy New Year!

Listen up! Natalie would like to tell you her hopes and dreams for the new year:



She's been doing a lot of cooing and gaga-ing for us this week. This little one really enjoys hearing her voice, and so do we! It's so fun to listen to the new sounds she's discovering she can make.

We spent New Year's Eve with our friends' sweet 7-month old son, Everett. He's twice Natalie's size and I wish we'd taken a picture of them together to show the size difference. He was so funny and really loved to laugh. Every time I said "woof, woof" to him, he would just fall out laughing. I look forward to making little Natalie laugh like that!

2010 was certainly a year of "firsts" for us as we went through pregnancy and then welcomed Natalie Elise into the world. It's crazy to think that I was pregnant for most of the year... from February all the way to November! Some days it seemed like I'd been pregnant forever, and now I have a hard time remembering feeling so totally different, with my big belly poking out further and further each day. I was so aware of my own body all that time, and now some days I barely remember to feed myself; I'm so focused on Natalie and ensuring that I meet her needs. My world truly revolves around her and I understand now how special it is to be a mama.

2011 will bring many firsts, too, as Natalie grows and develops new skills and personality. She'll be two months old on January 6th, and soon enough it will be November and she'll be turning one year old! It'll go by in such a hurry. Sometimes I find myself thinking, "I can't wait until she starts talking" or "I can't wait until she fits into that cute dress". At times like those I have to remind myself to sloooow down and take this adventure one milestone, one day, one breath at a time. An experience as amazing as this should be savored.