Dr Visit

Today we had Caroline's 6 month well visit, two weeks late. The Dr.'s office called this morning because my Dr. was sick so we ended up seeing one of the nurse practitioners instead. We started with the measuring. Caroline's head is 42 cm (30%)and she is 25.3 inches long (20%). Apparently she measured 25 inches last time so the nurse practitioner thought they must have measured incorrectly last time because she is growing in weight which is usually what stops if a baby is failing to grow.
Speaking of her weight, she weighed 14 pounds, 9.5 ounces (20%). She is still a little peanut.
Caroline has been coughing a lot and has had a lot of congestion for the past month. I have called several times and they always tell me it is no big deal. Nana currently has walking pneumonia so I was concerned about Caroline. Robyn (the NP) examined Caroline and listened to her chest for a long time. She does not have pneumonia. But, she does have a minor ear infection. I was shocked because even though Caroline has been congested, she has not seemed in pain at all. Does this look like a baby with an ear infection? Katherine has never had one so this is new territory for me.
As you can see, she loved the paper on the examining table. It is quite fun to play with and to eat. What I love in these photos is that if you look closely you can see that her hair is long enough to be messed up. It is sticking straight up in the back.

Bath time

Tonight was Caroline's first bath in the big bath tum. She and Katherine took a bath together and I think they both really had fun. I don't think I am ready to have all of Caroline's baths in the bath tub because she is still a little wobbly and it is not as comfortable to lean over the tub. I would rather her be in the small tub on the counter. It was fun for them though.

Sisters

This month it has been so exciting to see the relationship between Katherine and Caroline grow. I think the main factor has been Caroline learning to sit and therefore being able to interact more with Katherine. Katherine is the sweetest big sister. I have only seen her one time do something unkind to Caroline. Sure she has made Caroline sad at other times but they have honestly been pretty innocent. Like today she was trying to put Caroline's headband on and Caroline did not like that.
She always wants Caroline to be in her lap. Caroline is really getting too big and too squirmy to sit in Katherine's lap anymore so I place her next to Katherine. We all love to snuggle.
She likes to try to get Caroline to play with her. Here she is setting up a tea party for them to enjoy together. Notice that Katherine is taking a break to feed her baby. In the second picture she is telling her baby to say "cheese".
Katherine is very helpful. Now that Caroline is sitting Katherine can entertain her. This is especially nice while I am trying to get ready or fix dinner. They will actually be playing together.
Katherine loves to compliment Caroline. She will say, "mommy, baby Caroline is sooo cute". I agree.
Katherine also enjoys reading her books to Caroline. She gets frustrated though when Caroline tries to grab the book and especially when she tries to put it in her mouth. I can see many years of Katherine reading to Caroline.
The feelings of love and enjoyment are mutual. Caroline adores Katherine. She smiles at her when she comes by. She watches everything she does. She laughs at her more than at anything else.
I had hoped that my children would get along and enjoy one another. I have so far been so pleased at how well they have gotten along and I have been surprised at how early they have been able to play together and enjoy one another. I know that as sisters they will not always get along so perfectly, especially when they are teenagers but it is so fun to think about how this friendship will grow through the years.

The Helmet

Caroline was on my lap in the office today and she kept stretching toward Katherine's Dora bike helmet hanging on her tricycle. I decided to put it on her. She thought it was pretty funny. It is pretty big on her but look at that adorable smile.

Arboretum

I am about a week behind in posting this but last Friday was a beautiful 78 degree day. Sure was nice before the cold front came in this week. We met up with some friends at the arboretum, one of our favorite places. When we got there I realized that the attachment for Caroline's car seat was not in the trunk. So, for the first time, she sat in the front of the double stroller like a big girl rather than in her car seat. She does look like quite the big girl. She did great but there was no place for her to nap or really rest when she was tired because it does not recline very far.
We spent almost all of our time at the houses. They are so much fun for the kids to play in. There were not many flowers as it is kind of between plantings so it was fine by me to stay by the houses.
It is so hard to get a good picture of Katherine and Caroline. Right now Katherine does not let Caroline sit on her own very well. She still tries to hold on to her like she did when she had to support her. Now it just makes Caroline mad.
They you always have the "cheese" smile that is so fake.
It was so hard to get a good picture of Caroline because she was always interested in what was on the ground. You can see from the photos that she does have a very cute bow though.
Before we left we went to walk through the ferns. They have little trails and the kids had been trying to walk through the flower beds all morning. Someone suggested that Katherine and Kyle hold hands. They did so without arguing. Talk about looking very grown up!

Good, Kyle's sister decided to chaperone this outing and join in on the hand holding.
Katherine took off running down the trail. Kyle had left her and I think I heard her scream something about monsters.

We tried to get a picture of the entire gang. What is a challenge with 2 kids is impossible with 5. Here we have Katherine, Caroline, Kyle, Luke and Lacey.
It was a wonderful morning spent with friends (notice there are no mommy photos). I look forward to the spring when we will be headed to the Arboretum weekly.

35 months

I am a little late posting your 35 month post. I think I am in denial that another month has passed and next month you will be 3!You are so excited about your upcoming birthday. We talk about it a lot and you have no concept of time so you think it is this week. You tell me who you want to be at your party (Nana and Pops, all our cousins, Caroline), what you want to do (play games, do a craft) and what the cake should look like (pink, with sprinkles and princesses). I think we will have 2 parties again this year, one for family and one for friends.

When you talk about your birthday you say, "Now I am 2. Soon I be 3. Then I be 4. Then I be 5. Then I be 20!" I am not ready for that! You are still my baby girl.
You are a sweetheart. My favorite thing that you say often is, "I love you so, so, so, so, very, very much." You tell all of your family often how much you love us. It makes my heart so happy. You love to snuggle too. My favorite times of the day are when you crawl into our bed in the morning and when we read books and snuggle before nap and bedtime.

You really love your baby sister. You will say, "mom, your baby crying. Maybe she has a poopy diaper. Maybe she wants milk. Maybe she wants some mommy time." You are so concerned when she is crying. You are really good at comforting her and helping her to get happy.All of a sudden you are quite a girly girl. You want to wear a pink dress every day which is difficult because it is cold outside and you only have a few pink dresses. You also want to wear your pink dress shoes all the time. When we are at home you love to dress up. You have a basket of dress up clothes and you have certain ideas of what your outfit should be. usually you put on your pink princess dress, your tutu, your pink crocs, a hair bow and then you hold your sparkle wand and dancing ribbons.Your new favorite books are the Fancy Nancy series and Gigi God's Princess series. Of course both of these are very girly. We even have a few Gigi videos from the church library.

You love to dance. You twirl when you have your dress up clothes on. We are planning to start ballet classes soon. You were so upset the other day when I went to aerobics and you did not get to do the dancing exercise class with me. In this video she is saying, "I Cinderella". At the end she does a little bow when I clap and say "Good job".


You love to play pretend and have a very vivid imagination. If you want to know what to get her for B-day, anything that fosters the imaginative play. The other night she was playing with Sam. She pretended to nurse her baby doll. Then she said it was time to give her a bottle. So, she pretended to pump and then give the baby a bottle. She knows where baby's milk comes from in this house doesn't she?
You also love to sing all the time. You make up songs for everything. The other day you sang a fun song you learned at school. The song you are singing in this video is about the color red.


You love to play pretend and have a very vivid imagination. If you want to know what to get her for B-day, anything that fosters the imaginative play. The other night she was playing with Sam. She pretended to nurse her baby doll. Then she said it was time to give her a bottle. So, she pretended to pump and then give the baby a bottle. She knows where baby's milk comes from in this house doesn't she?
You also love to talk all the time. Your vocabulary is really large (I think). I am amazed that you are able to so clearly communicate. Your language has exploded to go beyond facts and now you also express very abstract ideas. I love it when you sound like a little adult. You will sit beside me and very seriously ask, "mommy, how was your day today?" Some words sound like you are living in West Texas. You can make a 1 syllable word into a 2 syllable word. I am not sure where this is modeled because none of us do this. An example would be when you said, "mommy, we are going up a big hee-uhl (hill)".
You are a typical almost 3 year old in that you are potty trained with an occasional accident, you don't ever think you are tired enough for a nap but you end up with a 2 hour nap almost every day and you eat lots of foods but can be very picky on any given occasion. Some of your favorite foods are pb&J, hot dogs, yogurt, applesauce, broccoli, and anything with Chick-fil-A sauce on it.

You love to try to read though you realize that you really don't know how. I try to get you to just say the words you know and tell a story with the pictures. Sometimes you will do this and other times you get frustrated because you know that you don't know the words. I have not started trying to teach you letter sounds yet as I don't think it is really necessary. You know all the letters of the alphabet and can even name something that starts with most of the letters.

You are really into trying to cut things now. As you can see you are properly using a knife. Your toddler knife is pretty blunt. I am not sure that it could even cut butter but you like to practice with it.

Katherine, you continue to be such a joy. I love you more and more each month. It is so fun to see you growing into a little girl. You are in such a fun stage as you are curious about everything. You ask so many questions and learn so quickly. I love sitting with you to talk and snuggle. It is so hard to believe how grown up you are and that you will soon be 3.

This will make you smile

Caroline is a very happy baby who smiles a lot. She makes all kinds of cute baby noises - coos, gurgles, squeals. She has laughs but it is usually a short chuckle or a squeal. Today though she got going like we have never seen before. Katherine was playing with some penguin toys and something about it was hilarious. Enjoy the cute video.

6 months

Half a year old - where has the time gone? Caroline, this month you have become even more fun. I remember with Katherine thinking that 6 months was where it got really fun. The same is true with you. It is not that you were not fun before because you sure were. Now though you are so much more aware of what is going on and you are doing so many more things that it is just more fun than before. You are quite the curious and active little girl. As you can see in your monthly chair pictures, you had no interest in sitting still and looking at the camera. Not when that cool piece of paper was there for you to play with. You wrinkled it up and chewed on it every time.
Your little hands are always busy. You grab at anything withing reach - toys, food, mommy's hair. You will take whatever you are holding and study it intently, including investigating with your mouth. Katherine does not like when you try to "eat" things. If you can't get your hands on something, then you investigate your hands. You love to babble. There are always cute noises coming from you. Katherine likes to point out that you are learning to talk. We plan to teach you sign language as well. Now that you are eating we are starting with "eat", "milk", "more", "please", and "all done".Speaking of eating, we started you on solids a day or two before you turned 6 months. So far you have only tried sweet potatoes. I think you mainly like the texture because when you see the spoon coming you stick out the tongue and start making funny noises. You are just investigating. I think you like the taste as well. You don't cry or protest, but you don't eat much either. I thought none of it was going down until I changed your first "post solid" diaper.
You love to smile. Almost anyone can get a winning smile out of you. Sometimes though you bury your head in my shoulder when someone tries to get you to smile as you pretend to be shy.
You have hit a lot of milestones this month. The main one is that you have learned to sit up. You cannot get into the sitting position on your own but if I sit you up, you will stay that way for a very long time. You are enjoying time on your tummy a little more but you still roll over to your back pretty quickly. Therefore you are showing no interest in becoming mobile. I know it will come and I am not in a hurry.
Katherine likes to help you sit up. Once she pushed you over (she did not like the discipline result of that). When you fall over (see photo below) she will catch you and even try to sit you back up. That does not make you too happy. Speaking of Katherine, I think she is your favorite person. She can make you smile and giggle like no one else. Now that you are sitting she enjoys playing with you a lot more. Mommy's favorite is when she comes up to you and says, "Baby Sister, I love you so, so, so, very, very, much." When you smile back at her she says, "Mommy, Baby Sister loves me too." I know you do.
You are still a pretty good sleeper at night. You have had a cold and cough for the past 2 weeks so you sometimes wake up coughing. It is pretty miserable sounding. You either sleep through the night or wake up once. You sleep about 11-12 hours at night. Naps are not as good. You do take naps but they are sometimes short and sometimes long. I am not very good at making you cry it out or sleep in your crib at nap time. Ashamedly I admit that you take a lot of naps in your car seat and in my lap. Caroline, you continue to be such a joy. I am so happy that I am able to be your mommy!