11 Month Update

Given the basic logic that as months pass, Lucy gets older, you would think that I wouldn't be "surprised" every month.  Lucy turned 11 months' old and she is moving at lightning speed to the toddler stage.  She isn't walking quite yet, but she is very fast at crawling, pulls herself to a standing position all the time and has started to stand unassisted for a few seconds before lowering to a seated position.

 We had to take Lucy in for an ear infection re-check and, surprise, it has turned into a double ear infection in the last week, despite taking antibiotics so she will likely get tubes in a few weeks.  Getting tubes was a godsend for Charlie so I'm happy that there may be a break from pain and antibiotics in the coming weeks.  Bless her heart, other than waking up during the night a few times, you wouldn't even know that her ears hurt.

 At today's appointment, Lucy weighed 17.5 lbs so she's slowing gaining weight, which is good since she eats like a bird, and seems to be "over" baby food and her bottle.  I'm pretty sure that her diet consists of Kix cereal, Ritz and graham crackers.

 Charlie continues to be a source of pure love and joy for Lucy.  She is constantly looking for him and is his most favorite audience member.  Other than watching and following Charlie, Lucy loves her bath and crawls like a crazy lady to the bathtub as soon as she hears the water run.  She also loves going for walks, going to the pool, reading books and listening to music.

Charlie was "helping" us take Lucy's pictures and decided that he should join the picture and show his beloved bag of M&M's.  Thankfully, he still hasn't figured out that 4 M&M's is NOT the whole bag. 

I took a few pictures during the Fourth of July festivities.  We had a great day that involved a parade, two cookouts and fireworks from our neighborhood pool.  Charlie was very excited about the day and the prospect of catching candy during the morning parade.

A quick picture of the kids while waiting for the parade to start.

 Lucy enjoying her sippy cup of water.  A big girl!

 Charlie confirming with BJ that the candy will fall from the sky.  Possibly the greatest moment of his life.

I'll be back next month with, gulp, Lucy's 1 year stats and photos.

The Heart Walk, 10 Month Update and Father's Day...

oh my!

This past weekend was the AHA's Heart Walk so we enjoyed that event (the rain stayed away until the end) and got to spend time with Nana, Papa, Jenn, Max and Milo too. 

Lucy and Milo eyed each other for a little bit, but didn't interact too much.  At these ages, a four month age difference seems to make a huge difference so I'm sure that once Lucy is as mobile as Milo, there will be some fun and a few battles.

 After spending the afternoon swimming, Charlie and Max were happy to veg out on the couch and watch a movie.  It's fun to see these two together as Charlie idolizes Max and is so happy that he can finally keep up with Max.

 Lucy is officially 10 months old and her "little" status continues.  At her 9 month check-up, she weighed 15 lbs. and 12 oz. (13%) and was only 5th percentile for height.  For comparison purposes, Charlie was almost 22 pounds at his 9 month check-up so we definitely have two extremes.

 Lucy quickly mastered standing up, but hasn't quite figured out how to sit back down so there is usually a cry for help when she grows tired of standing.  She is no longer content to lay on the changing table to be changed or get dressed.  We are in full on drestle (dress + wrestle) mode.  While she's started to like the Gerber finger foods, she is completely over baby food but is highly suspicious of "real" food.  And when we makes her mind up about not eating, there is no going back - those lips are sealed.  It's probably karma for the years when my food intake revolved around the same foods over and over again, despite my mom's attempts to get me to eat something else. 

 We celebrated Father's Day on Sunday and enjoyed Charlie's responses to his "All About Dad" questionnaire.  Some highlights about BJ (per Charlie): he is 5, his favorite activity is going to church, his job is to clean the table, he always tells Charlie to eat lunch and he likes to go to the mall with Charlie.  I hate to steal any one's thunder, but the response that BJ is 5 is probably the answer that is the closest to being accurate.

 Not to be outdone, Lucy had her own homemade card for BJ. 

Thank God for daycare because otherwise it would have been slim pickings for BJ.  Recently, Copper has been obsessed with chewing on a piece of mulch to the extent that I wondered if he was trying to whittle it into some type of message for me and I was tempted to wrap it up as a Copper's homemade gift to BJ but Copper hid it somewhere outside on Sunday morning.  The reason I know that he is still working on it is that any time he goes outside he barks on his way out the door as if it is a battle cry to resume the whittling before staying outside for ungodly amounts of time.  The irony with all of this?  Mulch is one of his many allergies so I figure that for every minute he whittles, he is shaving a good 10 minutes off of his life.

On The Move

Lucy is on the move!  She officially started crawling on Monday, June 3, 2013 and she couldn't be happier.  She'll crawl a couple of feet and then look back with a big smile to make sure that we are watching her.  The baby-proofing is in full mode as Lucy already opens drawers and heads to the steps every chance that she gets.

One of the first places that she heads is Charlie's room and she is always pleased with herself to explore his stuff.  So far Charlie is very tolerant of her exploring his things, but I realize that could change at any time.

 This past Friday night Charlie got to go golf with BJ for the first time and BJ said that he was a crazy man but that he loved it.  I'm sure that it will be the first of many nights that they spend golfing.

 Molly, Claire, Hannah and Pete came to stay with us on Friday night and the kids loved spending time with their cousins.  Shamefully, I only took  one picture of Claire, Lucy and Pete.

I had to include the following picture to show how tolerant Lucy is of Charlie - she thought that she was receiving a hug but he looks like he's putting her in a headlock.  Luckily, he catches himself pretty quickly when we tell him that he needs to be more gentle.

 Fortunately, she's still smiles most of the time!

 Finally, Charlie loves playing with the neighbor "girls" and was even willing to hitch a ride on his wagon so that Grace could take a turn driving his tractor.  He may be chivalrous after all.

9 Month Update

Little Lucy turned 9 months' old this week and she continues to be a happy little girl.  Her 9 month check-up is this week so I'll have some stats in a few days.  I'm anxious to know how much she weighs as she still seems like a peanut to me and doesn't have a huge appetite.  In fact, she hasn't finished a jar of baby food in weeks but thinks that I am trying to choke her whenever I give her the tiniest bite of "real" food.  The little basketball that she is holding in the photos below continues to be her prized possession and although she isn't crawling yet, she will scoot/turn/contort herself to be able to reach the basketball if it rolls outside of her reach. 

Lucy hasn't pulled herself up yet, but she thinks that she is pretty cool if we help her stand.  I think that she'll be really fun this summer in the pool because she is a splashing fool in her tub.  I've identified a surefire way to make her mad - take her out of the bathtub.  She does this holler thing and gives a little glare, but it is short-lived.  Lucy continues to love to watch Charlie, go for walks and look at books.  Overall, a big thumbs up from me, BJ and Charlie.

My parents came to visit us this weekend and the kids loved the extra attention.  I tried to take a few pictures before they left on Saturday afternoon and you can guess which spirited child was too hyper to take a picture.  Grandpa Bill brought Charlie his very own pack of gum (Charlie experienced his first piece of gum during the long car ride to Chicago and became a quick fan), which made him Charlie's friend for life.  I've been asked if he can have a piece of gum almost every waking hour in the last day.  BJ and I were able to head to a late movie on Friday night and we enjoyed some quality time with them again on Saturday morning.

 Lucy took a few minutes to warm up to Grandma and Grandpa, but once she did, the smiles were endless!  Please note Charlie's golf club on top of our refrigerator in the background below.  You can imagine that the golf club spends more time in "mommy jail" than it does in his hands.  The boy's energy and defiance is remarkable and would be funny to me if he was someone else's child.

 Yesterday was our 11th anniversary (side note, I can't believe that we were so young when we got married...what were we thinking?  Good thing that its worked out...so far) and we celebrated by taking the kids to a showing of Wreck-It-Ralph at Jack Trice Stadium.  The movie started at 7:00 and we had no idea how big the crowd would be.  The weather was perfect and Charlie had the best time.

 BJ took this picture from the stands as he was making his way to the one concession stand that was open.  We never did buy any snacks because the line was ridiculously long so Charlie and Lucy ended up sharing a baggie of Gerber Puffs because of the snack disappointment.  Despite having eaten supper before leaving for Ames, Charlie must have asked me 5 times if I had any other snacks in my bag and shock and dismay that I did not. 

 Other than the disbelief that we would not be eating any popcorn during the movie, we had a great time.

We hope that everyone had a great summer!

Chicago

Before I get into our trip last weekend to Chicago, I wanted to share Lucy's new favorite toy - a little basketball.  She holds it whenever we let her, including in the stroller when we go for walks so I wanted to capture a few pictures of her holding it.  Her hair has gotten quite a bit longer so she's been sporting a "top of the head" ponytail at night.  

 We went into Chicago last week and had a great, but busy time.  We started our weekend with a trip to the Children's Museum at Navy Pier.  The museum was great and both kids had a great time.

 After lunch, we headed to Shedd Aquarium, which was pretty cool but very crowded.  Charlie was especially excited to see the sharks, the beluga whales and the penguins.  The aquarium had a "pretend that you're a penguin" display next to the actual penguin's habitat, which included a floor-to-ceiling fake rock.  I leaned over to wipe Lucy's nose and when I stood back up, Charlie was at the top of the rock structure, inches away from the ceiling.  I was wondering where the stairs were that he used to climb to the top when an aquarium employee came over the speaker system asking for the parent/guardian to remind the children that penguins cannot climb rocks and that everyone needs to stay on the group.  What a stinker - a fast, climbing stinker.

 On Friday night we enjoyed pizza with Sam, Angie, Kendall and Jack, which was great.  Saturday was Cubs game time!  Angie and I had to laugh as we walked to Wrigley that with the strollers, diaper bags and kids, BJ and Sam were hardly recognizable to their previous Cubs' game experiences.

 A quick family photo - clearly Charlie still has to work on keeping his eyes open for pictures.

 I think that Lucy is a Cubs fan - she was great during the game.  Happy to sit on our lap and smiled constantly.

 Because the game coincided with the Kentucky Derby, we received "Derby-esque" hats upon arrival.  The hat provided endless entertainment for Charlie and Kendall.

Speaking of Kendall and Charlie - these two were some popcorn-loving fools.  I think that they both ate their weight in popcorn.  At some point, they were deliriously giggling and shoveling popcorn in their mouths while standing a few inches apart.

We stopped for some great ice cream on our walk back from the game and although Lucy wasn't interest in the ice cream, she was happy with the company.

 Following the Cubs game, we spent the night with our friends Dave, Laura and their family.  As I told Laura, we weren't at the best versions of our selves (tired, dirty, etc.) and I don't think that my camera even left our car.  It was great to catch up with Dave and Laura, to see how their 3 oldest kids have grown and to meet their daughter Jordyn.

Finally, I had a great Mother's Day today.  It was a pretty low key day, but we went out for lunch and enjoyed time outside this afternoon.  The daycare did a great job of helping the kids with cards for me - Charlie's class made magnets for their moms and completed a questionnaire regarding their moms (he said that my favorite food is meatballs and my job is to wash tables - hilarious) and Lucy's teacher included a cute photo with a sweet poem.

We look forward to seeing our moms over the next few weeks!

8 Month Update

I blinked and Lucy turned 8 months' old earlier this week.  She continues to be a source of pure happiness and is often referred to as Baby Ludy (by Charlie who struggles with the "s" sound), Lucy Jane, Little Miss, Short Stuff and Girlfriend (when I'm feeling particularly feisty). 

Other than an initial rebellion when I switched her to formula last month (which is when I started the "girlfriend" reference such as "girlfriend, this is what you have to drink so drink up"), she is still easy-going.  She is a rolling fool and doesn't like to miss anything.  I don't know her length or weight now, but she is still able to wear 6 month clothes, so I'm guessing that she hasn't had a huge growth spurt.   Lucy loves books and music but her favorite activity continues to be watching Charlie or Copper.  She falls asleep around 7:30 and has been waking for a bottle around 5:30 before falling back asleep until 7:00.  The 5:30 bottle at 8 months old is a little challenging since she had been sleeping 12 hours, but since the formula strike of March, she still isn't drinking as much during the day as she previously was so she happily takes an 8 oz. bottle at 5:30. 

She gobbles up rice cereal and a few vegetables (sweet potatoes, carrots) and bananas, but still doesn't love much of a variety.  We're at that point that where she loves to blow raspberries when her mouth is full of food so a bath generally follows supper.

We liked going for family walks last week when the weather cooperated so I'm hopeful that we'll be outside soon.

I don't have any recent pictures of Charlie to share but in the last few weeks he told me that my breath was stinky and that my suggestion that it was time for his bath/books/bed was "not a very good idea" so he has the honesty down pat but we need to teach him some sugar-coating techniques.

Easter 2013

We started our Easter celebrate a few days early by coloring Easter eggs.  Charlie was a little excited...

Coloring Easter eggs was one of those activities that I assume will be loads of fun and take some time.  It was loads of fun, but start to finish it was probably 10 minutes.  Quality minutes, but still 10 minutes.  God bless day care because I don't know how I would keep Charlie engaged 7 days a week.

We had an Easter egg hunt at a local elementary school with my side of the family.  Below is a picture of Grandma and Grandpa Gehl with the Gehl grandkids (minus Lucy who had just fallen asleep and was cozy inside the house).

 An action shot - it's amazing the difference one year can make.  Charlie was really excited about the Easter Bunny and we practiced the hunt by hiding eggs around the house for a few days.  He kept asking why the Easter bunny was coming to his house and I didn't have a good answer.  Seriously, how is Easter connected to a giant bunny that delivers goodies?  I told him not to question a good thing.

 Even big boys needs a little help sometimes so it's nice to have an army of cousins willing to help!  All of the grandkids were lucky to walk away with some age-appropriate treats, some cold hard cash and a giant chocolate bunny from Uncle Marty. 

 We celebrated Easter on Saturday evening with BJ's family and true to form, the camera stayed in its bag.  A good time was had by all and the kids were lucky enough to receive more Easter goodies.  The Easter Bunny has stepped up its game since the early 80's.

The Easter Bunny officially visited Charlie and Lucy Sunday morning while we were in Cascade.  I failed to snap a picture of Charlie with his basket, but he received some bubbles, a kite, a book and (of course) M&M's.  I took a picture of Lucy with her in-tact basket when we got home.  She was lucky to receiving some stacking cups, a few bath toys and Gerber puffs.  The Easter Bunny appreciates the kids that are too young to have standards.

Charlie's room at daycare celebrated SuperHeroes and he was in heaven.  His obsession with Spider-Man was in full effect as he was in character one night after his bath and refused to break.  BJ was trying to help him put his jammies on and he kept announcing "I am Spider-Man" and project his web at BJ.  The problem is that he can't make the "s" sound and he was stark naked so we couldn't help but laugh at him, which only infuriated "Pider-Man" even more.  I tell you what, if his persistence and determination for certain activities can be applied to constructive activities, he will be fine.

BJ and I were supposed to have date night last night, but our sitter canceled an hour before we were supposed to leave.  We were bummed because we were looking forward to eating at a restaurant that didn't pass out colors and a coloring book with our menus.  We decided to order a meal to go and recreate date night at our kitchen table.  As we were trying to eat, the following things were happening: Lucy was banging one of her hard-surfaced toys on her high chair; Copper was flinging his chewy at my feet, taunting me to chase him; and Charlie was in the bathroom making a deposit.  We've had some bad dates before, but never have we had our meal interrupted to go wipe the bottom of a fellow diner.  One of those nights that I'm sure we'll miss when the kids are out with their friends and we can go to any restaurant that we like.
We spent as much time outside this weekend as possible and it felt great!  Charlie rode his bike, we went for multiple walks and we even stopped by the park.  Fresh air makes for tired, but happy kids!