7 months old

Hard to believe baby girl is 7 months old already! A lot has happened this month. Abigail is now riding in her stroller facing forward (not in the car seat), she had her first ride in the shopping cart at Babies R Us and LOVED it! She continues to work on her "pincer grasp" and will have a quiet moment every now and then where she will ever so carefully pick at the tags on her toys.

Happy 1st Halloween!

On the Friday before Halloween, Abigail attended a Fall Festival at her daycare. Our little ladybug was a big hit! Each room was set up with a different activity. The first room was Abigail's room, where you picked out a little pumpkin from the "pumpkin patch", then went to the next room to decorate it. In one room there was a cake walk. Abigail didn't necessarily participate in the cake walk, but she watched from a distance with daddy. Although you can't hear it in the video below, there is music in the background, and Daddy is helping Abigail kick her legs to the music!







Watching the cake walk


In this video, Abigail tried her "legs" at bouncing on the trampoline!


On actual Halloween night, Abigail trick-or-treated at her Mimi and Papa's house, then went to Aunt Nan's and Uncle Joel's!

Pumpkin Patch!

We had a wonderful time at Gentry Farms for Abigail's first trip to a pumpkin patch to celebrate fall. Grandmama and Grandaddy were in town, so they got to enjoy the trip too. Grandad found the wheel barrow and had the great idea of snapping a few pics with Abby inside! The weather was perfect, clear sky, lots of sunshine.
Happy First Fall!

6 Months Old

Baby girl is 6 months old! She has learned to sit up and is eating solid food. She is very curious and into everything as you'll see in the video below. She destroyed her 6 months sign! She has worked her way up to eight foods now: rice cereal, banana, sweet potato, squash, peas, carrots, oatmeal cereal, & peaches. She is learning and growing so much every day! She is a very happy baby, squeals and laughs and loves to blow bubbles/make raspberries, and kick her legs. We are having a little more trouble than usual with nap time. . . . my thought is that she just doesn't want to miss anything! One of our favorite things to do now is jump in the bounceroo.

First Food!

Only the best food, for the best child. First food is rice cereal, organic, whole grain, no genetically engineered ingredients, no pesticides, no harmful chemicals, (from Whole Foods of course). . . . I'm sure I probably won't be this picky as we go forward, but I wanted her first food to be the best thing out there!






She looks pretty messy here, but overall, I think she did quite well! We didn't have too much of a mess to clean up. She was really eager to eat and opened her mouth and took good bites!


She was a little bit grabby. . . reaching out for the spoon. Rich thinks she got her "grabbiness" from me.

Overall, success! Next, squash or sweet potatoes. We'll add a little color to the mix and see how that goes. . .

Five Months Old

Abigail is 5 months old! She is now up to 13lbs 12oz at her highest this month. We are still supplementing some and weighing her daily with our home scale and trying to pack on the l-bs. Surely she'll start to pick up more weight since we started solid food today, October 1st!

At 5 months Abby has hit some big milestones:
-Rolling over! She's flipped over a time or two prior to this month, but she has really got it down now. She does not like to be on her back. If you lay her on her back, she immediately rolls over onto her tummy. She also likes to roll over in bed when you put her on her back, so after we flip her over a few times, sometimes she ends up sleeping on her tummy.

-First solid food! Well, it was actually quite liquid-y rice cereal. She ate very well and seemed to love it. She cried when we were done, seemed to want more!

-First flight. We went to Denver for a friend's baby shower. She was really good on the plane, she cried some, but overall was a very good girl. So glad Abby got to meet many of mom's Trinity friends.

-Abby was away from mommy for the first time. Mom went to LA for a friend's wedding party. She had a great weekend with Dad!

-First cold? Nothing officially diagnosed, but I have had a cold for about two weeks straight, and I think I may have passed some on to her.

-She likes to bang her hands on things, if you hold your hand in front of her, she'll give you five!

-She's learned how to blow raspberries! (sticking out her tongue and making funny noises). She also makes other funny noises with her mouth, smacks her lips together.

-She sits up well in her Bumbo seat.

-She still really likes her rattle, (and continues to shake it quite vigorously at times!) eating her toes, and likes watching the cat (who chooses not to come too close).

Four Months Old

Who says you can only be patriotic one day out of the year? We decided to pull out the 4th of July duds for her "4th" month pics. Abigail is truly a blessing. We are having so much fun with her. At 4 months she is full of smiles, babbles, and coos. She talks quite loudly at times, and even had a talk with the doctor at her 4 month check up! She likes to sit up with help, and seems to like the Bumbo chair. She is enjoying tummy time. When on her tummy, she picks her head up high and reaches out for toys that are within reach. Everything goes in her mouth, and we thought for a while that she was starting to teethe, but not quite yet. She started daycare, just one day a week for now (working up to three), and all is going well so far. The staff says she likes her swing, calling this her "throne", finding that she is not too happy doing much else; but while in the swing, she smiles and talks. They say this is normal for a child to have a "safe place", and that she is just taking some time to get to know everyone. Mom hates to leave her, but I feel she is in good hands. Luckily, I'm only working part time, so I still have some days at home with my girl!

Triple Playdate

On August 1st, Abigail invited her two friends, Caroline and Emmaline, over for a play date. Their moms, Martha and Beki, are friends of mine from church, and it just so happened we all became pregnant right around the same time. It was great having two close buddies to go through the pregnancy with! Our little girls have a special bond from early on and have had several get togethers already! Abigail, Caroline, and Emmaline were baptized together on August 14th, 2011. We wanted to have one last get together with all three before the big day!

Moms and Babies

By the time we set up the camera for a timed shot and got babies in laps, we weren't able to get all three girls to look at the camera at the same time, but this will do! Emmaline's got the idea, Caroline and Abigail apparently have something to say to one another.

Caroline (14 weeks), Abigail (16 weeks), and Emmaline (10 weeks). This is pretty much it! Once these girls get older, I'm sure they will have a lot of fun actually playing with each another. But look how excited Caroline is. . . she's cheering!

The girls were very good and amused themselves while we ate lunch.

Comparisons

Look at the differences: 3 days and 3 months

One person in these pictures is really changing!

Abigail Update

At three months, Abby likes to:
-grab toys and put them in her mouth
-pass toys from hand to hand
-shake a rattle
-bat at toys with her hands or her feet
-put as many fingers in her mouth as possible, and she has recently been spotted putting her foot in her mouth!
-smile, squeal, and most recently LAUGH!!! We are most excited about this!
-she finally likes reading (thank goodness); she will actually sit in your lap & look at the pages where before she had no interest.
-sit for short periods of time (with someone holding her body) and hold her head up
-AND, for the grand finale. . . she said mama! Well. . . actually she said the sounds "mmmmm" and "ma". . . "ma". . . I'd like to think it was in reference to me!



Who doesn't love warm laundry right out of the dryer?
We had to give Abby the warm laundry experience.

She's at it again!

Abigail is not only getting better at tummy time, but she is rolling over! She rolled over at 11 weeks, but we think this might have been a fluke. She rolled once, then stopped. She hasn't been able to repeatedly roll over until now (this was 15 weeks). It's still very sporadic, and rolling isn't her favorite thing to do, but as you can see here, she's got it down! I love how she looks behind her to make sure the coast is clear before she comes crashing over!

Tummy Time

Abigail is getting better and better at tummy time. She used to really hate being on her tummy. Now, she tolerates it quite well, and might even enjoy it just a little bit. . . at first. . .

Beach Bound?

Well, we have no plans to go to the beach, but Abigial is ready! She had to try on her swimsuit and sunglasses!

No more photos, please!

First Story time

On Wednesday, July 20th, Abby went to her first story time at her MiMi's library! Abby's MiMi, (Joy), is head of the Children's department at her library and each Wednesday morning, she does story time. This was a very exciting time for Mimi. She was very proud to show off her grand daughter to her co-workers. This Wednesday the theme was "the ocean". Abby was a very good girl, she sat and listened to MiMi tell several stories about walking on the beach and swimming with dolphins. Then she made her first craft - a paper plate clam! Well, I might have helped a little bit. . .

Smiley Girl!

After a grill out with friends Sunday night, we spent some time hanging out with Abigail on the couch. Rich read her The Cat in the Hat, and we made it all the way through (that's a long book for a 3 month old!). She has actually been quite smiley all day today, (mostly with Daddy). Here are some cute smiles we caught on tape! We can't wait for that first laugh!

Abigail Reads!

We know she's advanced for her age, but reading already?!?! Watch Abigail turn the page.

Playdate!

Abigail and Caroline met for their 2nd play date! Their first play date, we just laid them beside each other and they rolled away from each other. This time we put the girls beside each other and they reached over and held hands all on their own!





Abby is quite content with fingers in mouth and ring in hand.

4th of July

Abby's First Independence Day! We already know baby girl is quite the independent woman since she's been sleeping soundly night after night in her big girl bed since week 2! She also has moments where she prefers to be on her mat playing by herself than being held! (sad!)Baby girl is growing up! Anyhow, this 4th we celebrated our country's independence by getting dressed up in a cute red, white, and blue dress, posing by the flag, visiting MiMi and PaPa, then going downtown to Daddy's office to watch the fireworks from a VERY close proximity. Daddy's office is on the 30th floor of the L&C tower, right beside the river where the fireworks were being shot off. We had a front row view! Abby was actually sleeping soundly in her pack n play in a back room when the 9:30pm fireworks show started. We had a great time!

1 month, 2 months, 3 Months Old!

1 Month Old



2 Months Old


3 Months Old

Here is baby girl at 3 months old!

Gardening!

Mom and Dad, (Grandmama & Grandaddy) came into town for visit #4. Ever since Abby came along, we are finding that Memphis just isn't all that far away! These grandparents are smitten and will drive hundreds of miles to see this little girl! Abby is always #1, however, this trip Mom and Dad spent some time helping Rich and me start our garden. Rich and I have been wanting to get a garden started out back, and thanks to Mom and Dad and their green thumbs, we did it! We weeded one weekend, then Rich laid the garden border the next, then planted plants the next weekend.

There were a lot of weeds to dig up.


Mom helped out a lot!


Rich puts in the border.


Look at this border - Great job Rich!


Lantana, tropical dwarf canna, knockout roses, and herbs!

Father's Day

Father's Day weekend for Rich started out on Saturday with a big omelet breakfast and coffee out of his new "Super Dad" mug. Abby surprised Dad with her "I Love Daddy" shirt and a book with pictures of just her and Daddy for his first Father's Day. The rest of the day was spent playing with Abigail. Sunday, actual Father's Day, was Abigail's first trip to church. She had fun in the nursery while mom and dad sat nervously in the pew during the service wondering if everything would be alright! It would have been perfect if she slept from 11-12, right through the service. However, when we went to pick her up the caregiver told us, "she's been asleep for five minutes". Great! So, the rest of the day didn't run so smoothly since she missed her morning nap, but nevertheless, we were glad to get back to church. Next week was better - she slept 30 minutes!







Here is a video of Abigail playing on her play mat.