Can You Tell???

That I have a toddler on my hands?!  I have virtually disappeared from my blog.  Get it?  Virtually!  Because it's online?  Okay, moving on... Lydia Jane turned one on January 26th and we had a wonderful time celebrating.  She truly is the light or our life! I just wanted to post a few quick stats and highlights before I don't remember them!  She is growing and learning so quickly it is getting hard for me to pinpoint exactly when she learned to do this or that.  It is so much fun!  But on to the stats!
Height: 31in (97%)
Weight: 20lbs 9oz (50%)
Head: 18in (75%)
She can still wear a lot of her nine months clothes but they are starting to get a little short.  The 12 months are long enough but too small in the waist sometimes.  So begins our struggle with clothes fitting the right way!
Things she loves to eat:
Cheese (she literally gobbles it up!)
Any fresh fruit
Green beans (the frozen kind from whole foods, heated with salt.)
Things she loves to say:
 "Uh oh"  "Bye Bye" "Tank yoo" "DaDa" "Pup pup"
We can ask her "What does the pup pup say?" and she responds "woof woof." My mom is very proud to have taught her this.
Since turning one she can now also say:
"ma ma" (yay!) nigh nigh (night night) and will respond with "Meow" when asked what the kitty says.
Things she loves to do:
Dance (to any music she hears: us singing, tv show intros, whatever)
Read(She has started bringing books to us, then turning around and sitting in our lap. She is the cutest!)
Give kisses (she will give a kiss if you ask her and she is in the mood. I LOVE it!)
Cuddle
Ride in her wagon
Take things out of boxes and put them back in
Put her basketball in the goal (and clap for herself afterward)
Wave (like a princess)
Chase mommy and daddy (while laughing hysterically
Eat things off the floor she spots with her eagle eyes (This one may drive me a little nuts.  At least now she is already spitting it out for me when I walk toward her now instead of making me retrieve it from her tightly shut jaws.)
Things she loves to read:
Where is Baby's Belly Button? (10 times a day)
Any of her books that make animal noises
It's Time for Christmas! (A Duck and Goose book, she loves pointing to the duck and goose)
The card she got from my grandparents for her 1st birthday is a new favorite as well
Things she loves to play with:
Cookie jar
all her babies (she got some pretend bottles and a new baby for her birthday and she loves feeding them both to her babies and herself)
Little people princess dolls
Belle baby
picnic basket

We just love this little girl to pieces and are having so much fun watching her learn and grow!

Whew!

Every Friday Lydia Jane and I go shopping.  I don't always need to buy something but the only way I get to see this adorable sight on Friday's is to strap her in the car seat and go for a drive.  If that drive just happens to take us to Target, what can I do? :)
Before going on a drive, I try pretty much everything to get her to sleep.  We rock, sing, nurse and I even try to lay down with her to sleep.  Nothing doing.  She starts to drift off and then pops up ready to go.  For five minutes.  Then she is back to the yawning, eye rubbing, tired little girl I was trying to put to sleep five minutes before.  It may make me a little crazy.  Top that off with a little, or a lot, of co-sleeping (which seems very nice in theory but my back is beginning to hate me) and I think I have finally had enough.  This "I'll do whatever works as long as she will just sleep" approach ends now.  Mommy is getting tough and sleep training.  Someone has got to take charge here and I just hope it's me! :)

When not refusing to sleep, Lydia Jane is busy being the cutest baby ever as you can see in exhibits A and B. :)

A baby in fake glasses! Oh, the hilarity!

Paci smile!

Baby's First Tailgate

My family had been asking us to come tailgate for a USC game ever since the start of the season. I finally said we would come to the Georgia game not realizing that was conference weekend. We only missed one session but it is still not my favorite. Despite that, we had a really great time!  Lydia Jane was wonderful and let everyone hold her.  It helped that all the ladies had on nice shiny necklaces she loves to play with.  There was fantastic food, of course.  My family made Cory and I both our favorites, my great aunts hot dog chili for Cory and cowboy caviar for me.  It was so thoughtful and yummy! The majority of my family went into the game and we stayed to watch the first quarter in the Coop with my Grandad, great aunt Bob, Nance and Lois.  It was so nice to be able to chat with them all and cheer for the gamecocks during one of the best quarters of football I have seen ever. We left at the end of the first quarter because it was Lydia Jane's bed time and I don't like keeping her out any later than 8:30 if I can help it.  As we were walking out of the Coop lot to our car, I noticed an obviously intoxicated man in his 20's noticing us.  He was looking really hard at Cory, who had Lydia Jane in her Ergo baby carrier (which we LOVE by the way) and said in an amazed voice, "I know I see a baby right now."  Cory just laughed and said "yep."  The guy then starts following us exclaiming "You've got a baby in a papoose!" Again, Cory with the laugh and "yep."  By this time I am mental preparing to stab this guy with my car keys if necessary. I do not trust the inebriated.  Drunk guy then says "You're so cool, man. *pause* People are stupid. *pause* I'm not even half as cool as you guys.  You've got a papoose and hot baby."  I'm sort of flabbergasted by the hot baby remark and drunk guy seems to have gotten distracted by something shiny or remembered what he had been doing before spotting the hot papoose baby and wanders off.  Cory and I keep walking quickly away and after a couple of minutes I ask Cory "Did that just guy just say we have a hot baby?"  to which he replies "I think so. I was trying to figure out how I could quickly get her out of this thing to you and take him down if I had to."  We have reached the parking lot where we parked and being wandering around trying to remember exactly where our car is.  We encounter a police officer who at first thinks we are casing the joint and then sees our baby and offers to help us find the car with his spotlight.  ha!  He stayed with us while we loaded up which I honestly appreciated because I was starting to feel like we were the only "normal" people around.  We made it home in no time and watched the rest of game from the comfort of our couch which I have begun to vastly prefer over out and about with the crazies!

Some pictures from our day:

Official Mom Status

The Bad News
After putting Lydia Jane to bed last night, I realized I had forgotten to feed her dinner.  I nursed her, but she also has a jar of baby food that I did not give her.  Yes, I know.  I'm Mom of the Year.  She woke up at 10 though and happily ate her late dinner.

The Worse News
Because of teething, she has lots of gunk running everywhere: out her nose, on her face, down her throat. It's pretty gross but not as gross as the hacking cough she had when she woke up to eat.

The Worst News  
The coughing continued throughout her nursing and eventually was so bad she threw up.  ALL. OVER. ME. That jar of baby food?  Yep, that was now in my lap.

Mommy is not amused after being covered in throw up...

The Good News
While I was cleaning myself up, Cory told Lydia Jane "Look at your Mommy, she's a real mom now." Yay me!?

The Better News
After the throwing up episode, her cough got a lot better.  We turned on the humidifier, read some books and she was able to nurse and fall asleep without coughing.

The Best News
This sweet girls is feeling much better today and is the cutest sleeper ever!  Also, still completely lovable despite her tendency to spit up\rub snot\throw up ect. on me. :)

Teething!

It seems like teething is an endless process. Lydia Jane has 2 bottom teeth and is currently working on bringing in a top tooth. She is chewing on everything!
Exhibit A:




Here she is chewing on one if her actual teething toys. This is pretty rare though. She has a fairly short attention span and will chew on anything.
Exhibit B:




Her favorite thing to chew on is the finial from our headboard. In the beginning, I tried to stop her. Now I just take it off and let her chew away. She LOVES it.
Exhibit C:




Most of the time she is pretty happy but we do have occasional meltdown moments.




Luckily these usually end in like this:




We recently bought her a Sophie the Giraffe teether and that is her new favorite thing! I don't have a picture of her with it but it really is as good as the reviews say and I'm really glad we broke down and bought it for her.
Overall, we are all surviving just fine but I will definitely be glad when tooth #3 finally makes an appearance and we have our happy baby back full time!

Little by Little

Right now we are in the middle of teething and getting accustomed to my new four day work schedule.  It is awesome having an extra full day with my girl, but working 9.5 hour days is a little exhausting! I want to keep up with our life on here though so my goal is to post more little posts more frequently.  All the pictures may be from my phone, but at least I will have things documented! Here are a few of my recent favs:


Being a fashionista is so rough...


Anybody want a raspberry???


She loved chewing on this straw while Cory blew on it. I don't know why; she is weird. :)


I feel badly that this cracks me up but there it is...


My favorite happy girl!

6 Months Old!

Lydia Jane is now almost 7 months old. I am definitely getting worse at these things! I skipped 5 months completely. Oh well! She had her 6 month check up a few weeks ago and is still quite a big girl!
Height: 27 1/2 inches (95%)
Weight: 18 lbs. 7 oz. (90%)
Head: 17 In. (75%)
Likes: doing the inch worm crawl, sitting up, eating baby food, playing in water, chewing on everything!
Dislikes: sleeping alone, being left alone for even 30 seconds, waiting for anything (yes, she is a little spoiled but I'm working on it)

Even though she is spoiled, she is still the sweetest baby.  She is always so happy and rarely cries.  I was trying to wait until she was a full six months old before giving her baby food, but she was just too interested.  We went on vacation the second week in July and she would give us all the stare down when we ate.  I have a funny picture on my computer I will have to post soon.  She can't crawl quite yet, but she has learned how to inch her way around to get what she wants.  She sort of catapults herself forward which is a little dangerous because she will catapult herself into the side of her crib and such.  This month she got in the river and the ocean!  She loved them both but wasn't a fan of floating in her life jacket in the ocean like she was in the river (Cory was holding onto her, by the way, I do not just let my child float wild and free in large bodies of water. :)).  She has already had so many adventures and we can't wait for many, many more!

Hanging out with Daddy is too relaxing!

I love baby food!!

Yeah, I can sit up now...what's the big deal??