6 Months Old

We have a six month old on our hands and she is cuter than ever!  

Ten on Tuesday

1.  The kids have been out of school for a week or so now, but since we had an insane amount of snow this past winter, the teachers are stuck making it up with endless inservice time.  It's horrible. I am used to being on my feet all day, interacting with kids and (for the most part) being in charge of my time, so sitting and being lectured at day after day is getting old.  I just want to be home with my kids!

2. It has been HOT, HOT, HOT here, like 95 degrees or hotter.  I can't wait to be finally, finally, done school so that I can take full advantage of all of our YMCA pool privileges.  

3. I got free tickets to a Reading Fightin' Phils game as part of their educator appreciation night.  When it came time to go it was in the 90's, I was tired and not really feeling that into it.  I tried to convince Isaac that it would be fun to skip it, but he is soooo into baseball and he was determined we would still go. 

 Isaac really enjoyed himself which made it worth it in the end.  As Ryan pointed out, everything is always about Hannah now, so it was nice to do something that was just for Isaac. He choose a spot very close to where the pitchers warmed up and they tossed him a ball.  He really seemed to enjoy the night, so I was glad we went after all.

4. I received a disturbing phone call at work.  Apparently someone hit this guy's car and left my cell phone number in a note on his windshield.  Thankfully Ryan is a cellphone expert and was able to block his number so he can't reach me again.  Scary!

5. Isaac is spending all next week at my parents house.  He is attending a basketball camp there and doing some other fun stuff.  I know he is really looking forward to it.  

6.  I am so excited that some of shows are back.  I watched The Fosters last night but I am waiting for Ryan to be home to watch Switched at Birth.  I need a new show to binge watch while I organize a bunch of papers and file boxes I brought home from school. 

7. Saffron wants to be wherever Hannah is. 

I don't know why, since Hannah regularly rips out huge clumps of Saffron's fur.  It must be her motherly instinct.  It would be cute, if it wasn't so annoying.

7.  I don't think I have mentioned it on the blog yet, but Little League is FINALLY OVER.  I don't have a commitment every Friday and Saturday!!  Wahoo!!!!!

8. Now if only I could somehow get Cub Scouts off my plate.  They told me that they are looking for someone to replace me... but it doesn't seem like they are looking too hard. 

9. I am so boring I can barely come up with ten things.  

10. One more day of inservice left.  One... more.. day...

Taking stock

 Things have been slow here on the blog lately.  I have had laptop issues.  As in, my laptop currently looks like this:

 I really need to drop it off at IT but there always seems to be just one more thing I need to finish before I drop it off.  So anyways, I haven't been bringing it home, and blogging from my phone or tablet is just not as easy.

We have all been sick at our house. We all assumed it was allergies but it turned out I had a sinus infection, and Ryan had bronchitis. Hannah was quite miserable for a few days and Isaac never slows down but he has gone through two boxes of tissues in his bedroom.

We finally finished up baseball season (cue Hallelujah chorus). 

Isaac's team only had two real wins during the seasons, but things starting clicking in the playoffs and they ended up advancing pretty far in the tournament.   Isaac ended up getting the game ball for their last game-- he had 2 hits, including a home run!  He has really enjoyed baseball this year, and, although it hasn't been my favorite, I think we will probably play next year. 

 

This little chubba wubba is still charming us all.  It's a good thing she is ridiculous cute and loveable during the day, because she has been HORRIBLE at night.  

Ryan's parents moved out, so we were able to move Hannah out of the pack and play in our bedroom and into a real crib in her own room.  I thought this would help her sleep better since the pack and play is very small and wobbly and it always felt like we were startling her awake moving about our bedroom in the evenings or in the mornings as I am getting ready for work.  

However, it has been the complete opposite!  She went from waking up once, sometimes twice a night to waking up 5-7 times a night.  She used to be fine if I popped the binky in her mouth and hopped back in bed, but now she screams until I pick her up and rock her.  I don't know if she is scared, or lonely, or what, but it is EXHAUSTING.   Multiple people at school have commented on how out of it I have been.  I need an IV line of diet coke to keep on. I am trying to muddle through till the end of the year (today is the last day with kids, and then I have a week of inservice time) and then I am going to do some sort of baby sleeping boot camp with Hannah.  I don't know what that will look like yet, but we have to get her on track.  Suggestions welcome.

Speaking of school I received this really nice letter from a former student of mine.  She wasn't one of my IEP kiddos, but she and the regular ed teacher really clashed. 

 

It meant a lot to me that she would write that to me this year.

That's about it for now.  Summer vacation is SO CLOSE I can taste it!

Sibling Milestone

On Sunday I heard the first, "Mom!  Hannah's bothering me!!!" while Isaac was trying to play on his iPad.  The first of many times I am sure I will hear that. 

Hannah's 5 Month Update

Oh Hannah Banana!  Stop growing!!!

 So as you can see from the picture, she has all of a sudden gotten HUGE.  At her well visit last month they said she weighs 17 lbs  which is 90th percentile and she is 96th percentile for height.  Suddenly carrying her in the carseat carrier is hard work and it seems like her fat rolls have fat rolls now.   She is wearing a lot of 6 months clothes and some of her 6 month sleepers are even getting to be too small.  She is in size 3 diapers also.  I bought a pack by mistake and then realized they probably fit her better than size 2 after all.

She is still a very happy and easy going baby.   She loves attention from anyone and still loves to cuddle.


Sleeping

Her sleeping is still hit or miss.  She is still up several times a night (boo, hiss) but we are working on having her fall asleep at night on her own initially by putting her down when she is sleepy but not asleep.  She is doing pretty well with it.  We are also working on keeping her in her bed all night.  I wish she would sleep for longer stretches.  This coming month we will (finally!) be getting her out of the pack and play and into a crib, so I am hoping that helps.  Her napping is feast or famine.  She will either take only brief catnaps or will sleep for three straight hours.

Eating
She is doing well with eating baby foods.

 Most of the foods she has tried so far are ones I have made for her.  It's so much cheaper.  She has liked pretty much everything she tried.  To date she has eaten:

• Pears
• Bananas
• Sweet Potatoes
• Peas
• Avocado
• Peaches- she was crazy about these.  Like, she grabbed the spoon with both hands and was cramming it into her mouth. 

Milestones

Her biggest accomplishment this month is sitting up.  She is still a bit wobbly but she can hold herself steady for longer and longer periods of time.  She suddenly looks like such a big girl sitting up and playing with toys.  Of course, all of the toys go straight to her mouth.

She is babbling all the time and really experimenting using her voice.  This month she started making an excited "Eeee!" noise.  I have even heard her throwing some consonants in the mix when she is babbling to herself.

She has no teeth yet and is still drooling like crazy.  Buckets and buckets of drool.  It is my biggest laundry challenge to keep enough bibs clean for her, because she goes through so many each day.

She is able to keep herself amused for longer periods now.  If the mood strikes her right she will keep herself busy in the excersaucer or on her playmat with toys for up to 20 minutes.

Likes

• Trying to sit and stand up whenever she can.
• Her jumper.  Especially now that Grandma replaced the batteries and it is very noisy again. 
• DADDY.  She gets so excited whenever she sees him.  When I have her in the bed with me and he is still sleeping she scoots herself up to him and bats at his face, trying to wake him up and get his attention.  She gets so excited when he comes home from work and she thinks everything he says or does is HILARIOUS.
• Her toes/feet.  She is always grabbing for them, pulling off her socks and has even stuffed her toes in her mouth.

Dislikes

• Being alone or thinking she is alone
• Reclining.  She will always try to sit up now when she is in the bouncing seat or if she is not strapped into her carrier.
• She was not too crazy about bubbles either.

Ryan's Birthday

Rain cancelled baseball Friday, so Isaac was able to meet up with my brother Joe at Arnold's Go Karts. He had inherited a gift card from a coworker. Isaac had a blast with him.  I was a bit lonely at home on a Friday night with no Isaac and no Ryan.  Isaac didn't come home until after 10 o'clock!  Miss Banana happened to be up, so Joe got to squeeze in some time with her.  He calls her a meatball, which is pretty apt these days.

Saturday Isaac had a baseball game.  My dad drove in to see it and to keep me company since Ryan was working.  It was a nice spring day and afterwards he was able to come back to the house for a bit to fix something of Isaac's.

Isaac then went to spend some time with his dad and Banana and I headed into the city to see my friend Becca and her baby Wolfie (and yes, our kids have normal names like Hannah and William and we just chose to refer to them by bizarre nicknames.)  Her neighborhood was hosting the Kinetic Derby (you can read about our adventures at the Derby last year here).  We missed the actual race but there was still live music, booths, and food trucks.  We did catch this one biking away.  There were pictures on the panels that created a mini-movie as the cylinder spun. 

Then Hannah and I were off to meet Ryan at the Phillies game.  Ryan had asked to go to a rock concert for his birthday, but I feel like I am too old to be on my feet all night, listening to screaming and elbowing my way through crowds of middle schoolers.  His second choice was a Phillies game.  Baseball games are usually my personal hell, but I did it for Ryan.  I felt bad going to a MLB game without Isaac, but they had a special promotion going that if you brought a canned good you got a voucher for a free ticket.  Ryan said that he will use the vouchers to take Isaac.  We had some interesting characters around us and in true Ryan fashion he had made friends with all of them by the end of the game.  This was my favorite photo of the night.

  

 

Total photobomb for our family selfie. I could see him in the view finder, hence my cracking up but I guess Ryan didn't see him.  The ushers took a special liking to Hannah.  They arranged for the Phanavision guy to put Hannah on the big screen.  He did a close up of her little round face.  A coworker of mine was at the game and texted me that she saw us.

As usual, Hannah was ridiculously good and seemed to love looking around at all of the action. 

The next day we did church, picked up Isaac and did a soccer scrimmage.    We rounded out the weekend with a cake and candles. 

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Happy Birthday Ryan!  We love you so much!

catch up

Hannah had her four month well visit.  She did great.  The doctor confirmed what we already knew-- she is a chubby wubby-- at 17 lbs she is 90th percentile for weight and 96% for length.  The doctor feels like she is strong and was impressed at how much she was babbling.

 

She is driving me crazy at night though.  She is up over and over.  I am not sure if it is a teething thing, if it has to do with the sniffles she has had the past few days, if it is because she is really outgrowing the pack and play, or a combination of everything. Whatever the reason, it is leaving me exhausted.

Friday night we went up to Dorney Park, a local amusement park.  Ryan had got us season passes as a Christmas present.  Isaac went on his first really intense rollercoaster:

and I got to hang with this cutie:

Saturday was nonstop running around.  We had Ryan's kids with us and Allison and Isaac both had baseball games.  We watched quite a bit of Isaac's game from under the shelter of an umbrella since we were caught in a terrible downpour. 

Sunday was a lovely Mother's Day.  All of the kids trekked out to my mom's house.  I wish I would have taken some more pictures.  She had bought trays and trays of plants and flowers and we all potted planters to take home. 

We also watched some basketball, tried out the new basketball hoop dad and Joe just installed, had a lovely meal and then finished off the night with The Great Dalmuti, a new card game mom and dad introduced us to.  It was a lot of fun and I am sad to see the weekend end.