Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Happy Halloween

Any holiday as a first time mom is a big deal, and Halloween is no different.  I've had Annelise's costume stashed in her closet for a month now, and she finally got to wear it today.  I didn't want to go too crazy because she is still young, and we planned on just staying at home.  But, I couldn't let the day go by without dressing her up and taking scads of pictures.  May I present to you, my cute little dino!
After we took a bunch of pictures outside, the trick-or-treaters started showing up, so we came back in the house to hand out candy.  Annelise just sat by the door and watched.
She was over the hat about two seconds after I plopped it on her head.  She was gracious enough to let me get a few pictures of it though.

The little dino feet slippers were the best part of the costume to me.  Adorable!!

We have a ton of candy left over!  I really anticipated that we would have a lot more trick-or-treaters than we did.  Guess we'll be eating leftover candy for a while.  I'm sure Drew is sad!  Ha!

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Four Years

Another married year has flown and Drew and I celebrated our four year anniversary today.  So hard to believe!  The traditional fourth anniversary gift is fruit or flowers.  Since I knew Drew wouldn't really appreciate flowers, I had an Edible Arrangement sent to his work.  Him and his coworkers happily munched on that all afternoon.  It was pretty much destroyed by the time he got home.

Drew brought home some gorgeous flowers for me.
I can't believe that we've been married for four years.  We've been through a lot in that short amount of time.  I'm excited to see what the future has in store for us!

Sunday, October 21, 2012

Fall Traditions

You can't let the fall season go by without at least one trip to Edward's Apple Orchard.  My mother-in-law, Debbie, called me this afternoon and asked if Annelise and I wanted to go out there with her.  I jumped at the chance because I've been wanting to take Annelise.  And who can turn down apple cider donuts??

I decided to wear Annelise while we were there.  I'll tell you what, I love being able to wear her places.  It makes it so easy to move around and I don't have to worry about navigating the stroller in tight places.  Plus, since they were busy today, I would have had to take her out of the stroller when we went into the store anyway.  Then, I would have had to carry her in my arms.  Baby wearing is definitely where it's at!

I gave Annelise a slice of an apple while we were there and she happily gnawed on it while Debbie and I shopped around.

I hope that we'll be able to squeeze in a trip to the Pumpkin Patch before it gets too cold outside.  I love fall and all of the fall stuff that goes with it!

Saturday, October 6, 2012

Meeting New Friends

During my infertility struggle, I joined a message board that dealt specifically with infertility.  After being a member of this board for quite a few months, a bunch of us girls decided to make a group on Facebook and get to know one another better.  We created a bond that is priceless.  It made something that is so incredibly difficult to go through, a little bit easier knowing that there were others that "got it".  They knew what to say, and more importantly, what NOT to say.  These girls even sent me an incredible care package when I went through the miscarriage.

One girl in the group actually grew up here in my town.  She lives about two hours from her now, but her family still lives here.  It is amazing what we have in common and shows just how "little" this world is.  Her daughter, Anya, was conceived through IVF and was a frozen transfer, just like Annelise.

Heather and I finally met each other and got our little girls together to play today.  We had such a great time visiting.  Anya and Annelise weren't too sure what to do with each other quite yet, but I'm sure that after a few more play dates that they'll be inseparable.
I'm looking forward to getting together again.  It's a bummer that it's starting to get cold here, but I definitely foresee many summer outings!

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Six Months

Dear Annelise,

Oh my girl, you have changed so much this month!  I feel like you are at the point in your life where there is a lot of learning and changing, both physically and mentally, happening, and it's not going to stop for quite a few months.  It is so exciting to watch you learn and discover new things every day.  Every day is different with you and I love waking up and not knowing what you will surprise me with.
You sit all on your own now!  Last month, you were just starting to work on sitting alone, and now it's something that you've mastered.  You still bobble and fall over from time to time, but I think that's because you get so interested in what else you are doing that you forget to balance.  You really enjoy being able to sit and play with your toys.  I will spread a blanket on the floor and give you some toys and you love it.  It is so fun for me to watch you play with each different toy.  You inspect it and manipulate it in your hands.  Sometimes, you get so into it that you topple forwards or backwards.  If you go forwards, you will play on your tummy some.  If you go backwards, you usually start fussing to sit back up.  You do a little "baby crunch" and wait for me to pull you back up.

You have started to push up on your knees.  You have been scooting yourself backwards, no forward crawling yet, but I can see your little brain trying to figure out how to do it.  You have gone from just pushing up on your knees a tiny bit, to pushing all the way on them and wanting to move them.  I have a feeling that you will be crawling by the end of this month!  Time to start baby proofing!

If I thought that you loved Maya before, you definitely think that she is the greatest thing ever now!  Any time that she is around you, you have the biggest smile on your face.  You start laughing at her and giggle even more when she plays or comes to kiss you.

Sleep.  Oh sleep.  We have a love/hate relationship with sleep.  First of all, Daddy and I moved your Rock N Play to your room for you to sleep in there.  You have done great sleeping in your room all on your own.  We have been trying to transition you to sleeping in your crib.  We have good days and bad days.  I started off by having you nap in your crib, and then I thought that once we established good naps that we would move to nights in your crib.  Sounds like a good plan, right?  Well, you thought differently.  I have started a routine with you when it's nap time.  We go into your room and I shut the blinds so that it's nice and dark in there.  I swaddle you, turn on ocean on your sound machine, and sit down to nurse and rock you to sleep.  After you are asleep, I, oh so very carefully, get up and put you in your crib.  Most of the time it works, you stay asleep, and sleep anywhere from one to three hours.  We had such a good routine going with naps, that I decided to start trying to have you sleep overnight in your crib.  You decided that you hated me putting you to bed and fought every time I tried to put you in your crib.  You did much better when Daddy laid you down.  We had one good night of crib sleeping, and then you went through a Wonder Week.  Basically, you have been waking up once in the middle of the night.  Sometimes you eat and go right back to sleep and sometimes you want to play.  Let me tell you, little lady, 4 AM is NOT an appropriate playtime!  I will remember this when you are a teenager and want to sleep!!  Ha!!  So, we are back to working on getting good naps in your crib and then we will try nights again.  I know that you'll get it, I just need to be patient.
We are doing Baby Led Weaning (BLW) with you for solids.  I had every intention of waiting until your six month birthday to start, but you have shown us that you are ready to be an eater.  I put your high chair together a couple of weeks ago and let you try it out.  You loved it!  The other day, I took a pickle spear out of the jar for me to eat.  You started eyeballing me, so I gave you a taste.  You made a funny face, then reached for more.  After that taste, you grabbed onto my hand and would not let it go.  You wanted that pickle!  So, I put you in your high chair, gave you the pickle spear, and let you have fun.  You had the best time!  You moved it from hand to hand, sucked on it, pushed it around your tray, squished it with your fingers; you had so much fun with it.  I had so much fun watching you!  Since then, we've given you lemon, which you loved, avocado, which you weren't crazy about, cucumber, you loved, and zucchini, which you loved.  You ate the zucchini in your high chair and had such a great time exploring it.  Daddy is a little worried when you gag, and I explained to him that it's normal, but it still makes us nervous.  I have no doubts that you will love a lot more food as we begin the journey with solids.  You are so ready for it!

You do a lot of screeching!  I love it when you're vocal.  However, I don't really hear many definite sounds.  You do say "ma" or "mom" very clearly, but everything else is really just screeches.  Sometimes there will be a "yayaya" sound.  I'm curious how this will play out.  I talk to you a lot, and I can see you listening to me, but you don't really "conversate" back yet.

Right now, you are wearing size 6-9 month clothes, and are in a size 3 diaper.  It is crazy to me how big you've gotten!

My heart is so full of love for you.  These past six months have been some of the best months of my life.  You bring me so much joy and I love watching the person you are becoming.

Love you always,
Mommy