Thursday, September 24, 2009

Mama (9/12/09)

Here is Lily playing on the Boppy in my lap and showing the camera how she says ma-ma. I love how she does it with her tongue sticking out. So cute! It’s music to my ears.

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Violin Concert (9/11/09)

This is what Rachel learned on her first official day of orchestra. They are just learning the notes so she isn't using her violin bow yet. Lily was totally into her performance and even rocked to the beat and clapped! You see a brief glimpse of Amber's tail as she crossed Paul's lap then jumped to the floor, briefly distracting Lily.

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Lily's 28th Week (9/7/09 - 9/13/09)

Monday was Labor Day so we had the day off of work. We had a four day weekend since we took Friday off as well. Unfortunately, as noted in the last post, Lily was sick Friday and Saturday due to her immunizations so it wasn’t the most fun and relaxing weekend. Monday morning we did chores around the house then we went to my parents’ house in the afternoon for a Labor Day cookout.

Tuesday was a big day as it was Rachel’s first day of 6th grade. I had to work at the Brighton Health Center which meant that I needed to leave before Rachel’s bus arrived but Paul stayed with her at the bus stop to make sure that she got off to school okay. It was a half day of school so my mom came that day to clean the house so that Rachel wouldn’t be alone all afternoon. My dad didn’t come because he had American Legion meetings all day. Everything went well for Rachel at school. She really liked her teachers and was excited about orchestra. My mom made a wonderful dinner for all of us when we got home. Tuesday was also my co-worker, Kim’s, last day of work but unfortunately it was impossible for us to make it to her farewell dinner. We will miss working with her and wish her the best of luck at PA school.

The rest of the week was spent settling back into our school-year routine. I helped Rachel organize and label folders in her trapper-keeper for schoolwork in hopes that this year she will be better about not losing homework and will get better grades as a result. Originally, Rachel was nervous as she only knew one girl in her class this year but by the end of the week, she had already made a number of new friends including a girl who lives just down the road. In addition, she still gets to see her two good friends from 5th grade during lunch. The orchestra teacher collected all of the students’ instruments on Wednesday to put tape marks on them to help teach the notes. They got them back on Friday and Rachel learned her first song in class that day. It was ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’. When we got home, she played the song for all of us. Lily loved it and clapped at the performance and rocked to the music. She just started clapping this week but that was the first time she ‘danced’ to music. It was her way of showing how much she loved the performance and the performer. I will post a video of the event on my next blog entry. Afterward, we had movie night. I love the $1 Red Box movie rental machine at Kroger. It is so convenient. Unfortunately, Rachel was so exhausted from the week that she couldn’t make it through the movie so we had to finish it on Saturday afternoon.

The weekend was a bit difficult for me. First of all, I never got out of the house so I was going a little stir-crazy by Sunday night. Plus it was that time of the month and it was a rough one. I worry what it will do to my milk supply since last month’s severely diminished it. As it is now, I no longer have a surplus and am barely able to keep up with demand. Paul got to get out of the house on Saturday night as his friend, Chris, was in town from the Upper Peninsula. Paul met up with Chris, Pat, and Auriel for drinks at the Arbor Brewing Company and got home pretty late. On Sunday, Lily was fussy and demanding so I was barely able to put her down all day. I was in my pajamas almost all day and had to endure her crying whenever I had to set her down for such frivolous activities as going to the bathroom. Paul went over to Kirsten’s house to watch the Lion’s game with her husband, Pat. I never got a chance to shower or get ready but I did finally get dressed when my dad called to say that he was on his way over. He had an American Legion meeting in Pinckney so he stopped over afterward to visit and drop off 3 totes of clothing from Roni. Roni is the daughter of my mom’s good friend, Linda. It was quite generous of her to give me her girls’ outgrown clothes. I really appreciate it. Lily usually loves my dad but she was even fussy for him and his friend, Bernie. She had three big diaper blowouts later that evening then finally was in a better mood. Poor thing must have been having GI pain all day. What made the weekend worth it for me was that Lily learned to make the “ma-ma” sound. She does it with her tongue sticking out which is so darn cute. We got it on video so I will post it later. Her repertoire of sounds now includes ma, da, la, ba, and an occasional ga.

Here are some pictures from this week:

Lily entertained herself on my bed Monday morning with some toys and a big pot and plastic hammer to beat together. The girl is so strong that she kept picking the pot up and chewing on it. Here she is playing:



I found ‘Red Frog’ in her toy box which was Rachel’s very favorite teether 11 years ago. Lily loves it too. It has a great texture and is easy for her to hold. She can gnaw on its head, hands, or feet (you can see what it looks like better in the previous three pictures):

My happy baby Monday night at my parents’ house in her adorable frog pajamas:

Lily cuddling with Grandma Chris on Tuesday evening and playing with her favorite toys which are Red Frog, her ball, and Mr. Moo:


I spiked Lily’s hair for fun. It looks like she is saying, “Seriously!?”:

Lily drinking water out of a cup at Kirsten’s on Wednesday. She loves it:

My adorable girl woke up quite happy on Thursday morning, still wearing the previous day’s clothes:

This week Lily discovered that she could pull herself up holding onto her swing. She can’t get a good enough grip to do it on a table but can get a good grip around the swing bars and easily pull up. She stands on her own for a little bit then leans back on whoever is spotting her from behind then goes back to standing after a short rest. She is so darn strong:

Paul brought down a little something extra with the laundry on Sunday:

Lily kept trying to take off Paul’s hat on Sunday so he put it on her head. She looked so cute in it:



Lily dramatically passed out in her swing on Sunday evening:

Friday, September 18, 2009

Lily's 27th Week (8/31/09 - 9/6/09)

This was a short but busy work week. Rachel didn’t have camp this week so she went to Kirsten’s with Lily and played with Keegan and her friends. She seemed to have a lot of fun. Paul and I drove separately to work on Monday and Wednesday. I worked at the Brighton Health Center on Monday and he had to leave work early on Wednesday due to an event at Rachel’s school. It is so nice to have two reliable vehicles now. The event at Rachel’s school was Navigate Your Way Day where the kids go and meet their teachers, find and try their lockers, and generally get reacquainted with the school. Rachel was disappointed to learn that she and her two best friends all have different homerooms but is excited about the new school year. She is especially excited about back to school shopping. She is also eager to start orchestra. She’s had her violin for a few months now and is enthusiastic to finally learn how to play it. Paul only picked Rachel up early from Kirsten’s so I picked up Lily once I got out of work at my normal time. When I got there, Lily was taking a late nap, dinner was almost ready, and Paul and Rachel were still supposed to be at the school for another half hour, so I readily accepted Kirsten’s invitation to stay for dinner. She made tilapia which looked and smelled wonderful.
Lily always has to hang onto Kirsten’s brown blanket when she sleeps at her house:

Lily woke up right before we ate (of course). She looked so cute:

Lily was excited to wake up and see mommy so she was not happy when I tried to put her in Kirsten’s exersaucer while we ate. Instead, I held her while eating which I have become an expert at. She is very grabby and always seems to have a further reach than I anticipate so it can be quite challenging. The dinner was wonderful. Lily was so interested in my water glass that I jokingly held it up for her to take a drink. She actually drank out of the cup perfectly which really impressed me. I will have to get pictures of that later.

On Thursday evening, we went back to school shopping. Rachel has been begging to go for weeks but we had to wait until we got the school supply list at Navigate Your Way Day. She was excited because she got two gift cards from her Aunt Beth for school supplies so she felt like such a big girl getting her own cart at Wal-Mart, picking out her own supplies, and paying for them herself.

Both Paul and I had Friday off of work. Since Monday is Labor Day, we will have a four day weekend. We knew it wouldn’t be all that great of a weekend because we took the day off for Lily’s six month doctor appointment. She woke up in such a cute and cuddly mood. Too bad we knew it would end once we got to the doctor’s office:



Lily playing with Nolan. She kept diving backwards out of my lap to be next to him:


Her doctor appointment went well. Her pediatrician was pleased with her physical therapy progress and told us that she doesn’t need to go anymore because her torticollis is gone. She was 27 1/8 inches tall and weighed 17 lbs 11 ounces. She was in the 91st percentile for height and 81st percentile for weight. She got the Rotavirus oral vaccine, Pediarix shot, HIB shot, and Prevnar shot for the third and final time. In addition, she got a flu shot making it a total of four painful shots for my little baby. They give the flu vaccine in two doses so she will return in a month for the second half. It is so horrible hearing her scream through the shots so I am glad that she is done with vaccinations until 12 months of age (except for the second half of her flu shot next month). The first time she had her vaccinations, she got a fever and was lethargic and fussy for a few days. She was fine after the second time so I was hoping that she would be fine this time as well. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. I don’t know if it was the addition of the flu shot that was too much to handle but she got a really bad fever. After each round of vaccines, I gave her Tylenol every five hours for the first day for pain and then continued that schedule for longer if she still had a fever. Tylenol makes her sleepy so she got her last dose Friday night at 8pm. I didn’t want to wake her for her 1am dose so I let her sleep through it hoping that she would be just fine like last time. Sadly, the poor thing woke up at about 5am screaming and burning up. We changed her diaper, made sure she was comfortable and gave her more Tylenol but she was inconsolable. Paul and I paced the house with her for an hour until she cried herself to sleep. That was so hard because she was miserable and I couldn’t help her. She dozed on and off all day Saturday. She was still feverish and under the weather so she just wanted to cuddle with me all day.

By Sunday, Lily finally seemed to be feeling better but was still a bit fussy and clingy. We met Pat, Auriel, and Aneasha at the Renaissance Festival. It was a beautiful day out. The line of cars to get into the festival was two miles long and buying our tickets took almost a half hour. It was so busy! I haven’t been there since college and I don’t remember it being so crowded but perhaps it was because it was beer weekend. It was difficult meeting up with Pat and Auriel since it was so crowded and they couldn’t hear their cell phones so we wandered for a while. Lily fell asleep as soon as we got inside:

I made Paul and Rachel get their picture taken in this cool gazebo. Rachel wore a pirate outfit that she borrowed from Pat and Auriel who also attended the festival in costume. She loved the skirt and wore it on and off all week:

Rachel went on this crazy thing where you are strapped to all these bungees and jump up and down on a trampoline. Some kids were getting super high in the air. Rachel didn’t really perfect the whole technique of coordinating the push off the trampoline as soon as she felt it under her feet so mostly she just hung in the air and had the attendant pull her down repeatedly by her legs to get her bouncing again. When she felt him grab her, she would start flailing around so the attendant’s reward for helping was to repeatedly get kicked in the face. Poor guy. Here she is getting the harness on:

Her giant skirt made it difficult to get the leg straps on. It made the harness sit funny which could explain why she had trouble:

Rachel getting raised up in the air before beginning bouncing. They raise the kids up by the bungees, pull them down the first time, and then let their momentum and the force of them pushing off the trampoline send them high into the air:

That didn’t really work for Rachel so here she is, stuck again:

Finally bouncing:

Pat, Auriel, and Aneasha finally caught up with us while Rachel was on the ride. Afterwards, we did some shopping and watched some shows. We also met up briefly with John, Tonya, and Steve. Right after visiting with them, we ran into Shrek:

My family:


We left earlier than everyone else to meet up with my family at the French Laundry in Fenton for my cousin Todd’s birthday. It was conveniently only about a ten minute drive from where we were in Holly. We had dinner with my parents, Uncle Lee, Aunt Robin, Todd, Ashlee, Jeremy, Bob, Bobbie, and my grandma. Here is Lily visiting with Ashlee and Todd:

Lily had dinner too:


Paul’s giant salad:

After dinner, Lily fell asleep on Uncle Lee:


Then Aunt Robin took her:

She woke up and visited with Robin and Ashlee. Considering how clingy she had been all weekend, I was amazed that she let anyone other than me hold her but she did great:

Lily and Ashlee:

After dinner, we went to Uncle Ray’s for ice cream then went home. It was a fun day. We are looking forward to yet another day off of work tomorrow for Labor Day.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Lily is 6 Months Old! (9/1/09)

I can't believe that my baby is six months old already. It has been such a wonderful six months. She has grown and changed so much. Let's look back.

Lily as a newborn:

Lily at 1 month:

Lily at 3 months:

Lily at 6 months:


Look at Lily posing in the same chair in her 3 and 6 month pictures. She sure has gotten bigger:

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Lily's Professional 6 Month Photos (8/29/09)

Here are Lily's six month pictures. They took some great photos so it was really hard to narrow it down from the 150 they took to the few posted below. I can't believe what a big girl she is now. We also had some photos taken of the two girls together since we hadn't done that since Lily's one month pictures.