thirty before thirty revisited

We got the go ahead for starting solids at Hartley's well-check! After her appointment, I headed to Mema's to pick up my phone and inform her of Hartley's newest trick. She was picking pears (that had not been stolen like last year!) so I got a bagful.

I was introduced to Smitten Kitchen a few weeks ago and elated to find advanced baby food recipes! This isn't your grandma's mashed banana food- this is fancy shmancy, pureed goodness. Ground nutmeg?? Okay! Balsamic vinegar? I'm on board for that!

I tried Deb's Vanilla Bean Pear Sauce. For the record- I don't eat pears. The texture is just off to me. But I'm willing to taste a sample to ensure they would be to Hartley's liking. If it's anything like Tylenol, I'm sure she's going to love it!

10. Make Homemade Baby Food. I've only got a few more weeks before this starts rolling! We have lots of squash and zucchini in our garden that Hartley will hopefully enjoy!

Our next ventures will be with green beans, carrots, sweet potatoes, mangoes, and avocado. And don't worry, we'll have videos posted with her reactions.

six month check up aka drama

Sigh. Had to take a breather before beginning...

Hartley had her 6 month well-check this morning. I prepared myself for a disappointing weigh-in. I know she's a skinny baby. What I didn't prepare myself for was her "tantrum." We'll get there, hold your horses.

She had a great visit with the nurse and nurse practitioner (our normal doctor wasn't there). She rolled around on the table, smiled, blew raspberries, pooted. All the normal things she does. We talked about her weight and beginning solids. Her nighttime wakefulness. What we can do to make her an even more perfect baby...

She weighed in at 12lb 13oz. This is one pound up from 2 months ago. Putting her in the 5th percentile for weight. (Bummer.. but at least she's on the chart) She measure 25.5 inches long. Only .5 inch in 2 months. She's in the 25th percentile for height, even though she looks really long. It's that dang torso.

Hartley is developmentally where she's supposed to be. Rolling around, grabbing things (everything!), talking, etc.

Okay- so now it's shot time. I know she hates shots. But the previous times she's handled them fairly well. She cries of course, but she calms down within a few minutes..

Nurse lady is about to administer them and I begin distracting Hartley with her Emmie. And then shrill crying starts. She's cried like this before. Nothing new.

But she kept going. Then she got to the point where she was crying and there wasn't any sound. Again- we've been here before.

At this point, I noticed she wasn't taking a breath and even calmly told her, "Hartley, you can breath. You can breath!"

And all of sudden- her face turns purple. Her eyes roll in the back of head. She stops moving.

This is all during 3 shots in her leg.

"What's happening? What's happening?!"

Nurse runs of out the room, calling the doctor.

"Hartley, baby. Wake up!"

[this is upsetting me now, just replaying it in my mind]

"Hartley.. Hartley.."

As soon as the doctor comes in, she wakes up and starts crying again. At this point I'm a little relieved. She's awake. She's making a sound.

It wasn't a seizure. It was a breath-holding spell.

The doctor had to pull me together. "Mom, she needs you. She needs you to calm both of y'all down."

Breathe.

We calmed down eventually. Hartley nursed a little before passing out falling asleep. She skipped her morning nap, so it was definitely due. We have to rephrase the way we say she's asleep-asleep, because well.. you know..

As I was checking out, the shot nurse was walking by and asked how Hartley was. I said, "She's passed out... I mean- she's asleep!" The nurse felt horrible, especially seeing how upset we both were. She's been asleep for 2.5 hours now.

I say it's time to wake up. Hopefully she'll be in a happy mood..

Columbus Visit

Hartley and I made a trip to Columbus this weekend. The Kentucky ladies were making a pit stop in Georgia and had not met Hartley yet.. so it was a must!

Unfortunately, we had a super busy weekend and super teething baby.. so there weren't ANY pictures taken. I'm having to use Christmas pictures from 2009 to show off my pretty cousins.

Ally is the little lady on the right. She has to be sitting right on top of someone at all times. She loves the twins and Hartley!

And Katie on the lower left corner is the closest cousin I have in age (and coolest). We're separated by 8 years.

Wanna know something cooky??

Katie and Ally are 8 years apart.

Ally and Hartley are 8 years apart.

Which means- one of those girls has to have a baby in 8 years. Preferably a girl.

(Just a heads up for y'all. Don't flip out, Aunt Laurie.. would you rather it be you?)

We had a good time visiting. We met up with another Laurie and her baby Bella and got some pool time in! And also got a butt load of hand-me-downs!! We love those.

These are what most pictures are starting to look like.

This little stinker was a wonderful baby during the day. But once the sun went down- whoo-whee. Friday night was horrible. She woke up 3 times during the night, each time staying up for an hour. She wound up sleeping on my chest.

And last night- well, 2 hours. Two heartbreaking hours of fussiness. Well- mainly one hour of nonstop crying and another hour of being happy a few minutes and upset the next. Fortunately that was from 8:30 to 10:30 and we finally went to bed. Yes, both of us in the same bed. She woke up around 3am, nursed and went back to sleep easily. One little cry around 5 or 6am, and she was fine. I can't believe we slept until 8am!

Not sure of how tonight will be. But we've got Daddy to help! Grandmommie tried her best, though!

We go for Hartley's 6-month well-check on Tuesday. Hudson- send your chunky vibes again, we never received them last time. :)

sleep talkin'

I got more than I bargained for when I married Marshall.. especially during the middle of the night.

Soon after we were married, Marshall started blaming me for taking off his shorts during the night. I had no proof it wasn't me until one morning he woke up with his boxers in his hands. And another morning they were on his pillow.

So- it's not me with the sleep quirks...

Marshall also talks in his sleep. And performs surgery on dogs apparently. I get some good laughs, but usually I forget them.. like last night. Until he asked what happened last night...

Lemme set the stage for you. Whatever Marshall says will be bold. I will be italicized. Ready? Go.

I returned to bed at 3:38am. I was exhausted from staying up with Hartley for about 30 minutes and ready to get some more sleep.

Them Goobers! Dogs!

What? What did you say?

I assumed he was awake and about to tell me what the dogs did during the night. Mind you, we've been pet sitting this week.

They're asleep. I was asleep.

Big mess!

At this point, I realize he's asleep! I've started taking advantage of these moments and try to get crazy stuff out of him.

A mess?! What happened?!

[uncertain rambling]

What? What did you say?

Unfortunately he starts waking up.

I was asleep and you keep asking questions.

I didn't realize he was waking up, though.

What mess, Marshall?

The fun ended there. He woke up and was aggravated that I was talking to him. I laid there, smiling to myself and drifted back to sleep.

Then I dreamt that my nephew Caleb (15 months) started talking.. in a British accent.

babyproofing

It's time to start babyproofing the house.

And cleaning up dog hair more often..

six months

Hartley Caroline! You are 6 months old today! And I can't believe it.

What are you up to these days?

• During your 5th month, our schedule was almost perfected. Of course, things happened and we were thrown off. I say this every month, but you are still changing so quickly!
• When our schedule was consistent, you would start your day around 8am. You finally got to the 3-hour schedule, in which you would eat every 3 hours. Now sometimes you go 3.5 hours! This is much better than 2 or 2.5 hours! You've also become more efficient at nursing. For a few weeks you were down to 10 minutes per side. Now you average 6-7 minutes per side. At first I was so scared you weren't eating enough or I wasn't making enough milk, but you were just growing up!

• You went on your first vacation with Daddy's side of the family. We went to Edisto Beach and you enjoyed being with your cousins all day! You changed a lot that week. Perhaps being with all your cousins helped you to come out of your shell and squeal for them. You also learned to roll from your back to your front and suck on your toes.
• Teething and a growth spurt made vacation difficult (and teething continues to make life difficult). You took very short naps. Since we've been home, naps have gotten slightly better but you wake up throughout the night. Instead of sleeping through the night (boy was I spoiled) you wake up around 1am and 5am. And sometimes it takes forever for you to go back to sleep. At least in the middle of the night it feels that way. Rocking for 30 minutes to an hour is a long time. Thankfully, Daddy helps out.

• You have started eating rice cereal. I think you've done very well being spoon fed, except you want to grab the spoon and help. And you also like to blow raspberries and send food flying everywhere, including me. You eat your "meals" for breakfast and dinner. You've tried banana a little. You weren't too sure about it. And you had a "banana poop" - there were little stringy pieces in it. I told your Daddy today that your poots have forever changed- they stink now. Mema and I discovered this in Hobby Lobby yesterday.
• Right now Daddy is feeding you dinner and y'all keep blowing raspberries at each other. Hope he put a bib on himself...

• Sometimes I look at you and don't see a little baby. You look like a big girl, especially when you sleep and roll around. You're still very petite, not even 13lb. I weigh you when we visit Daddy's office. You are about 26 inches long. You wear size 1/2 diapers during the day and size 2 at night. You had been wearing size 2 throughout the day, but after multiple blowouts we switched. Mucousy poop is not stationery.
• Rolling around is your favorite thing. I can't keep you contained on your playmat any longer. When you first realized you could roll over, you kept doing it in your sleep and would wake up highly upset. We propped the boppy in your crib so that you wouldn't roll over, it worked a little. I found you sleeping on your stomach the other night though.
• Sassy is another favorite of yours. You reach for her and pull her fur, or chomp on her.

• You love to squeal.. still! You have become louder, too. You get a lot of attention when we go out to eat and in stores. You don't mind at all! In addition the mmming sound you make, you've added a bbb sound. It's more blowing spit that anything. I'm still working on getting you to say mama.
• You enjoy scooting around in the walker. You can get around pretty well, too! If only you wouldn't throw your toys on the floor...

• I think your hair is growing now. During your cradle cap phase a few patches came out, but now it's filling in. It's a little lighter than the dark brown it was at birth, but it's still brown. And your eyes are slowly changing. They will probably be like your Daddy's- greenish brown.
• You grab on and reach for everything these days. We have to be careful with plates, and most recently, newspaper (she got black ink around her mouth today). This is why I think you were ready to start solids, minus the spoon grabbing ordeal.
• We are working on dropping your third nap, mainly because you won't take it. I'm not sure how this is going to work out, but we're trying to figure out what kind of schedule it will be. It would be nice if you took 1.5 to 2 hour naps. Some days you do and it's wonderful! Other days, like today, you do the usual 45 minute nap. Boo.

• You are such a silly girl, Hartley! You make us laugh a lot. You are giggling more for us and not just the dogs. You think we're pretty funny and smile for us all the time (just not the camera). You give sweet open-mouth kisses.. slobbery ones too! And you think it's so funny to pull on my hair, glasses, and face.
• We continue to have good days and rough days. Teething has been incredibly hard for you. It's been at least 2 months of teething and I feel like there's no end in sight. Your Daddy got his first tooth when he was 7 months old. I'm hoping you get yours sooner. If not, we have one more month then. Hopefully they won't hurt as bad when the next teething phase comes.
• You know your name. You turn your head when we call your name. Sometimes you're really distracted and I have to add your last name. You haven't misbehaved too much so we haven't had to call you by your full name.. but I'm sure that will be soon!

We're going to Columbus for the weekend. Grandmommie will be surprised to see how much you've grown and changed! Maybe you'll surprise us with some teeth!!

they may say I'm a dreamer

It's been that kind of a week around here. Can you identify our evening rituals?

Marshall has a popsicle each evening (that means I haven't cleaned up after him the past 2 nights).

We've been back from vacation since Sunday and I've managed to do ONE load of laundry (our washer is slightly messed up right now), only swept the kitchen floor once.. and that's about it.

Hartley decided it was her week to grow and teeth terribly!

We had a much better night last night. I gave her a dreamfeed around 11pm. She woke up shortly after I put her down, I think she heard Daddy on the phone (he was on-call), but she went back to sleep after a brief rock.

She didn't wake up until around 5am. We nursed and she easily went back to sleep. This was much better than the nights before!

And guess who slept in this morning? Hartley Moorely! (The PigglyWiggly language.. PigglyWigglese??)

I dreamt she got in like 5 teeth, but alas, none. That's okay. She let me sleep in until 8:45am. I awoke frantically because it was so late and I had not heard a peep. I found her, passed out with Emmie covering her face. She had been having fun at some point this morning. I got her up shortly after that and she had some banana-rice cereal for breakfast. Note to self: put dogs outside for feedings, Hartley gets very distracted. Oh, as I was putting Hartley in the high chair the dogs got really excited. I think they confused it for her carseat. It entertained me.

So, today.. hopefully I'll get in some cleaning. Do some laundry, cook a meal?? We'll see how someone's naps go...