3rd week of May 2015

Maxwell's Kindermusik class has lots of homework this semester.  I'm awful at getting him going on in early.  Good thing I'm getting practice now before he's in school!  Here he is making a building with stairs and windows.

Not so sweetly sleeping.

Writing a letter to Pete the Cat at the library

Reading at the library

Multiple elevator rides are part of the magic of the library :)

My cute family.  

(Maxwell loves wearing his Diego bag.  This boy is going to rock a messenger bag someday.)

We stopped at The Snow Cone Lady for our first snowcone of the summer.  WOOO!  Max waited on the bench for us.

Video - Maxwell yelling at me and telling me he can't drive because he's not a grown up.  LAUGH

I think this may be Emmalyn's first snowcone

#truth

Enjoying some brunch 

She's unhappy because we aren't giving her food fast enough.  She just shovels it in.  I can't keep up.  I cut stuff for her and she's devoured it before I cut the next bite.

playing at the library with Landen

Enjoying Brittany's smoothie

I took Emmalyn for a secret photo shoot for a surprise for Peter (more to come on that...).  It's pretty dang awesome.

We made "ice cream" with frozen bananas, milk, and peanut butter.  EASY and YUMMY

Update on the kids recently:

Maxwell - 

Needs to have socks on his feet at night or he won't go to sleep

He's been scared of the dark lately at night in his room and wants the light left on in the bathroom so he can see a little bit.

Maxwell wants to cuddle and wants me to keep cuddling with him after he falls asleep.  He tells me he's keeping me and I can never leave.

Emmalyn -

She loves to eat fruit, cheerios, and water.  I mentioned above how much she likes to eat.  She will eat a bunch and then scream if she wants more or you try to get her out of her highchair and she isn't done yet.  She also loves to drink water, lots of it!

It's pretty painful lately to try and hold her and keep her entertained while on your lap.  She wants to be down and moving around.

She's doing great at listening and understanding.

She is pointing at what she wants and will scream if she's not getting it.

She is mimicking sounds and will mimic back to us her version of what we said.  She's very chatty!

She loves being outside and being in her bike.

She has super stranger danger.

I am still pumping at work and in the evenings. The stinky thing is that I only get 3-4 oz from those 4 pumpings a day.  It's pretty brutal but I'm sticking with it because I read that even only 3 oz of breastmilk still provides value to your baby.  So now, that is the only breastmilk she gets during the day and then Brittany gives her formula the rest of the time.  

She's starting to identify body parts like legs, chest, and hands.

Her favorite book lately is "bubbles bubbles".  She loves books.

She is walking about 3-5 steps now and she stood up outside all on her own without holding onto anything!
She loves to say "bye" and wave.
She's a Momma's girl and wants to be by me all the time.
She loves to sing!
She won't fall asleep and take a nap in the car lately.
She can go down the one step in the media room on her belly.
She loves to dump things out and can sometimes put things back.
Emmalyn's eyes are the color of Max's and she definitely has my hair, not Peter's.

Emmalyn 9 months old

On January 13, 2015 Emmalyn turned 9 months old!

She is so mobile - crawling, kneeling, pulling up on things and walking along things.  She often forgets to hold on and lets go.  She will walk with you if you hold her hands. She wants to be where the people are so if you go into another room, she will follow you.  Watch out though if there are any crumbs or other little things on the floor because she will find them and try to eat them.  (She loves to go after and try to eat shoes.  Gross.)

She has stopped saying "ga" and now it's just "ba" or "ma".  She signs "more" and we think we've seen her do "eat" and "milk".  She doesn't say da da but when she tries it sounds more like "blah".

She loves to clap and will clap to songs or when she's happy.

She loves her brother and Landen and Hayden.  She wants to be around them.

She great at getting food from her hands to her mouth.  She doesn't have the pincer grasp down yet.  I've stuck to mainly the basics on food - brown rice cereal, applesauce, mangoes, pears, bananas, carrots, peas, squash, sweet potatoes, plus all the puffs type food and rice crackers.  She's not a big fan of mangoes or avocados.  We aren't pureeing everything and try to give her finger food as much as possible.  Her doctor is a fan of "infant led weaning" where you just give them what you are eating in baby sized pieces and let them gum it.  I haven't gone so far as to just give her what we are eating, but feel like I'm pushing the textures faster than I did with Maxwell.  The other thing is that she is soooo insistent if we are eating and she isn't.  So, she's gotten some non-baby food that I wouldn't have given in and given Maxwell.  She will get a bite of hamburger rice or garlic bread or french fries, etc.  Lucky second child.  :)  We have given her a baby sippy cup so she can start to learn how to drink water from it.

She is so wiggly that changing her or getting her dressed can be torture!  I try to keep a toy in her hands but that doesn't always work.

She is still breast fed but my milk supply has dwindled horribly.  I pump 3 times a day at work and lately my total output for all three sessions is about 4 oz.  (She will drink 3 4 oz bottles while I am work.)  So supply is not keeping up with the demand.  I have tried essential oils, supplements, tea, fenugreek pills, increasing pumping sessions, more water..everything! I have been talking to a lactation specialist but nothing is helping.  I am really discouraged because I'm willing to put in the time and effort but the supply just isn't staying up.  The only other thing I did with Maxwell was rent a hospital grade pump.  At this point I don't think it's going to make much of a difference so I don't want to spend the extra money.  I have enough with my fresh and frozen (and friend's frozen) supply that I should be able to make it to a year without having to do formula.  I wish I was a milk producing fiend because I wouldn't mind continuing to pump and then donating the extra.   :(  She wants to nurse all the time and clearly communicates that to me by pulling at my clothes or trying to eat my chest but then when she does nurse she constantly gets distracted by her brother, the tv, someone walking by.  It's frustrating for me how she doesn't just focus and finish.

She loves getting her "teeth" brushed (with the infant gum cleaner).

Her favorite toy is the activity table.  She can stand there for a long time, just playing by herself.  She rarely likes to be in her jumpy exercise center thing.  She doesn't jump and quickly wants to be out by everyone else.

She will give up the giggles for her daddy when he tickles her but we still have to work hard if it's just her and I to get them.  When she does laugh it's super cute and usually involves some screeching.

She's a momma's girl, which I love.  Even though it's not good sleeping habits, I love that she wants to sleep with us.  Her little hands will escape from her swaddle in the night and I'll wake up to her laying next to me with her hand on me.  Or she'll roll over to be next to Peter and put her hand out to touch find his face.  It's so sweet.

She is still a happy baby with lots of smiles.  She is really interested in what is going on and will peer around you to watching something that is interesting to her. She doesn't like to be held by other people and will quickly freak out.

This girl can scream.  When she gets mad she doesn't hold back.  This is most often when she needs to go to sleep and doesn't want to.

She isn't a huge fan of the car and has a short span for being happy in the car and then will either scream or go to sleep if you are lucky.

She loves to be outside and starts jabbering when she gets outside.

Bedtime is funny because I'll be cuddling with Max and she will crawl over him to get between him and myself so she can cuddle with me.  (It frustrates Maxwell so much!)  We don't have a bedtime routine for her, we've just added her to Maxwell's routine.  She usually goes to bed around 8:30, struggles to sleep until around 11:30 when we are in the room with her and she finally stays asleep.  Then she'll wake up to nurse between 4-6 and then will sleep until around 8 am.

During the day she usually take 3 more naps.  The first one is the longest and if you are lucky can last a couple hours but the others are shorter and are anywhere from 1/2 hr to 1 1/2 hrs.

She LOVES to get in the shower.  If someone is in the shower she will crawl over and lean on the glass.  I bring her baby bathtub into the shower, fill it up with some water, and let her play in there while I shower.  Sometimes Maxwell will come in with us.  I don't know how long we will be able to bring her bathtub in there because she's trying to crawl out of it now.

She is such a sweet girl and so happy.  I love watching her engage with her brother.  I know we are just at the very beginning of her being able to communicate with us and I will enjoy seeing her personality really blossom.  She does keep us on our toes though.  For example, she wants to climb the stairs and when Britt's family moves out in a couple weeks, the gate on the stairs will be going up.

She's a little person.  She knows what she wants and she makes it happen.

Those cheeks!

Christmas is only a few days away...

Had to take a pic - - can't believe we are getting gas this cheap!  It's crazy how much the price of gas has come down...  We need to go on a road trip!

The boys being boys.  Maxwell has tackled Hayden.

My sleeping babies.  How sweet is this?

Max has like 4 different hats on

Emmalyn is doing a great job feeding herself.  I still make her baby foods but we are also giving her more foods to feed herself than we did with Maxwell.

Emmalyn ready to cheer on the local team.  Go cowboys!

Maxwell made this ornament at school with his school pic (we didn't end up buying any of these pictures so this is the only one we'll get)

We celebrated his last day of school for the year with Momma picking him up from school and going out to get ice cream.

Peter and I took both the kids furniture shopping for a new TV console.  It's harder to shop with two kids!  Emmalyn is in the stroller but Maxwell just walks by us which means he's harder to contain and keep his hands off everything.

Emmalyn continues to grow and do new "exciting" things - 

Her tastes are really expanding.  Her favorite thing to chew on lately is shoes...any kind of shoes...it's like she's drawn to them.  I have to be super aware and keep them aware from her.  GROSS!

Her second tooth on her left on top broke through on Dec 20 which is good because she's been fussy and not sleeping well.

She is standing a lot, pulling up and walking along things, and also climbing over things.

Will all that new moving, she's also falling down but that doesn't seem to bother her most of the time.

Sometimes she will give "kisses"  (big open mouth kisses).

Her favorite toy is the activity table.

She loves her binky.  (Max did NOT, so I'm nervous about having to eventually break her from it someday.

She's a momma's girl but certainly lights up for her daddy, Uncle Joe, and Aunt Brittany when she sees them.

When I sing to her she is starting to sing back to me.

She has now learned how to scream.

Can blow raspberries

She makes sounds like "gah gah" and maybe some "buh buh" and "ma"? (at least that's my interpretation.

Second week of December - Enjoying the holiday season

Uh oh - I was just hoping she wouldn't notice all the ornaments on the tree... (Ha, yeah right!)

Maxwell enjoyed one last play date with his friend Sam and us adults all enjoyed visiting with each other.  We have had a lot of fun hanging out with Sarah and Brad and Sam.  They are moving to Michigan and we are quite sad to lose them!

Maxwell helped me secretly "elf" one of our neighbors

My smiley girl!

Here's a couple videos to show you some of my kids "talents"

Video - Emmalyn blowing raspberries

Video - Maxwell working on his dribbling skills

My Christmas shopping is coming right along

Cuddle time at night - it's a big fight between these two on who gets to be next to Momma

Silly faces

She is perfection - - pure, true perfection!

Playing ring toss on the elf hat

We made our annual trip to the Deerfield neighborhood to look at lights.  This year we went by ourselves and got out and enjoyed a couple streets on foot (and stroller).  Some of our favorites weren't up this year... maybe the houses were sold to new people?

Maxwell caught Daddy resting

Max's selfie

Nerf darts - they make super chew toys

One handed push up

Love those baby eyelashes

She's working on her climbing skills

Everything goes in her mouth...

...even big things

I let her play with one of the ornaments

Emmalyn loves the song "Row, Row, Row your Boat" and will start laughing (really it's more like chuckling) if you sing it to her.  

She has been sleeping horribly lately - she's up every half hour to an hour and sometimes it will work to put the binky in and sometimes it won't.  :(  She is only completely calm and sleeps well if she's in our bed.  While I'm not a fan of having my kids sleep with me, I am a fan of sleep.  

She is great at swallowing her food and is starting to be able to pick up her puffs.

It's great that she can pick up the food we want her to pick up however, the flip side of that is now that she is able to pick little things up, she is also picking up and trying to eat things that she shouldn't - like stuff on the floor such as leaves...and she loves it!  UGH.