I'm A Half!

Our baby is 6 months old! And she is changing so much. She is starting to pull up on things. She isn't too good at it yet. But, she is working on it. She has loved to stand since she was very young. But, she is now able to do it a little by herself while she is holding on to something. She certainly does not like to be still for very long. She is a woman on the go.

She loves to read books. She likes to flip the pages and occasionally eat them.



She is still working on this crawling thing. We think maybe she moved forward a litte bit on Saturday. But, she didn't do it again. She has her ways of getting around though. She will roll and scoot and climb until she gets what she wants.



She has officially moved to the big girl bathub. We got her a sponge that is actually for bathing newborns. But, it makes it a little softer for her to sit on. She likes to splash in the tub and play with her toys. ( I know we are missing the "L" in the second picture. We don't know where it went. Maybe she ate it :)






She also likes to eat crab like a good Marylander. (I don't have a picture of her with the crab in the big bath tub yet.)



She has gotten very good at putting her paci back in her mouth and she has even gotten 2 in at the same time. Pretty talented.

She is getting very hard to change now because she wants to roll over and look at everything on her changing table.

It was a sad day on Saturday when lowered her crib. We figured it wouldn't be long before she is pulling up on the side of the crib and we didn't want her falling out. She just seems so far away now :(

Other things she is doing:

~She is sleeping great since bootcamp. She usually sleeps between 10-12 hours at night without waking up at all. Of course she has her nights where she wakes up, but they are few and far between now. She naps great as well. She is still holding on to that 3rd nap. But, I think she will be dropping it soon.

~She is eating lots of solid foods. Her favorites are green beans and peas. She will eat whole jars of those with no problem. She will also eat, without as much zeal, squash, sweet potatoes, bananas, pears, applesauce, blueberry apples, rice cereal and oatmeal. We are going to try some finger foods this week. She has been chewing a lot (what she is chewing, we don't know), so she might be ready to try some new foods.

~She is definitely getting a little mind of her own. She has learned how to lock her knees and arch her back so she doesn't have to sit in her high chair. Of course, I can win that battle pretty easily now. But, she still has a way of showing what she does or doesn't want.

~She loves ice cold water in her sippy cup. It probably feels great on her gums.

~She is sitting up like a champ.

~She loves to be outside. She loves to go for walks in her stroller and to be in swings. We are going to go to the pool this week for the first time. I think she is really going to like it.

~She likes dogs apparently. (You can see the video below.)

I am loving every second of motherhood. I am so madly in love with this beautiful little girl that God has given to us. She is such a sweet and happy girl.

Madeline and Copper

We went to visit with Evan and Jess Kennedy yesterday and Madeline got to play with Copper. Apparently she really likes dogs. Especially when they bark and lick her. So, maybe there is hope that one day we will have a dog. I think Andrew will have a hard time resisting when Madeline looks at him with her big blue eyes and says, "Daddy, can I have a puppy?"

Standing Up

This girl is on the move. She is now starting to pull herself up. So, we are lowering her crib tonight before she decides to jump out!

Memorial Day Weekend

While mommy was packing up for our trip down to Roanoke, Daddy and Madeline hung out on our balcony for a little bit.

Once we arrived in Roanoke, our weekend was full of hanging out with family. We can hardly hang out anymore without playing a little Guitar Hero.

We spent a lot of time outside since there was beautiful weather. One night we decided to make Hobo meals. Mom and I are preparing them in the kitchen.

And then we cooked them in the firepit outside. It was pretty fun, easy and yummy. Our Hobo meals consisted of green beans, corn, onions, potatoes and ground beef, topped with a little A-1 sauce. All of the ingredients were put into an aluminum foil pouch and then cooked in the firepit.

Another night, Nathaniel grilled up some Filet Mignon for us and we ate it on the back deck. It is pretty fun eating outside.


Madeline enjoyed some time in the swing and grass. It is so nice to have warm weather now. Madeline is so happy being outside.

She Wants To Crawl

Madeline has been up and rocking on her hands and knees for the past week or so. She hasn't figured out how to go forwards yet. She only goes backwards, which makes her frustrated because she gets farther and farther from her toys. I am hoping that she will stay in this stage for a while because I am not really ready for a 6 month old to have free reign through the house. That means we will have to start disciplining and who wants to do that.

Happy Mother's Day

Mother's Day was a very special day for me for several reasons. First of all, it was my first Mother's Day with our sweet little Madeline. I can't remember a time when I didn't want to be a mom and I am so glad that God has allowed me to be the mother to such a sweet little girl. Being a mom is all that I expected it to be and more. Andrew came home from work on Friday with a fun "mom" balloon (which Madeline isn't too sure about), beautiful flowers and a sweet card. Without Andrew, I don't think being a mom would be as wonderful as it is. He is such a supportive husband and father.

The other reason that it was such a special day is because we dedicated Madeline to the Lord at church on Sunday. There were 3 other couples along with us. We came before the church, just as Hannah did in 1 Samuel 1:27-28~"I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him. So now I give him to the LORD. For his whole life he will be given over to the LORD."

We understand that God has given Madeline to us to raise and it is our responsibility to teach her about her sin and her need for a savior, Jesus Christ. We pray that she will choose to make Jesus her savior at an early age and that she will follow him all the days of her life. She is such a joy already and we are so blessed to be her parents.

Sleep Bootcamp

Disclaimer: This post is rediculously long. Feel free to skip it if you want. (not that you needed my permission to read it or not)

Well, Madeline has been a pretty good sleeper since she was born. But, lately she has been getting a little worse. She has still been waking for a feeding in the night and sometimes she wakes up TWICE to eat. This has thrown off her schedule for the day so she doesn't eat well during the day. So, we decided that we needed to change that. Before, when she cried, I would give her her pacifier and she would usually fall back asleep or she would continue to cry and I would just feed her. But, since she is 5 months old and should have been sleeping through the night a long time ago, we decided to have "Sleep Bootcamp" this week. We have been reading Babywise since she was born. But, I guess we can't claim to be babywise parents until she is sleeping through the night. So, here is a "novel" about our bootcamp this week.

Monday: We started with Madeline's second nap. We put her down without her swaddler (she has been swaddled since she was born) and she fell asleep pretty quickly, about 1 minute of fussing. But, she woke up about 15 minutes later. I decided to let her cry herself back to sleep without giving her her pacifier. She cried for about 30 minutes while I dried my hair and turned up the music on the computer so I couldn't hear her. She eventually fell asleep flat on her face with the pacifier in her mouth. She then slept for another hour. Her next nap went great. She laid down and went to sleep pretty quickly for about an hour. That night, we gave her a bath, read her a book, fed her and had her in bed around 9:00. She fussed for a minute and then fell asleep. She slept until 12:30am and then woke up. This is the moment I had been dreading for a long time. I knew that it was best to teach her how to sleep through the night. But, it is hard to listen to your baby cry when you could just feed her and be back in bed in 20 minutes. So, we let her cry and she went back to sleep after about 30 minutes. Not, as bad or as long as I thought it would be. We shut her door and ours (and I tried to get Andrew to stuff tissue in his ears. But, he was too tired to get up and get the tissue.) so we could barely hear her. But, it was still slightly painful. :) I think I heard her a little later in the night. But, she didn't cry enough to really wake us up. So, she slept until about 7am.

Tuesday: She did great with her naps. She fussed for a few seconds when I laid her down and then she flipped over to her stomach and fell asleep with her face planted in the matress. That night, I tried to feed her before she went to sleep around 8, but she wasn't hungry from her last feeding around 6. So, I just put her down and she slept until 5am. I would have let her cry herself back to sleep but it had been 11 hours since she had eaten. So, I fed her and then put her back down. She slept until about 8am.

Wednesday: Naps went great. That night I tried to feed her again around 8pm before I laid her down and she wouldn't eat again since she had eaten at 6pm. So, I laid her down. She went to sleep, but woke up at 9pm. I decided to feed her so that she would sleep in a little longer in the morning instead of waking up to eat at 5am. She ended up sleeping until 8:30am. That's 11 1/2 hours. I think I may have heard her fuss a little through the night. But, not enough to really wake me up. Her little cries sound pretty pitiful now. She is really hoarse. I don't know if it is because she has been crying more than we think or if maybe she is a little sick. But, it is making it even harder to listen to her cry. Thankfully she isn't crying that much anymore.

Thursday: I laid her down to sleep around 8:30pm at our Bible Study Leader's house in their pack n' play. She was asleep in less than 5 minutes (once again, flat on her face). We put her in her car seat around 10pm and came home and put her in her bed. She gave a slight wimper, rolled over and fell back asleep. (Which I was very thankful for since we were missing the first part of LOST. :)) We heard Madeline wake up around 5am. I went in to check on her and she was trying to get her pacifier back in her mouth. So, I just shut her door and ours and I went back to sleep. I don't know how long she fussed. But, I don't think it was long because I probably would have heard her. So, she went back to sleep and woke up around 7:45 Friday morning. So, that was about 11 hours of sleep.

Friday: We seem to be on a better schedule now. I am leary of saying "this is her schedule now" because she always seems to change it as soon as I figure it out. And I can't always predict how long her naps will go. But they are usually between 1 1/2 -2 1/2 hours. But this is basically what we are doing:

8am eat and play

10am nap for about 2 hours

12pm eat and play

2pm nap for about 2 hours

4pm eat and play

6pm nap for 30-45 minutes

6:30pm wake up and play

8pm eat and bedtime

So, we made it to the end of our bootcamp week and I am still waiting for a "bad" night. I am sure there will be more sleepless nights due to teething and sickness. But, things are looking up. She is doing very well. I will always keep my moms advice in the back of my mind that she will probably try to test me every now and then and I just need to remind her that I am serious about her sleeping through the night (or whatever area we are trying to discipline her in). :) Well, we have a very happy daughter now and a very happy mommy!

I'm sorry this post is soooooooooo long. I am actually writing it down so that I can look back at it with our next child and remember that it really wasn't that bad and that we should do it much sooner with the next one.