9.26.2008

Sunday Date

Annie is still surprising us every day with what she's learning to do! She rolled over a bunch of times at Wendy's house this week, both front to back and back to front. She's still playing with her feet a lot, and is now putting them in her mouth, which is pretty hilarious. She started blowing raspberries last Sunday night, and will mimic me when I do it for her. Too funny! This video is so dark, you'll probably just have to take my word for it that she's doing it. I promise I'm shopping for a video camera!


Raspberries from porkchop on Vimeo.

Last Sunday was an exciting day. It was my Mom's birthday, so we went over to their house for a birthday breakfast (pancakes with strawberries & whipped cream, eggs, bacon, and cinnamon crumb cake, yum). After that Paul and I went to Buffalo for our first NFL game! They raffle off tickets at work and I have been trying to win them for years now. I finally won and was super excited. Until I remembered it was my mom's birthday. Darn it! She was great about it, of course, telling us we should go and that she'd watch Annie for us. She's the best. :) This is what Annie was doing when we left. She was all partied out:

The game was awesome. There were sooo many people there and it was so loud and exciting. Our seats were great, section 104, 22 rows up from the field. It drizzled off and on all day, but we didn't really get wet. The game itself was really exciting--they were losing for pretty much the whole game, but rallied in the 4th quarter to win the game with a field goal in the final 3 seconds. Awesome. Also, a relief, because I was getting a little nervous about how that crazy crowd would be if they lost! Traffic was horrendous on the way home, so we decided to go eat to wait it out a little. It didn't really help (traffic was still bad getting on the thruway), but dinner was delicious! We found an Olive Garden and pigged out. Yum. Overall, a great day. We missed Annie a lot, but it was nice to get out just the two of us again!

9.19.2008

Playtime

Lots of fun developments in Annie's world this past week or so. She has really started playing on her own: holding onto her feet and rolling from side to side, screaming at her mobile every time one of the animals goes by, picking up toys and putting them in her mouth. It's so much fun watching her play and seeing all of the huge smiles! The other day when I was changing her diaper she looked up at me and started making little clucking noises with her tongue. I did it back to her a few times and she gave me a huge smile and kept clucking away. Last night I asked Mom if Annie ever clucks at her. She said, "No, but I cluck for her all the time." Apparently, she likes it when Grandma does that, because she's been trying to get me to do it for her every time I change her diaper now!Here are a couple of videos of Annie screaming at her mobile and playing with her toys. They're really dark because our camera is not so great inside, but you get the idea anyway!

Screaming from porkchop on Vimeo.

Playtime from porkchop on Vimeo.

9.14.2008

My Sleepy Family

This was the scene at 11:30 am Sunday morning:(Paul was in the exact same position in our bed, but you'll have to take my word for it because I didn't have the nerve to take a picture of him sleeping. The flash might have woken him up and he's a grump in the morning!)

We all went to bed around midnight last night (Annie slept from 9-11:30, woke up to eat, and fell back asleep around 11:45). I woke up at 10 this morning and immediately turned the monitor volume up all the way to make sure she was still breathing in there. I took the dogs out, ate breakfast, did a load of laundry, cleaned the bathroom from top to bottom, and they were both still snoozing. I came in to check on her and promptly knocked into the exersaucer when I went to open the window. That was enough to finally wake her up. Man this kid can sleep. She definitely got that from her dad!

9.12.2008

where I get on my high horse and then get back off...

It's Friday again, hooray! A rainy day too, my favorite. I just finished another book, Annie is napping on my lap, and I am looking forward to another 3 whole days at home with her.

Last weekend was fun: fall ball started so Annie and I went to keep score Friday night, and then out to Tully's afterwards. Saturday after Paul got home from work we drove down to Ithaca for the afternoon. It threatened rain all day but we stayed dry. We hung out on the Commons mostly. We bought a bunch of stuff for Annie: some books at a used book store, and a ton of fall clothes at the thrift store. I've been really into buying used lately. It makes sense, especially for kids clothes. Kids outgrow their stuff so fast, it's always hardly ever worn. You find so much that looks new or barely worn. And since I got pregnant and had friends offering me things all over the place, I've really been thinking lately about how important it is to reuse and recycling clothes and books and toys. I mean, how can you not? "Go green" is everywhere these days! That's not to say that we won't be buying new clothes from now on. In fact, we stopped at Carter's at the outlet mall on the way home to pick up some more fall clothes. We're just going to try to be a little more conscious of recycling and contributing to stores run by Goodwill and Salvation Army. It's driving me crazy to see all of the stuff people are just throwing away on "big garbage day" in our town. Donate it, or give it to someone, it's so easy to do!! I hate to think about that baby stuff winding up in a landfill when it could go to someone who can use it. Arg.

Anyhoo, I got sidetracked on my high horse, what was that all about? I'll go back to talking about my weekend, journal style. It's boring, but it's safe. What I started saying was, Ithaca was fun, the people watching there is always excellent. We fed Annie a bottle on one of the cement walls in the Commons, and watched the crowds go by. I finally found an Ugly Doll for Annie, I had been looking for one forever. Had some fabulous pizza (white pizza with ricotta, yum) from a local pizza shop. She had a nice nap while we walked around. Saw these two playing the guitar, singing, and dancing:

They were both so happy, having so much fun. It made our day.

On Sunday Paul played in a golf tournament with his friend Tony, so Annie and I had a Mommy/daughter day. We stopped over to see Grandma & Grandpa for a little bit, then went shopping at the grocery store and Target. Afterwards we came home to play, snuggle, and pack Annie's bag for day care. Annie's first week at day care went great! She was there on Monday and Tuesday. Wendy is wonderful. She's so happy to have Annie, and is so great about filling us in on her day. Annie gets so smiley when she sees her and the other kids, it's so cute. She's always loved watching her Uncle Kevin hop around all over the place, so having other kids to watch is right up her alley. Wendy said she had a great time sitting in her bumbo watching everything. She didn't nap as much as usual, too much excitement! She was so tired each night. It made me happy to think about her having fun over there. She ate a ton of food this week too!! Definitely must have been having another growth spurt. Some of the clothes she is wearing are sized 6 and 9 months! She is outgrowing things so fast. My peanut is not going to be my peanut for much longer I'm afraid!

Wednesday Annie had her first full day home with her Daddy. They went out to see Annie's Grandma Sue. She recently had knee surgery, so she was itching to get out of her apartment. They went down to the lake and had some KFC for lunch. Paul and Annie picked me up after work and we drove over to Moe's for a burrito and then out for ice cream afterwards. We stopped at the library on the way home to pick up some books and dvds. They had a full day! Yesterday she was back at Grandma's. They had a lovely day, visiting Aunt Kathryn in Brockport and Mom's friends at work. Mom was happy to have some Annie time. :)

I am feeling really happy about her day care situation. She's getting lots of Grandma time in, time with other kids and Wendy, and time with her Mom and Dad. Of course I'd love it if I could be home with her all of the time, but I am feeling good about how it's working out. This will be good.

9.09.2008

Roll Over, Roll Over

She rolled over last night! Lately she's been rolling onto her side from her back but doesn't make it all the way over. She couldn't figure out how to get her arm out of the way. But we were both playing with her last night in the living room and Paul got up to go out to the kitchen for something (food, most likely). I put her on her tummy for some tummy time and she straightened out her arm and used her other arm to push herself all the way over! Poor Paul missed it, and she didn't do it again. We are very excited, but also feeling like this is going way too fast! Also, we need to start baby proofing, NOW.

One of her attempts:

9.07.2008

New Things

New things Annie has done in the past 48 hours:

  • Talking a lot more than usual, and with several different people
  • Put her pacifier in her mouth
  • Consciously held onto toys
  • Mouthing toys
  • Held her feet
  • Scooching (that's my word for folding up her legs to scoot herself around. Yesterday she scooched off the playmat, today I found her sideways in her crib. She's been doing it for a few weeks in her crib, but she does it every time we put her down now.)

It sure is fun watching her discover how to do all of these things!

9.06.2008

4 Days On, 4 Days Off

Going back to work didn't go too bad. I missed her like crazy, of course, and the guilt is awful. It will take a while to try to get over that. But I didn't even cry, which was amazing because I cried quite a few times during my last week at home just thinking about leaving her. She was in a good mood the first day though, and my Mom said she was really good all day, slept a lot and was happy when she was awake. That's how it's gone for the past few weeks. She only had one fussy day, and my mom is really enjoying spending the time with her. Such a relief. I know it would have been 10 times harder if she was crying when I dropped her off or called home to see how it was going. When I got to work that first day I immediately plastered my wall with pictures. I don't even care that I'm crazy picture lady, it helps!

Working 10 hour days isn't too bad. This is our really busy time of the year, so it helps the time pass quickly. I'm dreading December and January though, those are our slow times. The Fridays off are so worth it. I love having 3 whole days home with her. The first two weeks Annie was with her Grandma. Next week she starts going to Paul's former coworker Wendy's house one or two days a week since my mom works part-time. Paul brought Annie in to see her on Wednesday and said Annie was really smiley for her. So hopefully she'll be nice happy girl for Wendy like she is for my mom! She's an easy-going baby, so I'm confident it will go well.

Last weekend was Labor Day weekend so I had 4 days home. I planned that well! We had really beautiful weather all weekend, so we took advantage of it. Friday morning Annie and I took a really long walk, and then hung out at home for a little bit before going shopping at the mall for some fall clothes for Annie. She needed pants and socks sized 6 months because she's growing like crazy! She's just really long. 6 month socks are baggy on her because she doesn't have those chubby 6-month-old feet yet, but because her feet are so long they fit perfectly from toe to heel. I hope she stays long, I really am hoping she didn't inherit my height (or lack thereof).

Friday night we went to a baseball game. Melky Cabrera (a former Yankee) was in town playing on the Yankees farm team. He didn't do so well, but the home team won and we had a good time. Annie was fussy towards the end so she and I went down and walked around the picnic tables. She had many, many admirers down there, and she fell asleep on my shoulder after about 10 minutes or so. It's exhausting being cute, apparently.

Saturday night we went over to play Wiii with our friends Kris & Kelly. We had a really fun time eating junk and playing Wii sports games. That boxing game is quite the workout! I also discovered that I royally suck at Guitar Hero. Like, really bad. It's pretty hopeless. I had fun anyway, and they all had fun laughing at me. :) Annie had a good time watching and playing with her toys. Kris gave her a pink stuffed dolphin that he had, and she is mesmerized by it. It's very cute! Sunday was State Fair day! It was so nice out, but it was super crowded at the fair. We hid out at the draft competitions for a while and then ventured out into the crowd. (And what a crowd it was. People watching at the fair is...um...interesting, to say the least!) Annie slept for most of the day. When she woke up she was happy walking around for a few hours. We went back to the horse building to watch another competition while we fed her a bottle. I brought pumped milk and a thermos full of hot water to heat up the bottle, and it worked out perfectly. A relief since it would have been nearly impossible to find a spot to nurse her discreetly in that crowd! Rascal Flatts and Taylor Swift were playing that night, so when people started heading to the concert, it cleared out considerably. We had a lot of fun visiting all of the animals (the bunnies, guinea pigs, and goats are my favorites, Paul loves the pigs) and walking around the buildings. We got our milk from the dairy bar (only 2 little cups for me, since I still have to lay off too much dairy!) and headed home around 9:30. It was a fun day, we love the fair.

Monday we headed to the beach for a picnic lunch. Annie and Paul snoozed the day away while I read a magazine. When she woke up we took her to the water to dip her toes in. She looked really confused and concerned, but overall she seemed like she didn't hate it. I'm excited for next year when she'll be old enough to wear sunscreen so we can take her all the way in!So that was our first week with Mommy back at work. Not too bad, and a great weekend to cap it off!