10 Months

 

 Joanna is growing up!  She now has 6 teeth with 2 more coming in.  She has been crawling for a few weeks now, and is pulling up on the furniture, and as of this weekend is even starting to take some steps holding on to the table or couch.  She is calling us mama and dada now, and also says "uh oh".  I forgot how cute that is!  She says it over and over while crawling around like she's so proud of herself.  Or like she's practicing.  I'm not sure.  She has been babbling more lately, too, trying to make new word-like sounds.  Its fun.  This age is fun and challenging at the same time!  She is getting a little bit naughty, and is quite persistent.  Mostly trying to get into Spot's water bowl, or flip the switch on the power strip in the living room.  I'll pick her up and say "no no" and move her away, and back she goes again and again and again.  She is to the point where she'll be near something, I'll say "no", she'll  look back at me, smile, think for a second, then take off as fast as she can to quick touch/splash/push the button before I can get to her.  :)  We are also beginning the fun stage where she throws a tantrum whenever she doesn't get her way.  Thankfully she gets over it pretty quickly when I just walk away.  We are getting closer and closer to sleeping through the night as well.  Scott had to deal with her for several nights in a row to get her out of the habit of eating between 3 and 4, so at least I don't have to feed her anymore, but she does still wake up at least once or twice a night.  Most of the time we can wait a minute and she'll go back to sleep, sometimes we have to go in there and give her a pacifier.  Once life settles back down, we'll work on giving that up, too.  She doesn't like to give up smiles to people she doesn't know, but around here she is so joyful and fun (I've probably said that many times before, but those are the best words I can think of to describe her)!

9 Months

Stats for this month: 19 pounds, 3 ounces (75th percentile), and 29 inches (95th percentile).  I was surprised since I was certain she was over 20 pounds.  Joanna is in 18 month clothes now, and has 3 teeth on the bottom (although the top two are just about to poke through).  She is growing by leaps and bounds now!  Lately she has been scooting all over the place.  Not quite crawling yet, but it doesn't matter because she has been able to figure out how to get anywhere.  Including down the stairs (scary!).  She is working on pulling up on the furniture, too.  We still can't get over how opposite she is from Orrin.  She is quite the daredevil.  Even after tumbling down the stairs, she will make a beeline for them if she sees the gate opened.  So I stood at the top just to see what she would do, and sure enough, she launched herself right down the stairs again (caught her that time).  She has also tried to launch herself off of the changing table numerous times.  I just get her dressed on the floor now.  The other terrifying thing is that everything goes in her mouth.  She choked on some grass the other day, and I can't tell you how many times I have fished fuzzies and other random small things out of her mouth lately.  We've tried giving her a pacifier in the hopes of blocking that stuff, but she'll just pull it out when she finds something more interesting.  So needless to say, this little girl keeps us on our toes!

It is a lot of fun to see her and Orrin play together.  They actually fought the other day, which was pretty funny (it will get old, but it was the first time she screamed back at Orrin over a toy).  For the most part, she just likes to follow him around and watch what he does.

She is not eating much beyond baby purees yet- very sensitive to textures, and still won't eat anything green.  She briefly went through a stranger anxiety phase a few weeks ago, but it seems to have passed.  We are having so much fun being her parents!

At cousin Joy's wedding

Hanging with her brother

Exploring

Loving being outside

                                     

Enjoying her swing under the deck.

She loves dolls and stuffed animals!

Figuring out how to get into her brother's stuff.

Family Fun

Well this post is sure to be random, but I'll try to summarize what we've been up to the last few months.  We did finish our basement - maybe a post later with before and afters.  But we love it!  Its nice to hang out down there, and the kids and I both have lots of space to play (or sew). 

Orrin is going through a sunglasses phase, therefore we keep losing them.  He didn't seem to mind putting on his sisters pink sparkly glasses until his could be replaced.  :)

Orrin loves to be outside.  He frequently plays on the deck or driveway while I'm in the kitchen getting dinner ready.

One day, Orrin found Joanna's brush and was gently brushing her hair so I walked away for a minute.  I heard the faucet running, but it didn't really register until I heard him telling her that he was fixing her hair.  I went in to find her a soggy mess (these pictures were a few min later).  While taking her pictures, I heard the faucet running again and he was "fixing" his own hair.  :)

We switched car seats a month or so ago, because I got sick of lifting the bucket seat into the van and killing my back.  So Joanna is in Orrin's old convertible seat - which she loves because she sits higher and can see out the window.  And Orrin got a new seat that will convert to a booster someday.  The box of course was the best part.

Orrin also got a new lawn mower.  We felt so bad last summer that he would take whatever he could find to push as his "mower" to follow Scott around when he mowed.  So this year, we surprised him with something to push.  He loves it!  He'll follow Scott around, but he also will "mow" anytime I let him play outside.  Its funny because he imitates Scott so well.  He'll pretend to put on his earmuffs, then fiddle with the controls, then pretend to squeeze the bar, then walk in circles around the lawn.  Over and over again. 

We had our small group over, and somehow the four 2/3 year olds were unsupervised for a few minutes (everyone thought they were with someone else).  We found them in Orrin's room feeding the fish.  :)

Took some fun pictures of the kids at the park near our house. 

Orrin in front of the huge beech tree there.

Orrin helping Scott put new dirt in our garden.  He was pretty excited about this.  I'm really hoping that he still enjoys all this work when he's actually big enough to really help. 

This was my mother's day gift.  Scott let Orrin pick out a couple of things all by himself.  Bet you can't guess which ones they are...  :)

Playing outside the other day - he mowed the lawn, swept the garage and driveway, fixed the motor on his truck... nothing left to do but shovel the snow.

Ok, I guess that was mostly about Orrin.  Currently, our favorite Orrinism is "draining your injury".  We tell him he is draining our energy when he is throwing a fit about something - and if we run out of energy, we won't be able to (insert whatever thing he wants to do at that moment, usually reading a story before bed).  It works quite well, so well that at random times he'll remind us that he's not draining our "injury". 

8 Months

This little girl is just so joyful and fun.  In the last month, she has figured out how to quickly roll across the room and get pretty much anywhere she wants to.  We have to watch what we put on the coffee table because that is currently a favorite spot and she loves to pull anything that might be hanging off the side.  Lately she is trying to pull her legs under her, and gets very frustrated that she can't make herself go forward yet.  She is still eating great, although she doesn't like green veggies.  I'm getting better about hiding those things.  Nighttime is getting better, too.  Last week 2 or 3 nights in a row she did not wake to eat.  Then we had a crazy weekend so the last few she has been up.  Her third tooth popped through in the last couple of days also (on the bottom right).  She still squeals a lot, and says "mama" and "dada".  She seems to use those words appropriately, but I'm not really sure if she's still just making sounds, or actually using words.  "Mama" is only said when she is complaining and wants me to pick her up.  "Dada" is more of a happy word.  I guess that's just a view into what's to come!  :)  Orrin is still her favorite person, although she loves to torment him.  He hates it when she pulls on the tablecloth and moves his plate.  So she'll grab a handful, look at him, smile, and give it a big yank.  Its pretty hilarious.  We weighed her the other day and she is around 20 pounds now.  Wearing 18 month clothes.  Scott and I marvel at how different she and Orrin are.  She seems to be taking after me with a love for animals.  She just adores Spot, and likes to see other pets or animals at the zoo.  Orrin couldn't care less (his favorite thing at the zoo is the tractor)!  She is so mellow, more sensitive and quicker to cry about something, but will calm instantly by being picked up or soothed.  She goes to bed without a fight (she'll practically climb out of my arms into her crib), eats without a fight (unless its green), and she sits contentedly for a long time as long as there is something for her to watch (people, dog, etc).  They're both amazing kids, just very different.  It will be fun to see what her personality is like as she gets older.

edit: I forgot to add that she is playing peek a boo now.  Last week she started lifting up the tray liner in her high chair over her face, then giggling.  Then on the way home from Chicago, she was using her blanket and laughing like crazy when I'd play along.

7 Months

We apparently need to take some more pictures of Joanna!  I don't think too much has changed in the last few weeks.  She is eating more/better, sleeping better, and moving a bit more.  I think the record is about 6 feet from where I left her so far.  But she is working hard to get places!  She loves to sit and play with her toys, especially when I give her a basket or bin full of random toys that she can empty.  She has started playing with some of the bigger toys, too, like Orrin's favorite drum or the book that talks and plays music.  She makes a whole lot of noise, most of it joyful.  When she starts to get a little crabby - 99% of the time she is just ready to sleep, or  maybe eat.  This week she must have been teething or something because she was quite crabby all afternoon for a few days in a row.  She would never let me put her down without throwing a fit so finally I put her on my back in the ergo.  She loved it!  She giggled for the first 10 minutes or so, then happily and quietly rode back there for at least an hour while I worked in the kitchen.  It makes for a good workout for me, too!  I'm glad she likes it, now I know I can use that for our walks to the park.  The double stroller is just about impossible to get through the woods and field. 

I think Joanna might be giving kisses now, too.  She likes to grab your face with both hands and pull it in to her wide open mouth.  Its cute and a little scary at the same time - those two little teeth are sharp!  She's still mesmerized by her brother, which makes it difficult to feed her if he is at the table.  She will crane her neck as far around as she can to see him and watch him eat.  She thought it was hilarious when he was pretending to feed her the other day (until he jammed the spoon a little too far down her throat and she gagged).  Although she was not amused when he teased her with her sippy cup of water.  She's a little possesive of that already.

I think this was green beans and/or squash or something.  She wasn't loving it, but I couldn't quite catch her disgust with the camera.

She is in love with Pooh.  And most other stuffed animals. (you can see these were taken right before bed, she looks like she has black eyes when she gets tired!)

 We get a lot of comments from people about her beautiful blue eyes!

6 months

Edit: I forgot about the stats - she was 17 pounds, 11 ounces (75th percentile), and 28 inches tall (95th percentile) at her last appointment.

Can you believe its been a half a year?! Joanna has been up to all sorts of new things in the last month.

She is sitting up on her own (although she still prefers to be standing), rolling, and working hard on moving around. She can kind of wiggle and roll to get around a little, and she kicks and squirms when she is playing on her tummy like she is wanting to crawl, but thankfully she doesn't get too far yet. Babyproofing again is in our near future.

She is eating solid foods regularly, although not very much. So far we've tried peas (gag), green beans (gag), carrots (yum), apples (yum), sweet potatoes (ok), peaches (ok), squash (gag), oatmeal (ok). We also have given her cucumbers to gnaw on which she loves, and puffs to play with and eat, which she promptly choked on when she finally got one in her mouth. So as you can see, the only two foods so far that she actually readily eats are apples and carrots. I keep trying new things but she seems pretty picky.

Her first tooth poked through on March 17, and the second just a few days ago. Of course she was miserable the week that Scott was away in the UK, leaving me to be up with her many times per night. He came home and she slept 15 hours straight and when she finally got up, we noticed the little tooth.

A few weeks ago she started making the "dadada" sounds. Before that it was all just her joyful squealing, which she still loves to do. She seems to be experimenting with volume at the moment.

She thinks that Spot is hilarious. When he is near, she loves to talk to him and grab at his face. Today he rode in the back of the van where she could see him being crazy and she laughed the whole way to the vet and back like she had her own personal comedian. I wish I had a tape recording of it!

She is a very happy kid now. She laughs at being tickled, and in general loves to smile and talk to us. Unlike Orrin at this age, she loves to play with toys and chew on everything she can get her hands on. She is figuring out the interactive toys like her radio that plays when she pushes a button, or the hanging toy that plays when she pulls on the handle.

She is still up a few times at night (only once to eat) but will usually go quickly back to sleep when the pacifier is replaced. But she is actually becoming a good napper. I can now put her down right when Orrin goes to quiet time and get an hour to myself in the afternoon. What a treat for me!

Can you believe that she was able to wear this outfit in March?? Crazy.

You can see a perfect hand print on her face here after her nap. :)

Modeling her new hat in one of her favorite places.

With all of the nice weather, we can't get enough of the gardens this year.

Practicing her new skills.

She loved the apples so much she needed to lick the bowl.

The obligatory carrots picture.