Marjorie at 10 Months

She's almost a year old! I can't believe it! Here's the update:

Marjorie:

-she is officially crawling! A week or two after she turned 9 months, she really started going. We of course bought a long fence to block off the radiator and the TV stand and have rearranged our bookcase multiple times so all of M's toys and books are where she can reach
-M loves books! If she's in a good mood, she will sit and pull out all of the books from her shelf and move them around and flip through them for a good 20-30 minutes
-A tooth! Finally! There is a teeny tiny little nub of a tooth (bottom left while looking at her) that has just started sticking out in the past week. I think the one next to it is going to be coming any day now
-Went on her 6th flight to NC to visit our family there and had a spectacular time hanging with Marjorie #1 a couple of times
-Eating solids like a champ. I think her system has gotten used to them enough now that there is no more screaming when she goes to the bathroom. In the past week since getting here to NC, she has decided that baby food is for the birds and she will only eat table food. So that's nice but also hard to think of things to make her and not just give her cheerios all the time. Also lots of cleaning. Cleaning her, cleaning the floor, cleaning her chair, cleaning up after cooking for her... never ending
-stayed inside a lot. It has been freezing and and snowing non-stop it feels like. We've just been hanging out inside all day long. It's been boring and she definitely starts to go bonkers after a while...as does mommy
-loves her dog. She interacts with him more and now that she eats food that Fitz and get off the floor, he really loves her too. He comes around and kisses her, she swats him away, then she chases him around while he tries to get me to play with him
-pulls herself up to kneeling, but not to standing unless you help her. I think part of this is because we don't have a coffee table, just a soft ottoman, so there's nothing for her to really get a good grip on when she tries pulling up
-everyone talks about how she's such a happy baby. She generally is, unless she's tired or hungry and has I have a much better idea of when this happens now, she is able to stay happy for the most part
-I feel like she's developing more of a personality now. She loves interacting with people, she's opinionated and gets frustrated when what she wants doesn't happen right away or how she wants, she gets a bit nervous in new situations (especially if tired), she doesn't recover well from a little tumble or head bonk unless mommy gives her loves (maybe that's my fault, but I do try to just be happy and tell her she's okay rather than freaking out when that happens)
-dropped down to two naps a day. We just went for it because 3 naps were driving me crazy and they were all getting super short. She's doing well on that and I feel like I have more freedom.
-Sleeping through the night! Right now with traveling, she's been up a bit more, but at home on a standard night we get at least a 5 hour chunk and usually more like a 6.5-7 hour chunk. Hallelujah!

Mommy:

-trying to figure out how to keep a baby entertained all day long while stuck inside and not going mad. It's a difficult task, let me tell you
-I started a baby group for the girls at church that have babies under 18 months. That has definitely helped a lot with having something to get out and leave the apartment for but not needing to spend money
-Feeling much more confident about being Marjorie's mom. My worries have switched from being about her physical needs and trying to figure out what in the world she needs/wants to her emotional/intellectual needs and how to make sure I'm "enriching her experience" rather than just sitting around doing nothing. We definitely have our hang out days, but I'm trying to have a theme each month that we kind of focus on and that helps prompt what I do during "Marjorie time." Sometimes I feel successful in that and sometimes not. It's really hard sometimes feeling like I was productive during the day and making sure I'm not having too many lazy days

It is much more difficult to take pictures of a very mobile child. So there are a lot of blurry ones, but hey, it depicts what she's up to right now.

                   

                   

The Marjorie Summit

Today we went and visited Dan's grandma Marjorie (GG) with our Marjorie. Always fun to get these two girls together. It was much more difficult to get cute pictures of them together since our Marjorie is all over the place now. She will not be restrained!

 

It was her first time wearing pigtails and I've decided to never do it again since they make her look waaay too old!

 

Love this one of GG smiling. Too bad it was getting close to nap time for M.

 

Marjorie at 9 Months

This month felt like lots of new tricks were learned. We started out the month in California and half way through came back to NYC, and then I left Marjorie for the first time to go to my friend's wedding in Colorado. It was a busy month!

Marjorie:
-at her appointment she was 16 lbs and 1 oz
-started sitting up on her own a couple days after her 8 month mark. She now sits up by herself just fine and knows how to catch herself when she starts to topple over.
-can push herself up from laying down to sitting up. This is becoming a problem when she's goes down for nap time...
-wants desperately to crawl! She gets up all the time on her hands and knees and can kind of push herself backwards. Every once in a while I think she may do one little crawl forward, but then usually just lays out to reach whatever it was she was trying to get.
-to get around she does a lot of swiveling on the floor and then pushing herself into a seated position, then rotating some more and then laying down and rolling a bit until she gets to wherever she wants to go. It's entertaining.
-is laughing more and more. Sometimes she gets to watch Baby Einstein while I'm showering, and I can hear her laughing and giggling at it the whole time. We played chase the dog the other night and she was screeching with laughter. So fun!
-loves her kitty (binky with a kitty attached to it), her nesting cups, stacking rings, kitchen utensils, monkey from Uncle Connor, cell phone, ipad... any and all ity bity pieces of lint, food, plastic, hair, etc. on the carpets...
-eats three meals and a snack each day. She's starting to not like the purees as much, but she still doesn't have any teeth at all so I'm not sure what to feed her. I also have a hard time because I think of things, but they're messy and I don't want to have to clean her up and change her clothes after every single meal. Maybe I should just give in to the messiness that is having a baby. She does consistently love to eat puffs (of course), chicken, apples, cheerios, pirates booty, and sweet potatoes.
-we switched out gassy tummy problems for constipation problems. She gets a dollop of peaches, prunes, peas, or pears with every meal in the hopes of making things a bit easier for her. Sometimes it helps, sometimes not.
-drinks water through a straw cup. I'd read somewhere that straw cups are better for helping develop the facial muscles you need for language and it seemed easier to be able to ask for a cup with a straw when we're out and about rather than needing to carry my own sippy cup, so that's all I've offered her. This month she finally figured it out. She can definitely drink from a straw sippy, but usually if she's eating finger food rather than purees, she wants nothing to do with it which is a bit frustrating because of the tummy problems.
-sometimes uses "mamamamama" to mean me, and somtimes uses "dadadadadada" to mean Dan. But not consistently.
-loves watching Fitz play and especially loves watching him play catch. Fitz also loves to bring Marjorie a ball to throw for him, and loves bringing her his rawhides because he knows how much she loves chewing on them (I tell myself it's good for developing her immune system and reducing allergies. Le sigh).

Mom:
-traveled back to NYC alone with M and it went much smoother. The flight to Denver was fine, she was able to take a nap in her stroller during the layover, and there was an open seat next to me on the longer flight from Denver to NYC which was Ah-mazing!!!!! She was so much happier having her own seat. She played with her toys and watched Baby Einstein and was a happy little girl the whole way, which means mommy was a happy big girl the whole way.
-I went to CO for my friend's wedding a week after we got back from CA. First time leaving M was hard, but it was good that I was a bridesmaid and busy the entire time. I didn't have many down moments to stop and worry about what was or wasn't going on back home. Dan sent regular happy updates which was nice. It was wonderful getting on a plane without having to worry about another little person. And I had a lot of fun celebrating with my friend.
-Marjorie slid off the bed for the first time the evening I got home from CO and on my watch, of course. I stepped away for a second and when I turned she was sliding feet first down the side. I dove to catch her but only made it worse because I nudged her in the other direction with resulted in her landing on her face on the wooden floor. She cried, I couldn't stop apologizing, and then she forgot it. Thank goodness they do.

And now pictures:

 

And a couple of outtakes of her just yelling like she does.

The end.

Naked Baby

While we were in California, one morning we had naked baby time. I am in love with these pictures. I know they're not technically correct in any way. They have hot spots and they're blown out, but I loved this moment. She was so happy and calm and and the light was beautiful on her soft skin. I love that it highlights her fluffy hair and her little peach fuzz all over her body. And her bum. I didn't know I could love a little bum so much! I love them because they so perfectly captured a moment.

Christmas 2013

Growing up Christmas Eve was always when we celebrated our Christmas with Poppa. But she was out in North Carolina with my Aunt's family so she wasn't able to be there, but we had our fancy dinner still. Dad had the brilliant idea of ordering dinner from Whole Foods and it was delicious! I don't think I've ever had a better gravy than Whole Foods. Spencer came over and spent the night so he could be with us on Christmas morning.

We always have Christmas crackers to open up during dinner. Then we all have to wear silly paper crowns.

My Dad had a tripod, so I was able to take a picture of all of us by the tree. We missed having Connor there! Marjorie was already asleep.

 

My pretty mama : )

Stockings all hung up.

 

Christmas tree.

Christmas morning! We had Connor on facetime all morning so it was kind of like he was there with us. 

 

Marjorie loves facetime : )

 

Uncle Spencer 

Looking at her favorite faces book I made online. That was all we got Marjorie this year, as I knew our family would be incredibly generous (which they were). She got lots of cute clothes and fun toys which we're enjoying now. She did find the wrapping paper the most entertaining of course.

 

Glamme got Marjorie a little elf outfit which she of course had to wear all day on Christmas.

 

It was pretty adorable.

We had so much fun in California and are so grateful for my parents hosting us and being so generous. Marjorie and I got to spend a month there and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.