Gettin' Crafty

In honor of a dear friend and fellow nursing, sewing, and blogging mom, I decided to make something after being inspired by her crafts and charge to "get your craft on." (Love ya, Lindsey!) My first project? A sundress for Lailey. You know, since it's warm outside and perfect for romping in the sun...uh huh. Well, it was a simple first project anyway, and will still fit her this summer. Here are some progress pictures. I made it last night, and it only took a couple of hours. This is the pattern cut out, with the tie finished.

By the way, I've had that "Sarah's Ruler" since elementary school I do believe. Little piece of history for you. This is the front and back finished, but not together yet.

This is the almost finished product, just needing a bottom hem once I can fit it on Lailey. She was sound asleep at the time. I don't think she would have appreciated my reason for waking her.

Not the best picture, but I was afraid she'd let go of the chair and fall, so it was a quick snap. It does show off her cute little chunky legs though. I could just eat them.

This little dress, also called a pillowcase dress or potato sack dress (neither of which I like), will grow with her and she can wear it as a shirt with leggings, pants, or even bloomers in the summer. She can even wear it now with a long sleeved onesie and tights. It's not the cutest pattern ever, but I adore the fabric, and I think for a first attempt at dress making for Lailey it came out darling. If anyone wants the pattern (it's a PDF file I found online), let me know.

If you missed the last post, check out Lailey crawling!!!

And She's Off!

Slowly but surely, our little one is crawling! It's been so incredibly fun to watch the process as she's figured out how to push up, get up on hands and knees, scoot backwards, rock back and forth, bunny hop with her knees, lift her hands, then lift her knees, and then get it all together and move forward. I have never watched this learning process so closely before, and it's quite incredible how many prerequisite skills are required to do such a thing. Next time I crawl across the floor with her, I'll be sure to remember that.


Also, Lailey is much better now, but we found out on Monday that she had the flu. This surprised us and our pediatrician for a few reasons: 1) She had had the first round of the flu shot. 2) She definitely didn't "look" like she had the flu, according to the doctor. Apparently, kids typically look a lot worse off. 3) She was still eating and nursing well the whole time. By that evening after we took her in to the doctor's office, she was already looking and feeling much better, and by the next day her fever was down. We're praising the Lord for her quick recovery and, except for an occasional cough that is fading every day, she has no lasting effects.

An Interesting Week

Before I get into why this week was interesting, I wanted to post this sweet photo of Lailey and her 2nd cousin, Abigayle, on New Year's Eve. This was our last night together before my cousin Jen, her husband Mike, and three kids, Noah, Ethan, and Abigayle took off across the country to move to Washington state. For those of you who don't know, this is ironic because my family is from WA originally, and now part of the family is moving back there. I miss them so much already, but I'm excited to see how God uses them in their new location. Love you guys!

Okay, last Saturday (Jan. 2nd) Lailey started on a nursing strike. Basically, she would be hungry but refuse to nurse altogether. The causes are varied, but it's not uncommon for babies to do this around this age. I am not able to pump enough to keep up with her growing appetite, so my stock of frozen milk in the freezer began to quickly diminish. I'm thankful I had as much as I did though. Sunday evening I started to feel sick, and ended up with a cold that lasted the better part of 3 days, fever and all. Davey had to assume Daddy and Mommy duties for a little while. This picture is entitled: "what happens when Daddy takes over housework..."(that's the tie from my bathrobe around her head)

So with Lailey not nursing, me trying to pump when I could get out of bed, and both of us feeling pretty rotten about the entire situation, it was not fun. Then Wednesday afternoon, I started to feel a little better, and she decided she was going to nurse. Hooray! Except for the fact that I noticed that she was burning up. Pulled out the thermometer, 27.2 sec. later I hear: beep-beep-beep, beep-beep-beep! My thermometer's way of telling me that yes indeed, my sweet baby girl was running a fever, for the first time I might add.

Well, the next 48 hours involved lots of Tylenol, temperature checking, nursing (thankfully!) and most of all cuddling. Poor kid did not want to be put down for anything. Lailey does not generally like to be held while she naps, so the fact that that was the only way she would sleep all day Thursday told me how bad she felt. Dr. said she probably just caught what I had and it would take a little while for her to feel better. Oh yeah, she had her 9 month checkup and besides the virus she's doing great. Usually she likes to be social with all the nurses and our doctor, but not this time. She was not a happy camper! She didn't want to be messed with and cried whenever somebody tried. By the way, she is now 27.5 in. tall and weighs 17.75 lbs.

Now I'm feeling mostly better, and Lailey is on her way to recovery, though still not quite herself. Hopefully she will be soon though.

A week or two ago, I was surprised when I went in to get her from her crib, hearing that she was awake after a nap, and found her on her tummy, scooting backwards! Just recently she has started sleeping on her side and now her tummy once in awhile.

Our 9 month old

It's time for another video. She was talking while I was taking her teddy photo today, so I thought I'd capture it on video. You'll notice that when she claps for patty-cake that her hands are sort of folded. That's because she's starting to sign "more" and gets it mixed up with clapping.

A Very Merry Christmas and Almost 9 Months

We had a wonderful Christmas, with lots of celebrating with family. In the above picture, Lailey doesn't look very happy, but she did have fun opening presents on this morning with Grandpa Jim, Aunt Amy, and Uncle Tim. The next one is the three of us on Christmas Eve's Eve at the Akins house.
This is on the actual Christmas morning. Lailey just discovered that her new koosh ball does not taste good...nope, not good at all.
Daddy teaching Lailey to play with her new Stack 'n' Play Elephant from us.
Yay! We got everyone in a picture!
We had a wonderful visit from my Grandmother this year for the week after Christmas. She hadn't seen Lailey since she was about a month old, so I'm sure the changes were quite remarkable. This is Lailey and Great-Grandma Cele opening presents at Davey's Grandparents house.
While she was here, Lailey had lots of fun doing new things, like standing a lot more and walking while holding her hands. Rudy loves Grandma's visits just like we do. He gets lots of extra love. It was very nice to relax, read, and just spend time together with not very much of an agenda.

We all loved having Grandma here, especially Lailey. I'm so thankful that we had so much quality time together this Christmas. I'll never forget it.

Where's Lailey?

I don't remember what I was doing while taking this picture, but obviously she loved it! (Check out those two little teeth. I finally got a picture.)

Now that Lailey is getting older and can play more, we had a playdate with McKenzie while Grandma was visiting and I was on Christmas break. It will be fun to see how much more they will interact together as they get older.

Lailey will be 9 months on Thursday and is growing and happy. She enjoys playing with all her toys, especially her new Christmas toys. Right now as I type this she is rolling around on the living room floor, which is still her only true way of getting around besides scooting backwards on her hands and knees. Lately she has been walking while holding onto two of our fingers, and doing quite well actually. Maybe she'll skip crawling, but only time will tell. Not crawling hasn't slowed her down when it comes to jibber-jabbering, that's for sure. She says "hi" and will wave hello and goodbye. She's beginning to attempt signing "more," though not consistently yet. Her favorite word is probably still "Da-da." In fact, if you say "Ma-ma" she will reply with "Da-da," the little stinker. :) Mostly she just talks and sings her own stuff, and she loves it when we do it back. Most of all, she loves to clap her hands and wiggle to music.

That's all for this update, unless I think of something later.

Christmas Photos

We had a long but fun day finishing up some last minute Christmas shopping today. Uncle Tim and Aunt Amy are in town for Christmas, so they came along too. We started the day off with a photo shoot at Target, and man did the pictures turn out great! Lailey was very happy and content to sit on the floor playing with pretty Christmas ornaments. Here are a few of our favorites:

One more thing after the previous post

Davey, after diligently studying for about a year, has completed his certification exam and is now a Certified Fitness Trainer!!!!!!!!! I'm so incredibly proud of him! I shouldn't brag about his exam score, so I won't tell you what it is. I'll just tell you that it's 104 minus 11 (out of 100) and you can figure it out on your own. :) WAY TO GO DAVEY!

Hello Again

Well, it's been awhile. But we've been getting into the holiday season in full force. I'll try to back track and let everyone know what's been going on since the last post. With pictures, as usual, to tell the story. We'll start back at the week of Thanksgiving...

As in the tradition of our family, we went in search of the perfect Christmas tree. We drove for miles through the mountains, searched through the wilderness, climbed the highest peaks, and finally arrived at a Christmas tree farm in a remote location, not known to many people, known as...

Lailey rode along in the Baby Bjorn carrier, which she loves. She's definitely getting heavier now though. Not quite as easy any more. Here she is feeling a little tree.
Thanks to the help of the local wilderness experts, we sawed and chopped for only 2 hours and ended up with this beauty.
We then loaded the freshly cut (ha!) tree onto our dog sled, er....snowmobile...okay, CAR, and headed the 1.5 miles home. :) (I like the adventurous version better.)
We celebrated Thanksgiving several times over the course of a week, ate lots of great food, and enjoyed time with all our family. Here's a picture of Davey, Lailey, Grandpa Jim, me, Amy, and Tim at my aunt and uncle's house.

It's a Lailey sandwich! (her shirt, which I accidentally covered with my thumb, says "Good things come in small packages.")

Playing a round of peek-a-boo around Daddy always gets her giggling.

Here is Lailey's funny face. For a week or two she would do this whenever she liked something or got excited. She hasn't been doing it as much lately, but hopefully it will come back because it makes me laugh every time. Goofy kid. She takes after her Daddy in that area of course.

Lailey and Rudy are becoming better buddies now that she's more curious and interactive with him. I keep my eye out for pulled ears and fur, but he's pretty patient with her and just moves away if she bugs him. This was so cute, because she kept reaching for his paw, and he'd move it and try to lick her hand. Then she'd reach toward it and he'd move it again and try to lick her again. It was like they were playing a little game. I think the licking won out. He's too quick.

Lailey is now 8 months old. In this picture, she was saying, "Hmmm, I'm 8 months old now. Shall I use my powers of cuteness for good or evil?" She is sweet as she can be, of course.

We still thank the Lord often for good health, even through this nasty cold and flu season that has people out of work and school all the time. A little bit of a runny nose for a couple of days has been the worst of it, and for that we are truly thankful. She is not quite crawling, though she's getting up on all fours and rocking a good bit. She still scoots backwards, and it still annoys her that she tries to go toward an object but ends up getting farther away. I know it's mean, but I think it's hilarious. She'll be all over the place soon enough, so I can laugh. She wants to pull up on the couch, and can do so much more easily now when sitting on my legs. In the last week I've given her some Little Puffs and Cheerios to try to pick up and eat. She'll sit in her high chair and concentrate for 10-15 min. on picking them up. It's amazing, and it lets me get dinner finished. She's gotten a few in her mouth using her index finger and thumb, but mostly they end up in the palm of her hand and then she attempts to eat her whole fist. It's darling. I love to watch her learn. She's still a great eater and hasn't really refused anything I've given her. She's eating more fruits now along with a bunch of veggies. I made acorn squash this week and she's been doing pretty well with that. The texture was a little weird for her at first, but she kept eating. As far as homemade veggies go, I've now made peas, green beans, avocado (no cooking, just cut open and "smoosh it real good"), carrots, peas/carrots together, broccoli, sweet potatoes, and acorn squash. For the fruits, she likes applesauce and bananas, and for the others I've been buying baby food because not as many things are in season right now. She's eaten pears, peaches, prunes, and mangos. I also gave her some YoBaby yogurt and she loves that too. Different sources say different things as to when to give a baby yogurt (since it's dairy), but I decided to give it to her anyway and she hasn't reacted to it in the slightest. I tried it and it's yummy and not too sweet. Fine with me.

This is my favorite recent picture of Lailey. She was all dressed up ready to see Santa at The Bass Pro Shop. Sounds like an odd place to get Santa pictures, but it was free for a 4x6 photo. I like free! Then to download the file it was only a couple of dollars (thanks Grammy and Granddaddy!). We'll probably be heading there every year.

Isn't he a cute Santa?

Here are two videos of Lailey. The first is of her crinkle face. The second one is of her in a Jumperoo. Thank you to our dear friends who so graciously let us borrow it. It is getting lots of love and good use as you can see. We love you guys!