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Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Splash Park

Between her first teeth and a case of separation anxiety, Hannah's not been in the best of moods lately.  Daniel and I wanted to treat her to something fun.  Well, we thought it'd be fun.  It's one of those things where we get so excited about introducing Hannah to a new toy or experience and it turns out to be more exciting for us than her.  One of my friends had taken her daughter, a month older than Hannah to a splash park and she looked happy in the photos, so on Sunday, we thought we'd give it a whirl.  Afterall, Hannah loves to splash in her bath and makes our kitchen into a splash park of sorts when we bathe her.
First job was to coat little red headed Hannah in sun screen.  I covered every inch of her to where her fair skin turned two shades fairer.  What this first time mom forgot is that sunscreen on hands goes on the face to collect more sunscreen, then into the eyes.  Poor Hannah's eyes swelled to a point she wouldn't even open them.  She just sobbed.  I felt horrible.  She was so uncomfortable.  A rash grew on her forehead, too.  We still reckoned that the splash park would provide a distraction for her and hopefully keep her from rubbing those eyes.  Poor girl fell asleep in the car on the way over.







What a nice park we went too!  We'll definitely return.  When Hannah isn't traumatized that is.  She spent the whole time there staring at the ground.  No smile.  No emotion at all.  Just stared.  Meanwhile I squealed like a banshee and clapped like a seal to try to make things exciting and get a rise out of her.  Nope.  I'm sure the onlookers were quite entertained, though.
Is this supposed to be fun?



Are we having fun yet?

This is as close as she came to a smile

At least my bathing suit is entertaining

Aww...there's a smile!

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Mountain Time!

Hannah made her first trip to North Carolina and got to spend time with Grandmommy, Granddaddy, Aunt Sarah, and Aunt Lisa.  We spend a week at a condo in Blowing Rock and had a great time!  Grandmommy got to babysit some while Daniel and I got to do some adventurous things--horse back riding, fly fishing, and white water rafting.  Hannah also got to go swimming for the first time.  She loved it!
Hannah on Daddy's back

See how much she enjoyed hiking?

Hannah?  Can you breathe?

Hiking in comfort

We hiked to Linville Falls.


Proud Aunt Sarah watching the sleeping baby

Reading with Granddaddy

Hannah loves her Aunt Lisa.

Aunties showing Hannah how to wear shoes and a hair bow

Chilling in the rain with Grandmommy while mom and dad fly fish

Daniel's brown trout

Me and my rainbow trout.  More impressive in person :)

Rocking the waders!

Eight Months!


It’s been fun this month to really see Hannah’s brain at work!  I love the way she grabs anything within her reach, picks it up, rotates it, studies it, feels it, claps it between her hands, and talks about it.  She particularly loves paper products.  The reason we can let her play with a straw wrapper, tortilla chip, or crayon baggie?  She doesn’t stick a thing in her mouth.  I thought all babies explored with their mouths.  Maybe she’s just not at that stage yet, but she lets her fingers do all of the work.  I love how she’s fascinated by the simplest things.

Hannah’s “words” now have consonants at the beginning of them.  She loves to say “da, da, da, da” and her da-da loves to hear it!  I’ve heard “ma” a time or two.  We sign up, eat, all done, bath, mom, and dad to her.  She knows the sign for up and gets very excited and puts her arms out to the side when we use it.  Daniel and I have each heard her say the word “up” at an appropriate time.  She also uses “uh oh” correctly on occasion.

When I pick Hannah up, she feels so big!  I think the solids have been adding weight to her.  I no longer tote her around in her car seat.  That got way too heavy.  Especially since she sits up for long periods of time, we now use high chairs in restaurants and put her in the cart at the store.  She’ll eat anything Gerber packages, minus meat, green veggies, and prunes.  My attempts at making food didn’t cut it for Hannah.  She isn’t a messy eater.  The mess is usually one I create by getting too much food on the spoon.  Speaking of messes, it’s been a long time since we’ve used Oxyclean for the down below dirties.  That seems to have stopped shortly after solids were introduced.  Coincidence?  I think not.

Hannah gets great pleasure out of splashing around in her bath, sitting on her car, giving Hannah hugs, and watching Daddy walk in the door after a day of work.  She loves rolling back and forth in her crib and playing with her stuffed animals and mirror. 

This month wasn’t all fun and games.  On Monday, June 27th, something clicked and Hannah decided she didn’t like bedtime.  For a week, I coddled her, rocked her, read to her, gave her Tylenol, even fed her to sleep and unsuccessfully snuck her into bed, and eventually slept with her.  After doing this for a week, including through the trip to Nashville, I stopped making excuses for her and decided to use the CIO method--parent lingo for “cry it out.”  Now, this new bedtime dilemma also coincides with Hannah’s general dislike for being left alone.  She prefers for you to be right by her side, or she’ll whine.  A lot.  Then start to cry.  That’s why my house is messy, but I digress.  The first night, Hannah CIOed for 20 mins.  Not too bad, but still heartbreaking.  The second night was even longer.  Forty minutes.  The third night….what?  Hannah’s a quick learner!  That’s right…no more crying.  Back to bed without fuss at 7:30!  That’s not to say all’s been perfect.  Another week of travel and some teething made for a few middle of the night wake up calls, but nothing serious.  I have my perfect sleeper back!  And averaging 2.5 to 3 hour naps now!  Woo hoo!  But don’t expect my house to be clean.

We did have to make our first “sick” visit to the doctor this month.  Hannah started making a sound like she was gasping for air.  Her face would remain calm, as if it didn’t affect her at all, but it scared us.  It was just an occasional thing, usually when she got excited, but also happened once in her sleep that I know of.  Even though I didn’t think it was anything, I know I needed to do my due diligence and take her to the doctor.  Turns out every baby’s wind pipe take a while to develop and hers just happens to make sounds while it matures.  Dr. G. encouraged us to not react to this sound as she was getting attention from doing it.  Bedtime blues, no independent play, sounds to attract attention…sounds like a form of separation anxiety to me!  The sounds have completely stopped.  Hannah’s pretty trainable!



Friday, July 8, 2011

Nashville!

Hannah will get to see all of her grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins this month!  Her first opportunity was our long weekend trip to Nashville.


Cousin Aaron loves taking care of Baby Hannah

The girls teaching Baby Hannah how to play with a doll


Where's Baby Hannah?

3 of Hannah's cousins.  Check out our Grandma-made 4th of July outfits!

The girls doing a good job supporting Baby Hannah.



Hannah also gets to play with her cousins' toys!  We had no idea she'd be big enough to support and push herself on her very own car.  She loved it so much she struck quite a few poses!
Wanna ride?

Putting it in reverse
Bang!  Gotcha!


Kung Fu Hannah!
Am I cute, or what?

Daddy's telling me how much he likes my outfit

Happy Father's Day!

Daddy wasn't feeling well on Father's Day, but we still managed to get a few shots.  It's so fun seeing how much Hannah loves her Daddy, and visa versa.  This week at bedtime, I was holding Hannah in the rocking chair and she was almost asleep.  Daniel came in from a business trip and I was trying to keep Hannah aroused enough so he could kiss her.  As soon as she heard his voice, she snapped to life, flashed a huge grin, sprang into his arms, and gave him a Hannah hug.  It was hard to get her to sleep after that excitement, but totally worth it.