End of fridge challenge

As mentioned on a previous post, in preparation for Masters week I wanted to clear my fridge and freezer. Not knowing if we were going to rent this year made it hard to get motivated, especially when Land O Lakes butter was on sale for $1.99/lb at Kroger (hmm... yes, I did purchase 5 lbs of it and they are now nicely stacked in our freezer for our guests to wonder whether we are somehow related to Paula Deen).

BUT, I did do a lot of meal planning based on what we already had in the fridge/freezer to help clear it out.

Before...

After...


I must note that I did cheat some in doing this challenge, since I ended up giving much of our food away to help clear it out faster. Still... I am quite proud of my clean fridge/freezer.

Mama's boot camp

A happy baby girl in the morning, flipped on her belly facing the door, waiting for her mommy and daddy to pick her from her crib.

Note: What you are about to read is something both Byron and I decided to do together as parents. I ask that you would respect this choice and keep all negative comments to yourself if you don't agree with what we did. Thank you!

Those who are friends with me through facebook already know that Emma has been going through "boot camp" for a full week now. This means that I have been working on training her to sleep through the night.

Emma turned 7 months and was continuing to wake up at least twice during the nights. Many nights she would wake up more than that. Her desire to be nursed several times during the evening, in addition to her not wanting to eat solids, were literally sucking the life out of me. She was more than 7 months old, practically exclusively breastfed. There were days when she would nurse 7 times through out the day. *Yikes*

So after talking to a few friends, and checking with her doctor, Byron and I decided to go "cold turkey" with it. Her regular hours to wake up during the night were around 1 am and then again at around 5 am. We decided to drop the 1 am feeding. (At that point we had also already started feeding her three times a day. Still wasn't eating much, but something was something, right?)

First night was way too hard. She woke up at around 11 pm (earlier than normal) and cried for a good 20 minutes until I went in to feed her. Fail! I convinced myself that I would stick to my plan better the next night.

Next night she woke up at 1ish and cried and cried for about 40 minutes. Then she was quiet! Checked in on her to make sure her blanket was on her, and headed back to sleep.

Next day she cried for longer. On and off for about 3 hours. So hard! Then 4:30 am rolled around, I got out of bed and nursed her (btw, 4:30 am is the earliest I will go in and feed her).

Third night woke up as normal, cried a little, then fell back asleep.

Fifth night came around... NOTHING! Did not hear a sound come out of her until 5 am.

And later nights have continued the same, mostly sleeping through the night. She'll still wake up and cry, but it's normally because she hears thunder or gets stuck between crib mattress and bumper (yes, we've removed it since then). Byron may go in and console her when these things happen, but otherwise I will not go in to her room unless it's at least 4:30 am.

I guess I just kept hoping that she would naturally adjust to sleeping through the night. I really did not want to have to do this. But she didn't! She kept waking up. I knew of babies her age and younger who were already sleeping long hours at night, so I decided I would do it. And I did!

Besides, this is not the first time I am going to have to make Emma do something she does not like, right?

*sigh* The joys of parenting... :)

Daddy's girl

I am married to a wonderful man. PERIOD.

Byron does not like waking up early in the morning. But recently, he has been waking up an hour before me -- eats his breakfast, has his quiet time, showers, gets ready for work, all in time for his girls to wake up. Then he picks Emma out of her crib, changes her diaper and plays exclusively with her for close to an hour before he leaves for work. Okay, I'll stop bragging now :)

During their play time yesterday morning, Byron decided he would try his college sweatshirt on her (she loves chewing on the strings that hang on it). Not quite sure if fits her yet... :p

A baby girl's teeth

Our baby girl has two toothies. We love them so dearly. Signs of how fast she is growing, and growing she is!

Chismosita (little busybody)

Emma is turning out to be quite the chismosita these days. Hands (and mouth!) into everything.

This morning -- first time I've seen her open our cabinet doors.

7 months old

Emma is 7 months old.
*Sigh*
So big, so fast.

Decided to take this picture with her two best pals -- Bunny and Monkey. Faithful companions in the crib.


A few things that have taken place over the past month:
* Bottom two teeth are coming in, which also means unhappy baby girl.
* She can roll from back to front, and as of earlier this week, from front to back.
* She can sit up by herself.
* Still waking up twice during the night *sigh*
* Has developed a love for lovies and stuffed animals, especially Bunny and Monkey (see first picture).

To see older pictures of her with Johnny Bear, click on "Johnny Bear" on the right side of the blog under labels.

In a pretty dress

Memma found this pretty dress for Emma at a consignment sale the other day. I could not wait to put it on her, and when I did, I could not believe my eyes -- what a doll!

I tried to have a little photo shoot with her with the blooming azaleas in the background, but she was too busy trying to pull the grass and stick it in her mouth for me to get anything good. So these will have to do :)

Enjoy!

Teeth

As of last Wednesday, March 14, 2012, at 6 1/2 months old, Emma gets her firth tooth.

First: Bottom right.
Second (a few days later): Bottom left.

They are so cute! They are hard to see since her tongue is usually rubbing against them, but if you stick your finger in her mouth, she'd be glad to bite down and leave a mark.

We believe that this explains her increase in crying and discomfort. To help soothe her gums, she sticks just about anything in her mouth.

Including diapers...

And her friends...

Bed time stories

Enjoy this 2:00 min video of Emma girl being her silly self during her bed time stories.

Fridge Challenge

Byron once told me that if I ever did a pantry challenge, he would go out to Outback and spend all of the money I would have saved on groceries on a single steak meal. Well... okay Honey, let's do that!

You see, Masters week is just 3 weeks away, and though our house is not rented out yet, we are going to pretend that it is in hopes that when it does get rented, we are not frantically trying to get things ready last minute. And well... as of today, my fridge and freezer look like this:

Our guests won't be too impressed if they open the freezer and find ziplock bags of full of frozen cooked brown rice, cheddar cheese, cooked black beans, veggies, cooked shredded chicken, bread... need I go on? You get the point. Our fridge is not all that promising either.

So this is my plan: To clear out my fridge and freezer by Masters week, and when there is no more food to eat at home, we go out to Outback for dinner. Yay!

Visit with Aunt Alison

We traveled to be with Aunt Alison this week. We had a good time playing and hugging each other. It's been fun watching Alison grow to love Emma. A side of her nobody knew existed has been coming to the surface since she became an aunt.

Playing together on the couch.

Gotta love the close up pictures of Emma <3

Emma meets her "cousin" Yo-Yo.

Emma's most favorite thing to do these days is cry and cry and cry before a nap and bedtime *sigh* While at Alison's, she cried for a total of 2 hours before she finally fell asleep for the night. She cried in her crib, she cried in our arms, she cried while we walked around with her. Here is a picture of Alison holding Emma during that time (she calmed down a little here).

And while we are updating, as of last Tuesday, Emma can roll over from back to front. Yay! She still hates being on her belly, so whenever she rolls over and there is nobody to roll her back to her back, she just fusses and cries until somebody helps her.

Toys

Ever since Emma started sitting up, she's been able to play and enjoy herself more and more. This has been a fun time for me as well since she is much more self-entertained.

I took this toy out for the first time and just watched her explore it.

Six month checkup

This is two weeks late, but better late than never.

Emma's six month doctor's checkup numbers:
Weight: 17 lbs 5 oz (90%)
Length: 25.5 in (50%)
Head Size: 16.75 (50%)

And because my mom can't get enough pictures of Emma playing with her feet, here is our most recent one.

And there were 16...

James Allen "Ames" Morris, welcome!
8 lbs 7 oz and 20.5 in
Morris's newest member makes us a family of 16.


Five minutes after Ames is born, Uncle Caleb walks out with a blue shirt announcing it's a boy! Emma congratulates her uncle by snuggling with him


At the hospital.
"Mommy, my cousin is here! When can we have our first sleepover?"


(And I love this picture. This was taken while we were still waiting for Ames to be born. Notice the pink shirt Memma was wearing. She changed to blue once she knew it was a boy. Poppa just kept his pink shirt on, but covered it with his sweater.)

Emma sits up

Sooooo... solids are not going too well. Today was our third day with them and the only progress we have made is that now instead of opening her mouth like she used to, she clamps it shut when the spoon approaches her mouth and refuses to eat anything.

Out of frustration, I called my newest mama-friend for reinforcements. She encouraged me not to get too worked up about this and take it slowly. Maybe just let her play with her spoon for a few days until she gets more warmed up to the idea.

But... we ARE making progress. As of last week, Emma can sit up on her own for quite some time. I do have to sit her up myself, but she can stay balanced. When I went into the church nursery yesterday to nurse her, she was sitting up all by herself, amusing herself with toys. Her Aunt Amber later told me that little friends would crawl over to her and play with her, then crawl away. And so the day went...

(Update: I had forgotten to take the "private" setting off this video. It is now public for everyone to see.)

Solids for Emma

There were several reasons why I wanted to wait as long as possible before introducing solids into Emma's diet. The main reason was that nursing was way.too.easy. No prep, no cleaning up, no wiping dirty faces, no nothing (and no gross dirty diaper).

But a week into her six month birthday, she began wanting to eat more and more frequently. Instead of only being nursed every three hours, she was hungry every two. Instead of only waking up once during the night (like she had been doing for a few weeks), she began waking up twice.

I was ready to introduce solids early this week, but Byron wanted to be present for this big moment. So Satruday, March 3, 2012 came around (six months and 11 days old) and it was finally time for Emma to taste "big girl" food.

I'll let pictures describe this moment for you. Enjoy!

And a video that probably only interests the grandparents and maybe an aunt/uncle or two...

Our baby giraffe

I found this little costume at a garage sale a few weeks ago and tried it on on Emma for the first time this past weekend. She must have worn it for about 48 hours straight. Love it!

NAKED

Emma's most favorite thing in the world is to be naked! She loves it when we strip her down to nothing and she is free to wiggle and turn and stretch and kick with nothing to keep her back. This is also the only time when she'll giggle at us.

Tags

Have you ever noticed how many tags you have around your house? If not, have a baby and you'll quickly find out.


Playing with Miss Sally's tag (^)

It's been fun watching Emma play with her toys and always finding and becoming fascinated by the tags that they have. She'll grab them and chew on them, then drop the toy and find another one with tag to play with.

Skyping with Oma

Thank you, technology!


Despite the distance that separate us from my family in Mexico, thanks to Skype we are able to video-chat with my mom about once a week.

Though this may be a blessing, it's also a curse. Video-chatting allows my mom to watch Emma in action, but it also makes her long for her little granddaughter, and tears almost always stream down her cheeks when we talk.

Love you, Oma!

Toes

Because of her big cloth diapers (and big belly), Emma is somewhat constrained and unable to reach for her toes when wearing them. Therefore, when she is getting changed and is diaper-less, she loves to grab them.