58 Weeks & A Trip to the MN Zoo

Today we went to the zoo with our dear friend and one of Isabel' godmothers, Jessi. She brought along her nephews with as well. Jessi gave Isabel passes to the zoo for her birthday and we wanted to go with her to use them. We had a good time. We have not idea who the little girl in the haystack picture with us is. She just stuck her head through.

Friday,June 29th

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Cute Story.

At one point today I was sitting on the floor of the living room leaning against the couch surfing the internet on the computer. Isabel crawls over to me and on top of me and buries her head into my chest, pulls it back and does it again. She infrequently does this if she wants to nurse. Well, shortly after the 2nd head bod, something else got her attention and she went to that and then decided to crawl over to the rocking chair that I normally nurse her in, removed the boppy from the seat and then looked at me as she leaned against the chair and started patting the seat of the chair with one had while she grasped the fabric of the boppy with the other hand. It was as if she was saying, "Woman! Get over here and nurse me!" It made me smile and giggle. Of course, I went to her.

Hangin'

Fun Stuff to Do

Here are a couple of things I found to make online:
Kool-aid Fingerpaint (beats paying $5 for fingerpaints.)
Homemade Bubbles (not that bubbles cost a lot, but it's easy to do.)
No Sew Fleece Poncho (Phanie - you could make one of these for Hannah for xmas, it would be cute.)

And not fun stuff to do, but helpful, is this website about using vineger to clean EVERYTHING!

Get that cute butt over here.

I bought this little skirt at a rummage sale on Friday. I thought it was fun. I also picked up the little chair too. She thinks that is fun.

57 Weeks

This was a garage sale find for $2. She like to tip the ball in with one hand when you hold it there (since she isn't standing by herself yet.) She giggles when she tips it in.

13 Month Charts

Length: 32.5"

Weight: 24 lbs.

Almost Friday...

Well, Isabel had grandma come & babysit her yesterday & today while mom had to go to work and dad was gone to interviews. She enjoyed spending time with grandma.

I have been participating a lot on a discussion forum on Milwaukee Moms. It is a very nice resource and I am glad I found it.

This afternoon, Isabel & I went to 43rd Street Pub & Grill (it used to be a Green Mill and is still just like that.) It was during happy hour time, so we had half price appetizers of chicken quesadillas and chicken fingers. The waiter was nice and brought some applesauce out for her as well. She ate all the fresh tomatoes from the quesadillas and her applesauce and had some of the appetizers & her juice I brought along. So, she ate a decent meal. As I looked over the menu I realized how hard it is to feed her a balaced healthy meal like I do at home, but I think we did pretty good. And we even had enough left over that daddy gets half of it.

Tonight marks the start of Straight River Days, our local festival.

Nothing new to report. Our house has not sold, actually no one has come to visit in the last 2 weeks. And we still don't know where we are moving to. We should know soon, but then again, maybe not.

13 Months

Happy Father's Day Daddy!

We went & checked out the local wildlife reserve....not much to see....then we took our picnic and went to the park and sat out on a blanket and had a picnic. I figured a blanket was easier with Isabel than sitting at a picnic table. Then mommy & daddy played some bocce ball and Isabel played with her toys, then she & daddy went on the seings & slide and finally we all went to the outlet mall to buy a couple of things. She napped quite a bit today, but needed it after we had to wake her up last night because of the tornado warning & all the sirens. We had to go down to the basement until they cancelled the warning. Luckily, she went back to sleep after that.

Totally Cool. Make a Kid's Carboard Chair for free.

As I was reading through my Natural Home Magazine, I saw a short article on making your own foldschool cardboard chair. Very neat. All the instreuctions are free and located here. They have designs for a stool, chair, & rocker. Guess I have something to do with our moving boxes. I could make enough furniture to fill a whole elementary school, I think. Very cool idea.

June 16, 2007

Just a little slide show of pictures from today. She has been practicing letting go for a second or two and standing on her own. I think the daycare lady was wrong; I don't think she took any steps yet. Anyways, she's standing without support for 1-2 seconds at a time.

Our new little game is from the Toddler's Busy Book. We just put golf balls in & out of the muffin pan.

Fun Times

We put the dog in the castle, but she very quickly figured out she is small and agile enough to jump up and out through the window.

We bought her this Little Tikes castle from Craigslist. We got a really good deal on it (brand new this things costs $350 - yikes!) and there is just a little something wrong with it, but it doesn't affect how sturdy it is or fun. She's still al ittle young for it because she can't see out of the turret (or even climb up to the bench in the turret) or climb up to go down the slide, but she can look on the windows, go in & out the door (& secret door). It's something to enjoy little bits now and grow into it more later.

We went to visit our friends Carrie & Kyle today as well. They are due to have little Gavin in 2 weeks.

Almost the Weekend

Her First Masterpiece

We tried out fingerpaints today. By the end she just wanted to rip up the paper. We pretty much just hung out at home all day. We played outside a couple times and she was obsessed with her sticks in the AM and then in the PM we played with balls on her cube and she thought that was so much fun to roll them down the slide and them throw them over the top of the cube.

I'm trying to change her routine a little bit so that she goes to bed a little later and then gets up a little later too. So, after supper we go outside and play for about 30 minutes and she goes to bed now at 7pm (instead of 6:30pm.)

I did her weight(24 lbs.) & length (32.5") today.

,m n n
b

Isabel typed that last part. She likes to pound on the keyboard.

Stick Lover

Last summer & fall we used to bring her outside when she would get really fussy. She loved looking at the trees. In the winter we would show her the trees through the window (since we were too lazy to get us all bundled up to go outside.) We still take her outside to calm her down, like when she starts throwing a tantrum. She loves being outside.

Today I took her on a walk to the park and we went on the swings & slide and then went over by the sandbox where we ended up spending over half our time playing with sticks. I wonder what goes through her mind. She's studying them and categorizing them over & over again.

This afternoon/evening after supper we went outside again to play on her cube and towards the end of playtime she was given a couple of sticks.......well, that just dragged playtime out even longer and she kept experimenting with the sticks & throwing them down the slide (of course she would grunt and yell for us to pick them back up and give them to her) and then back to sorting and sorting and sorting.

At one point, we decided it was time to go in and took her away from her sticks. She started to throw a tantrum, so I put her back down with daddy and went to get the mail. When I came back I tried to distract her with giving her junk mail (she loves paper too), but she was not going to fall for it. Finally, we just had carry her away throwing her tantrum. Once we got inside, she was distracted and stopped her tantrum. I don't know what the deal is with the sticks though.

If she had to grow up throwing & piling wood like her mommy, she might not be so into sticks.

Happy Anniversary Grams & Gramps!

Isabel's Grams & Gramps have been married for 31 years today.

Today, Isabel & mommy went to the library and picked up some books & puzzles. And then we went to Kohls' and checked it out. It's been there for 1.5 years and mommy just got there for the first time; it's nice. The only stuff we bought was some Dora stuff for Isabel. Then we came home, played, ate lunch, took a nap, played, ate a snack & played (above pictures, he puzzles are ones we got from the library) and then Isabel, mommy & daddy all went to the city pool and swam for a while. The big pool was warmer than the kiddie pool, so we spent most of our time there. Plus, Isabel loved watching all the big kids in the pool, whereas in the kiddie pool it was just her.

I'm Ready To Go Swimming!

Today she crawled all the way up the stairs twice without having to stop and rest for a second. And she also figured out today how to crawl up in her cube without any help.

She loves getting herself up to standing, but can't quite figure ou how to get back down and gets very angry when she wants to be down again. She'll figure out soon.

First Day of Summer with Mommy

Well, not just the summer......I'll be staying home with her after we figure out what's next for us. I don't know how long I'll stay home with her or whether or not I will stay home FT or PT with her, but I really want to be home with her.

Although this first day was not the greatest, as both mommy & daddy have pink eye. We were both taking her leftover drops and they are working great and fast for mommy, but not so fast for daddy. He got some other drops and also some anitbiotics for his sinus infection (which I think I have one too.) We all went with daddy to the Dr., which in hinesight was not wise as the doctor was slow getting to us, but she did fall asleep in the car as we were leaving from getting groceries & prescriptions and stayed asleep as I brought her in and into her crib (which she has never done before). She took a nice 2.5 hour long nap and woke up all happy & giggly. Then she had some fruit for a snack and we went outside to swim in the pool, play on the cube, and go on the swing. Fun times. Right now she is playing with daddy.

She did crawl all the way from the bottom of the steps to the landing and up the next small set of steps to the guest room. She was very proud of herself for doing that. She was pretty serious the whole time she was crawling (I was right behind her) and hardly cracked a smile until she got to the very top and then was all giggly and couldn't stop smiling.

Tonight we gave her the last little bit of her chocolate bunny from Easter. I her little bits about once a week. This time I didn't break up the piece and just gave her what was left and her eyes got all big and she got all smiley. She knows what chocolate is and loves it, can you blame her.

Hold On...Let Me Finish This Email.....

She goes crazy when we are on the computer and wants to do it too. Of corse she doesn't want the toy laptop I bought her, she wants the really one. I was going to see if she will want our broken one, but I don't know if will like it since it doesn't power on, hence nothing on the screen.

Today we were practicing using a toddler fork. She can't quite stab the food yet, but if mama helps her stab it she will do the rest just fine. She ate quite a bit of green beans today, which was nice. You just never know when she will want some veggies or not.

Nursing/Breastfeeding

So, it was a goal of mine to breastfeed Isabel for the first year of her life. I read a lot of things about the benefits of breastfeeding and there is a real push to breastfeed for the entire first year and that the most benefits are gained early on and through the first year.

And even if someone is not sure if they want to breastfeed or not, they say that any amount of breastfeeding is beneficial, especially if you breastfeed during the first two weeks when it's colostrum (or a mix with milk) that the baby is getting.

Now the first year has come and gone and I have to say, I never once thought about quitting it. It was really hard, REALLY HARD, sometimes. Plugged ducts and mastitis is painful and very uncomfortable, but I pushed through it. It sucked having to get up in the middle of the night (many, many times) because she needed to nurse or at least needed the comforting that nursing from mommy brought. It was very frustrating and worried me a lot when she wouldn't take a bottle for so long. It was really not fun leaking all over the place, and for the first 4 months I did have to wear nursing pads all the time and then again when I got mastitis. And it was inconvenient having to go to my office to pump twice a day. And it was frustrating sometimes that I couldn't go out & have a drink after work with friends because I was going to nurse her soon or that I couldn't play volleyball because that game schedule interfered with Isabel's schedule.

With that said, I never once thought about quitting breastfeeding. I believe all the benefits they say breastfeeding has and even if they all don't prove to be scientifically true, I do know this; that Isabel & I have this wonderful strong bond. She has a great bond with her daddy, but I have all those special moments of just the two of us nursing and no one else can have those moments with us. Even though night feedings were not on the top of my fun list, I loved knowing that I could provide nourishment and comfort to her. The plugged ducts & mastitis were even less fun, but she had to nurse more to help free the blockage and I liked knowing that she could help me as I helped her. It was to give & take like that.

And even though it was inconvenient to pump twice a day, I was able to pump enough so that we didn't have to supplement with formula and then at around a year we started giving her whole milk. And the stifling to my social life, actually saved us money and if I am being honest, after spending all day away from her I didn't want to spend any more time away from her. And if I am being really honest, I probably enjoyed spending more time with her.

I am still breastfeeding her, but only three times a day, right after she wakes up, at nap time and at bedtime. Although, last night she was so tired, she went to bed after just being rocked for a while and not nursing. I am not sure exactly when I will completely wean her, but for now I think we both still need it. With moving and all the changes, we both need the comfort and something that hasn't changed yet and since there is no more pumping, no leaky breasts, and no getting up in the middle of the night, and she's drinking milk, water & juice from a sippy cup -- it's all good now.

So, that's what I have to say. I have had people ask me when I am stopping or seem surprised that I haven't stopped yet. I have received encouragement that I was still continuing from one person, which was nice. I don't know when we'll be done, I guess when it's right for both of us.

55 Weeks

Watching Dad Mow Part of the Lawn

"I Want This Many Pieces, Please."

Isabel now has 10 teeth. It is just amazing. Her 1-year molars are coming in right now on both sides on the top only.

Yesterday we went to see our friends Jason, April, Kallen, & Noah. It was a very nice time. We like getting together with them. It was fun to watch the two babies chase their cat around. It was cute to see Isabel get all excited about "new" toys to play with. They had this one where the balls blow through a tunnel and pop out and stuff and she was just fascinated by it.

We had our rummage sale today. We made decent money, but it's a lot of work. I think in the future we may just donate it (since you always end up with stuff to donate anyways) and take the whole tax deduction on it. Last time we had a rummage sale was when we were moving as well. Wasn't fun then either, and then we had about 10% of what we had this time.

Tomorrow if the weather cooperates, we may walk to the city pool and go in the kiddie pool.

Next Tuesday is Grams & Gramps' 31st wedding anniversary.

Not Appropriate Reading Material for Babies

She was going through the stack of books I set aside for the rummage sale we plan to have on Saturday. This was her first choice to pick up. It's a pretty funny book.

Every Day Stuff, again (I used this title before)

Well, because we are packing to move, doing small projects around the house and repainting rooms I have not really had much time to take pictures. But I thought today that I would make a little time.

Whoever said no news is good news apparently was not waiting to find out where their husband was getting a job at and where they were moving to. People keep asking me for updates, and well, I have none. I wish we did. I also wish someone would just waltz in and buy our house so that was over & done with too.

She had blood tests done at her first year appointment and they were supposed to call us iwhtin a week-- they didn't. I needed to call them and then they called us back a bit later with the results. She doesn't have any lead in her blood - good news! - but her iron count was low. So, I need to go buy some vitamins with iron in them and make sure whe is getting iron-rich foods. She actually eats quite a bit of meat, but maybe the meat she's eating doesn't really have iron in it. And she will eat pork & beans, so I may have to give her that a little more often. And she did eat creamed spinach when I served it the other day, so maybe that will become a weekly side dish. They also said she was fighting a virus - well, duh! I could have told them that. She & I have been sick for ovr 2 weeks now.

First Steps, Pink Eye, & Crankiness

Well, the daycare lady told me that today she took her first steps without holding onto anything. She said that as soon as Isabel saw her watching her she stopped and sat down. Yesterday I just saw her take steps with the walker and stand alone for a few seconds, so now I am excited to see her take steos for us.

She was super cranky today. She didn't nap much, which always leaves her cranky.

I had to take her to urgent care today and found out she has pink eye. So, now we have drops for that for three days. Some kids at daycare had it last week.

Fun at a Hotel

All three of us stayed at a hotel recently and they are shots from jumping & playing on the bed. Isabel was all excited when we walked into the room and she saw the big fluffy bed.

Like most kids, she thinks jumping on a bed is the most fun in the world. It doesn't help that mom plays around with her because then she just thinks it's the best.

The hotel had a crib for her to use and she did fine in there. She has been pretty adaptable in different situations & locations as long as she has mommy (& daddy) with her.

We also recently stayed at Aunt Phanie's & Uncle J's house. Isabel woke up early in the night a little scared because she was alone in the dark (we should have put the night light on, but I forgot - she might have done fine then.) So, she ended up sleeping with mom while dad slept on the couch. She is a bed hog and tosses & turns A LOT! You never know what position you are going to find her sleeping in. She also got to see Grams & Gramps again. It had been quite a while since she saw Gramps. She has sure changed a lot in 6 months.


Some new things this she has done......well, she figured out how to climb up steps when we were visiting a new library and was showing that off to daddy today. Climbing steps is really making her work at pulling her self up more. She is so proud of herself now that she can do steps.

She has been trying new foods all the time. Today I gave her pieces of turkey sausage (from the Old Wisconsin store, w/ the casing removed) and she loved it. I thought she might think it was too spicy or something, but she very much enjoyed it. She has raw tomatoes and raw cucumbers the other day. She's still not sure about cucumber, but kinda liked the tomatoes. She didn't care for black olives at all (they were all topping from her sub.) I don't think there has been a fruit yet that she won't eat. She does certainly have preferences, but she seems to love fruit overall. She still on a bit of a veggie hiatus, but I keep trying new things to see if she will eat them or I try to sneak them in. She is definitely a carnivore; there has not been a meat she has eaten that she hasn't loved.

Oh, she learned how to drink from a straw today. I had a drink with a straw in it and she really wanted to be like mommy and put the straw in her mouth. So, I let her and we just watched as the drink would inch closer and closer up the straw and then finally she got some. I think it surprised her at first, but then she had to do it again and again. She also had to take the straw out and inspect it, then take the cover off and inspect that and inspect the inside of the glass and then try to put everything back together.

The top she is wearing was part of a present from her friends Noah & Kallen. We have a play date with them this coming Friday.

54 Weeks

Hre she is just before bedtime, brushing her teeth. We started brushing her teeth as part of her bedtime ritual at a very early age (6 weeks) so that there would hopefully be less of a struggle when she got older. It has gone ok and at times when she is pushing a tooth through and her gums might be a little tender she doesn't always like getting her teeth & gums brushed. So, then we do a little thing called "Brush mommy's teeth (and I do so), Brish baby's teeth (and I do so.)" She thinks it's fun when we do things with her like that; she is much more agreeable when she might not otherwise have been. (Don't worry, she wasn't going to fall, daddy was right there while I took the picture.)