Bad, bad mommy!

It's been nearly 2 months since last post. How in the world will I remember everything that's happened since then? I can remember logging in and seeing that the blogs I follow had not updated in forever and being - dare I say - upset. And now look at me :) I must say, the fact that Lisa told me she read my blog, made me feel guilty about not updating. So, now that the little munchkin is asleep, I blog.

Where to begin...our 9 month dr's visit was in January. She was the picture of being right on target in the 50th percentile for everything. This surprised us, because it seems like she's gained weight when we carry her around :). Everything looked really clear and there were no shots (yeah!). Well, 2 days prior to that, she had been really fussy, really sleepy and running a small fever. It seemed to go away, but I mentioned it to the dr anyway. No worries on the day of the appointment because she looked good. (I too had all those symptoms in addition to a horribly painful throat...worse than I had ever had, dr looked at me too and said my throat was really raw, but I was negative for strep and mono...10 days and an antibiotic later, that throat either worked it out on it's own, or the antibiotics did something. Who knows.)

Well, the next day she ran a fever again and was sent home from her day care. John took her to urgent care and she had an ear infection. Popped up over night. She also had a sinus infection. So, we got an antibiotic for her and a decongestant which cleared things up so well and she was back to sleeping through the night again! (double yay!)

We went to Houston to see my college friend Joanna and her hubby. It was a great trip, albeit rainy. Her house is beautiful, but at 4 stories, I had a good leg workout by the end!

January 18th, Sophia learned how to crawl. Just a bit, but within 36 hours she had it down. A week later, she decided to learn how to pull herself up into a standing position as below in the bathtub! eek!.



She still loves her day care and continues to practice her crawling and standing and smiling! :)



This was the Valentine's party at her day care.



We had some pics taken for her 9 month and Valentine's Day milestone. She sure was precious!


February brought us some changes. I stopped nursing. Initially, this was just going to be during work (expressing) and at lunch. She was starting to have a harder time when I would leave her after nursing her at lunch. So, we dropped the pumping and lunch nursing, but I continued morning and night. Well, that lasted about another week and now she's strictly on solid food and formula. Which hasn't seemed to hurt her any. We went to get a weight check at the hospital at her 10th month and she was 20 lbs, 15 oz. Wowzers! I thought she was getting heavier!


She loves to eat and try new foods. For now. Some of my friends with young ones tell me they are on a solid food strike. Or a formula strike. My daughter eats just like her daddy - everything! Here she is trying avocado...and changing the color of the white onesie to green :) We have 3 teeth solidly coming in and one more that's just on the cusp of emerging. Tonight, so gladly ate cooked zucchini from our meal. We are really working to try more real food rather than the baby food purees. She's not picky, thankfully!



She loves to play with her toys in the morning before we go to "school" and before our books/bath at night. This little chair came from my sister's boys and it's her favorite right now. I put the bunny up there, but she was having none of it!



I am busy planning her first birthday party which will be here in 2 months! We are gonna rock the ladybug theme. Found this perfect invitation on Etsy. Can't wait to scrap this big event! She will have a party at her day care on April 28th and we'll celebrate at nana's and pawpaw's in Belton on May 1st. I can hardly believe the time has passed as quickly as it has. But man, oh man, it's been a fun ride!

More pictures....

....because apparently I was too dumb to add them in the last post.... ;)




Enjoying some Christmas baby goats.


This is my sister's dog Wrigley. He is the reason
John is considering getting a lap dog in the future.
(I've been asking for years! :) )



Sophia getting in to her stocking.



Sophia with Aunt Liz.

Happy New Year!

What a great year so far. We're having so much fun with this little girl. Now that the holidays are over, it's back to some sense of normalcy...even though that may not be all that close to normal! :)

Christmas Eve, I had to work a partial day. This turned out to be about an hour. So we headed to Waco after a night of absolutely NO sleep! Sophia decided she was going to be fussy from 2 am to 6 am. So, momma walked the floors with her which brought back memories of some of our earliest weeks. Daddy got a good night's rest so he could drive us to Waco. We made it to Temple and I saw some white fluffy stuff coming out of the air. John didn't believe it was snow, until we got to Waco and it was undeniably snow! How neat to have Sophia's first Christmas and first snowfall all in the same day. We went out in it for a minute, but it was too cold to play and she wasn't too interested. We had a wonderful Christmas and dinner with John's mom and got to see our nephew also. John's sister wasn't able to come down this trip because she was off to get married in Vegas (congrats!).

Sophia's first Christmas and snow!

Sophia with Nawnaw and Daddy

She's mommy's best gift!

Cousin Christopher visiting for Christmas

We headed down to Belton later that night and spent Christmas Day with my family. My sister and her family arrived that afternoon and we all had another wonderful Christmas and another wonderful meal. (I'm scared to step on the scales after that weekend!).

With Nana and Pawpaw, and that fun little Wrigley!

It was such a perfect first Christmas as a mommy. We headed back to Uvalde on Saturday and got everything put away, washed and ready to get back to the grind.

The new year was rung in with a close examination of the back of my eyelids. Totally enjoyed it :)

Sophia is now 8 months old and growing so fast! We are working on more floor time so she can practice her mobility skills. She currently gets on 3 limbs with one leg stuck straight out behind her. But she's able to roll and move enough to get the toy she wants. We're eating 3 meals a day in addition to our regular nursing. She's started trying puffs and teething biscuits. Only 1 near-choking incident which scared the hooey outta me. Whew. I thought I was going to have to put my infant choking training into practice. She's also been battling her first cold (?). I say (?) because I can't imagine a cold lasting since before Thanksgiving. I've had one doctor tell me that kids do not get allergies before 2 years old. My doctor has said she may have a cold or allergy. And the nurse practitioner we saw this week said it may be an allergy. All I know, she's got bad congestion, runny, runny, runny nose, and sneezing. Oh, and she's stopped her consistent sleeping through the night. Darn. That was one of my favorite things before I lost it. And we've got rosy red cheeks and massive drooling, so possibly we may get some new teeth soon. In spite of all this, she's a happy little girl who lights up the room with her smile.

We have plans to travel to Houston this week to see Joanna and her new house. We're excited, but wish Houston were just an hour or two away! :) It will be a fun trip! The next weekend Molly is coming from Dallas. I think in February we are staying home every weekend!! Haha. Now I know what my sister was talking about being tired of all the weekend travels!

Better close this out. Baby girl should be waking from her nap soon. I used this morning to scrapbook and this afternoon to blog, so maybe I'm close to being caught up? Just don't let me see the laundry basket!

Wishing you all a blessed 2010!!

'Tis the season...

....to be jolly! What a wonderful season is here! Despite today being a very dreary, misty day outside, it can't overpower the Christmas season. I love this time of year. I actually spent last night making cookies for our department Christmas party tomorrow night. I have finished my shopping and nearly all the presents are wrapped under the tree. A few days ago, we got to catch Sophia's first interaction with the tree.

Playing on the floor with mommy

"I think you have something in your teeth mommy!"

Sophia is now getting up on her hands and knees and has started rocking forward and backward. It doesn't last long... :)

But, she's also now sitting herself up from her belly. We went in to her room the other night when she woke up crying. Found her sitting up in the bed. Lowered her bed in case she gets any ideas to start pulling up!

Fascinated with all aspects of the tree...

What a perfect gift for this Christmas!!

I couldn't help it....

I know I will be chastised by some for changing the layout straight to Christmas, bypassing Thanksgiving, but I am so looking forward to this first Christmas with our sweet little one. So, for you who "tsk tsk"... don't worry, it's all gonna be a'right. :) And I couldn't wait to get "Breath of Heaven" on the playlist. I actually haven't excluded Thanksgiving because every single day since April 28th has been a constant prayer of thanksgiving to God for our blessed little one! Even on days like today when she doesn't want to nap and I have 1,000 things to do.

Could they be any more precious??
These are some pics we took at Olan Mills in September.
And yes, we have the copyright release :)

First Halloween

Here are some pictures of our first Halloween with Sophia!

Getting ready to go to the South Texas Maize just outside of Hondo, TX. There were many more things for kids to do when they are older than Sophia, but we got some good pictures out of it!

Great "cowch" for photo opps! :)

She's wearing a John Deere bib, but I don't think that was a John Deere tractor!

Our next stop was to Matthews' Learning Center where Sophia goes during the week. Carolyn had set up a wonderful place for fall pictures out front!

Playing with our friend Amelia.

Cutest little ladybug...EVER! :)

Getting in some fun time with Mrs. Matthews


The last stop of the night was to our church where they had a Fall Festival. They had lots of stuff for the older kids too, but here was a photo opportunity that was set up. They were taking and printing pictures for visitors for FREE!

Ready to ride off into the sunset....