Our big girl at 3 years old

 This lucky lady had two birthday parties this year.  Look at this amazing cake Grandpa Dave and Sue got her.  It was delicious too.  This birthday she got a lot of princess and Dora toys so she was in heaven.  Also Uncle Jay got her some great sand/beach toys which has caused a daily discussion about when are we going to go on vacation.  Almost every morning she asks to go to the beach or vacation.

 She is still an amazing eater.  She loves bagels or oatmeal for breakfast these days with fruit and sometimes yogurt.  She often eats 2 breakfasts before her morning snack.  Lunch she has become pretty boring and wants only peanut butter, tacos or quesadillas.  She will eat baby carrots and fruit at every meal.  Sometimes she will eat well at dinner but usually not.  Then right before bed we have to hear how hungry she is -typical bedtime stalling.

 We are so fortunate to have found such a great daycare.  Lori does a craft and learning activities every day.  Abby knows her basic colors, shapes, how to count to 10 and can recognize all the letters of the alphabet.  This month they will work on writing their names.  She can not write anything yet so I don't expect this will really happen but it's nice to know how dedicated Lori is to teaching them.

 Her best buddies right now are still her cousin Kayden, Eli, Keira from day care and Hunter from daycare.  We saw Hunter at Target one day and she was shouting hello to him across the store until we went up to greet them.

 Bedtime is a long drawn out process and now includes many friends.  She seems to have outgrown her night terrors.

 She continues to love books.  We go to the library once a week to get new books.  She is enjoying teaching Emerson all about reading and books - well as long as he doesn't touch the pages.

 Her other favorite activities are puzzles, riding her tricycle, playing at the playground, blowing bubbles, coloring, painting, play douh, playing with her Disney princess castle and playing with her dinosaurs.  This summer we will get back into story time at the library and she will have swim lessons.

 This is adorable girl is completely potty trained.  I still can't believe it and am often nervous when we go out. Luckily she is not afraid of any public toilets and is really good about telling us when she has to go.  The last two accidents she had were right by the toilet because she couldn't get her pants off.  We had a rocky start but she learned fast.

The most difficult things for me right now are that she gets sick a lot   She only got sick once in the first year of her live and since Emerson has been born she has had 4 serious illnesses.  Also, she is getting sassy trying to test her boundaries but her tantrums are usually pretty quick.  I really enjoy watching her grow and the amazing new things she says and does everyday.  She is 30.5# (45th%ile) and 37 3/4 inches tall (70th%ile) today.

6 months

Emerson is 6 months old.  He still seems like such a baby to me.  I just can't imagine he'll ever speak or walk or even crawl.  He does make different sounds now key, gee and da-da.

  He has slept through the night two nights now.  Not in a row and it's been at least a week now.  He still sleeps best swaddled but keeps busting out resulting in crying fits in the night.  He has to have his Nuk to sleep.  He is doing well unswaddled for naps as long as he has a blanket. (We know, we know.  Don't tell the doctor on us.)

 He grabs everything in sight.  Your face, toys, choking hazards, the cat's ear, or whatever is handy.  He has been enjoying his play yard and jumper lately and seems to understand the idea of peek a bo and will cover his face with a blanket and laugh when you "find" him.

 He has a great smile that we are seeing more and more of.  He has an infectious laugh and loves to be tickled.

 Abby is still his best bud and gets the best giggles out of him.  She likes to teach him, tickle him, read to him, sing to him and scold him.  He's becoming more weary of people he doesn't see often and has give one of his  grandmas a complex by bursting into tears when he sees her.

 He can sit for a few seconds now.  Sitting and standing are his favorite positions these days.

 He refuses to ever be on his tummy.  He flips over right away to play with his feet.  I wonder if he'll be one of those kids that skips crawling because he never wants to be in that position.

He's eaten sweet potato, squash, pears, peaches, green beans, peas, and his favorite applesauce.  He did not like bananas at all and avocado did not agree with his delicate tummy.  I love making baby food so this is one of my favorite phases in babyhood.  The doctor said he can try Gerber puffs or cheerios, so for lunch I gave him a few puffs.  He didn't know what to do with it so Abby wanted to feed him one.  He looked like we were trying to poison him and spit it out.  He's really good at telling us when he isn't ready for something.

He continues to grow.  Today's stats were 80th%ile for head circumference,  16# 9 oz for wt (down to 35th%ile) and 271/4 inches (75th%ile).  Dr Cornell says growth curves have some bumps but he is right on his track.  It still makes me nervous to see the weight percentiles drop every visit but she is not worried and said "you aren't big people.  He won't be either.  Stop worrying."  So I'll try and continue her previous prescription of a glass of red wine nightly for mama. 

Sweet Potato Black Bean Enchiladas

I have 15 other blog posts in my head that will never get written with two little kids at home but I do not want to lose this recipe.  Do you get the Penzey Spice catalog? I originally signed up for the coupons for free spices but realized I never go to that store.  It does have a lot of good recipes.  There was one that sounded good but the seasonings when I made it were off to me.  You used vinegar and soy sauce to cook the sweet potatoes and it was just off to us.  So here is my drastically revised Sweet Potato Black Bean Enchilada recipe.  Bonus this is a really low cost meal to make.  I got all the ingredients from Aldi's except the leeks.

5-6 large flour tortillas
2 large sweet potatoes
2 leeks, washed and thinly sliced
4 cloves garlic chopped
1 T ground cumin ( I didn't really measure, this is my guess)
1 T chili powder (recipe said 1 tsp hot chili pepper but I didn't have any of those)
1 15 oz can black beans
2-3 cups grated cheddar cheese (I used a Mexican blend)


Bake the potatoes.  I did it in the microwave but you can do in the oven.

 Preheat oven to 375.  Mash or puree potatoes and put to the side.

Saute leeks and garlic in a little oil with the cumin until you smell it across the room.  Then add chili powder and black beans.

 Fold the beans and 1 cup of the cheese into the potatoes.  Fill the tortillas with a handful of filling  roll and pack tightly into a lightly greased 9 x 13 baking pan.  Top the enchiladas with the remaining cheese, and bake at 375 for 25 minutes.

Serve hot with salsa and sour cream.

5 months

March was AWFUL.  Somehow Emerson made it through with only a cold when the rest of us were falling apart before him.  He did start the new month with an ear infection though.  He weighed 15# 3 oz.

Sleeping:  Still no consistency at night.  He'll give a few nights were he'll wake only 1 or 2 times and then have a night like last night were he'll wake up every hour for half the night.  He is a great napper though.  He will sleep 1-2 hours in the morning and then 2-3 hours in the afternoon.

Eating: He's had sweet potatoes, green beans, squash and peas.  This week we will try carrots and then move onto some fruits.  He likes to try to grab the spoon so eating is a bit messy.

Reflux: Starting solids has seemed to greatly help his reflux.  He doesn't spit up large quantities anymore and can go a whole day without spitting up at all.  At his 6 month appointment I'm going to ask if we can stop the medication.

Tricks: He really likes to grab your hair, glasses, clothes or beard.  It's amazing how much his hand eye coordination has developed.  He loves jumping in his jumperoo.  He still doesn't roll much and shows no desire to move in that way.  He is trying hard to sit up when he is in a reclined position.  He is making more and more sounds and still loves to laugh and sing with his big sister.

I had so much fun today.

Today I took the kids to the zoo.  ALONE.  I was terrified and excited and it turned out all right.  It's so fun to listen to her these days.  Here are some of my favorite moments from this morning.

1) As we entered the zoo parking lot. "Mama, I want to tell the zoo animals how I watched the rapunzel movie with my mommy".
2) A mom kept screaming for her kid to come by her. She was really making a spectacle of herself because we were in the giraffe house and it is small.  Also her daughter wasn't do anything wrong.  Abby pointed right at the mom and said "She sure is screaming". LOL.  The mom softened up a little to her daughter after that.
3) The new jaguar cubs were wrestling and rolling around, really getting aggressive with each other.  Abby said, "Their mommy is going to tell them to settle down".  This produced chuckles from 2 moms standing by us.
4) We went to the elephants first because they are her favorite.  Here she made me wiggle my tail, ears and trunk:)


She was ridiculously cute today.  Love that little girl.

What to do on a cold winter day

Bring out something old.  This killed hours one morning and afternoon last week.

4 month update (only 3 weeks late)

The fourth month of Emerson's life have been as chaotic as the first 6 weeks.  Tim, Abby and I all got a terrible stomach flu again.  Then a week later a bad cold/cough that is lingering for all four of us.  I even lost my voice for 4 days.  Emerson's 4 month appointment seems like months ago.

The stats: 14# 10 oz (40th%ile).  He continues to gain weight but he keeps dropping lower on the growth curve.  Dr. C said he would have to eat all day to keep up with the growth he is doing in length so not to worry.  It's hard not to worry when he started at the 75-90th %iles.  He grew another 2 inches and was 26 3/4 inches (95th %ile).  Just look at those long, long legs.

Reflux: His medication was increased a little again.  He seems to spit up a lot less often and definitely the volume is less.  He no longer spits up in his sleep which makes me a less anxious mama at night.

Tricks: He has rolled a few times but hasn't done it in a week at least.  He currently loves playing with his feet, his ducky pull toy and another wooden toy that's just perfect for little hands.

Sleep:  Like his sister he is a great napper.  He naps 1-2 hours in the morning and 1-3 hours in the afternoon.  Night sleep is still all over the place with no real schedule yet.  He goes to bed at 6:30 or 7:00 pm and then will wake up 3-9 times.  I think the cold is not helping.

Eating:  We started cereal and he recently had sweet potatoes.  The whole time he was eating sweet potatoes he made the cutest mmmm sound but made faces like he hated it.  He eats about every 3 hours these days.

 

He's full of smiles and giggles in the day and loves his big sister, especially when she sings to him.