Playing and Discovering

We took a little break from play excursions on Tuesday and Wednesday.  On Thursday, Jess and Wesley came with Annelise and me to Kindermusik class.  Once Wes warmed up, he had a pretty good time.  Annelise, however, was pretty clingy.  This has been interesting to me because she was pretty darn social during the spring semester.  I think that she got used to seeing the kids that she knew, grew comfortable with them, and interacted with them more.  Also, she's the youngest kid in this first summer session.  I'm wondering if that has something to do with it.  She almost acts intimidated by the older children.  She seems to be drawn to babies, or at least children her age or slightly younger, a lot more than she is drawn to older kids.  Yesterday was our last class for the first summer session, so I'm curious to see how the second session plays out.

Today, Eric, Jessica, and I took Wesley and Annelise to Discovery Center.  Both kids had a great time! We started out in the water area, and my kid probably would have been happy as a clam if we had just left her there to play all day.

I had to put her paci in her mouth so that she would stop putting all of the water toys in her mouth.  Please tell me that the "I've got to put everything in my mouth" phase will be over soon!!!

She noticed the stuffed dog sitting there and got the biggest, cheesiest grin on her face.  It was absolutely adorable!  And, notice the baby doll in her hand.  She's pretty obsessed with them.  In fact, whenever the teacher in Kindermusik pulled out her doll to do demonstrations for the class, Annelise always stole it away from her.

Jessica told Wes to take Annelise over and show her the train.  So he grabbed her hand and started pulling her over there.  She obliged and followed right along.  Melt my heart!

Annelise loves anything that she can climb up or down or slide on right now.

She's signing "more" because she wanted to swing on the swing with me again.

We left at about 1:15, which, if you're keeping track, is about two hours after her nap time.  I don't know how the kid was still functioning as well as she was.  She crashed hard on the way home and slept for 4 1/2 hours!!!  Her longest nap ever!

After she woke up, and Drew got home from work, we went over to his parent's house to have dinner and hang out.

She loved the little red rocking chair.  Pretty sure she's yelling at me to stop taking pictures.  Ha!

I wanted to try and get a nice picture of the cousins together.

Eric and Jess leave to go visit Eric's parents for a week tomorrow.  We'll be heading to meet up with them there on the 4th for Wesley's birthday party.

And Play We Shall

Eric, Jessica, and Wesley are in town this week for their annual summer visit.  I am beyond excited to have someone to take the kids places with.  Today, since it was rainy in the morning, we took Wes and Annelise to a huge indoor play place.  This was the first time that Annelise has every done something like that.  It took her a little bit to warm up, but once she did, she had a blast!  I had a great time watching the kids play.

She already looks up to him so much, literally and figuratively!

I was a little worried about how the morning would go.  The play place doesn't open until 10 AM, and Annelise usually goes down for a nap at 11 AM.  I figured that we'd get maybe a little over an hour and she would be begging to go home and go to sleep.  However, she outplayed Wes, and was still wanting to climb and play at 12:30 and Wes was over it.  I was pretty impressed!  I can't wait to take her back again.

The Beginning of Some Healing

It's about to get real in here.  Real.  And deep.  I haven't blogged in basically forever because I've really been struggling with myself.  I struggle with what I should post, and how I should do it, and whether I really want to open up and talk about it.  Then, I get so angry with myself because I don't blog about things.  I love blogging because it is such a great way for me to look back and remember what has happened.  So, I'm done being scared about what I should and shouldn't post.  At the end of the day, this little piece of the internet is really just for me.  I need to stop being scared that what I'm going to post is going to offend somebody, or make them think differently of me.  I need to grow a backbone.  I need to open up and be vulnerable sometimes.  I need to write and just let the feelings flow out of me through the keyboard.

I am feeling very alone right now.  I've had a falling out with a couple of friends recently and it has left me very bruised.  The first friend happened for the first time many, many months ago.  Last March actually.  I tried to open up with her and be honest about some things that were really bothering me about our friendship.  I must have been too honest, because she was deeply offended.  Rather than talking them through with me, she talked about it with everybody else.  She managed to muster up a "Congrats" on my Facebook wall when I had Annelise.  (Yes, that's how long ago this was.)  After many weeks, I could not get our disagreement out of my head.  I felt like God kept putting her on my heart and wanted me to reach out to her.  She was pregnant at the time and I felt like God wanted me to try to put the disagreement behind us so that we could be friends again and I could be there during her pregnancy and we could be friends with young babies.  We hung out once, and then had another fall out.  I sent her an email and told her that I didn't feel like things could be patched up and that maybe we needed to go our separate ways.  I asked her where she stood and how she felt about things.  She sent me an email back basically saying that she had a lot on her plate and briefly opened up about some struggles that she was having, but then told me that she wanted space.  After reading that email, I knew that things just wouldn't ever really work out between us.  This girl had once called me her best friend.  To me, a best friend is someone who tells each other practically everything.  A best friend leans on each other for support through good times and bad.  This girl just wanted to open up enough to get some attention, but then slam me to pieces when I tried to ask questions and be a friend.  I responded to her email with a very cordial goodbye and told her that I wished her well with her new growing family.

I thought that that would be the end of it.  Maybe we'd reconnect in the future, maybe we wouldn't.  But, just a couple of days later, my sister called me and told me that this friend had deleted her and I from Facebook.  Now, I'm not usually one to get my feelings hurt over a Facebook unfriending, but this had me a little suspicious.  She obviously didn't go through her friends list good enough, because she had still left Drew on there.  I saw that she had posted a status and had torn me to pieces.  And since I know that you're curious, here's what she posted:

I cannot stand those people who claim to be your friends, but are really jealous of you and try to put you down any chance they get.....what's the word....frenemy, right? They want to hang out with you, only to criticize you, like its their job or something. And for some unknown reason, you try and be nice to them, thinking that they are really not so bad. Then, they push the line, and you see their true colors. Good riddens, nana nana hey hey goodbye to a selfish bitch who was never really a true friend to me. I am way better off without you, baby! Wha whoo, free of the wicked witch!

Honestly, I bawled my eyes out when I read it.  I just couldn't believe that this girl who had practically been a best friend to me, we were bridesmaid in each other's weddings, we lived together, could publicly call me names like that.  And what bothers me even more, is that this girl is always talking about how mature and professional she is.  Am I wrong, or would the mature thing have been to talk to me about the situation and try to work things out personally?

After taking a little bit to calm down after reading that, I sent her another email.  I basically told her that I was most certainly not jealous of her, that I was embarrassed for her after reading that outburst on social media where all of her family, friends, and her husband's family could read it, and that sometimes choosing a gentle reply doesn't mean that you're weak, it actually means that you possess a rare and godly strength.

I received an email back.  She let me know that everyone thought I was a complete bitch.  She reminded me that she had been a great friend to me, that she stood up at my wedding, that she was there for me through all my IVF stuff, and other things.  She told me that the only reason she stayed friends with me is because I promised to change and not be such a bitch, but obviously that didn't happen.  Notice how there was no mention of her trying to fix things to be a better friend towards me?  She then told me that I would never hear from her again and that if she saw me in public that she would ignore and to have a nice life.

I responded back.  It was pointless really.  I did remind her that I lost my dad in a very unexpected way and that I am very careful to choose my final words with a person because of that.  I would hate to have the last words that I say to somebody be filled with anger and hate.

I must have gotten my point across, because that was the end of our correspondence.  And the end of our friendship.  I honestly thought that I would never hear from her again.  Honestly, I always deep down hoped that she would have an epiphany and realize that throwing the friendship away was stupid and we could work on things.

I was getting ready for the day one Sunday back in late February or early March when my phone rang.  I looked down and saw her name.  My heart leaped up into my throat.  We hadn't spoken in 5ish months.  I did send her an email when she had her baby and congratulated her.  I received nothing back.  With shaking hands, I answered the phone.  In a very snotty tone, she told me that it was her and then informed me of a situation that happened with my sister at her work.  Apparently, she had gone through my sister's line at the grocery store and didn't even realize that it was her line.  My sister made a comment about how she had seen her picture on Rockford Mugshots and was going to ask if everything was ok.  Before she could get the second part out, this girl leaped down my sister's throat and demanded to talk to her manager.  She told the manager that my sister had a made a rude comment and that she didn't appreciate and whatever.  She told me that I needed to tell my sister to mind her own business and that the conflict we had was between her and I.  She then kept rambling about how pissed her husband was over what happened.  Over and over she told me this.  I calmly asked her that if the conflict that we had was between her and I, why was her husband so pissed.  She was silent for a solid five seconds.  So, I repeated myself.  She didn't have an answer.  She must have gotten angry that I wasn't telling her what she wanted to hear, or apologizing for my sister, or something, because she hung up on me.

Now, if you know me, you know that hanging up on me is the epitome of disrespectful in my eyes.  Not too long later, another friend sent me a screenshot of a status that this girl made on Facebook.  She informed Facebook world that she had gone to the grocery store and that a former friend's little sister had said some immature and rude things to her and rather than respond back, she handled in a more mature and professional manner and talked to her manager.  She said that "she was a mother now and a 20 year old little twit wasn't worth her time".  I texted her the screenshot and told her to grow up and leave me alone and take her drama somewhere else because I was sick of it.  She quickly texted back, called my sister a cunt, and told me to fuck off and live my happy little life.

Yes, she seriously took it there!  In all of our correspondence, I never once cussed at her or called her names.  And then there was that.  It was kind of like the straw that broke the camel's back.  I had finally gotten over the first fall out that we had.  I didn't think about it anymore, I didn't dwell on the lost friendship, I didn't spend any more minutes wondering what she was doing and how she was enjoying motherhood.  I had finally moved on.  With one phone call, she opened up all the old wounds and sucked me back up into her drama.  I was so upset.  After letting a few days pass so that my anger and hurt could subside, I sat down and drafted a letter.  I told her that I never wanted to hear from her again.  I wanted her to delete my number and forget about me.  I packed it up with a couple of things that were from her and left it on her doorstep.  I have no idea if she received it, or read the letter, or anything.  But, I haven't heard from her since.

And do you know what kills me?  I'm upset about it still.  I'm still so hurt that our friendship ended.  She was the crappiest friend to me.  And, if I'm being fair, according to her, I wasn't a good friend to her either.  I wanted to work on it.  That was the whole point of our first initial fallout.  I wanted to become better friends.  And, in trying to get to that point, I lost her friendship completely.  Everyone keeps telling me that it's much better to have no friends than to have crappy friends.  That's so much easier said than done.

I feel so lost.  I feel so alone.  I feel so isolated.  It's hard to make friends, and it's even harder to make mommy friends.  Girls suck, and everyone can attest to that.  We can be evil, nasty, backstabbing, conniving, jealous monsters.  Of course, there are some good ones, but I'm proof that they are very hard to find.

Who knows if writing this all out will help me feel better and move on.  It's a start.  It's the beginning of some healing that I need to do.  Actually, a lot of healing that I need to do.

National Infertility Awareness Week

This past week was National Infertility Awareness Week (NIAW).  I've been struggling with whether I wanted to write something about it or not.  You see, to most people, I have a child and therefore I've beaten infertility.  While that is correct, there is still a lot more to it.  I may have finally gotten my miracle in my snowbaby daughter, the big question now is, "What next?"

Drew has always said to me that he wants five children.  I don't know if he says that to make my eyeballs bug out of my head, or if he actually does want five kids.  But I do know that he would like more than one.  I always said that I wanted two or three children.  I understand that it's all up to God and He gets to decide how many children we are blessed with.  I would like to have more though.  So, the big question remains.  Am I still infertile?  Or am I now considered fertile since I have a child?

I think that the definition can vary for different people.  I was infertile because of my endometriosis.  There are many other reasons that a person can be infertile, and there is also unexplained infertility.  It's a very complicated matter!  I was told prior to getting pregnant that I had a good chance of my endometriosis going away, or at the very least stop growing while I was pregnant.  Unfortunately, my endo did not go away while I was pregnant.  Now that my periods have returned, I still have the same pain.  Bummer!  Since the pain has come back and I know that my endo is still there, the big question remains.  Will I ever be able to get pregnant on my own?

Frankly, I don't know.  Drew and I decided that we are going to give it a try.  We aren't in the position at this moment to do another frozen transfer, so we certainly aren't hurting anything by trying again.  I can tell you this though, all of those old infertile feelings of insecurity and pain have definitely resurfaced.  I think that once you struggle with infertility, it's something that stays with you for your entire life.  I will never forget all of the pain and tears and struggles of the long year and a half that we struggled to conceive.  To me, I don't think that I belong in the fertile category now.  I still have endometriosis, which put me in the infertile category.  I think that I won the battle at the time of infertility, but I still think that infertility is a war that is made up of a bunch of battles.  Infertiles battle with their own feelings of inadequacy every day.  While some may have their children, it's still not easy to see others achieve that dream so easily.

I was always very open with my infertility journey.  I wanted to be a voice for those struggling in silence.  Did you know that 1 in 8 couples struggle with infertility?  Chances are someone you know has suffered or is suffering.  I will continue to be a voice for those who suffer.  Just because I may have a child, doesn't mean that I'm cured, or that I've forgotten where I was.

You Are My Sunshine

Today, we celebrated Annelise turning one year old!  The theme to her party was "You Are My Sunshine".  I racked my brain for weeks trying to come up with a cute theme and fell in love with this one.  I immediately started pinning ideas.  I seriously pinned ideas for months!

We had such a great day and are so blessed that so many people came to celebrate with us.

Annelise's smash cake for the party.

I saw this idea on Pinterest and thought it was adorable!  Not that many people participated, but I love that some did and that I have something to give her to when she turns 18 to see from her 1st birthday party.

Drew made the wreath for the door and he is incredibly proud of it.  It was super easy to make and I think he did a great job!

Annelise and I wore matching shirts.  Mine says "You are my sunshine, my only sunshine" and Annelise's says "You make me happy, when skies are gray".  I ordered them off of Etsy.

We are so thankful to everyone who came to celebrate with us and were so generous.

Smash Cake Session

A few days before Annelise's 1st birthday, I decided to take some smash cake photos.  I figured that the practice with the cake would be a good idea before her party.  Drew and I haven't really given her much sweets to just chow down on her own.  We'll give her small bites if we're eating something, but for the most part, she hasn't had much.  This cake was the first time that she really had a treat all to herself.  She was a little unsure of it at first.  But, after a few minutes, she dug right in!

Before I gave her the cake, I wanted a few nice pictures of her.  She is terrified of my seamless paper backdrop, so it was quite the struggle to get these two.

I think the two that I did manage to get turned out pretty cute.  I just can't believe how grown up she is!

Sneak peak to the theme of her party!

Twelve Months

Dear Annelise,

Well, my darling, we've made it!  We have made it through your first year and I seriously cannot believe how fast this time has flown by.  You are a toddler by everyone's standards now.  Some people consider it when you start walking, which you are doing, and some people consider it when you turn one.  I can't believe that I am a mother to a toddler.  It's so surreal to me.  I always pictured myself as a mother to a baby.  It's so hard to imagine you so old.  Please stop growing so fast!!

It's actually so funny that I tell you to slow down growing, because I have pushed you to grow up also. You have been walking since you were about ten and a half months old, but not really consistently until you were eleven months.  I prompted you and worked with you so much to teach you how to walk.  I knew that you would be happier, so I tried so hard to work on teaching you how to do it.  I was right, you are happier now that you can walk.  You have started to walk a lot faster, practically run places.  You get up from the ground without holding on to anything.  You put your feet underneath you, put your butt in the air, get your balance on your feet with your hands still on the ground, and then stand up tall.  It's amazing how fast you've gotten at getting up.

I am so excited because you have started signing!!  I've been signing "milk" to you consistently when you nurse since you were about four months old.  I knew that you would eventually understand what it meant.  It is so cute to watch you squeeze your little hands into fists.  You do it so excitedly.  And, if I don't move fast enough to give you some milk, you just stick your hand down my shirt.  You tell me one way or another.  You have also signed "more".  It's not the proper sign of more, but I know what you mean.  You will either clap, or point one finger of your hand into the other palm.  You also sign "eat", but again, it's not the fully correct sign, but we definitely know what you mean.  You will use one finger to point to your mouth.  "Please" is usually you swiping down the front of your chest.  I am so, so proud of you picking up the signs.  Mommy and Daddy plan on working with you so that you understand them more and use them consistently to tell us what you want.  You are very good with using them when prompted.  "Milk", however, needs no prompting!!! :)

You have sprouted more teeth this month.  You got the other two on the top.  So now, you have four on the top and the middle two on the bottom.  I love, love, love seeing your little toothy grin!  Teething hasn't been too bad with you.  Thank you amber necklace!

We took you to visit the Easter bunny.  I was a little nervous about this trip because you are definitely at a stranger danger phase.  But, you surprised me, and sat on the bunny's lap and didn't cry at all.  We even got an adorable smile out of you.

Mommy and Daddy also took you to the Shedd Aquarium this month.  You really liked to look at all the fish tanks and see the colors.  I think that your favorite thing was the penguins.  You even pointed at them, and you rarely point.  I can't wait to take you to do more fun outings.  This summer is going to be such a blast with all the fun things we can do.

You still continue to eat so well.  Sometimes, I swear that you would eat all day if we let you.  You are definitely your father's daughter, and you LOVE cheese!  You have water with your meals and you love it.  You will even search for your cup to have a drink between meals.  I'm so glad that you like water so much.

I don't think that I've mentioned it in any of your other letters, but you have been taking a Kindermusik class for a couple of months now.  You love going to class.  You love to interact with the other kids, and play with the fun different instruments and sensory activities.  Sometimes you get a little feisty when I try to hold you to do some of the dances.  You just want to run around and play with the other kids.

You are 19 lbs 5 oz (22nd percentile) and 28.5 inches (32nd percentile).  You have grown two and a half inches since your nine month appointment.  That's crazy!!  You are still in a size 3 diaper and 12 month clothing.  Daddy and I have bought you all 18 month stuff for summer, so you'll be moving into that size then!

My girl, I cannot believe that you are a whole year old.  You are so much fun right now.  We have our challenges, and you are trying to exert your independence.  I know that you are learning what you can and can't do.  I know that you won't always be in this stage and that it's something that we need to work through.  All of your fun moments make up for the challenges.  I get so much joy out of hearing you dissolve into a fit of giggles.  I will never stop trying to make you laugh.  I wish that you knew just how much I loved you.  I can't possibly write it here with words.  I can't wait to continue to watch you grow!

Love you forever,
Mommy

Surfacing

My lack of blogging is probably getting a little annoying.  At least it is to me anyways.  I always say that I'm going to blog when something happens, or when we do something fun, but then I get wrapped up into another project and blogging takes a backseat.  I really need to get better about it because I'm forgetting so many memories because I'm not writing them down.  And, at the end of the day, blogging is really for me to remember everything.

So, we are shoulder deep in stuff to get ready for a certain little lady's first birthday party.  I just can't believe that my baby is going to be one is two short days!  I keep thinking back to last year and the anticipation and excitement that I felt.  Each day I kept wondering if that day would be the day that I finally met my daughter.

Bear with me, as I get through this next week.  I'll post her twelve month letter and then I'll do some birthday party posts.  Hopefully after that things will be a little quieter around here and I can do a lot more posting.  This age is seriously so fun!

Eleven Months

Dear Annelise,

I just can't believe that in one short month we will be celebrating your first birthday.  I keep thinking back to this time a year ago and remembering how excited and anxious I was for your arrival.  I had no idea how much my life would change and how much joy you would bring me.

You are walking!!!  You started off slow, with just a few tentative steps to me.  I would stand you up, and back up a little bit and encourage you to walk towards me.  You'd take a couple steps and then lose your balance and fall into me.  After a few days, you started to walk the few steps between your toys.  Then, before I knew it, you took off.  You would walk a short distance, maybe 7 to 10 steps, and then cling on to the next object.  You seemed to do it most when you thought I wasn't watching.  But, little lady, I'm always watching you!  I would catch you when you didn't think I was watching.  After you would get to where you wanted to go, I would cheer for you.  You would look at me and grin and sometimes even clap your hands.  I think that all my cheering really encouraged you to walk more.  Now, it seems to be your preferred method of movement.  I notice that you would much rather walk places than crawl.  Occasionally, you'll still crawl, but only if there isn't anything quick and close by for you to pull up on.

We've finally hit the jackpot with your sleep.  You go to bed easily, and sleep all night.  It's taken us a long time, and a lot of struggle and learning, but we've made it.  Every once in a while, you'll wake up in the night.  But, we know that something is wrong with you then, and try to figure out what it is.  Sometimes you're wet, and sometimes I think you may have had a bad dream or something.  Naps have been a little wonky.  But, I think that is because you are working on walking.  Once you master that more, your naps will go back to being better.

You have really started to be a chatty little girl.  I love how much you talk to us.  I try to keep your pacifier out more so that you can work on your vocabulary.  You've said "mom" and "mama" for quite some time, but now I think that you've added "dad", "hi", and a version of "dog".  You also will growl back to us if we growl to you.  You even do it if Maya groans.  It's adorable, and it melts our hearts.  Your grandparents love when you do it too!

You continue to be a fantastic eater.  You love being able to feed yourself and you definitely do not mind trying new things.  I love to watch you pick something up and bring it to your lips and taste it before you eat it.  You drink water with all of your meals, and you do a great job with your sippy cup.  You still haven't figured out how to use a straw yet.

You've had quite a few bumps and bruises lately.  You even had your first black eye.  You were playing in the kitchen with the gate, and it started to swing and you fell and hit your face on it.  You cried some, but you were better after some snuggles.  It just started off with a bruise on your cheek, but then spread to underneath your eye.  It looked pretty bad, and I'm sure people kind of side-eyed us a little bit.  Of course, it didn't help that two days after that happened, you bonked your forehead on the side table in the living room and got a bruise there too.  It breaks my heart when you hurt yourself.  Let's just keep the injuries small and simple, ok?

I just keep commenting to people about how fun you are lately.  I certainly loved you before, but I can feel my love grow for you every day.  I love that we can play together and that you laugh and giggle when we do.  I love that I can tickle you and get these awesome giggles where you show all of your teeth.  I love that I can chase you around the living room and you run away and screech while you do.  I love nothing more than to find ways to make you smile and laugh.  My heart just swells with love every time I get to see joy in your face.

My darling, you are quickly leaving behind the baby stage and moving so quickly into toddlerhood.  It is so surreal that soon I will be the mother of a toddler.  I have such a hard time picturing that.  I always pictured myself as a mother to a baby, but never a toddler and older.  I just can't wait to see all of the fun things that are in store for us.  I will treasure this last month with you as a "baby".  I love you more than all the numbers.

Love you forever,
Mommy

Let's Catch Up

Blogging has fallen so far on the back burner that it would take me forever to do individual posts on everything.  Hopefully I can stay caught up after this and make it a point to blog a few times a week.

First, Drew lost his job.  His company closed their doors and everyone but a few keys employees was terminated.  It came as quite the surprise to everyone.  Apparently, the company has been bought now.  Drew is waiting to see if they are going to ask him to come back.  He's been applying for other positions, both here and in other states.  I'm torn about whether I want to move or not.  On one hand, it would be a great opportunity and a chance to try out a new place.  I've only lived here in Illinois.  And we've got to face it, this isn't exactly a great area for aviation.  On the other hand, it will be hard to leave our families.  We've both got extended family in other parts of the country, but it will still be hard to leave our "home".  We're both just saying lots of prayers that Drew gets a job quickly and that he is able to grow and expand his skills in it.

We recently took a week long, extremely spur of the moment trip to North Carolina.  Drew's BFF, Drew, was talking to his dad one day when we arrived at his parent's house.  He was talking about how he was going to start laying some laminate hardwoods that weekend.  Drew decided that we should go out there and help him.  So, we left the next evening.  Annelise did such a great job traveling and while we were there!!  For some reason, her bedtime was extremely late every night.  Not quite sure what that was about.

Drew spent the whole time laying the floors and didn't really do anything fun.  Poor him.  Annelise and I were busy little bees.  Jen and Emma took us to a place called Discovery Zone Kids.  It was a blast.  There was a huge place for Annelise to play.  When we first got there, she spent about 10 minutes just looking around at everything.

But, once she warmed up and had a chance to take everything in, she had a great time.

She especially liked playing in the water table.

I had the awesome opportunity to meet a lady that I've been friends with for quite a few years.  We met while we were both planning our weddings on an online chat forum.  Lindsay only lives about a half hour from where I was at.

She also has an adorable daughter named Lila.

There are a lot of blue eyes in that picture!!

Drew decided that he wanted to travel back home during the day, so that we could see the mountains as we drove through them.  That idea was all fine and dandy, until night fell and we ran into a snow storm in Indiana.  And then, we got stuck on a closed highway that got shut down because of an accident.  So basically, a 12-13 hour roadtrip turned into 18 hours, and we didn't get home until about 4 AM.  Not so much fun!  It was definitely the second worst road trip ever.

Now that we've been home, we just been focusing on getting stuff done around the house.  Hopefully we can knock out a bunch of little projects that have been on the back burner while Drew is off of work.

Ten Months

Dear Annelise,

My goodness girl, how fast time is flying now!  I swear that since you've become mobile, the days, weeks, and months are just zooming by.

You finally have teeth!!!!  Daddy and I were beginning to think that you'd be toothless your whole life. You have four teeth, two bottom and two top.  They came one right after the other.  The first one came in, your bottom right, then a few days later, when I feeling the first one, I noticed that the second bottom one had popped through.  Just a day or two after that, we were playing and I noticed that your top right one was showing.  A couple of days later, your top left one.  It was so weird to see your with teeth and not the gummy smile that we've grown so accustomed to.  Sometimes, I still get caught off guard when I see them.  Every once in a while, it sounds like you grind them together.  I think that you are probably wondering what they are.  You've bitten me while breastfeeding a couple of times.  That hurts, A LOT!  I would appreciate it if you didn't do that ever again!

You actually cut those teeth pretty well.  I've heard horror stories about kids teething and I have been dreading it with you.  You did very well and, honestly, weren't really much different than your usual self.  I hope that the rest of your teeth go just as well.

You have become such a pro at crawling and cruising.  There is no stopping you now.  You crawl everywhere and pull up on things like you've been doing it forever.  You are definitely a lot happier now that you can get to where you want to go.  You are very good at cruising along the couch and then dropping to your knees to crawl to get somewhere else.

You think about taking some steps, but then you get scared and drop to your knees.  You took one step while we were visiting some friends in North Carolina.  I held out a puff to you and you took one step and then fell.  I've been trying so hard to get you to walk, but you don't show a lot of interest.

While we were visiting some friends in North Carolina, you learned how to climb the stairs.  At first, you climbed one and then didn't really climb anymore.  Then, a little while later, you saw their cats upstairs.  You started climbing the stairs like you've been doing it forever!  I guess all it takes is the right motivation to get you moving!

You continue to be a lover of food.  There isn't much that you don't like.  At this point, I think that the only things that you definitely are not a fan of are bananas and avocados.  You love yogurt, and will usually have some yogurt and fruit in the morning for breakfast.

Sleep is still pretty consistent and not much has changed from last month.  I'm so thankful that things are going well here.  Let's just continue, ok!

Little lady, you absolutely adore Maya!  I think that your love and fascination for her grows everyday.  You love to climb all over her and rub your face into hers.  You love it when Maya gets hyper and runs around.  In return, Maya tolerates you climbing on her, and loves it when you eat so that she can get some treats.  You have started to love Leo too.  If he's near you, you'll scurry over to him and then grab onto his fur and start screeching.  Leo is not a fan.  He usually tolerates it until he can run away.  Simon doesn't even let you come anywhere near him.

You are quite the opinionated, headstrong little girl.  You know what you want and you won't stop until you get it.  The tantrums are out of control.  You throw a fit about practically everything.  You throw a fit when you get put into your car seat, when you get put down, when someone else holds you, when you don't get fed fast enough, when something gets taken away from you.  Basically, it's temper tantrums all day long.  Boy, I'm certainly looking forward to the toddler years.  Ha!

You are still wearing 12 month clothes and in a size 3 diaper.

I cannot believe that we are getting so close to your first birthday.  I have started planning your party and I am so blessed to be able to plan a first birthday party.  You are so much fun lately and it astonishes me to watch you grow and learn.  I love you so much my darling!

Love you always,
Mommy