Sunday, August 31, 2008

She just keeps on going...

We had a few instances of sitting up in the crib during the past weeks, but on Saturday Morgan went from lying down on the floor to sitting up all by herself! Here's how it went down:


At first it involved a little rotating around the floor on her tummy (now she does it without rotating)...


Then she pulls one leg under...


Then she pushes up with her arms...


Ta Da!! She did it! She also managed to grab a toy in the process this time.

Now she's a pro and is trying her best to pull up on the couch. What's next?!

Saturday, August 30, 2008

Morgan says, "Go Bears!"


More Milestones

Morgan managed to do two brand new things on Thursday morning within about an hour of each other. When the milestones come, they come fast and furious. Morgan's friend Taylor was visiting yesterday while her Mommy had an interview. She brought over a fun new toy to play with and Morgan was fascinated!!

The toy has all kinds of buttons that play music and teach things like colors and shapes. Morgan pulled herself up to her knees this time. This also shows you how big Morgan is. Taylor is THREE months OLDER than Morgan. She's on the smaller end of the scale, but wow!

After a outfit change, I sat her down in front of it again and next thing I knew she pulled herself up all the way to standing! There's Taylor about to crawl into another area I haven't baby-proofed yet. Sigh. The girls had fun.

Once she stood up, Morgan's feet stayed like this. Not so stable yet, rather funny though.

Next, it was nap time. I put Morgan in her crib and about five minutes later I looked at the video monitor to see her head MUCH closer to the camera than usual. I went in the room and this is what I found!

She looked a little stunned, wondering how she did this...and what she should do now.

I can't remember if I lied her back down, but she managed to take a decent nap after this. What a big girl!

Friday, August 29, 2008

Blogger Annoyance

As you can see with the "Milestone" entry, it is labeled Saturday, August 30. If you are reading this on Friday the 29th...obviously this is not Saturday. I was creating the "Milestone" post for Saturday and accidentally "published" it before I entered the preference to have it post on Saturday morning. I tried to go back and change it to Saturday and it only changed the date. Can someone let me know how you "un-publish" something without deleting it? So annoying...

Vacation Recap - Lafayette

Now for Part 2...our Lafayette visit. We stayed at my parent's house. My Mom and Dad were so excited to have their first grandchild come stay with them!! They couldn't get rid of us fast enough so they could have Morgan all to themselves. That made it easy for us to go out to dinner with some friends and take some "baby breaks" in the afternoons. Everybody was happy! Here's some pictures from the visit:



Daddy feeding her in her "big girl" booster seat.


A diaper change in the trunk of Grandpa's car after a stroll around the Lafayette Reservoir. Who has a trunk this clean?! Only my Dad. :-)



Brunch at Millie's, a Lafayette favorite...and yes, she did flirt with some boys and an older gentleman at the restaurant.



Grandma's got hold of the back of Morgan's skirt to keep her steady.



Morgan started clapping while we were on vacation!


Morgan and Walt, David's best friend from high school...and his best man. Walt and his wife Becca are expecting their first child in January '09. We're sooo excited for them


Morgan "army crawling" to Auntie Ali and her new bath time book.




The knobs on Grandma's kitchen drawers looked really yummy.




At Auntie Ali's office at Old Navy corporate in San Francisco. She has a bear like this one at home too. Ali has lots of pictures of Morgan in her workspace, so everyone came to see her in person.




Another shot at Auntie Ali's desk. As we were leaving David heard someone say "must be a baby model"...the star of a future ad campaign?!




With Grandma at the Open House party. They match!


With Grandpa, watching Daddy (on his phone, of course)


Actually holding her bottle...this doesn't happen often folks. She must have been really hungry!


Getting some reading done on the plane, about to head back to Spokane.


She slept the whole way home. One passenger commented as we were getting off the plane "I didn't even know there was a baby on this flight." Yay, Morgan!

Now we have our first trip under our belt...next, we're headed to Chicago to visit Auntie Cristen, Uncle Ian and Cousin Jack. We can't wait to see them!

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Vacation Recp - Twain Harte

I'm finally getting to that recap I promised! We had a great time in California! Morgan did pretty well on the flight to Oakland. Just a little fussing at the end when she wanted out of the car seat.


After a quick stop in Lafayette to borrow my parent's car (thanks Mom and Dad!) we headed to Twain Harte. For those not familiar, Twain Harte is in the Sierra (Mountain Range) Foothills near Sonora...on the way to Yosemite. David's family used to vacation there when he was a kid and his parents have now lived there for about 10 years. They have a wonderful little lake for rafting swimming and just relaxing. It was the place to be! We had a great time at the lake and spending time with David's three siblings, their spouses and kids.


Morgan's first experience with sand. She had a mouthful of it by accident the next day. Didn't seem to bother her at all.


First swim in the lake with Daddy. It was cold when you first got in, then it was nice.


Having fun with Grandma


Per my Wordless Wednesday, the "new" cousins, Keilah, Jack and Morgan. They have four older cousins, Madison, Jamie, Regan and Makena.


Loved the bear baby floatie!


Napping at the Lake



Hangin' with Grandpa


Aunt Cristen and sleepy Jack


Morgan and Mommy


Morgan loves her cousin Maddy


David, Makena and Morgan...Kenna, Morgan loves you too!!


Twain Harte Lake

I'll recap Lafayette tomorrow!!

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Back to Blogging

Did you miss us? I sure missed blogging...but it was good to have a break. We had a great vacation! I'll be posting more pictures and info the next few days, but here are a few "new" items little Morgan has surprised us with lately:

* Morgan has suddenly started clapping! I have done lots of "patty cake" with her and we always clap and cheer when she does something extra good or new. At the beginning of our vacation I saw her putting her hands together with her fingers outstretched (instead of folded). By the end of the week she was actually making a clapping sound. So cute!

* She is officially "army-crawling" now. She pulls herself across the floor with sometimes a little help from a foot. I hear this is a step to real hands-and-knees crawling. She's making progress.

* All of a sudden her naps have become longer and she goes to sleep with less resistance. This may be due to a few things. One is that on vacation her night-time sleep was not great and we're still struggling with this now that we're home. The second reason may be that I think I've finally figured out the best timing for the naps...no later than 2.5 hours from when she last woke up, but usually 2 hours. Then, the same for the next nap. Her naps have been lasting from 1 hour to 2.5 hours. Yippee! Hopefully this won't change once we get her nights back on track.

* She has started to do what we call the "scrunchy-face" where she squeezes her eyes shut and crinkles her nose. Sometimes this is with a big smile, sometimes not. It just cracks us up!

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Leaving on a Jet Plane

We're off for vacation to see family and friends in Northern California. It's our first trip with a baby AND on an airplane with a baby. I think we've got everything packed...

We'll be taking a break from blogging during this time, but are sure to have LOTS of pictures and stories when we get home.

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Scattered Schedules

I just told my sister that I think I dreamt that I posted something yesterday. I was actually surprised when I went to my blog this morning and there was the Sunday post there and not a Monday one. This is how scattered I am lately.

I am such an organized person...OK, maybe a control-freak, that I try to force everything into a pattern or schedule of some kind. This worked for me when I was working. I had to get Morgan to daycare on time...then I could control my time. The daycare dealt with her daytime activities. Now that I am home, it's a different story. I am finally realizing that babies don't work that way. Or, at least mine doesn't. Yes, some form of a schedule is important for all children, but it doesn't need to be as rigid as I think it should be. I desperately want Morgan to be predictable, and she just isn't. I want her to wake up at the same time each morning, to take naps at regular times (for a defined amount of time), and for her to eat at the same times each day. Other babies seem to do this, why doesn't mine? The only thing that is predictable is that she goes to sleep more or less at 8:00 pm each night. Some babies are like clockwork, mine is not.

We are getting some longer naps out of her though. This morning she napped for 1.5 hours and she's on 1.5 hours as I write this...but, she did wake up at 4:30 this morning. She didn't finish her bottle last night, so I was afraid she'd wake up early and she did. We've also got a cold and more teething working against us. It's always something.

That aside, I think we are getting closer to some kind of schedule now that I am home. It just has wiggle-room in it. I'm learning to be OK with that. Every time I look at her I am reminded how amazing she is and how lucky I am to have her, even if she doesn't do everything my way. I think we can find a "happy" medium in there.

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Daddy Love

Have I mentioned what a great daddy David is? I can say it again and again. Today David let me have a "Mommy Day" which means I get to do whatever I want. He's had a lot of activities lately that have taken him away from home and Morgan's had a cold so we haven't been venturing out much. I wanted to go to church this morning, but they are pretty strict in the nursery...that runny nose and weepy eye are a dead giveaway. Sooo...we hung out, had a family nap and then I got to go to my yoga class and shopping! Daddy changed all the poopy diapers (and there were a lot of them). Now I'm taking some time to make some more of Morgan's food. I am so thankful for David and all he does for us. It is so fun to watch him interact with Morgan. She loves him so much! When he's been gone on a two-day trip she gets so excited when she sees him. She now does her new "cheerleading" moves where she yells and waves her arms up and down. It will be fun to watch their relationship grow as Morgan gets bigger.

Friday, August 8, 2008

We go together like Peas and Carrots

As we have ventured into the realm of solid food, I've continued to make most of Morgan's food over the past few months. Today I tackled carrots for the first time. In the baggies you can see other "fruits" of my labor, such as butternut squash, peas, sweet potatoes (yams) and peaches. There are only two fruits I have purchased: applesauce (just because you can get great organic stuff in a bigger jar) and pears. I haven't looked extensively, but I don't think the pears are all that great around here. Maybe I'm biased because I grew up with a pear tree in my backyard that produced amazing fruit. I have trouble getting pears ripe around here. I use the website wholesomebabyfood.com as a great reference tool.

You will also see my Magic Bullet in the photo. Basically it is a blender that pulses at high speeds. It purees great. I'm trying to make Morgan's foods chunkier now as she needs to progress towards table foods. She gagged a little on my carrots, but she did that with peas and bananas at first and is now fine with them. We also tried some whole milk yogurt this week. A little tart on it's own, it was a bigger hit when I added applesauce. She also has learned to feed herself "puffs" all by herself. These are fruit and veggie flavored rice puffs that melt in the mouth and get them more used to eating items like bread and crackers. It is fun to watch her pick up the puffs and attempt to get them in her mouth. Sometimes she makes it and sometimes it ends up on the floor or in her high chair. We've only had one gagging/vomit incident when she put one too many at a time in her mouth. I think she learned her lesson.

Thursday, August 7, 2008

I finally caved

I joined Facebook this afternoon. I'm not sure what I've done, or really what it is, but so far I have 7 "friends." These are mostly people from my days in San Francisco. We were a pretty tightly knit group, though not a small group. Some I have kept in touch with, and others it is great to reconnect with. David joined about a week ago and has reconnected with people from his Catholic school days up until the present. My sister has been on it for a while too.

I'm just trying to figure out how this works and am looking forward to seeing some "blasts from the past" send me an invitation to be their "friend." After that, I'm really not sure what is supposed to happen. I'll let you know how it goes!

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Baby Talk

I forgot to post about this earlier, but I think it was just a fluke anyway. Yesterday I had Morgan in her high chair in the kitchen while I emptied the dishwasher. I turned around to look at her...she looked right at me and said "Ma-ma." I got so excited I ran over and kissed her. She's been saying something that sounds like "mom-mom-mom-mom" for a while...but this time it definitely did not have the "m" sound at the end of it. It was a clear "ma-ma."

She wouldn't say it again though, and hasn't said it since. Who knows...even if she didn't really mean it, it was nice to hear it with her cute little voice.

8 Months Old!

Another month has flown by in the life of our Morgan Ann-Marie. She is 8 Months old today! Here are some pictures taken earlier this morning. Since David was out of town, Mommy had to fly solo on these. Not bad, but we might try again later. It is difficult to find a spot for the sign where she won't tear it down and try to eat it.

Morgan has lots of exciting new experiences in store this month. She has now started to eat three meals of "solid" foods a day. We just added yogurt! She is also getting some practice with more textured foods. I gave her some small pieces of banana this morning. She wasn't quite sure what to do with them, but at least we avoided any major gagging or worse.

Morgan is going on her first vacation in about a week. We are going to California to see the Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles and Cousins. There are many family members she has not met yet and we can't wait for her to spend some time with them!
Happy 8 Month "Birthday" Morgan! We love you so much and are so blessed to have you in our lives.

Monday, August 4, 2008

A Day in Coeur d'Alene

Now that I no longer work in Coeur d'Alene, it is a nice 20 minute jaunt over the state line for a visit. The resort-feel and the lake make you think you are getting away from it all. Sunday we decided to check out the "Art on the Green" at North Idaho College. This is a school that is right on Lake Coeur d'Alene close to the City Park, Resort and Downtown. We had a really nice time perusing the booths and just enjoying the perfect 80 Degree weather.

Pics of the Lake:




Swingin' at the City Park playground (it's a big fort....really cool!):


Click on the close-up shot for a look at Morgan's upper teeth!

A few more of the lake (keep in mind, this is a small part of the lake. Lake Coeur d'Alene is 25 miles long with 135 miles of shoreline...big):


Little Boo-Boo with her Daddy: