Let Her Eat Cake!

The invitations were sent.  The family gathered.  The decorations done:





The guest of honor was seated:



The song was sung.  The cake was delivered.  But what to do now?  She'd never eaten cake before...



 

Now one might think that she was sticking her tongue out in anticipation of the entire can of frosting holding the smash cake together.  We all held our breaths in anticipation of how big of a mess she'd first make.  However, you'd be wrong.



My little fruit bat went for the strawberries first.  Say what?  Honestly, how is this child mine? Never fear, she did discover cake and frosting, in a big way:



By the end, the frosting was even in her eyelashes and hair:



 

It was a slow start, but a strong finish.  Here's the happy family after the main event:



It was a fun first experience with cake.  I'm glad that we waited until her birthday to induce her first sugar rush:)

 

The Cousins Come to Visit

Over the weekend we had a little celebration to mark Little Miss' first birthday.  We invited immediate family into town for the occasion and we were blessed to have them all come.  The cousins all arrived the night before which made for even more fun.  It gave Sugar Pop some time to adjust to being around so many people.  She was spoiled with so many people wanting to play with her and provide her entertainment.  Here she is in the morning just playing with her cousin:

In fact, the cousins thought her toys were so much fun, they continued to play with them after she wondered off:

There was one cousin not as interested.  He had his own stuff going on:

The girls in particular got along really well.  They enjoyed making each other laugh and having snuggles:

There may have even been some wrestling involved.  Little Miss can really issue a smack down:

Sadly, the cousins had to take off pretty early.  We can't wait to see them again.

Interisland Play Date

In the past I've mentioned my friend Sayrah.  She and I were classmates, roommates, and just good friends.  She visited often when I was both pregnant and a new mom and had her baby just 5 months after Sugar Plum was born.  The first play date wasn't that exciting as her little island treasure was only a month old, but they were recently back in town and we were able to get the girls together for another introduction.  My, what a difference 5 months makes.

THEN (November):

NOW (April):

Look at the hair on both of them.  And their size!  I can't wait to see how they've changed the next time they meet:)  Wouldn't it be great if next time it were in the islands?

A Walker in our Midst

You may remember a few months ago when I posted about a walker/bike that hubs and I bought for Little Miss.  Here is a picture of Daddy and daughter assembling the toy:

We've tried to get her interested in it, and she hasn't been at all responsive.  Until last week.  She had a friend over and we were all playing in the play room.  All of a sudden, Little MIss stood up behind the walker and started walking around the room- quickly.  I'd never seen her do that before and was very surprised.  Sugar Plum used the dining room chair as a walker with Mamaw during the week.  Friday she emerged from her play room walking confidently behind the walker all over the house- regardless of the surface- quickly.  We were both stunned and impressed at her sudden walking prowess.  Here are some pics snapped on Friday:

She decided to continue her practice on Saturday:

and every day since.  Couple that with the amount of free standing that she's been doing and I'd say that we're going to have a walker much quicker than I anticipated.  How did this happen?  10 days ago she wasn't really close to walking and today she's at the cusp.  She's already the size of a toddler and could be confused for an older kiddo, but the crawling keeps her a baby in my eyes.  Once she starts walking I'm going to have to acknowledge that I'm now the mother of a toddler and that makes me sad.  I love everything about her current phase and while I'm sure that the next stage will also excite me, I'm sad to be leaving this behind.  Motherhood is so bittersweet. 

Evicted

Ok, so we weren't evicted as in thrown out of our house, but we did have to leave while the house received a nice new coat of paint.  Mamaw, Little Miss and I were lucky enough to score an invite to a friend's house for the afternoon so off we went.  While at her house, Mamaw and Tater Tot were able to get in a little cuddle time:

Little Miss also wanted to check out a new ride.  She thought it was pretty sweet:

However, as fun as these things were, this stole the show for the afternoon:

What is it you ask?  A container of bubbles.  Our darling girl never opened them or saw us blow any bubbles, she just really enjoyed carrying them around the house in her mouth.  For over 20 minutes.  It was long enough that after a while it occurred to me to start timing it, but I got distracted.  Just trust me- it was long and it was weird.  Our friend gave us the bubbles since she was so attached to them.  Wonder what will happen when she actually sees me make some bubbles.  Mind. Blown.

Happy Anniversary to Us

On April 21 hubs and I celebrated our 2 year wedding anniversary.  We received a card in the mail from my grandma to commemorate the day.  Little Miss really enjoyed playing with it.  We thought it was her own special way of adding her signature to the card:)

It just so happened that Mamaw was in town to spend some quality time with Little Miss.  Although our anniversary was technically on Monday, hubs took Thursday off and suggested we do a paddle to celebrate.  It was a gorgeous day and you don't have to ask me twice to get out on the river.  We decided that while the Piney River is our favorite, it's now farther from our new house and there might be some rivers out this way worth exploring.  We packed up the cars and headed to Stones River to give it a try.  Here we are at the put in.

It was a really nice river with just the right blend of a calm river with some technicals.  It took us a few hours to complete the paddle with a stop for lunch in between.  We decided to take our trusty skipper, Huck with us.  We think he also enjoyed the paddle.  We're never sure if his love of spending time with us outweighs his disdain of water, but we take him with us when we can anyway.  Regardless of whether or not he enjoyed the paddle (we're just going to assume he did), he rocked his life jacket

(above picture taken from a previous paddle) and smiled all the way home.

How did we get two kayaks, two people and a dog transported?  We loaded one Prius with the kayaks, and the other with a driver and a dog.  It's hard to imagine 2 kayaks fitting in a Prius, but I have photographic evidence.  Please disregard the danger I put myself in while taking this photo.

It was an amazing day and while the week was incredibly busy, I'm really grateful we were able to get out and enjoy some time as a couple.  Thanks to hubs for planning it and to Mamaw for watching Tater Tot.  It really does take a village.

Water Play

Now that it's getting warmer and Little Miss is able to stand, we bought a water table to enjoy this summer.  It was a beautiful day and a friend came over to explore with her.  Please excuse the lack of clothes, we were trying to clear up a bit of diaper rash.  The girls really enjoyed the water and didn't really fight over the toys.  When that was over they went exploring in the backyard a bit.  The advantage of a shaded yard was that the girls could play without having to load them up with sunscreen.  Her friend has a screened in porch, so we may move over to her house when bug season gets into full swing.  

We've already had the table out a few more times since these photos were taken.  Each time she enjoys it just as much.  As fate would have it, we actually have 2 water tables.  We bought one at a garage sale for $5.  When we were home later that afternoon our neighbors came over and gave us another one.  We're still exploring both to see if we have a strong preference for one or if we want to keep both.  The good news is that a decision doesn't need to be made now.

Happy Belated Easter!

I know that many of you celebrated Easter, but we're just not that into it. We don't go to church regularly and we didn't put together an Easter basket, but we did want to mark the day in some way. One of the neighbors had a huge blow up bunny in their front yard. We thought it'd be fun to take her Easter picture there. We got busy and by the time we went to take the picture after dinner the bunny had already been taken down:( Luckily, they also had these little yard ornaments, so without asking, we plopped Little Miss down in the front yard and quickly snapped some photos before the neighbors could come out and ask what we were doing. Little MIss was very interested in the grass so it was difficult to get a picture of her looking up. I hope your Easter was very happy.

Books with Mamaw

Mamaw came today to visit for a week. Because it's Easter, she brought a few goodies for Little Miss to enjoy. One of these goodies was a touch and feel Easter themed book. Little Miss is really starting to get into her touch and feel books and this one has large areas to feel. Here are the two exploring the book together. I'm excited for a fun week.

Sensory Overload

When I taught at the preschool we had sensory bottles in the younger classrooms which counted as 'science.'  Mostly, it gave the kids something to look at and handle during the day.  Many of these bottles are fast, easy and cheap to make.  My mom found some great small bottles and we brought them South with us when we came down after Thanksgiving.  Then we got busy with the move and I asked a friend to store them so that they wouldn't get crushed or thrown away.  After that I completely forgot about them until my friend was getting ready to move and asked that I take them back.  So, I've finally been reunited with my bottles and this week I've started making some sensory bottles.  

One of the first things I did was make different colors with food dye and water.  I'm paranoid about giving them to her on the carpet, so she plays with them on the kitchen floor.  It keeps her busy when I'm cooking and she doesn't seem too upset to leave them there.  Here are some action shots of her checking them out earlier, although I must admit that some of the bottles are currently mixed in with the pots and pans.  I'm glad that minimal effort can create such a success.

Another Big Milestone

When we began feeding our Little Miss food at six months, we did it with the motto that 'food before one is just for fun.' She was getting all the nutrition she needed from formula and breast milk and we were just giving her experiences with different foods, textures, and flavors. It turns out that Little Miss is an excellent eater. She definitely prefers variety, but she can pack some food away. As we're rapidly approaching a year, we've started thinking about the transition to food as that main nutrition and milk as a supporting role.
As part of that transition we decided that the time was upon us that I would stop taking domperidone to help my supply. I've been on pharmaceuticals for nearly a year and passing those on to Little Miss. You have to transition off it very gradually, so over the past few months I started decreasing my dosage until I was completely off the stuff a few weeks ago. I watched my pumping drop from 2 oz, to 1 oz, to 1/2 oz and the last couple of nights I've gotten nothing. I still nurse Little Miss several times throughout the day and I do still have some milk, but there's no need for me to pump anymore. The milk in this vial represents several nights of pumping and will be the last major dose of milk I give her. I won't really miss the pumping, but I am sad that I won't be sure that she's getting enough milk for full immunological benefit everyday.
Luckily, I asked my donor to only put 2 oz of milk in each bag. I have a nice little stash out in the freezer that we can start to give her and should last for a while. I'm sure I'll go through another little grieving process when I run out of that.
At the end of the day, even though we chose a very difficult road with the drugs, and the pumping and the donor, I'm really glad that we did that for our little Sugar Pop. I know that I'll look back with confidence that I did everything I could to make sure that she had the best possible start in life. Would I do it again should we choose to have another child? Probably not. It was incredibly time intensive and it only worked because I stayed home and could nap during the day with the baby. If I had two kiddos to watch with different nap times I'm not sure that I could manage it. I may look into a milk donor, but there's no way I could maintain that strict pumping regimen. Breastfeeding is such a conflicted issue for me. I'm so grateful that I was able to cultivate a successful breastfeeding relationship with my baby, but sad that it didn't include adequate amounts of milk for her needs. I'm confident that I did the best with what I had to work with but I feel both success and failure. Hopefully as time goes on I'll give myself more credit and come to peace with the decisions we made.

My Cozy Little Family

Hubs often gets home when Little Miss is waking up from her afternoon nap. She gets a bottle when she wakes up and he sometimes volunteers to feed it to her. Huck was also cuddled up on the chair and this scene made my heart swell. You may notice Little Miss playing with her hair. When we nurse or do bottles she prefers to play with my hair, but she still pulls it at times. If I move my hair out of reach she'll then begin to play and pull her own. I wonder if one of these days she'll start actually feeding herself the bottle, but there's enough ways she's showing us that she's growing up all too quickly, so I'm not going to push it.

Puppy in Training

Little Miss has been interested in my keys for quite some time now. However, she's only just recently started carrying them around like this. Could it be that she's getting some pointers from puppy?

TGIF- The Star Legwarmers Edition

I'm so happy that it's starting to get warmer out, but we still have mornings that are a bit cool. Legwarmers are the perfect way to keep her legs warm in the morning and then peel off in the afternoon without having to go through a wardrobe change. Little Miss also hates crawling with her bare knees on hard flooring. She changes her crawl technique when she's on these surfaces and it doesn't look very comfortable. The legwarmers also help her crawl normally wherever she goes. Plus, they're darn adorable. Warning: I have these in lots of different patterns so you may see them a lot in the coming months.

Babywearing

Although not specifically mentioned in previous posts, you've seen hubs and I babywear since nearly the time our Tater Tot was born.  There was the classic- Ergo style carrier:

(Remember that photo from Father's Day?  She was so little!  When I put her in that now she's almost eye to eye with me.  I need to look around her head to see where I'm going.)

That worked for a while, but when I met my mama friends, they recommended a ring sling for quick ins and outs, like at the grocery store.  Here's a picture of me trying it out:

For hiking, we moved up to something a little more heavy duty that should support her for a few years to come:

Hubs pretty much uses that one exclusively.  I keep the ring sling in the car and used it just today at the store.  It is very handy.  I have an Ergo at home that I use when she's fussy.  I put her on my back to cook dinner or do other chores around the house.  However, as she grows it's becoming less and less comfortable to wear and at some point she'll outgrow it.  Enter wraps.  They come in many different sizes and you can wear your child differently depending on how long your wrap is.  I'm currently borrowing two from friends as I get the hang of it.  Basically, there's tons of different ways you can wrap your baby onto your front, back or hip. I'm trying to get back carries down and I'd like to learn one where her head is over my shoulder so she can really see what's going on.  They're not the easiest to learn, but I'm trying.  Hubs helped me get her on yesterday for a walk on the greenway.

When I sent the photos to the Facebook group about babywearing, they were able to give me lots of tips.  The main problem I have is that she's really wiggly when I'm trying to get her wrapped so it's not as tight as it should be.  She likes to lean and kick her legs and towards the end of the walk we discovered she popped her seat.  Luckily, her legs were still firmly wrapped, but we had to take her out and hubs carried her the rest of the way home.  The advantage of these is that they're always the perfect fit (once you learn how to do it correctly) and they'll never outgrow them so you can use one wrap until they outgrow being worn.  I have friends with 4 year-olds that still enjoy being worn.  However, it can take a while to get the child up and only certain carries make it possible for the child to come in and out often.  I definitely think these have their place and am trying some out as I venture into the world of wraps and try to decide what works best for Sugar Pop and me.  It'll be interesting to see all the different ways we carry her before she outgrows it.  

TP Trouble

This post may offend some of you, but in the interest of keeping it real, I have a recent bathroom scene. Since it's just Sugar Pie and me during the day I don't bother closing the bathroom door because it just causes her to fuss. She comes, stands at my leg and hangs out until I'm finished. Lately she's been interested in the toilet paper because she sees me use it every time. A couple of times she's pulled some, but never too much and doesn't fuss when I roll it back up. On this particular day I wasn't paying attention and she unrolled a lot. I know that this is totally normal but I hope that she never gets to the point where she goes into the bathroom by herself and unrolls the entire roll.