Almost 11 months

Well, where has the last 11 {on friday} gone???

Ms. Madaelyn, you are quite incredible. 

You are crawling {for a while now}, cruising, curious, careful, and content. 

Last week your top two teeth erupted!  You have a total of 4 teeth now {2 on top, 2 on  bottom}.  It seems to take them 2 months {where you are bothered by them off and on} to "pop through" so to speak.

Food, you are loving food now!  You eat a variety of foods, made by yours truly.  I have just introduced meat {chicken} to you {yesterday} because I refused to puree meat. GROSS!!! {you're welcome}.  You enjoyed it.  You are also eating avacado, sweet potato, banana, peaches, mangos, apples {any kind}, pears, watermelon, string  beans, carrots, puffs {banana, sweet potato, kale/green veges, apple strawberry}, potato, crackers, pizza crust, plums, pretzels....I'm sure I'm missing some.  You are a good eater!

You have become quite vocal recently. You are starting to use words with meaning now.  You have known kitty cat and doggy for a while, but now you are starting to repeat your verion of words when I describe things to you.  It is brilliant!

And dancing! How can I not mention dancing?! 

You love music.  We always have it on. 

 I think when you go to school you may get there and ask the teacher where the music is.  You will even crawl over to the radio, turn it on and start dancing.  I love it. 

 Your dancing has evolved, as the rest of your gross and fine motor skills have.  You have evolved from holding a hand up to holding both hands up, to bouncing, to bouncing with both hands up, and now you will stand up and shake your booty with a hand in the air.  It is quite fascinating for me to see you dance the same way I do. We sure have a lot of fun.  Work it girl!

More to come on our recent adventures to the zoo, Penns Landing, and the Beach!

first boo boo.

 

so it happened. Madaelyn had her first real boo boo.

a busted lip.

how does an 8 month old baby get a busted lip?

{by sneezing in her stroller and face planting on the bar that goes across the front.}

Remember those 2 teeth I told you about? yup. those pearly whites.

…

Well they happen to be sharp enough to cut her lower lip. ouch.

Thankfully it was nothing more than a fat lip. I know that it is only the beginning of many bumps and bruises to come as Madaelyn becomes more mobile.  {it doesn’t help that the girl has no fear. seriously. she laughs hysterically when she “falls” into my arms off of the couch, or my knees, or anything higher up.} On the one hand I am so proud of her bravery that she is willing to explore and learn about her surroundings.  She has her mind set to walk.  I think by 10 months she will be toddling around independently.  However, it is a little nerve wrecking to know that your child will hurt herself.

Madaelyn’s bravery is mostly shown in her walking around.  She is certain to know exactly where I am in a room at anytime. I call it her momdar. {mom+radar=momdar}.

Something else that is incredible is that I think I actually felt pain for her when this event occurred. It was more than empathy, yet I was not actually bleeding. No one can truly explain how connected you feel to your child. It is quite an amazing attachment. As a nurse I am around people who can be in great amounts of pain and I fortunately am able {usually} to help dissipate that pain.  I empathize with my patients, but never to this extent.

Another learning curve for the 1st year of motherhood; pregnancy {if you recall mine was not so smooth} was only the beginning of the emotional roller coaster you feel as a mother.  Boo boo’s may even hurt you more than your child.

So, here’s to hoping I get a little tougher skin for when my baby girl has her next boo boo {please don’t be anything severe}.  Because, I refuse to be that Mom who has no furniture so her child does not get hurt.  She has to learn that hitting her face on a hard object is going to hurt, but please lets not have any more blood, and can we do it so it only hurts a little bit, you know, enough to learn the lesson but no any real damage?. lets all hope.

shutterbug

 

Fellow Momma’s {children, cats, and dog Momma’s} do you find that you take an obscene amount of pictures?

I literally had a handful shy of 500 pictures on my phone.

500.

I may have an addiction.  It doesn’t help that 90% of them are of Madaelyn and the girl doesn’t take a bad picture {complete mom bias here.  the blurry ones aren’t great, and there are ones where she is beyond cute. not just cute}

I hate deleting them from my phone.

Confession: I still have pictures of her on the day she was born on my phone.

 

Is that weird? I love her so much I hate deleting the pictures.

Thankfully they are all in digital format. otherwise I would be a serious hoarder of photographs. 

But, you see, they are useful for memories {and she is growing so fast. please baby girl, slow it down just a smidge} and many end up on here.

Plus, my phone is almost always within reach when she does something super cute and my camera is not.

 

Here are some of my {recently {within the past month} taken} favorites:

baby food

 

Madaelyn is now eating 3 square meals a day, and breast feeding 4-5 times a day.  I started introducing real foods at 6 months.  It was a struggle for me.  She is a champ and eats well so far.  I decided to make her babyfood. 

Making her baby food has been a rewarding experience for me.

1. I know what is in the food. No preservatives or any other crap.

2. I save a lot of $.  It is expensive

3. I like to cook and it super easy to make.

                  

 

Currently Madaelyn has a menu of bananas {which I started giving to her whole as well}, apples {gala, yellow, green, red..a wide variety}, pears, carrots, string beans, cauliflower, sweet potatoes, and regular potatoes. 

She also eats oatmeal (the baby kind), Mum-Mum rice crisps, teething cookies {not real cookies}, soft pretzel nuggets that are frozen with the salt scraped off {super great for teething}, apple slice {no skin}, and puffs {we are still working on the pincer grasp so it’s a little messy. winston is thankful for the mess}

We also recently introduced yogurt.  I was worried about this because when she has to get supplemented with formula {when I am working..sadly I do not pump enough} she has to have soy because the regular formula gave her horrible gas pains and green poop/diarrhea..yuck. {sorry if that was tmi} and she has been tolerating it well so far.  It is a great dinner.  She is getting stonyfield organic baby yogurt.  complete with a fruit and vegetable added to it. perfect balanced dinner.

yum.

So I have not been so motivated to cook in light of things going on. {read divorce} With the nice weather that has been around recently I have been inspired to cook again.  

Recently I have made hummus and tabouli.  

so. good.

I also made a moroccan carrot salad.  it is the perfect salad for summertime when you don’t want to cook. 

you simply get 1lb carrots.  if you are feeling super lazy buy the carrots already shredded.

add a decent amount of cilantro I prefer fresh, 1 tbsp cumin, 1/2 tbsp cayenne pepper {be careful, this is spicy}  1/4 cup olive oil, and a 3 tbsp little lemon juice.

mix together.

voila. moroccan carrot salad.

super refreshing and easy.

teeth.

ahem.  my little girl has teeth.  the bottom ones. 2 of them.

seriously?!

{for the record I think that teething may be one of the worst parts of parenting so far. thankfully no one remember it.  it’s the little consolation I have for myself}

I have tried to document this with failed success.  

When I get a good shot of those brand new chompers I will certainly share.

The first tooth erupted 1 day after Madaelyn’s 8 month birthday. 10 days later its neighbor popped up.

and there you have it. 2 bottom teeth.  I believe she is working on the top 2 now.

a little of this.

 

      

Girlfriend is 8 months old!  We’ve missed a few postings.  But we are finally getting into a routine. 2 naps a day!! This is a quite a feat if you know Ms. Madaelyn.  and those naps are about an hour long!! {okay, okay, sometimes she fools me and only sleeps for 15 mins…we all have our days}

I think that I have an amazon child.  she is 8 months old and fastly outgrowing her 12 month clothes.  Truly, I have moved to 18 month clothes. yikes.  this happened in the process of a month..growth spurt between 7/8months I thought that 9 months was supposed to be the next one?!

{oh, and we can stand, pull up, roll from belly to back, and just be awesome in general, as evidenced by her awesome leg warmers}

Anyways it is absolutely gorgeous her in the Philly area.  77 degrees today. and its march. {jackpot} 

Our day was filled with sunshine and fresh air. Not these pictures, because those ones are not uploaded, but I love pictures and I hope you like seeing these.