Catherine 41 weeks

A weekend of birthdays

This weekend Caroline got to go to two birthday celebrations!  First on Saturday, we went to the first birthday party of my coworker Melissa's daughter Livy.

That is Livy's new rocker.  She loved it!  Then today, we celebrated Nana Laura's birthday with breakfast and cousin time.

Of course Caroline is scavenging for the uneaten food of her cousins.  Hehe.

Shelley and Genny needed a few shots of them together for school, so they posed for my camera and we got a few that weren't overly silly.

Speaking of overly silly, I did a little photo shoot with Catherine and Eric.  Baby Olsen is a week overdue now...he may break Caroline's record at this rate.  Below are the silly and the serious.  Some more artistic shots will have their own post.

And a random photo of James showing off his juggling skills!

Professional shots from the beach

The images from Rebecca Knowles arrived!  Yep, we took sunset photos at the beach wearing pastels. Ha.  My favorites are the ones of Nana and Papi.  By far.

No idea which ones I want to print, and no clue where I'd put them.  I'll probably fiddle on Photoshop a bit and maybe turn one B&W and see how it goes.

Ah, the beach.

Eight Months Old

This sweet girl is now eight months old.  Caroline amazes us every day with her focus, energy, and growth.  At eight months, she is a super fast crawler--so fast in fact, that I can never get photos of her because she comes at me too quickly!  Caroline also pulls up on everything and is cruising along.  She'll take a few steps toward John, Daiane or me, but she still has no idea what she is doing (she dives at us in the end).  She can usually balance on her own while standing for 5-10 seconds before she gets distracted and topples over.

Her mobility also scares me to death!  She has no issue heading to the end of the bed or the top or bottom of the stairs, and given the fact she grabs everything in her reach, we've had to be extra cognizant of what is around.

Our month-by-month photo shoot was therefore nerve-wracking.  Thankfully John was close by.

Caroline continues to eat everything in sight.  Her most recent discovery is hummus.  She loves hummus, one of the messiest foods ever (esp. when it dries!).  She also had a meat dumpling last night. Loved it.

Caroline claps and dances.  It is adorable.  She has three teeth and will have a fourth in a week or two.  She shyly puts her head on my shoulder when she meets someone or hasn't had a chance to warm up to them.  After a few minutes, she is busily playing about like she's seen you every day.

Her favorite toys are the loud plastic "learning farm" walker, a purple plastic phone rattle, golf balls, and of course cell phones and remote controls.  Below she is listing to her learning farm sing and fetching her rattle.   She is starting to get into books.  It will be fun when she snuggles in my lap and listens to me read her a story.  That will happen right??

I cannot imagine what I'll have to update on in a month.  So for now, I'm going to enjoy her little wobbly self and go stop her from crawling out the back door onto the deck of splinters.

xoxo

A new do, a new tooth, and a new skill

So I tried out a new hairdo on Caroline this week.  Mini pigtails.  We have quite a ways to go to rival the pigs of our cousin O or friend Pearl.

Caroline is enjoying some delicious avocado toast and a yogurt pop.  She actually does like the pop.  Especially because she cut her first upper tooth this week.  She is now napping again...three times a day to make up for lost time.  I am glad she is back to her normal silly self.

There you see her standing by the new ottoman (with terrible hair - apologies).  Caroline is cruising, crawling, and standing.  Every once in a while she'll take a few steps in our direction, but she has no idea what she is doing.  The standing has gotten quite impressive.  It is unbelievable so I let her just do her thing and stand and wander as she sees fit!  The cloth diapers provide an ample amount of padding :).

Eight months old tomorrow!  Updates and a photo shoot this weekend of course.  I should go plan her outfits!

Teething again

A few days before Caroline's 6-month mark, she cut her first two little mouth razors.  Currently, as she nears 8 months, she is getting her first upper tooth.  Caroline's teething symptoms are not really in line with what I read in all of the various parenting literature.  Aka, no drool, no runny poo, and this time no fever.  However she is quite fussy.  AND SHE DOESN'T NAP.  She'll sleep for an hour or so early in the morning as usual.  Then nothing the rest of the day, despite the fact she is exhausted.  Therefore it was a tough weekend for us all.  Not horrible though.  Could have been way worse.

This is how I was greeted yesterday after the first (only) nap.

See that camera back there in the first picture?  So does Caroline.  That was a good 5 minutes of entertainment when trying to nap on Saturday.  If she is sleepy enough she'll ignore it though.  The weekend was filled with a trip to the pool, and putting practice with dad.  Caroline and I also played in her room a bit and sorted outgrown clothes.  I only wish her rug were a bit softer.

Big diaper tushie!

She seems to always pose like that when wearing this particular ensemble.  Perhaps because it is French?

Finally, our new ottoman arrived.  I don't love it.  But Caroline does.  It is the perfect height for her to cruise around.  She is a big time cruiser and stander.  Where is my little squidge of only a few months ago?

Adieu!

New books

I snagged some new books for Caroline on Zulily a few weeks back and they arrived today.

There are two issues however.  1) Caroline isn't into books yet.  2) Three of the four books are counting books.  I think both issues are minor though, especially since they are so very pretty inside!

After checking out her new loot, Caroline returned to her favorite activities.

Chewing on remote controls, and

Crawling all over mom and trying to grab the camera.  Big ol cheeks.  Then we took some self timer shots of us together!  Please excuse my gorgeous look...I worked from home today.

Until next time, xoxo.