isla - 7 months & 8 months

now that isla is back to a normal sleeping schedule, dave & i are sleeping again too.  everyone is happy.  this girl still refuses to nap- i don't know how an almost 9 month old can stay awake from anywhere from 7-10am all the way until 10pm, but this girl has mastered that skill.  isla turned 7 months old on january 17  and 8 months old february 17.  here's what she's been up to.

isla celebrated her first christmas- it was pretty non-eventful as she was just 6 months old.  she got plenty of books, clothes and toys- but she was more concerned about being held and loved on.  check.  we left the the warmness of atlanta once again to return to the frozen wasteland we now call our home.  for the love... it is now mid-march and we are still facing sub-freezing temperatures and snow.  we're only 10" away from the all-time snow record, and we are not going to get a repeat of the 80 degree st. patty's day from 2012.  i really just want to leave my house, but it's too cold.  while we were in atlanta, both of the kids were sick and a call to our dr. was asking us to take them to urgent care.  of course, none of the urgent care facilities around there would see isla, so we were able to find a dr to see them that afternoon.  that was an unusual experience as we left with no explanations and a bunch of prescriptions.  after seeing dr. nick, we decided to schedule an appt. to see our regular dr. a few hours after arriving home- the kids had just caught colds and we were able to toss the prescriptions.  sigh. 

we celebrated ian's 4th birthday in january- and isla enjoyed that because it was more time for her to be held and cuddled.  i took both of the kids (with dave's help) to the pediatrician and isla had her 6 month check up.  the ped told us that she sounded like she had maybe had a touch of rsv at some point, but was sounding really good.  she was weighing in at 12 lbs 7 oz, and i am unsure of the length.  weight is less than 2% and height was less than 5%.  she also had her shots and caught up on some others.  i've decided that while i'll probably keep her up to date on them- that i will not do that many shots again.  my doctor is willing to let me space them out how i choose.  there is no telling what caused the craziness the last 2 months- but a lot of it started shortly after...  we decided to start solids shortly after this and that was met with zero success.  after the first 10-15 attempts, i was beginning to think she wasn't going to be interested in eating.  she was nursing well though, so i wasn't as worried.  we had tried oatmeal, avocados and sweet potatoes with no luck!   sometime in february, i took her to see the pediatrician again because she kept coughing and throwing up- and although her check up came back as "perfect", it was her weight that had me a little nervous- she weighed in at 12 lbs 10 oz- only 3 oz gained in 3 weeks.  the ped told me that i should try a fruit with her, and they would re-check her weight at her 9 month appointment.  we decided to try applesauce for her- and she loves it.  i have learned that what they say about 2nd children and so on is true.  with ian, we tried all the fruits and veggies to schedule and i had made all of them.  with isla- we're still eating applesauce- if i remember to feed it to her... oh, boy.

on february 1, isla went from daily yoga to movement!  she had been pushing up on her arms, and then her hands and knees since late december... and finally she crawled!  it really doesn't take long to really get moving- now she is so fast, you can't turn your back for a minute!  later that week she started sitting unassisted as well.  the doctor at her sick visit said she though she would be walking by 10 months- we'll see!  time has just flown too fast!

 plank!

 celebrating christmas in georgia

 giving me the stink eye

 opening christmas presents!

 christmas planking!

 4 generations 

 my heart = bursting

 nap time with gg

 ooh, new toys!

 with gg & pop

 playing nice!

 sunday best!

 brother's birthday

 hanging with dad

 all smiles!

  valentine's day!

12 months

well, everything i have been talking about is here and gone- i have a 1 year old!  here's what my crazy kid did during his 12th month of life!

a tooth finally came in!  why it takes my child 4-6 weeks per tooth, i'll never know, but ian now has 2 1/2 teeth!

he is pulling up on everything- me, the furniture, the bed, the dresser, the book shelf- you name it.  he loves standing and reaching for things.  he's not interested in you standing him up though- and he's not really ready to stand alone- he's done it once, for about 2 seconds- and only because he didn't realize he wasn't holding on to me anymore!

feeding is still the same- nursing 3x a day and the bottle before bed.  we're working on switching to milk right now- he can definitely tell that it tastes different!  we're still doing baby food and table food.  we've introduced blueberries, blackberries and red bell pepper in the last month.  the pepper didn't thrill him, but we were able to sneak it into the other foods and he finished it w\o knowing..  we've also started doing cheese (swiss, provolone and cheddar) and pieces of low-sodium lunch meat as finger foods.

ian celebrated his first christmas.  we drove down to my mom & dad's house just south of atlanta- it was a horrible trip.  it took us an extra 3 hours (we did stop and sleep for over an hour) and ian screamed half of the trip.  awful.  the trip back was better, but only b\c we decided for the sanity of all of us to face his car seat forward.  don't worry- we are back to rear-facing and will be for a while now.  unfortunately, ian came down with a stomach virus christmas eve night, and was pretty much out of it most of christmas day.  poor little guy.  we also celebrated christmas with dave's family on new year's day, which was a lot of fun.  he was feeling much better by then.

we celebrated ian's birthday with friends and family while in georgia- it was nice for all of his friends from home to see him, and for family who wouldn't be here for his birthday.  unfortunately, my grandmother was in the hospital, so it didn't work out for us to see them that week.  :(  we also had a party for ian with our friends and family up here.  pictures to come.  2 parties- exhausting.  we will only be doing family parties from now on...

we also signed ian up for parent-infant swim with our local park district.  we're taking the class w\ one of the little girls from baby group.  ian loves bath time, but it's taken a few weeks with swimming.  the pool is warm, but not bath tub warm.  he cried the entire first class.  poor kid!  at least i found it funny.

ian has started giving out high five's and now is clearer in saying "mama" and "dada."  no new words though.

stats from 1 year appointment: weight: 17 lbs, 1 oz- less than 5th (less than 1st actually) percentile.  height 29.5" (this is the same as 9 month appt.- i'm not buying it)- 25th percentile.

well, here we go- we're starting year 2.  wow!

 these are getting more and more difficult to take... grr

baby's first christmas

we spent ian's first christmas at my mom & dad's house in georgia.  it snowed there and everyone was acting like Jesus had been born again!  i guess it was meant to be for ian to have a white christmas regardless- b\c we knew it would happen in illinois.  i mean, we had a white thanksgiving, white new year, and we'll probably have a white valentine's day and a white st. patty's day... ::sigh::

ian made me so happy to have given birth to him by managing to scream 7 out of the 15 excruciating hours that it took us to get to georgia...  including a 3.5 hour non-stop sesh.  bravo kid.  nice lungs.  needless to say he was exhausted when we arrived, so everyone was able to get some much-needed rest.  we celebrated his birthday w\ our ga friends/family the next day, where he was an absolute delight (more on that after his real birthday). 

the next day after the party my dad started feeling sick, but no one thought much of it....  then as i was getting ready for church on christmas eve, i got ian up from his nap, and we were playing  and i tossed him into the air a few times...  it wasn't long before he threw up all over me... 3 times.  luckily i wasn't dressed for church yet- but he did puke on the slimming tank- so it was muffin top for christmas eve... oh well.  we thought it was maybe my tossing him that caused him to "toss his cookies", so we headed to church- where he did well, and sat relatively still throughout the service, but i fed him as soon as we got to dinner (mexican for christmas eve- love that tradition) and he couldn't keep it down, or anything else we gave him.  after i became the jerk that paged the pediatrician on christmas eve, and several attempts to get pedialyte into him, we gave up and put him to bed, and he slept it off.  he was out of it most of christmas day, but luckily he won't remember any of it.  unfortunately, my mom will remember that she was so sick, she had to spend the entire day in bed, and my uncle & brother's gf will remember the 27th, as will my husband, who by the divine will of God was able to drive us home before sucumbing to the nasty that was going around.  it wasn't just limited to us- my poor 4 y/o nephew spend 3 days in the hospitl w\ dehydration.  luckily everyone is back to feeling 100%!

ian was a lucky boy for christmas- we decided to stay small.  we chose to get him a few tops, a pair of pj's, a few books, one small toy, a push walker and we took a baby tent that we had used once, bought a pack of balls and made him a "ball pit" (it's probably his favorite thing).  between christmas and his birthday, he got so many toys, and a ton of clothes- he's still too small for a lot of them, but i'll probably just move him up b\c he needs to start wearing them!  this was just in ga- we still had illinois christmas on new year's day and his bday in a few weeks!  lucky guy!  here are some photos from the festivities!

 celebrating christmas at our house before leaving for ga

 one of the few christmas morning smiles, and opening a present with daddy's help

 ready to go back to bed- and he did- and he slept and slept!

kisses for my sweet boy

 trying out his walking toy, and standing with granddaddy's help

testing out one of my toys

i haven't uploaded any pictures from his other christmas, but he was just as uninterested in gifts then too!

merry christmas!

merry christmas!  love, dave, melissa & ian

just an old sweet song

...keeps georgia forever on my mind.

hello warmer weather. 

tonight we head to husband's christmas party and then we will either leave late tonight or get a few hours of sleep and head out early saturday morning.  thoughts and prayers as we make the 12+ hour drive to georgia.  you'll hear from me once we've arrived!

nice to meet you, santa

ian met santa for the first time friday night.  he was really distracted by the whole set up and all the people walking around the mall.  we actually had to sit under the camera to try and get him to look in our direction- it didn't really work.  they did manage to get 2 pictures of him looking, but none of him smiling.  it was so fun for me to have him meet santa, i am just so excited to celebrate our first christmas with him!  i'm sure next year with santa will be a totally different story- so i'm glad things went well this time!

(santa looks a little drunk, no?)