Sunday, February 20, 2011

Babies

Babies are amazing. They are adorable and cute. They love you no matter what. When they smile, it just lights up your life (especially if you are Mom or Dad). They learn new things every day and amaze us with the smallest achievements. And yes, as "they" say, they grow up far too quickly.

Gwen is already changing from a helpless little baby to this little person that has her own personality. She can sit completely unassissted now and while I am very excited by this, I can't help but look over at her and sadly realize how the little baby I brought home from the hospital is no longer here. I miss that baby and yet love her more and more now and every day, with each new achievement.

She grabs at everything now, the remote control, my glasses, my cup or my plate. She backwards crawls all over the floor and she plays with just about anything you give her. She is a complete delight to have around and is always all smiles. I love that she seems so interested in the things that go on around her as well as the objects that she finds (toys, blankets, anything really).

But, I've done this before. I've seen Christina make these same steps and I see where she is now. It is exciting to see Gwen grow up, but it is sad that I can't hold on to my babies. The stages in a baby's life come and go so quickly! By age 1 they are completely different from the day they were born and by age 2 they have again changed by leaps and bounds.

If I'm this bad now, oh goodness, just wait until they go to college! I may have to keep having babies forever, lol. Seriously though, I am comforted by the fact that we want two more children. I love these girls so much and I am excited to add two more siblings to the bunch, one day. Nik thinks its funny because I talk about our next child as if he/she is missing, like our family is not yet complete. I actually do feel like that. I feel like we are waiting for the next two.

Two of my friends just recently had their first child (one had a girl and one had a boy - on the same day!) and there are several new babies that will be born this year, Christina's Godparents are expecting as well as my sister and Nik's cousin. All of these babies make me so happy. I am baby crazy, lol. Seriously though, is there anything better than being a parent?

Saturday, February 19, 2011

Noisy baby

Friday, February 18, 2011

Eight months old

Gwen is eight months old today. My little girl is getting so big! This is what she has been up to . . . Gwendolyn Eve . . .

- has been going to bed without me every night right after we put CC to bed. This is a huge achievement since she normally would refuse to sleep until I went to sleep.

- gets distracted so easily now, mostly by either Christina or Dora on TV. This is extrememly frustrating when I'm trying to nurse her and she keeps stopping to turn and look at what is going on.

- still doesn't have any teeth, but is still teething.

- continues to love pureed babyfood and will eat anything I give her. She has such a wide range of food right now, which is something Christina pretty much never had. She eats: banana, green beans, sweet potatoes, carrots, apples, pears, zuccini, sweat peas, squash (several kinds), plum and she'll soon be trying blueberries and red pepper - all of which are hand made by me. I'm loving making babyfood and I'm so glad that I have the means to do it. I wish I had done it for Christina.

- wants to eat table food sooooo bad! She is always trying to grab my food, right off my plate. Sometimes she manages to get it too. I have to watch that little one. I have given her banana cut up and she gums it. Ever since, she sort of gums the pureed food too. It is almost as if she is getting ready for the good stuff. After her well baby visit this month, I will likely start giving her some finger foods.

- likes to chew on her hands and fingers.

- holds onto me tightly when I am carrying her around on my hip. I love it. Christina always just let herself hang which was a bit annoying. What is great about Gwen holding on is not just the holding on part, but it is that I get to hold her so close and it is almost like cuddling. I just love to cuddle with my little girls.

- has been known to say "dada" a few times, but not referring to her Daddy at all, more like just playing with those sounds.

- is starting speech therapy. Even though she is hitting all of her milestones and is more verbal than many other children her age, speech therapy is important to make sure that she will not have any speech delays due to her mild hearing loss. We are going to start with weekly therapy and then move to biweekly therapy. It is a bit intimidating because I am going to have to work with her all week otherwise the one hour sessions will not be as effective.

- wears her hearing aids every day all day. Sometimes she'll have an off day where she pulls them out over and over again, but most days she'll only pull them out once (if that) during the entire day. She is pretty good and usually doesn't fuss too much when I put them in. She prefers to hold them and play with them though and she always crys when I take them out of her hands.

- was doing this weird head banging move for awhile there. Whenever she was on her belly she would nod her head up and down. She did this several times for several days. It was really funny and weird. I have no idea what she was doing and unfortunately never caught it on video. She hasn't done it in a few weeks.

- has a wonderful new teacher. She was moved to a new room in January and has the best teacher now. Ms. Lori gives me a full update on Gwen everytime I pick her up. She pays attention to how Gwen is doing with her hearing aids, how she is reacting to things, what she is hearing, what sounds she is making, etc. Apparently she is doing extremely well and seems more advanced than the majority of children in her class.

- claps her hands on occassion (at least that is what I was told although I have not seen it first hand).

- loves books. She is very interested in holding books, looking at books and being read to. This is awesome because CC really didn't have any interest until recently.

- can hold her own bottle (apparently). This is again something I have been told but have not witnessed first hand. Since I don't give her bottles, I just nurse her, I will just take Ms. Lori's word for it.

- drank from a sippy cup for the first time a few weeks ago. I gave it to her just for fun and Gwen did really well.

- gets on all fours and rocks back and forth like she is getting ready to take off crawling.

- does a backwards crawl thing to get around - and boy does she get around. She can make it all over the living room. She can also do something best described as a jump forward. She is like a little frog, but doesn't get much height out of it. It really is just her way of moving forward slightly.

- just adores her big sister.

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Go Gwen Go

Per my Mom's request, here is a very short video of Gwen getting her practice in so that she can start crawling soon.

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Mirror mirror on the wall

who are the cutest girls of all?



It's Gwendolyn and Christina of course!


































































Bath time fun:







CC insisted on wearing her Dora underwear OVER her pants, even when we went to toys r us:





Christina wanted to show off all of her favorite dolls:






Whenever the weather is nice, we always go out to play on the swingset. Christina loves it:





Here are some mostly really old pictures that I never got on here. They are the girls with their favorite cousin, Evie: