audrey lizzie

Audrey,

Yesterday, you were six months old. It hardly seems possible. Half of your first year is already gone. Even though it feels like we've known you forever, in other ways, time seems to have flown by!

You got your first tooth on Monday. Your daddy called me at work to let me know. He was the one who discovered it. One day shy of six months old! We can feel your tooth if we put a finger in your mouth, but you don't really open up your mouth to show it off much. If we try really hard, we can get a little peek!

You love the Jumperoo and the teddy bear walker. In the Jumperoo, you started off jumping from side to side, left foot, then right, left, right, left, right... Now, you jump higher and harder using both feet at once. You also like "walking" in the walker. You're not as interested in the little plastic bears as Josh was, but you really like to chew on the little toy bar and play with the plastic beads. Maybe that's because you've been teething. Daddy has also taken the walker outside and let you "walk" on the deck. You manage to go backwards and forwards and you get stuck in corners a lot too.

You've been eating baby rice cereal for a while now. I think we first started trying to give you cereal when you were about 4 months old You weren't sleeping through the night and Mommy thought "real" food might help you sleep better, instead of just bottles. No such luck! We've also started feeding you baby food occasionally. You seem to like eating cereal and baby food, but you are a very messy eater! With each bite, you tend to push some of the food back out of your mouth, so it takes a couple of tries to finish each bite. If you don't wear a bib, you end up with half of it on your clothes! Since you're not sitting up by yourself yet, we feed you in the walker or in your swing.

We finally transitioned you out of your swaddle (Miracle Blanket) for sleeping. It was tough at first, but I think you've gotten used to sleeping without it. You still take a pacifier for naps and for sleeping at night, but most of the time, you don't use it when you're awake. You take all of your naps and night time sleep in your crib. When you first stopped sleeping without your swaddle, we would cover you up with a blanket or two. Inevitably, you would pull the blanket up over your face at some point during your nap or during the night. Mommy started to worry that this wasn't a good thing! So, we got you a baby sleeping bag. When it's time for bed, we put you in your sleeping bag. It snaps over the shoulders and zips up the side. It's like a blanket that you sleep inside, so that you can't pull it up over your face or get tangled up in it.

You still don't want to sleep through the night. You make a habit of waking up once or twice every night for a bottle. Eventually, we're going to have to break you of this habit somehow, but for now, Mommy can't stand to hear you cry. And, since your room is right next to Josh's, I'm afraid that you will wake Josh up if I don't come get you. So, for now, we are still getting up for a bottle and a diaper change in the middle of the night. You usually go to bed fairly early- around 8 or 8:30 most of the time, sometimes a little bit earlier and sometimes a little bit later. We want you to be able to go to sleep on your own, so we put you into your crib when you're sleepy, but still awake. Sometimes, you put up quite the little fight and there's a lot of going back into your room to give your pacifier back to you and "tuck you in". Sometimes you stop crying when we give you your pacifier, but a lot of times, you just spit it back out! Most of the time, you will wake up between midnight and 2 AM for a bottle and sometimes you wake up again between 5 and 6 AM. And you're pretty much always up for the day by about 7:30. Getting ready for work is kind of hectic when you and Josh are awake, but I love getting to see you in the morning before I go to work.

You're good at rolling over from your back to your front, but you don't really roll the other way (front to back) yet. If we lay you on your tummy, you will push up, but you don't like laying on your tummy as much as you like laying on your back. In fact, you have a little bald spot on the back of your head from laying on your back and turning your head from side to side. I've been told that that's pretty common! You like to stand up on the floor with our help or in Mommy or Daddy's lap. Sometimes, I wonder if you plan to just skip crawling and go straight to walking at some point!

You're getting bigger every day. At your 4 month checkup, you were in the 75th percentile for height and weight compared to other baby girls. You were actually about the same height and weight that Josh was at that age. You are just about to outgrow all of your 3 to 6 months size clothes and the 6 to 9 months size is beginning to be a good fit!

You're starting to laugh more and it's so cute. You especially like to laugh at Daddy and Josh! It's fun to see them do something that really tickles you. You're laughing for a reason!

You've learned to make little clicking sounds with your tongue/mouth.

You've been shopping with Mommy and out to lunch! You've been to Third Saturday Lunch Bunch with Mommy and NiNi twice now.

Your little clothes are so cute! Shopping is a little dangerous right now (from a financial perspective!), because everything they make for little baby girls is so stinking cute! You've already passed along a suitcase full of outgrown clothes to your cousin Olivia. Since you two are only two months apart, it will be interesting to see if either one of you will be able to wear hand-me-downs from the other or if you will be too close to the same size at the same time.

Your favorite thing to say right now is "Uhh, uhh, uhh, uhh" - over and over again! We love you to death, but honestly, it can get a little old sometimes. :-) We're looking forward to those first few words. (I'm secretly working on "ma ma" with you!)

You are starting to reach for toys or other objects that are in front of you. You have a rattle and a couple of small stuffed animals that you like to hold on to. You also like the plastic links. You are also fascinated by Josh's little choo choo train. If we lay you on your tummy next to the tracks, you'll watch the train go around in a circle. It's fun to watch you as you follow it with you head. You also love the plastic toddler swing outside on the porch. You've actually been getting in the swing for probably two or three months now. You're so small that it looks like it wouldn't be comfortable, but you seem to really like it. And you're not afraid for us to swing you!

I watch you with the boys and I can tell you really love Josh and Daddy. You don't pay much attention to Bones. You do, however, already seem to be interested in Elmo when Josh watches Sesame Street in the morning. Josh calls you Sissy and it's kind of stuck (I think Daddy started it.) I make a point to call you Audrey too, though, because I love your name and I think it's too pretty not to use it!

Happy Six Months Birthday, Audrey! I love you.

Love, Mommy