sleepy baby

Normally Kaitlin is a tummy sleeper (one arm on each side). I peaked in on her before I went to bed and found her laying like this. Her arm HAD to have fallen asleep. And notice the multiple pacifiers I put in her crib so she can find them on her own in the middle of the night (which doesn't always work).

bix weekend

We packed up and headed back to Iowa last weekend so Bryan could run in the Bix. For those of you that haven't heard of the Bix, it's a 7-mile race that's pretty much all hills! Bryan did really well for his first time and came in just under 55-minutes. Unfortunately it was really rainy and thundering so Kelly and I left Kaitlin and Gavin at the house with Grandma.


Here's so pictures of Kaitlin and Gavin when we went to go see the horses that are down the street from my parent's house. Of course they weren't outside...again. Maybe next time.

Here's a great shot of Kaitlin's hair. It's growing pretty fast and also getting a bit darker.

I'm waiting for Kelly to send me a few more photos to upload to this post.

9 months

It's getting harder and harder to get this kid to sit still (and not try to crawl off the chair) for a photo.

This is one of the few pictures you can kind of see her first tooth.

SLEEP:
Kaitlin is still going down around 6:30/7 pm and has been sleeping until 6/6:30 am (on most mornings). She will occasionally wake up 1x a night. I have been able to let her cry it out and she'll fall back asleep after about 7 minutes or so. Sometimes we will go in and pop in the pacifier but I've been leaving a few in her crib hoping that she can find one herself. We have been trying not to feed her a bottle in the middle of the night. If she wakes up between 4:30-5:30 am I will change her and feed her a bottle and try to put her back down. Most mornings this works and she'll sleep until 6/6:30 am.

FOOD:
I have started giving Kaitlin a "dinner" feeding on most nights. Over the last week or so Kaitlin seems to fight the pureed baby food and seems way more interested in the finger foods (but the nanny says she can get K to eat a jar of purees just fine). She has been eating stage 2 foods for almost 3 months. I tried a stage 3 jar and she didn't like the chunkiness and spit it out. She seems pretty picky on what types of finger foods she will eat. She has rejected steamed carrots, mango, pasta and fresh tomatoes. She gags and spits them back out. I'm assuming she's not into the texture (although she loves playing with all these items). She seems to eat pretty much any type of bread product. She will also eat puffs, cheerios, toast, pancakes, banana, hash browns and cut up meatballs. Raspberries are a hit/miss on if she'll eat them. I'm going to try to introduce some cheese chunks soon and I keep giving her the items she doesn't like. One of these days she'll eat them.

I'm wondering if we should give up the purees soon and move strictly to finger foods. My only concern is that she doesn't eat nearly as much finger foods as she would purees. That's on my list to talk to the doctor about next week. I do find that if I can distract her with a cheerio or a second spoon I can shove down a few spoonfuls of puree. But I'm not sure how much longer I can "trick" her.

CLOTHING:
Kaitlin is mostly wearing 6-9 months. She's able to fit into a few 12 months items and a few 3-6 month dresses still. The size 2/3 diapers fit her nicely and we've been pretty much been using Pampers (found a great deal and stocked up for the next few months).

MILESTONES:
- Her first tooth finally came through this month.
- Starting clapping
- Started waving bye-bye

finger foods & sippy cups

Kaitlin's really has gotten the hang of finger foods and drinking from the sippy cup.

I just watched this video after I posted it on the blog and I didn't realize how loud our washer is.

babbling

Here's Kaitlin talking away.

gavin turns 3

Over the weekend we headed to Racine to celebrate Gavin's 3rd birthday. We ended up staying the night and having a big slumber party. In about a month (or less), Gavin will be a big brother!

Here's a few pictures from the weekend. These first photos my sister took with her new camera.

In case you're wondering, that's bark she's holding ;-)

She's really good at pulling herself to stand up.

And she's also really good at putting everything in her mouth.

The boys had fun throwing water balloons.

Gavin and Gus playing in the pool. This was pre-poop in the pool. :-)

Grandma and Kaitlin

Gavin was too intimidated by everyone singing "Happy Birthday" so he didn't blow out his candles the first time.

feeding schedule - 8.5 months

Okay I'm posting this more for future reference and I figured this is probably the easiest place to find it.


We are starting to introduce a 3rd solid feeding. So our feeding schedule is somewhat like this:

5:30- 6:30 am: 4-6 oz bottle
7:30- 8:00 am: fruits mixed with oatmeal or cerea
10:30 am-ish: bottle after morning nap (nanny gives bottle)
11:30 - noon: veggies or veggie with meat (sometimes mixed with cereal if she doesn't have any in the morning with fruit)
2:30-3:00-ish: bottle after afternoon nap
5:30-ish: veggie/fruit blend (just started introducing a 3rd solid feeding and so far I've done fruit/veggie blend, but will probably alternate fruit or veggie)
6:30-7:00 pm: 5-6 oz before bedtime

This morning gave Kaitlin oatmeal/fruit and introduced buttered toast. She's got the pincher pick up down but she likes to play with her food rather than put it in her mouth. Of course all the toys and other stuff goes into her mouth but not the food. She has dropped down from 25-30 oz to 18 oz that I noted the other day. I'm going to fully keep track for a few more days so I can let the ped know when we go for her 9 mo visit.

Many of our friends who have taken their babies to their 9 month visit have gotten the go ahead to eat pretty much any type of table food (with a few exceptions). So that's what I'm anticipating in a few weeks at Kaitlin's 9 month appointment. So I see no more baby food (purees) in our near future.

july 4th weekend

Ooops I realize I never posted this from the July 4th weekend.

Better late than never, I guess.

Kaitlin and daddy after his run. She really wanted his Gatorade.

tooth

Kaitlin finally had a tooth break through this past weekend. Poor thing was miserable one day this weekend. It was seriously like a light switch with her moods that day. But overall (knock on wood) she has been in really good spirits.

You can feel the tip of the tooth that has broken through but and if you're lucky she'll let you see it (she sticks her tongue over it when you try to peak at it). Once it comes in all the way I'll have to snap a photo. I'll miss that gummy smile of hers!

a few pictures from june

We were back in Iowa last weekend for a wedding. We stopped at my parent's house the night before and Kaitlin got to go swimming in their backyard. She loved splashing around and of course biting the toy boats!

All ready for Kenzie & Mike's wedding in Iowa City.

Kaitlin stealing Colton's binky. I love seeing the progression with the photos.

Colton: "hey, give that back!"

Kaitlin: "it's all mine now."

8 months

SLEEP:
No big changes in sleep in the last month.

FOOD:
We have introduced various meat (turkey, beef, chicken) and some new veggies (spinach, avocado) and all in puree form. She’s still eating solids 2x per day and will most likely increase it to 3x per day soon. Kaitlin has gotten used to texture of smashed foods like bananas. She hasn’t quite gotten the puffs from the table to her mouth by herself but she knows to open up wide when you give them to her. We’ve also given her some teething biscuits.

We have been giving Kaitlin her sippy cup with water in it from time to time. She loves tipping it back and chewing on the spout. We’re not sure how much water she’s getting (verses what is spilling out).

CLOTHING:
I have packed up most of Kaitlin’s 3-6 month clothes. She fits nicely in most of her 6-9 month items. We will need to move her to 12 month sleepers soon because she’s so long. We are using up the last of the size 2 diapers and will be putting her in size 2/3’s (the 3’s are still a little big) and she is still wearing the size 3 Huggie overnight diapers. I’m guessing she weighs between 17-18 lbs.

MILESTONES:
- She is very good at moving from sitting to crawling, to standing and back down to sitting
- She’s a very fast crawler:-)
- She is pulling herself up on everything and starting to cruise around the furniture (and moves back and forth from the table to couch to toys)
- Loves to walk around while holding your fingers
- She has started to say more sounds
- Still no signs of teeth (but Ruth swears they are right there). I had a dream the two bottom ones came in, does that count?
- Started using the word “no” with her (she’s in the cat food/water bowls) – is that a milestone? ;-)
- She plays with a ball and chases it around the house