Little birdie chronicles’

Yup that is me… starting now.

Harper was 11 months old on December 9th.  Even typing that makes me want to weep, WEEP!

The last time I updated was 8 months ( can you say slacker- or maybe just mom who works full time and has zero energy at the end of the day).

I can’t remember all of the milestones in order, so I will just list them.

-She has 2 teeth on the bottom.  No bleeding or massive trauma when they broke through, we just woke up one day and she had teeth! She is super cute with her woodchuck smile.

- Over Thanksgiving she ate shredded turkey and ham.  She doesn’t like mashed potatoes yet though.

-Her bedtime is now 8:30, rather than 10:30! Yay!  Mommy can do other things now!

- Whenever one of her little toys makes music, she stands up, rocks back and forth and hums.  It is probably the sweetest thing ever!

-She LOVES her daddy! When he comes home, she squeals with excitement!

-Animals are hysterical to her.  There is a travelers insurance commercial where all of the animals are frolicking and getting along, this commercial makes her laugh really hard.

-She learned the sign language for “all done”, but rarely uses it.  Instead she does this weird head bob. It isn’t necessarily her shaking her head “No”, its… hard to describe.

-She thinks its funny when she toots.  Probably because I think its funny to.  Come on… baby toots = cute!

Now we are gearing up for her first Christmas.  I am so excited, even though she has NO clue.  Christmas eve I am going to put away all of her toys so she can fully enjoy the gazillion packages under the Christmas tree.

With her first Christmas comes,  SANTA PICS!  Whenever I think of Santa pics, I think of this scene from Elf:

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One last cute thing to add!  She has this adorable little “lovey” frog named Hoppy.  She sleeps with Hoppy every night and every nap.  She has started this habit of throwing Hoppy over the side of her crib in hopes we will come rescue him.  The other night Justin walked by her room when she was supposed to be asleep and heard her say “dadadadad” and jump up and down.  He went in and rescued Hoppy for her of course, then she laid down and went right to sleep.  It was super cute!

More to come after Christmas!

Tomorrow she will be 8 months.

That sentence (or fragment) deserves it’s own line simply because that line alone brings me to tears.   Last week she started giving us teenager style attitude when it was time to change her clothes or diaper. She would jerk away and go “Ahhhh” and make an Elvis lip.  If it wasn’t so frustrating, it would have been cute..

In the last 2 months she has started crawling like a pro.  She is fast and furious!  Shortly after she started crawling, she started sitting on her knees… then standing on her knees… then, my worst nightmare…. STANDING!  In the last few days now she has started taking a few tenative steps while holding onto the couch or her toy table.  I also noticed her trying to climb things.  She has the concept right, she pulls with her arms and tries to hike her legs.  She is super cute!

I have felt a little lost on when to feed her what and how.  We started her on rice cereal, then veggies, then fruit. Recently we added turkey as well.  I guess Im struggling with seeing other kids already starting on table foods ( tearing up moms food into tiny pieces).  I know that we got pushed back to square one when she had to go into the hospital and was on heavy antibiotics that wiped out her tummy goodbugs, but I still feel like we should be further along.  She doesnt have teeth either, so I guess that plays into it.

Speaking of teeth!  Holy Hannah ( new saying-like it?) !  She has had “teething symptoms FORRRRREEVVVVVEEEERRRRR!   Drool Drool Drool!   Lately it has been like a faucet dripping, along with her nose!  Oh and talk about grumpy guss too!  I just keep praying for that pearly white to poke through so we can be through this stage!

I swear she said “daddy” today!  I got her out of the car and asked her ” are we going to see daddy?”, She said “Dallllly” and smiled.  It was super sweet.

After talking to a friend tonight at a baby shower I am going to attempt to teach her sign language.  Most mamas use this to break the frustration barrier every kid has before learning to talk.  It seems hand signals are easier for little brains to master than actually speaking (hmmm might be a spiritual lesson in that somewhere).  Don”t worry, I am not trying to teach her to sign in lui of speaking.  I am just talking about simple signs like, “More”, “All Done”, “Please”, “Thank you”, “Potty”, “sleepy”, “Binky”, “cold”, “hot” ect ect.  Basic things that will help her communicate her basic needs to us.

I haven’t been very good about pulling out the camera and capturing her moments.  I need to keep it in the living room, rather than the office.  Oh, speaking of the living room!  I need to take a picture of it right now.  We bought this awesome red leather sectional in April ( because, you know, we are hip like that!) The last week I laughed to myself when I looked at our living room FULL of baby goo.  Some friends who have a 2 year old passed on their baby toys to us to borrow until they need it for their second daughter.  We inherited a baby saucer, leap frog toy table, music station, and I pulled out a swing we have had in storage.  Our living room has been effectively taken over!

Hopefully the next time I post something, it will have pictures and videos attached.

So I’m about a week 2 weeks late on this post.  I really had no intention of waiting a whole week past her 6 month birthday to do an update.

Since my last update so much growing has happened!

She started daycare 3 weeks before her 6 month birthday.  I was really sad for the first few days, but after about a week I realized her being around other kids REALLY was affecting her development in a positive way. She is laughing more, baby babbling more, and MOVING more.  Jesus help us!  She also has been eating like a little monster! She loves pretty much anything except peaches, and depending on the day, bananas.

Harper is SO close to crawling. She gets up on all fours and rocks back and forth, but then her head gets to heavy and she falls on her face.  To get herself around she does this rolling, inchworm move. Its super funny to watch.  The little weirdo is going to be a techie! She loves any type of electronic gadget.  We put our cell phones, tv remote or laptop within her line of vision and she locks in on it and starts reaching and wiggling towards it.

I’m pretty positive she is cutting a tooth on top.  Her first tooth!  I dont really know what to do with her right now! I have been so spoiled by my ALWAYS happy little baby that I have no experience with fussy baby.

Ok now for the hard part of the post.  Most of you heard via facebook about our trouble last week.  We had her 6 month vaccine on Tuesday afternoon around 4 pm.  At 10 pm she had an episode that we now think was a seizure in reaction to the vaccine.  I called 911, but by the time they paramedics got there she was somewhat ok again.  She was still lethargic and had trouble focusing her eyes.  They took us to the ER where the docs ( Doogie Houser the second) did an evaluation and decided to call in the Pediatric resident to do a full workup.  She was a wonderful doctor with a compassionate bedside manner ( which is great for 3 am!). She decided to admit her to do a full workup to rule out viral meningitis ( yikes).   I think I have decided that watching my baby go through all of those tests was worse than the actual episode!  After 2 days of tests and strong antibiotics ( in case of the meningitis) they determined it was a reaction to the vaccine.  The doctor brought in a print out from the CDC with a diagnosis that fit her episode to a T!  It wasn’t necessarily an allergic reaction, but a reaction where her immune system is so strong that it fought the antibodies rather than taking them on and caused her blood pressure to drop…. yeah, I think that is right.  We got to go home Thursday afternoon and spent Friday and Saturday sleeping, recovering and washing “the hospital” out of our clothes .   It was scary episode, but I have felt God guarding my brain against the “what if” wondering.  I just haven’t let myself go “There”.  She slept in our room for the first 2 nights home, but I realized if I didn’t let her go sleep in her room, I would NEVER get any rest or peace and fear would move in and consume me.  Jesus was definitely with us last week and kept us in the shadow of his wings!  I’m sure most of you mommies out there are wondering what this does to my belief about vaccines.  I’m working on that.  It definitely has not made me go completely anti vaccine, but I definitely know I need to do more research.   I also need to find a new pediatrician.  Not because of this ordeal, we were looking before this happened.  Our family doctor and pediatrician, Dr. Babb is moving to Nashville, TN and will be teaching and practicing at Vanderbilt.  We are so thrilled for him and his family to have this opportunity to follow Gods call, but we are SO SO SO sad for us!  If you know of a wonderful pediatrician/family doctor who loves Jesus, and LEANS more towards the holistic side of medicine, let me know! Also, if you have some reputable information on childhood vaccines (either pro or anti) let me know.  I want to educate myself as much as possible before we take the next step.

My sweet girl is growing up!

She started cereal, then veggies. She isn’t a huge fan of green beans, but LOVES squash and peas.

The last picture is actually her newest face she does when she is laughing.

She is  starting to hike her back legs up like she wants to go somewhere.   Jesus help me!  Last week I put her down on her blanket in the living room, went to grab a spit rag from her room and came back and couldn’t find her for a second.   She had rolled 3 feet, and 180 degree from where I left her. She was UNDER the coffee table, chewing on the leg.  I laughed so hard!  When she heard me, she looked up and started laughing to. Silly girl.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE her little personality.  She makes being a mommy fun and easy.

That is all for now.  We are looking forward to 4th of July weekend! We are going to Leakey to spend the weekend with Justins dad and step mom. Its probably one of my favorite places on the planet! Belinda ( Justins step mom) has such a sweet but fun personality and is a blast! The fact that we have ZERO cell service while there isn’t bad either!

Last night I laid Harper down on the couch on a blanket while i read for a while.  I was able to basically get an hour of uninterrupted reading because the ceiling fan is her new best friend.  She thinks he is the funnest and funniest. She kicks her legs and swings her arms and smiles and coo’s ( quietly coo’s because she hasn’t quite figured it out yet).  It doesn’t matter if its Mr. Living room ceiling fan or Mr. bedroom ceiling fan! She loves him!

While she was entertaining herself I took a peak into her mouth and felt around her gums. Guess what? There is a spot on her top that is whiter than anything else. I knew something was up 2 weeks ago when she started drooling constantly and chewing her fist.  I think we still have another 2 or 3 weeks before anything makes an appearance though.

This weekend she gets to meet another batch of relatives she hasnt met yet.  We are driving the 6 hours to Leakey to the cabin Justins dad and step mom have on the Frio river for Easter.  Justins Grandmommy will be there along with his Aunt, Uncle and 2 cousins.  The weather is supposed to be mid 70′s and sunny! We are taking the dogs with us, so it will be fun to take them to the river for a swim!

I will upload pics when I get back next week! In the mean time, John Childress borrowed Harper to snap some baby pics for his website.  This is a little taste: