Four Months

This post is a couple weeks late, but our little girl is now four months old. That's one-third of a year, one-sixth of two years, one-thirtieth of ten years. No matter how you count it, it's going way too fast.

She had her four month puppy shots and she did great. There was definitely crying involved, but only for a minute or two. She is such a big girl. They put a camouflage band-aid on her bare-naked-leggies. Not exactly very lady like, but she didn't complain.

She was 24-inches long and 13 pounds, even. I figured I should grab a picture of her slightly chunkier four month old hands and feet:

Baby Hand

Chewing on my hand is serious business...

Forecast: Sickness With a Chance of Locusts

Quoting from Tuesday's post:

"Luckily we have turned the corner and hopefully she will be back to 100% here soon!"

Unfortunately, I spoke too soon.

Audrey spent 2 hours at daycare on Monday because both Kelly and I had commitments at work that we couldn't get out of. It turns out all the kids at daycare on Monday became sick on Wednesday, this time with some sort of stomach bug. For Audrey, that meant a good half-day of throwing up while Kelly was home with her.

We assumed a baby throwing up for half a day wasn't good, and a quick call to the doctor's office confirmed that fact. We were told to get her on Pediolyte with a warning that if she couldn't keep it down, we would have to take her to the children's hospital. That freaked us out enough that we did everything we could to keep her hydrated. Why exactly do they put food coloring in something you are supposed to feed babies?

Six or so hours, and two or three orange stained outfits later, she was holding liquids down and we figured we were through the worst. And we were...for her, at least.

Thursday was fairly uneventful but come Friday morning when Audrey woke us up at about 1:30am, the first words out of my mouth were: "I think I'm going to throw up." About 20 seconds later, my prediction came true in a most unpleasant way. What followed was an 8 hour tag-team parenting adventure, the details of which I will spare the readers. Let's just say that for 8 straight hours, Kelly and I wished our apartment had more than one bathroom and Audrey wished her room wasn't next to the only one we have. Today, my chest muscles hurt so bad that it is painful when I breathe.

Thankfully this truly was short lived and while we are both still trying to rehydrate today, we felt good enough to go for a family outing to Audrey's favorite store: Babies R' Us. She poured on the guilt pretty strong, reminding us of how we basically ignored her for 24 hours, and she managed to talk us into getting her a new toy. Here she sits, in her new big-girl Bumbo chair:

Hopefully I don't jinx us, but I will say it again: Luckily we have turned the corner and we should be back to 100% here soon!

Close Encounters of the Twenty Footers

Since the green goop was still flowing from Audrey's nose this morning and she still has a bit of a lingering cough, I decided that me working at home was a better option than taking her to daycare today. We decided that she has officially outgrown her infant play-mat, and we set up the "big girl" play mat we inherited from Norma. Anything new holds Audrey's attention for a few minutes--which was just long enough to attend to all the emails I needed to send today.

The stars aligned around 1pm (she was both well-fed and well-rested), so we both took an extended lunch break and went to the zoo. The highlight of the trip was again the giraffes, especially since one took interest in her, bent down, and stuck his nose within six inches of her nose. I honestly thought he was going to lick Audrey in the face. Both everyday events and extraordinary occurrences are still equally amazing (or unamazing) to her, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised that she didn't even flinch.

This is the third cold Audrey has had and it is definitely the worst we've experienced. We are on day six and I feel like she is just starting to get better. Luckily we have turned the corner and hopefully she will be back to 100% here soon!.

Super Bowl Sunday

Our little girl sure knows how to throw a Super Bowl party! She had Doritos, 7-layer dip and chips, veggies and some sort of delicious sour cream dip, Twizzlers, brownies, soda, and somehow even managed to get beer. I will have to say though, she is still sporting an old-school cathode ray tube TV that she really needs to upgrade. Doesn't she know that you can get some good high-def flat screen TVs at Costco for just a few C-notes?

She also needs to learn to follow football a little better. Her favorite team wasn't even playing, but she was still sporting their shirt.

It was an extremely selective party. Only the coolest of the cool were invited (which meant her mom, dad, two cats, and Dave). One of her main goals was to test out her hiking backpack. The backpack is designed for kids 16 pounds and up and she isn't quite there yet. However, watching her shovel down those Twizzlers and brownies, I'd say she'll be there soon. Regardless, she'll definitely be ready for adventures by the time the snow is gone.

What a Difference a Day Makes

Twenty-four little hours ago (more like forty-eight, but I'm taking artistic license here), this was our little girl in the morning--bright eyed and excited to go to school to play with her new friends. Two weeks her elder, Ivy is one of her better friends. They apparently like to share the toy gym together and often they ignore the toys and just stare at each other.

Well, Ivy's mom got sick, then Ivy got sick, then of course...this is our little girl now. Cold + slight fever + ear infection + eye infection + no sleep. If I could get inside her little head, I'm sure she is asking:

"Can you please explain what is going on? I know I only slept like 20 minutes last night, but when I finally did go to sleep in the morning, you woke me up to drive me to the doctor. They stuck things up my nose, put cold things on my chest, and when I finally fell asleep after crying there, you just woke me up again, put me back in that stupid car seat (which I hate) to go back home. Then you shoved droppers in my mouth with nasty medicines and put drops in my eyes that sting.

All I want to do is watch the Muppet Show, but you will only let me do that for like 10 minutes. And why do I feel so crappy? Can't you just make me feel better?

Don't worry, I'm not blind. I see your camera there. But no...there will be no smiling for you today."

Poor little girl. We're trying. Feel better. :(

On the Road to Mobility

After two extremely unpleasant nights, including screaming at bedtime (by Audrey, not us), we figured we'd eschew the ubiquitous advice of putting babies her age to bed early and let her yawns be our guide instead. That meant an extra hour and a half of working on her floor routine. Our little Mary Lou Retton decided to thank us by demonstrating her new-found tumbling skills. She rolled over from front to back, twice!

In case you didn't hear Kelly's squeals from where you are (highly unlikely if you were anywhere in the lower 48), I'll replay it for you:

AHHHHHHHHHhhhhh!!!!!!!!

EEEEEYYYYEEEEHH!!!!!!!!

Needless to say, we were quite thrilled.

So, congrats Audrey. You're on the road to mobility. Just don't ask for the keys to the car quite yet.