8 Months Old!

Ellie is eight months old...and quite frankly we can't believe it! Life is excitedly busy and we are loving this age. This month has been crazy with Grandma Sue being out of town at the Iowa State Fair and Ellie going to daycare. Ellie is doing really well and still changing every day!

Some highlights of the past month:
-Digestive issues resolved! Although I'm sure nobody cares and it is a little gross but Ellie finally started pooping. When she was a little younger rice cereal and oatmeal just plugged her up and it was not real fun. Now she can handle it all and in fact loves cereal. She eats at least two solid meals a day and I think I'll credit the daycare teachers with really teaching her how to eat from a spoon. She is a champ now and gobbles down fruits, veggie and cereal. She has slowed down on her drinking a little bit already.

-No teeth! Ellie has no teeth. Silly girl. Who has ever heard of an 8 month old with no teeth? Well actually lots of people have and it is not a problem but hopefully all this drool is working towards something. I'll even give her the one month buffer since she was a month early...and teeth are probably something that would be affected by that but sometime soon we want to see those little chompers!


-Rolling..rolling..rolling! Ellie has been able to rollover for months but she hasn't really done it very much. This month she started rolling over to get things and has started using it is a little form of locomotion. It is pretty funny. She can roll very quickly back and forth and reaches and stretches her little body to pretty much get anything she wants. Adorable! We know it won't be long before she is crawling and walking all over the place. Ahh! We must baby proof. She spends a lot of her free time in her newly decorated "office." She has a great time surrounded by all of her toys, safe from the craziness that is two big dogs. I recently decoraed the walls and the gates. I printed out big 8x10 pictures of family and laminated them and they turned out really nice. She loves seeing the familiar faces.


-Ellie would probably tell you (if she could talk) that sitting is fun but standing is better! Ellie can finally sit without tipping over. You know it is pretty tough when you are distracted! She sits and plays with her toys all the time but if you are holding her she prefers to be standing up. She is pretty stable and is getting better balance. She can hold her self up at a small table but hasn't started pulling up yet.

-Vera! We went up to visit Jesse, Mike and Vera the last weekend of August. We rode up with Glenn and Elizabeth in the big truck. Ellie shared her seat with Sampson the bulldog...well he rode on the floor in front of the carseat. Ellie and Vera took their first bath together. Too cute! Vera is great with Ellie...such a gentle, loving little girl!

Jesse went out for a couple of minutes while Vera was napping and she woke up. I went in to get her and she looked at me and asked "baby?" So cute! This was probably the first time that Ellie realized that Vera was a little person and was happy to watch and learn.


-The little sailor man! Ellie has a little sailor man that fits in a tug boat bath toy. Every time she gets in the bath tub she grabs this toy and sucks on his hat. If she drops him she strains to reach him. It is so funny. It makes it funnier that this is one of the old school toys that we picked up at a yard sale because we remembered it from when we were little. Ellie still loves the bath. She plays with all her toys and splashes around. We're still using the bath seat because it is just easier but I know she'll be on her own soon.

-Ellie is sleeping fairly well although she honestly slept better when she was about 4 months old. She goes to bed like champ. We do the bath, put on PJs, read, and I nurse her and she is out. She goes right in her crib. She usually sleeps pretty well sometimes wakes up and needs her pacie until somewhere between 12 and 3. Then she gets up and I usually nurse her in bed because it is way easier for me and so comfy for both of us....we probably need to break this habit but for now it really doesn't bother me. I guess it is one of those personal decisions and for sure we'll have to cut it off sometime soon.

Grandma is coming! Grandma is coming!

Well today is the day. Grandma Sue is coming home. She has been selling origami at the Iowa State Fair for the past 10 days and man did we miss her! The first day of daycare was rough but it actually went very smoothly after that. I was very impressed with the daycare center and found Ellie happily playing on the floor almost every day that I picked her up. The teachers were all really sweet and I loved that they were usually sitting on the floor playing with the babies (I guess that is part of the reason why they don't have any swings/exersaucers, etc.) Ellie however did not sleep very much at daycare which the poor teachers were great sports about. This meant that she came home and basically crashed every night around 6:30. Going to daycare is hard work! So at least for now life will return to normal and Ellie will be back with my mom. I'm glad we had a chance to do the daycare thing. I found that it was very comforting to have her so close to me (5 min from work) so that I could stop in if I felt I needed to or I could be there quickly if they called (which they never did). This way I was with her for that extra 40 min. commute even though she was usually asleep I felt like I was spending time with her. I think she enjoyed seeing the other babies and it is important to us that she gets some social interaction even if she is staying with my mom. Depending on how long my mom keeps her (she initially said 6 months :) we'll look into some part-time/morning programs that she can start next year.

I know Ellie will be so excited to see her Grandma...they have a special thing going on :) and we are pretty excited to see her too...

Life is Good!

We have been reminded in a few of different ways how fortunate we are to have a happy, healthy baby. We don't take it for granted and although we may mutter about some of the daily chaos the big picture is that what is going on in our lives right now is wonderful and we are so thankful!

How's this for a happy looking little girl?

By the way... Happy Birthday Uncle Alex! We had a great Outback dinner with Alex and my Dad. Good times! Good food!

Daycare Day 1

My mom goes every year to the Iowa State Fair to sell origami. This happens to be quite a conflict when she is our childcare provider :) Luckily Jason's new job has a wonderful back-up childcare benefit where we can take Ellie to one of the best daycare centers in the area for $25 a day up to 20 days a year. We signed up for Ellie to go the day he started working and today was her first day. Friday Ellie, my mom and I went for a visit and she was totally excited to play with all the toys and see the other babies. The room is really neat. They have nothing to contain a baby (except cribs of course)...but no bouncy seats, no swings, no exersaucers...they just have made the room totally baby friendly by putting pads/mattresses, rugs all over the place. There is only one little shelf in the whole room and it is empty so that the kids can crawl through it or sit in it or whatever. They have a cute little table with wooden chairs for the older kids to eat at and I have no idea how they feed the littler ones because I didn't see any highchairs.

So this morning I dropped her off. I was totally prepared for it to be a traumatic experience but she was just fine...a happy little camper. I sat her down on the carpet with 2 other babies and they had a big stack of toys that they were trading around. We're wondering if maybe she'll learn to crawl while she is there because there are a bunch of mobile babies in the room and she'll have plenty of floor time.

I left instructions for them to call if Ellie was struggling. The daycare is literally 5 minutes down the road and I planned a flexible day. I kept waiting for the phone to ring but it didn't. I went to pick Ellie up at 3:45 and she was sitting in the middle of the room holding a toy. I went over to her and she was okay but had obviously been crying. I asked how the day went and the teacher said "she had ups and downs, I almost called you a few times" yikes! It pretty much sounds like she cried most of they day but finally exhausted herself and took an hour nap. Poor baby girl. I felt so bad. Weird...I just felt like I had left her for so long even though I really was with her more than normal. I know they are busy at the daycare. How can one person take care of 3.5 babies, it is hard enough to take care of 1!

Tomorrow will be much harder to drop her off but it is good for Ellie to be in daycare and see all the other babies and get some extra floor time. It really makes us appreciate my mom and all she does for us.

7 Months Old!

Being 7 months old is pretty much exhausting. So much to do so much to learn! Most recently Ellie has learned how to wave hi and bye bye! It is pretty much the most adorable thing I've ever seen. She started turning her wrist a couple of weeks ago and so we started pairing it with hi and bye bye and no she has it. She shoots her arm up in the air and waves her little hand. Too cute! Check out the video clip of her open hand wave (She can also do the open and close, fold down fingers wave...but you'll have to wait to see that!)

Highlights of the past month:

-She loves Patty Cake and doesn't quite get Peek-a-boo yet but I'm sure that is in the very near future. Every once in awhile she'll even toss it in the air with us and patting is no problem at all :)

-Ellie sits up very well and enjoys this new perspective. She still will tumble over every once in awhile but it doesn't phase her. She just starts playing from the laying down position. She still isn't much of a rollover baby. She can do it but doesn't very often. We probably hold her a little too much but what can you say...

-She is getting quite bored with her "baby toys" (rattles, etc) and is moving on to stackable, noisy, button, wheel toys. We've had fun searching for new toys but haven't had much luck at finding good yard sales lately. Hopefully this weekend!

-Little fish! Ellie loves the water. This month Ellie took her swimming classes and we have taken her to the pool as often as we can. She loves it! She kicks her little legs and soaks it up! The bath is a great time as well. She has upgraded to the bath seat and loves playing with toys and splashing. We even got her the little Fisher Price boat that we had when we were kids and it is quite a hit!

-Vera and Jesse came to visit last weekend and we had a great time. This was probably the first visit where it seemed like Ellie realized there was another little person around and it was fun to see her interact with Vera. She loves kids! They are going to have some fun times together.

-Grandpa Bill and Grandma Beth came for a visit and we went to Star, NC for Jason's Aunt Sally's wedding. It was a fun time and we are so happy they were able to come for a few extra days. It was really nice to get to spend some extra time with the Hamilton family and Ellie did really well traveling. Finally we are past the "car-seat aversion" stage she was going through (I hope!)

-Storytime at the library- We have been going to the Saturday morning "baby time" at the library and Ellie loves it! (Jason doesn't so much...well he just doesn't like to be the spectator without a baby in his arms as it is quite awkward!) It is an action-packed 20 minutes of baby rhymes, songs, bubbles, tickling, hokey-pokey, etc. Ellie gets so excited...it cracks me up how every part of her body wiggles in excitement. Too cute. It is also a great place to meet other babies and families. I'm impressed that there are so many moms and dads that come together. We've been sticking around afterward and the babies all just play together on the carpet. Fun times!

-We are attempting to teach Ellie to dance. So far she just looks at us like we're crazy and smiles. Oh well...

-Still no teeth! We are thinking that they will be coming in soon because she drools like crazy. We pretty much have to keep a bib on her 24/7 because she drools all over the place! She still chomps down on her teething rings and shoves her entire fist into her mouth but still no teeth.

- Yummy toes. Ellie discovered grabbing her toes a couple of months ago but kind of got over that phase very quickly. Well this month she has discovered that she can suck on her toes. It is pretty funny because she doesn't pull her foot into her mouth she leans all the way over and sucks on her big toe. Another one we'll have to get a video of. What a silly girl.

Ellie is a happy girl and for that we are very happy parents!

She Sits...(and sometimes doesn't fall over)

Well Eleanor sits. At this point she CAN stay upright for a long period of time...but it doesn't always happen that way! She is much too busy checking out the world around her to keep her attention focused on staying balanced. She does brace herself with her arms or a toy but can sit up without any support. For now we'll keep the padding and pillows close by!


Things are busy and fun in our house. Jason is recovering well from his surgery and anxiously awaiting a pair of new glasses with the correct prescription (he has to wait 6 weeks while the vision stabilizes). His last day at IBM was on Friday and he has this week off. Ellie will have some extra daddy time and he'll have a little break before he starts his new job next Monday.

We've gone to "Baby Time" at the library two weeks in a row and Ellie loves it! "Zoom, zoom, zoom we're going to the moon..." We are learning all of the songs and rhymes and having fun seeing all the other babies. After the organized session many people stay and let the babies play (or stare at each other :) on the carpet. We're trying to find more opportunities for Ellie to see other babies since she doesn't go to daycare. It is difficult to find fun things like this on the weekend and it is great that it is free!

Eleanor is super fun. Her latest trick is spitting. Yes....spitting. It is kind of unfortunate but she finds it very amusing and will spit for many minutes at a time. She soaks herself and anyone who is holding her. It is pretty gross. We're hoping she grows out of it by her teenage years! Grandma Sue has been working on "How big is the baby? Soooo big!" and she is actually getting it. After about 3 demonstrations she stretches her arms out. She so far hasn't gotten them up above her head but it is adorable even to the sides. We have to get a video.

How Far We've Come!