Tissue Trouble

Morgan had an EARLY morning today. She started fussing around 5:45 am. Usually she'll fuss a bit then go back to sleep for a little while longer. This time she just got louder...and louder, then I knew when she sat herself up in the crib there wasn't going to be any more sleeping. I got up, changed her diaper and brought her in the bonus room to play a bit. We goofed around a little, then I decided to go get her a bottle. I left her playing on the floor with lots of toys to keep her occupied. She seemed to be headed over to her activity table, her toy obsession of the moment.

I got the bottle ready...and as I headed back up the stairs it seemed awfully quiet. When she plays with her activity table it makes a whole bunch of noise. I became a little concerned and picked up my pace. When I peeked over the baby gate, this is what I found:



She was taking tissues out of the box, chewing on one for a bit...dropping it on the floor, then going for another one. The whole time she was just looking at me. I was instantly reminded of a familiar image of my sister and I on the floor of our bedroom surrounded by piles of tissues. I don't know if we were the same age as Morgan, or older. Of course I grabbed the camera and took a few pictures to capture the "moment." I wish I could show the picture of my sister and I as well...or, was it a home video? It might have been. So funny. As I was taking the pictures I did notice that Morgan seemed to have a wad of wet tissue in her mouth. When I tried to pry some out she BIT me!! Yes, bit me. She left quite a tooth mark on my right index finger. She kept chewing for a while...next try I got the wad out. It wasn't much, but she didn't seem to be swallowing it or spitting it out. Yuck.

And by the way, David or I cannot figure out how the box of tissues got on the floor in the first place...and they are not usually in a spot she could get to them. It's a mystery.

Ducky Drama Done

As I'm sure you've been waiting to hear, the ducky drama is over! Last night we had a successful bath in the ducky tub. No tears, no trauma, just a lot of splashing and babbling. Yay! Here's a picture from a day or two ago when Morgan was investigating where the quacking noises were coming from. We're glad to be done with this saga.

Morgan Updates

There have been a lot of small things Morgan has been doing that I thought I'd compile into one post as they are soo small to warrant their own.

* Morgan has now been doing a "real" crawl on her hands and knees about 50% of the time. If she needs to go longer distances she still plops down on her tummy and drags herself along. It seems that this method is still faster at this point. Before her nap this morning she crawled on her hands and knees the entire time she played.

* She is eating more and more "finger foods." We've been trying to incorporate them slowly, still feeding her some thickened purees for each meal as well. She now eats bits of veggie burgers (the ones with lots of actual vegetables, not "pretend meat" burgers), tofu, pieces of baked chicken and special Gerber crackers (small and easy to chew). She's doing pretty well with these, but some days is more interested in us feeding her that feeding herself.

* She is loving her "puffs" more and more. She now recognizes the containers and gets very excited when we open the cabinet and pull them out. She doesn't yet eat the 61 (yes, 61) puffs they say are in a serving, not that this is really a goal, but it is so odd I thought I'd mention it.

* Morgan has her "9 month" well-baby check this Thursday. Originally this was scheduled for a few weeks ago, but the many changes we had in travel plans forced us to schedule the appointment at almost 10 months. I did learn that she will be getting two shots at this appointment. Previously I thought she had a break until her 12 month appointment, but no luck there. Poor baby! We were able to set her 12 month appointment for December 8th, so her "stats" will be more acurate for her age at that one.

* My "little baby" is starting to look more and more like a toddler to me. It is odd to see her standing at her activitiy table and pulling up on anything and everything. She greets us after her naps standing in her crib. So cute! She is looking like she has more and more balance and agility on her feet. A new friend asked me the other day if she could walk...huh? Then I noticed she was standing, holding on with only one hand and truely looked like she might be able to just "take off" walking. No, not yet, but who knows when? The only thing that keeps her baby-like to me at this point is that she still doesn't have a lot of hair. It is growing slowly though, but it's still not quite enough.

* In most of her clothing, Morgan is wearing 9-12 month sizes. Though, anything that is one-piece (onesies, sleepers, etc.) we are thinking we're going to have to move to 12-18 months sizes soon. She's not wide, but long-waisted. As we say alot around our house, "such a big girl!" We had a little one in the 5-10th percentile visiting us last night. She is one month younger than Morgan and is teeny-tiny. Morgan looks like an amazon next to her! There is such a range of sizes at this age.

* No more teeth, yet. She's got four on the top and 2 on the bottom. I keep thinking she's going to get two more on the bottom, but they are nowhere to be seen at this point.

That was more than I thought I had. We'll, I've got to run and take a shower while Morgan naps. Hopefully, we're off to church when she wakes up...and after I determine whether her runny nose is going to get us in trouble at the church nursery. They are sticklers in there!

What do you think...

...of my new Blog layout? If you are interested, I got the background at The Cutest Blog on the Block website and I created the header at Scrapblog. So much fun! I hope it's not too busy and still easy to read. Let me know if you have any issues and I'll try to tone it down a bit.

TGIF!! I'm off for a Baskin-Robbins Cappuccino Blast as soon as Morgan is up from her nap! I made it to the gym a few times this week...I deserve it!

7:32 AM

I woke up at 7:32 this morning. Well...I actually woke up for the first time at around 5:30. Morgan was doing her usual 4:30-5:30 "fussies." She usually wakes up around this time and rolls around in her crib and makes some noises. I wonder whether she is really awake at these times or in some kind of dream state. I know she can't be hungry and when she actually wakes for the day she'll sit up and start "yelling." So, I'll usually wake up to her fussiness and then will "will her" to go back to sleep for a little while longer. Usually she'll wake for the day around 6:30-7:00 am, sometimes a little earlier though. It also depends on when she goes to sleep the night before. Our routine has her asleep by 8:00 on most days, but some days it's later if we have social events.

So this morning we went through a similar routine with the fussiness, and we both fell back asleep. But...this morning I jolted awake and it "felt" later than usual. I looked at the clock and it said 7:32 am. I clicked on the video monitor and saw Morgan sitting up in the crib. I thought to myself "how long has she been awake, sitting there waiting for me to wake up?" I wondered if she had cried and I didn't hear her. With all those guilty voices playing in my head, I got up and went to her room, peeking in the door...and she was not sitting up in her crib (the camera does not get one corner of the crib too clearly), but she was sound asleep. I was stunned, and thought "OK, now what do I do?"

I went in our family room and turned on the news. I am so used to seeing the local morning news as well as the opening into of the Today Show and the "top stories"...it was strange to see that it had all started without me. I watched for a bit, turned on the computer...even considered taking a shower, then at about 7:50 my bliss was interrupted by the waking cries of our Boo Boo girl. Then I realized that Morgan had gone to sleep last night at about 8:20. This is a little later than usual, because she took longer to settle down. I think she's in a growth spurt. The other day she had 10 ounces (yes, TEN) of formula before bed. I've been making sure to feed her plenty of solid food during the day, especially yesterday...and again, she needed 10 ounces to get to sleep. That's another subject, anyway, that means (not counting some early morning fussiness) she slept for 11.5 hours! She has never broken the 11 hour "barrier." Usually it's about 9.5-10 hours, with a random 11 hour stretch once in a while. I thought it would never happen. Maybe it's a fluke, but maybe, just maybe, we've turned the corner. I'll certainly keep you posted! This might just be the beginning of a wonderful new sleeping trend!

Can we be friends?

Blowing Bubbles

You may have to click on this picture to get closer look. I can't believe I was able to get such a good shot of this. Here's how I discovered what is going on in this picture:

Morgan has been making a new sound lately. It is sort of like a drawn-out "mwah." It is also a very monotone sound. She will do this when quietly playing with her toys or in her jumperoo (and not jumping). It is sort of a rhythmic sound she'll make over and over. The more she did it, the more curious I thought it was. I got closer to take a look and realized she was blowing bubbles! Yes, she is making bubbles with her drool/spit, whatever you want to call it. She will let extra moisture collect on her lips...then she'll seal them together and open them slowly and deliberately to make a bubble (see proof above). The bubble will get about as big as in the picture, then it will pop and she'll start all over again. Isn't that odd? Not that I've been around a lot of babies, but I've never seen this before. I just had to share...

And for an update on the "ducky situation"...we have now moved the duck into her play area. Here she is checking it out right after I moved it into the room. She was not sure what to make of it. Now it has her stuffed animals in it in hopes of creating a "friendly" vibe.



This last picture shows how thrilled she was when I put her in it again. She actually whimpered for a while, then finally humored me a played a little. Maybe we'll try another bath sometime this week? Stay tuned...

Ducky Disaster

Morgan is growing out of her infant bathtub. She continually tries to climb out of it during baths. I've been thinking about what to do about this for a while. I'm not quite ready for her to be in the big tub by herself and am not crazy about getting in it with her every night.

Well, we may need to start getting in there with her because my first solution was a disaster. I decided to buy this cute inflatable duck-shaped bathtub that fits nicely in the big tub and doesn't slip around like the infant tub did. It even quacks when you squeeze it's beak! Everything went OK as we were filling up the duck with water (see the cute baby butt below!) But, as soon as we put her in it she burst into tears! I didn't have the water hotter than usual, she didn't seem to be hurt in any way. We managed to calm her down a little and finished the bath. We figured she was over it.




We were wrong. Unfortunately I do not have pictures of last night's episode. I was all excited to give her a bath in her ducky tub tonight. I was convinced she was going to love it this time around. I put the duck in the big tub and David brought her in. As soon as she saw it she just completely melted down! She was crying and turning red. David and I looked at each other and said, "I guess this isn't going to work." He took her in the other room to calm her down and I exchanged the duck tub for the old infant tub. Then I heard a yell from the other room...Morgan had peed on David. Oops! She was still crying when I took her from him. I put her in the old tub. She was still a little upset, but calmed down quickly when I started washing her. After cleaning himself up (and the carpet in the bonus room), David came in the bathroom to help finish the bath. I decided to do one more thing to "test" Morgan. The ducky tub has a suction cup on it that allows it to hang from the wall of the tub. I had hung it up there and covered it with the shower curtain liner. I uncovered the ducky and she started to cry again...sure enough...

...my daughter is afraid of the great, big, duck-shaped bathtub. Huh? She loves her little toy ducks and any book with a duck. I swore the other day she said "duh" after I said "duck" to her. Maybe such a small, cute thing is really scary when it's over sized?

Anyone want a inflatable ducky bathtub??

Great Day (and Night)

What a difference a day makes!!

After such a terrible day and night on Wednesday, we turned a corner and had the opposite on Thursday. Morgan took a 2 hour nap in the morning and a 1.5 hour nap in the afternoon (woo hoo!). She had a little trouble settling down to sleep, but was asleep by 8:30 that night and slept through until 6:30 am this morning! David was so kind to take over the "baby cam" so I could try to sleep off this cold...and she didn't even let out a peep! This is unusual. We did have the humidifier going in her room, so the white noise might have done the trick. This morning she also took an almost 2.5 hour nap and she just got up from a 45 minute one this afternoon.

Let's hope the pattern continues! Here's a peek at a new toy Morgan just got. She is obsessed!! It has also nicely distracted her from chewing on the leg of the jumperoo. She's only had this two days and has already improved her standing balance and is starting some real "cruising." I just saw her pull herself up on the couch and maneuver herself 180 degrees to play with this table. Wow!

Rough Day (and Night)

Morgan woke up yesterday with a runny nose. At the time it was a clear runny, not an infected runny, so I chalked it up to teething. She also woke up really early...so I cheated and took her in bed with me so she'd sleep a few more hours.

Well...that backfired. She proceeded to refuse to take a nap in the morning and had a measly 30 minute one in the afternoon. She was SUPER cranky all day (so tired) and I knew I was in for it last night as well. If Morgan doesn't get at least one good nap during the day she sleeps terribly at night. By the end of the day I was also questioning the teething "diagnosis." She did a lot of sneezing all day and from time to time the runny nose would become an icky yellow color instead of clear. Yuck.

I was right about the night too. She protested greatly, but finally fell asleep at 8:30 pm. She woke up crying at both 9:00 and 11:00 (where I gave her a dose of Tylenol). She fell asleep for a few more hours, but woke up screaming at 2:00 am. Morgan randomly cries at night. It is usually brief and she goes back to sleep. Odd? I don't know if other kids do this, but its normal for her. This level of crying went on for a bit. I was concerned and went in her room to find her standing in her crib, banging on the front rail, her face red and wet from a combo of tears, snot and drool...just yelling at the top of her lungs. Wow. I decided to take her to bed with me. I figured if she settled down she was really OK, but if she still was crying after a while I'd contemplate calling the night nurse. She was so worked up it took her a bit to settle, but she did. At about 3:15 am I was able to take her back to her bed and she slept until 6:45 am.

So, as you can imagine, I'm dragging today. I think...indeed, she does have a cold because I'm not feeling so hot right now myself. I'm kind of bummed...I've been getting into a groove with a new spin class at the gym, but now I can't go because Morgan would sure to be rejected from the childcare for her icky runny nose. That's probably where she picked up up in the first place though. I'll have to make due with a long walk around the neighborhood.

I haven't ruled out the teething as well, so this is making for a rough combination right now. We'll see how the night goes tonight as David will be home from his road trip. As I write this Morgan has been sleeping for almost an hour. Wish me luck that this makes for a better day today!

Wordless Wednesday: Just Chillin' with my Toys

She knows "No"

David and I have figured out that Morgan now knows what "no" means. We are trying to be very careful about how much we use the word "no" with her as we have heard if you use it too much it's not as effective.

She has this one thing she loves to do that makes us nuts! She crawls over to her jumperoo and tries to gnaw on the metal base. Her teeth make this awful clicking sound when she does this. She already has a small chip in one tooth and we're trying to help her avoid another. Each time she crawls over and attempts to chew on the bar we'll say "Morgan, no" in a stern voice. At first she would stop abruptly and look at us with a quizzical look on her face. Then it evolved to her lifting her head up and smiling at us (we knew we were in trouble then). Now she crawls over and gives us a mischievous look and a grin even before she tries to munch on the bar. She knows it is a no-no and is already testing us.

We looked at each other yesterday and said, uh-oh...she's going to be a handful. Just yesterday I was reading my Baby 411 book and it said that it may be necessary to start the discipline process as early as 9 months. I had no idea it would be that early...but after we saw that grin we knew it was true. I'll try to get a picture of it sometime soon. She certainly gives us lots of opportunities!

Blogging Block

Some people get writer's block, sometimes I get "blogger's block." I want to post about something, but nothing significant comes to mind. I guess I've just start writing and see what comes.

It's Monday morning and Morgan is taking a nap. She's due to wake up soon, so I've got to be quick here. I've actually been able to get quite a bit done so far today. Lately I can count on at least an hour and half nap from her in the morning, maybe more. Today I organized some personal files, separated and started some laundry, made the bed, cleared a bunch of clutter that built up over the weekend and got myself ready to go for a walk when Morgan wakes up. The next few days are supposed to be really nice here, then around Thursday/Friday we are expecting a temperature drop...so I've got to get outside! We might make it as far as the mall today (about 40 minutes each way on the Centennial Trail).

My friend April is coming for dinner tonight. She is the rep for a magazine that my old company used to advertise in. We bonded over trying to get pregnant at the same time. She's had quite a long road, but is now 17 weeks pregnant with a little boy and I can't wait to see her!! She and her husband live in Seattle, so I don't get to see her much, but we talk about every week. It's been fun to be on this "journey" together and support each other along the way.

Well, enough babbling for now. I hope you don't mind my random post. Happy Monday everyone!

She's a (really) BIG Girl!

Here is a serious comparison to how big Morgan is. We haven't put her in her swing for a long time. I think she technically has passed the weight limit and she's just too mobile to want to stay in it. I put her in there for "fun" the other day and was shocked at how HUGE she looked in it. I had to look back at my early photos of her in the swing to compare. Check this out!


This picture was taken when our little one was 3 DAYS old! Look at her all scrunchy and snuggled in there. I remember I was nervous about strapping her in because I couldn't make the harness any smaller to hold her tighter.

Look at her now!! She is waaay too big for it. I could barely get the tray on. It was funny that she can play with the toys on that tray a lot better now than she did when she actually fit in the swing.

She is so long, fer feet just hang over the end of the swing. AND she kept kicking her legs. Every time she kicked the swing would bounce and creak. I'm surprised the motor could keep the swing going!

Sigh, I guess that's it for the swing. We're going to let our neighbors borrow it for their new baby that's due in December...I can't believe she'll be a year old by then!

Stronger

Recently I've made a big effort to get back on the exercise bandwagon. Before I got pregnant (the first time), I was really into my yoga and cycling classes at our gym. I tend to be a wimp if I work out on my own, so classes are key to keep myself challenged.

It's been a looong time since I've been to any of these classes. I worked out quite a bit early on with the first pregnancy until the bleeding worsened (sorry, tmi...for me, the miscarriage involved a slow increase of bleeding, not just starting to bleed one day). The second time around I was terrified to over-exert myself during pregnancy, so walking was really my only exercise.

In the last few weeks I've taken both the yoga and cycling classes again and they've been great! I was convinced that I was going to be really weak in the yoga classes since it had been so long. I shocked myself by being able to do most of the poses. I was not as strong as before, but stronger than I expected. I was especially surprised by my arm strength. Then it dawned on me...a 22 pound baby's got built-in strength training at home every day. Thanks honey! There's a definite benefit to having a baby on the high end of the the weight scale!

I'm making an effort to get to the gym 3 times a week. I'd love to say I'll go more, but with working around naps and David's traveling, I think that's a good goal. Thankfully Morgan does well in childcare situations, so I don't (yet) have to deal with any meltdowns there. Working out makes me feel good and thus helps me be a better Mommy.

Wordless Wednesday: "Goofy's" Girl

For Great Aunts Bonnie and Berri

Here's Morgan in her onesie from the Portland Rose Garden! She looks so cute in it!! Here are a few more pictures...she was making the funniest faces.

Acknowledgement

As a person who has experienced the loss of a child through miscarriage, I have since learned of many families who have had the same experience, as well as those who have endured far worse with the loss of a child later in a pregnancy or soon after birth. Tears stream down my face as I read these stories because I cannot imagine the grief. Many of these families are ones who are held up by their faith. Really, I cannot imagine surviving such an experience without having some kind of faith.

This also makes me feel so grateful for the gift of our little Morgan. She is such a blessing that we cannot imagine living without. There are so many terrible things that can happen in this world...so, all we can do is pray that she will be protected. We are given the gift of this child for a short time, but she really belongs to God. I remember this as I sing "Jesus loves me" to her as she is ready for a nap or bedtime. I want her to understand from a young age that she is God's child and created in such a special way. I can't wait for her to discover the love He has for her. I watch her discover new things everyday. Someday she will sing "Jesus loves me" along with me and will say her prayers along with us, instead of just us praying over her.

I was looking for some scripture with "gift" today and I kept coming back to a very simple one:

"Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift."

2 Cor 9:15

Indescribable...that is what our Morgan is. So precious, so loved and such a gift to us.

9 Months Old!

Here she is!! It's amazing how much easier taking pictures is when you have two people. One person to "entertain" that the other takes the pictures. Here are a few more:

When I was taking the pictures by myself she kept crawling away...so I thought I'd include a few of those shots as well. She also repositioned herself that her back was to me. I just missed the shot where she was looking at me.

Her 9 month Dr. appointment has been rescheduled to the beginning of October...so she'll be almost 10 months old at that point. We've had to move some travel plans so this disrupted the earl er appointment we had scheduled. I did weigh her on our bathroom scale yesterday and she was 21.5 lbs. BIG girl! According to Baby Center's calculator this is between the 75th and 90th percentiles. I think it's closer to the 90th because I put in 22 lbs and it calculated to the 90th percentile. This is where she's been all along. Even though she's big, she growing consistently.

We'll give the report from her appointment on October 2nd.

The 9 Month Whines

Morgan is 9 months old today! We are still working on our 9 month pictures. It's hard to get a good shot when all she wants to do is crawl away. I'm going to try again when I have some help.

With the 9 month birthday comes what I call the 9 month "whines." I've read that there is an increase in crying at this point in most babies, as compared to the 5-6 week peak you see in newborns. We haven't had much extra crying yet, but in the last week or so I've heard a lot more whining than ever before. Possibly this is part of it. Morgan is learning communicate her likes and dislikes more clearly and with the dislikes comes the whining. She whines in her high chair when she wants more food or when she doesn't want to eat anymore...or if she wants her sippy cup. She whines when she's crawling around and can't get to someplace or something she wants.

Today she crawled over to the spot where one of the couches meets the wall. There is a small space you can see through to the other side of the couch... and through it she spotted the toy tray from her swing. It has a few bright colored rattles and beads on it. She whined and whined until I figured this out. Then I was able to give her the tray and she was happy as a clam playing with it for at least 15 minutes.

I'm glad she's expressing her feelings, but it's frustrating when w can't figure out why she's upset. We thought we had her figured out...she previously only got fussy or cried if she was tired or hungry. Now she has other reasons for fussiness that aren't so easy for us to pinpoint. We've had friends that have warned us about this. Once you think you have them figured out, something always changes. Everything is a phase. We are now getting used to putting on our "detective caps" to solve each "mystery." Now, I'm sure as soon as we solve the mystery/problem...everything with change again.

Wordless Wednesday: Hey...can someone please help me here?!

A few more random shots from Saturday

Now that Morgan sits herself up in her crib and plays a bit before she naps...anything can happen.

On Saturday this is how she fell asleep. After David took this picture he managed to ease her down onto the mattress without waking her up. He figured she might sleep better if she was lying down. :-)



Another nap story...today I was checking in on the monitor to see if she'd fallen alseep. Sure enough she was sitting up, playing with the bumper again. A few minutes later I heard a frantic cry. I went in and Morgan was holding onto the crib bars on the outside of the bumper. She was leaned forward and apparently didn't have any leverage to push herself up and back into the crib. I lifted her up and laid her back onto the mattress and she immediately rolled over and fell asleep. She tired herself out!


Another cute shot in her Cal duds.