7 Months Old

 Time for Annie’s 7 month update! 

Aaron and I stood on our heads, made as many funny faces and sounds as we could, even barked and panted like a dog (I'm sure our neighbors think we are crazy) but to our best attempt...no smiles from Miss Annie for this picture.  *SIGH*

My little fashionista 

What’s new?!  Crawling.  She was taking a few strides on her hands and feet during 6 months but was mostly army crawling but once she hit 7 months old, she is now spanning some good distance on all 4s, she has this crawling thing down!  And what does she crawl for most?  Dog toys.  Yep.  We relocated Charley’s toy bin but Charley still strings them all thru the house, making it difficult to keep out of Annie’s reach.

"Where'd you put all those doggie toys?!" 

She has been pulling herself up for a while now but we officially had to lower her crib mattress all the way down, we are getting standing morning greetings, even with her sleep sack on she has figured out how to stand in her crib.  Crazy girl!  This had made putting her down for the night and for naps more challenging since she wants to stand in her crib rather than sleep; more so an issue at nap time than at night at least. 

Good Morning Sweets!

 Speaking of naps, we are still challenged in this area.  She is not getting good day time naps, it’s difficult for her to nap at daycare with all the other activity and she just wants to play. This can make for very long weekends when she won’t nap because unlike daycare, there isn’t the same level of stimulation to keep her going all day long, which usually results in some periods of fussiness but refusing to nap. I wish we could get a napping routine down but I just don’t see how we can get to that point.   

Mission: Ornery 

She loved rice cereal and took it down like a champ; baby food is a little more challenging.  We’ve tried pretty much all the level 1 foods, she fairs about the same with all of them except sweet peas, its clear she doesn’t like them.  Who wants mashed peas anyways?!  I sure don’t blame her. 

Baby Tub is packed away 

 Several weeks before daylight savings time I really started to fret.  How will we cope with this hour change coming up?!  We’ve been putting her down an hour later, and to our surprise it has resulted in her waking up an hour later than normal.  So I think we will adjust just fine this weekend but still nervous about 4:30 am wake up calls.  I can hardly complain though, she has been the easiest night sleeper, sleeping thru the night at 8 weeks old.  We haven’t had nearly the sleepless nights that I was expecting we would have.  She gets that from me, Aaron requires far less sleep than Annie and I do!

What is really interesting is to hear who people think she looks like or what features she has from Aaron and I and you know what I’ve noticed…It changes almost monthly.  One month she looks more like me, the next month she looks more like Aaron.  It’s very interesting! What do you think?!

Consistently being told she has Erin's eyes and Aaron's nose. 

Annie’s most popular nicknames that Aaron and I use are Pumpky and Sweets.  The girls at daycare like to call her Annie Bananie or Annie Bonanie. All nicknames are cool with me as long as it isn’t ever shortened to Ann.  Aaron and I are both pretty clear on that.  It’s not that I don’t like the name Ann, it’s just that when we named her Annie we were pretty particular that we don’t want it to evolve into any other name over time.  She’s my little Annie and will always be! 

Happy Halloween! 

Cancun Mexico 2014

Aaron and I, along with our friends Mark and Nikki just got back from vacationing 4 nights/5 days in Cancun Mexico.   And it was GREAT!  Early last year, Aaron and I went to Cancun and stayed at Live Aqua, which was the best trip we’ve ever taken so it was an easy decision to repeat it again this year.  It also worked out great because with a baby, there was no extra time to research and plan a trip so this was an easy book and go and once we were there we didn’t leave the resort once.

Rather than talking about our trip in great detail, I’ll leave my thoughts on what makes this vacation different with a baby back at home.  Annie is now 7 months old and it’s was the first time we left her overnight.  She stayed with Aaron’s parents, which I knew she would be in the best hands and care so that made leaving her for that long easier.  When we first started to book this trip, we were looking for somewhere in the States.  It snowballed into Cancun.  I was definitely nervous about going International, away from Annie for the first time.  A lot of ‘what ifs’ ran thru my head.   As well as a lot of thoughts around the guilt that would follow if any of those ‘what ifs’ would actually occur.  Ultimately I realized that those ‘what ifs’ could happen at age 5 or age 10 so these ‘what if’ thoughts will forever hold me back if I let them and living a life of worry does no good.

By our choice, we don’t live close to our family, which means we rarely get a break from parenting.  And Annie is quite the little handful!  I think Aaron and I have done an awesome job thus far as first time parents while juggling all other aspects of life that I will feel that we deserved this get-away.  It seemed to come at a really good time too, both Aaron and I have been swamped at work, we have barely been able to keep up with each day that we needed to put the ‘breaks’ on so to speak for a few days to just decompress and escape.  Basking in the sun, ocean backdrop, good friends, amazing food and adults only all week was glorious!

One conversation that arose on vacation is how our little babies aren’t allowed to spring break in Cancun years down the road.  I’ve seen and heard enough about Mexico to know that you do have to have your wits about you when you are down there.  Spanish is their first language and the language barrier is very present.  I would say about 50% of the resort employees you can talk to and the other 50% just shake their head and smile and have no idea what I’m asking them.  Mexico though… is certainly the most beautiful place I’ve ever been to, the beaches are unbelievable, it’s like a picture perfect postcard.   Despite all else, it’s our sliver of paradise in this world. 

6 Month...aka half a year old!

Every month is a celebration but a half a year, now that’s a BIG one at the Hyde house!  I’m getting a glimpse of what’s to come and I think that we will far love months 6–12 of her first year way more than months 0-6.  Something about her little personality popping out more and more each day, watching her really learn and explore, and most importantly, knowing what is wrong now when there are tears and just the fact that there are far less tears now than in any months thus far.  We had been nicknaming her Pumpky (aka Pumpkin) but lately it’s been Sweets.  Because she is just so darn sweet!

She can now sit unassisted, she hasn’t figured out how to push up into a seated position, but place her in a seated position and she gets along great.  She’s mobile!  Army crawling all over, she will push up onto all 4s for brief periods but normally plops to her tummy and starts army crawling and she can move at a pretty good rate.  Apparently she is self-feeding her bottles at daycare, we’ve tried this at home and aren’t having the same success but she does have the ability now to hold her own bottle and feed herself.

We’ve gotten the green light to start on baby food.  I’m so excited for the transition and think it will be a lot of fun.  She spoon feeds really well, it took a ton of practice but we got there.   Not only did we get the green light on baby food but we also get to experiment with the sippy cup and snacks like mum mums, yogurt melts, and puffs.  I find this all very exciting territory and can’t wait to see what her preferences will be.

I’m loving that she is becoming more independent.  A few weekends ago, I sat on the sofa and just watched her play for a good 30 minutes all on her own.  It was really nice.  I love playing with her and being involved but I also want her to learn to play on her own and we are starting to see this happen more and more.  I feel like we are slowing starting to get to that good mix of us being involved but yet giving her the room to explore on her own.

She still fights her naps some on the weekends.  If she doesn’t nap, one of 2 things happen, neither which are good…  She becomes overtired and will be extremely fussy all day, continually fighting the nap.  Or she will be happy all day, yet refusing to nap but then putting her down for the night is a huge fight and usually produces multiple middle of the night wakings.  Naps are so key.   If she will not go down, we just fight her on it for 2 hours, it’s exhausting.  If after 2 hours she refuses, we let her get up for an hour.  Then the next hour we try again.  Usually we become successful at some point but it can easily chew up a half a day easily just fighting her for one nap, leaving us needing a nap ourselves!  We don’t let her cry but for a minute or two so we will just sit in her room with her with the lights off and no interaction other than rocking her and then we just juggle between rocking to stop the crying and putting her back in the crib.  2 hours of this, it’s painful for all but my book The Sleep Lady says this is the method that must be done.  The dreaded weekend nap fiasco has been our biggest challenge right now.  

Some favorites from her 6 month professional photo shoot

 She has 2 teeth!  I knew she was teething badly, a few times that accompanied with a fever that had her down right super fussy.  Then one morning I dropped her off at Daycare and they told me she has a tooth, WHAT?!  Just popped up overnight pretty much! 

Well that's a wrap for month 6!