First Fever

The reason we saw this face all weekend was because my poor baby was sick.
This much I figured... I could tell she wasn't feeling well. She never ran a fever and she was still sleeping well. Last night was a rough night though. She was fussy all night long. It was exhausting. When were all up in the morning I took her temperature. No fever. Then Tallon called me to tell me that once he dropped her off at daycare she was happy as a clam.

All morning I was telling everyone how Charlie has developed a bad attitude over the weekend. Well, around 2:30 I got a call from daycare and they told me that Charlie had a fever of 101. I will admit... this made my heart race a little. She has not been sick yet... not sick enough to have daycare call. I rushed out of work as calmly and together as possible. I didn't want to show my crazy new mom side. When I picked her up she was napping and once she realized what was going on she was so happy to see me. We went home, ate, played and scheduled an appointment with the doctor for the morning. I did leave a message with the nurse to make sure we were safe to wait until the morning... we are. I am thinking it is an ear infection caused by some teething. She has yet to cut a tooth and I am sure it will happen any day now.

After some much needed attention from mama, a hot bath, some medicine and a warm bottle my sweet little baby was a sleep by 6:45. Lets hope she has a better night than last night.

What we do...

I read another blog recently that had an entry about taking a photo an hour for ten hours. I decided to try that today...
I took way too many pictures and lost track of the time throughout the day. However, it did document how we spend our weekends. Here is what I came up with.

We wake up... and then go back to sleep about an hour or so later.

While she sleeps I have some coffee, work on a different photo project and...

get ready.


We wake up and eat.

We go to Wal-Mart.

We make baby food.

We take Diet Coke breaks while Charlie naps again.

We play with a very happy and well rested baby.


(My new favorite picture)

We make more baby food.

We lose socks.

We see this face a lot.

We take happy baths.

And we wear Christmas pajamas in March.

That was our Sunday and my not so successful photo project.

Great Weekend

This really was a great weekend. The weather has been great, we ate great food and we had a great time.

Saturday we went to see some friends that we haven't seen in quite awhile who now live in Van Buren. Their little boy was having his second birthday party. We had a lot of fun and I think Charlie really liked playing with his toys.



We dropped Charlie off at my mom's when we got back in town so Tallon and I could have ourselves a date night. We ate at a new restaurant called Hjem. We have been avoiding it because we thought it was going to be expensive and we thought I wouldn't like anything on the menu. Wrong and wrong. I got the burger... it was the best burger I have EVER had! Then we walked to Orange Leaf to enjoy some frozen yogurt. I love that place!After that we went home, watched a movie and enjoyed a good nights sleep.



On Sunday we cleaned up the house and did some laundry before we went to my mom's to pick up Charlie. We decided to go with my mom, brother, his wife and kids to Lake Fayetteville to have a picnic and fly a kite, as well as walk around the lake.



It was such a nice day and we all had a great time. Charlie did however get a little sunburn after being outside so long. I need to remember to break out the sunscreen from here on out.

C C C Crawling

As you know Charlie has started to crawl. A week ago she figured it out... I am so happy. I love every time she hits a milestone. However, this milestone has also come with a lot of frustration... for both of us. She gets frustrated when I tell her no and I get frustrated when she gets so upset. I don't have to tell he no often (yet), but when I do she really hates it. Last night she even threw a little bit of a fit. She was trying to get some cords that are on the ground in the TV room (yes, i know, I need to baby proof on) and I kept telling her no. The first time I told her no she just looked at me and then reached for the cords again. The next time I told her now she fussed a little. Around the fourth or fifth no she became quite unhappy. She turned away from me, cried and started flapping her arms in frustration. It seemed like the rest of the night (about 45 minutes) she was mad. There was no pleasing her.

Also, with crawling comes a sleepy baby. Charlie doesn't sleep all that much at daycare. When she is home on the weekends she takes two two hour long naps. However, when she is at daycare she only takes two 45 minute or less naps a day. She sleeps great a night though, so I can't really complain. This hasn't been too much of a problem until this last week. She is SO tired at the end of the day. There have three days this week that she was sleeping when I picked her up from daycare. She tends to fall asleep on the way home, but used to she would wake up as soon as I would take her out of the car... not any more. When she wakes up after he car nap she is quite cranky. She does okay for bath time, but once it is time to lotion up and get pajamas on she is mad! We make it though. Then it is time for a bottle and she passes out. The last two mornings we had to wake her up. That rarely happens. I wonder what she will do this weekend when the time changes...

(my sleepy baby)

I know that she will soon balance out and things will get smoother. I also know that she will start hitting milestones pretty regularly now. I am looking forward to the pulling up, cruising, walking and talking. I know all these things will have their frustrations, but they also mean she is a happy, healthy and growing baby.

She is perfect and I love everything about her. She is the most wonderful thing that could have happened to me. Perfect.

Eight Whole Months

Charlie is 8 months old today. I know I say it every month, but I can't believe it. She has changed so much in just 8 months. She went from a blob that just needed to eat, sleep and poop to a tiny person who babbles, squeals, smiles, laughs and now crawls.

She learned how to crawl a few days ago. Last Thursday (March 3rd) she just started crawling. I was sitting with her on the floor in her room playing with some toys. I have been pushing her toys away from for a while now and nothing happened. This time she got on all fours and moved forward. She used to just give up and find something else to play with. By the next morning she was all over the place. She is doing a true crawl... she gets her hand on the ground and walks them forward... she puts one knee on the ground and slides it forward... Her other leg sticks straight out to the side and she uses her foot to push forward... by doing this she is able to get back into the sitting position easier. It is so funny to watch. I have seen the army crawl, the bear crawl and the regular crawl, but I don't know what to call what she is doing.

She eats and sleeps great. She is pretty much always in a good mood. I can just look at her and she smiles. She mimics so many sounds, but her favorite is the pretend cough. She is turning into such a big girl. I really didn't think it would happen this fast.

Happy Valentine's Day!

I have never really made a huge deal out of Valentine's Day. It is a little bit of a silly holiday. However, now that Charlie is in my life I have a whole new reason to enjoy Valentine's Day.

I wanted to buy all the cute stuff in the store for her... even if is was a little to big for her. I just wanted it all. I ended up buying her a few things... I didn't wrap them up or have her open them. I will next year. I think Valentine's Day will have a whole new meaning for a while.

Last night Tallon decided he wanted to have dinner together. We didn't really feel like cooking after a long day at work. So on his lunch break he went to the store to buy a variety of easy dinner making supplies. As I fed and put Charlie to bed he started preparing our easy Valentine's Day dinner. When I got done with my shower I went to the kitchen to find a candle lit meal of microwaved lasagna, salad, a bowl full of these weird dried snap pea things (they were tasty) and less than ten dollar dollar champagne. It was perfect. Simple and cheap. I loved it. I like that he really tried to do something special for me, but also knew that something elaborate would just irritate me. We were done eating by 8:00 and able to cuddle up on the couch to watch some TV.

Love Them!

Seven Months Old

Charlie has made it to the 7 month mark. It seems like after seven months it goes by even faster. I know people that have seven month old babies and before you know it they are a year old. I know it is going to go by so fast... I have even started planning her first birthday party. It's going to be a pool party!

She does something new almost every day. Right now she is showing signs of crawling. She hasn't quite figured it out, but I know she will get there soon enough. I am actually watching her try to do it now. She starts out in a sitting position, puts her hands on the floor, twists a little and ends up on her belly... which she hates. She then cries a little and I put her back in the sitting position. I know it be long before she is crawling all over the house and making messes. I am excited and worried about when this day comes.

She is a good sleeper at this point. She goes between taking three short naps and two longer naps during the day. Either way she gets a good amount of sleep during the day and sleeps great at night. We rarely have to get up with her at night. Every once in a while she will wake up in the middle of the night. Sometimes she quickly gets herself back to sleep and sometimes we have to go in her room to comfort her. She normally doesn't cry when she wakes up. She just babbles in her crib until we come get her. She is still going to bed around 7:00pm and waking up around 6:30 or 7:00am. It's not too bad... especially since I get up fairly early anyway.

She eats great! I read all this stuff about how they won't really get all that much food in their mouth and that it was just practice. We never really had that... She has always been able to eat from a spoon quite well. She eats a new vegetable every week (I think we are running out of vegetables now). She eats the vegetable around lunch time and eats cereal in the evening, as well as bottles throughout the day. I can't for the day to come where she just eats regular food.

She tries to repeat things like "mama" "baba" and "dada" but she normally just gets "baba" out clearly. However, when we are not trying to get her to repeat us she says them all. I know she is not calling me "mama" but it makes me feel pretty special. When I leave the room she normally says "mama" over and over... I like to think she is calling for me.

She is a very curious baby. She watches everything and when she gets a hold of some she examines it thoroughly. I know when she starts crawling will have our hands full. She will be into everything. I probably should start baby proofing a little more.

This is her pre-crawling maneuver. She eventually just ends up on her belly and mad.