just a swingin'

Yesterday was a beautiful day. Sunny, a little breezy, and temps in the 70's (it is February right??). Kathryn & I took advantage of the nice weather and a lazy day and tried out her swing she got for Christmas. We have a swingset/play thing in the backyard and replaced one of the regular swings with the Little Tykes swing that Grandma & Grandpa Waugh gave her for Christmas. Here are a couple of pictures and a video for your viewing pleasure!

the next car seat

This post is more for input from you guys than me telling you something. I know that we have a little while before we need the next step in car seats, but you know... we are nerds and we research. So here begins the research.

What kind of front facing car seat do you have? Do you like it? Would you recommend it? Are there things about yours you would change? Do we really need all the bells & whistles (cup holders, etc.)? Does anyone have one of the ones that upgrades to a booster seat for later? Was it worth the money??

I know she doesn't sit forward for another five months, but either I start looking now, or I'll be running at the last minute to get one when I realize she has outgrown the one she's in.

seven months and counting

Our little Kathryn is growing up so fast. She just turned seven months and within this past week she has hit a few milestones.

First, we had given her Cheerios a few weeks ago. You would have thought we had given her peas. The faces were hilarious and she made gaging sounds. Last Sunday we bought a box of Cheerios and a couple of tubs of those Gerber puffs. It took her a little while to figure out what we were feeding her. Now, she begs for them. I couldn't get her to eat much breakfast this morning, but she had about 10 Cheerios and a few puffs. It is funny to watch her beg and open her mouth so wide to try to get the food. Now if we can get her to do that with her normal food.

Secondly, we had seen her once a few weeks ago sit herself back up from on her belly. Now she does it very well. I have even found her sitting up in her crib after a nap. Guess it is time for her Buzz mobile to come down.

And the exciting part... she's crawling!! Her movement had become more like a frog hop. Or she gets up on all fours (hands and feet) and falls forward a little bit. She could definitely get to where she wanted to go. The other week she had gotten over to her bouncy chair and was a little whinny. Eric picked her up and she started bouncing. He put her in her chair and she was happy for at least half an hour or not longer. We were impressed she made it clear what she wanted! This afternoon she actually crawled for a few steps... feet I guess.

She is really good about keeping herself occupied and playing with her toys (that have now taken over the living room). Her feeding hasn't been great. If I want to make sure she eats an entire tub at a meal, it has to contain bananas. She doesn't even eat an entire thing of sweet potatoes normally anymore.

Let's see... sleeping. I don't know what happened to sleeping through the night. I promise she did for a couple of months. Now the normal routine is down somewhere between 9:30 & 10:30... and then up around 1:30 & 4:30 to eat. But then she sleeps until at least 8... some days I'm lucky and she will sleep until 9:30!

Her hair is starting to come in thicker now. To me, it looks like it has an auburn sheen to it now... or at least the new stuff. She has thinned out a little. Some of her pants don't stay up very well. Especially her jeans. Socks still don't stay on. Most of the time she pulls them off and eats them. Grandma even bought her shoes... and she manages to get them off, most of the time the socks come off still inside the shoes.

I believe that is it. Let me know if you think of something else you want to know.

pictures from the couple of weeks or so

These first few pictures are from our Waugh Family Christmas a couple of weeks ago.

Esther, Caleb & Kathryn

Kathryn in a box

Esther & Kathryn

These pictures are from the past week (see story below)

Four Generations of Waughs

Aunt Nancy & Uncle Jack with Kathryn

Eric, Grandpa Waugh, Jennifer, Great Grandma Weeldreyer, Kathryn

Great Grandpa Weeldreyer, Grandma Waugh

Kathryn playing with Eric's cousins Megan & McKenzie

First time with a sippy cup

"Nana, can I have some birthday cake too???"

Asleep on the plane ride home

kathryn is airborne

This past week and last weekend we did a little bit of traveling. Kathryn had her first plane ride. It was a little delayed as our flying stand-by out of Fayetteville didn't happen the first time. We missed the first flight we tried last Thursday and the rest of the day looked bad. If we didn't get to Atlanta on Thursday, we weren't going to make it out of Atlanta to Nebraska on Friday. After not making the flight, we hopped in the car and drove the 6 hours to Atlanta. We some how survived with no CDs in the car.

We made it to Atlanta in one piece or three I guess. Then Kathryn's flight experience was delayed again. We were trying for the first flight out on Friday morning with Grandma & Grandpa Waugh. Luckily Grandpa checked the flights before we went to bed on Thursday and found out a flight was canceled on Thursday and all 40 something passengers were moved to flights on Friday. We tried (and made) the last flight out on Friday to Omaha. If I remember right, I think it landed around midnight, just don't remember if that was eastern or central time.

We spend the night in Omaha with Great Grandma & Grandpa Waugh and Uncle Jack & Aunt Nancy. After breakfast and a little social time on Saturday, we drove to South Dakota for Great Grandma Weeldreyer's 80th birthday celebration. After the celebration on Sunday, we drove back to Omaha to sleep and was on a early flight out Monday morning. My parents met all of us for lunch at Old Spaghetti Factory (finally! long story for another time). Eric then drove back to Fayetteville on Monday and Kathryn & I headed to Rome for the week to celebrate Nana Payne's birthday. We arrived (by plane) back in Fayetteville this afternoon.

Kathryn did wonderful on the plane trips. Leaving Atlanta on the way to Omaha she watched out the window for about ten minutes or so and then slept the rest of the way. On the way back to Atlanta she also slept for most of the trip. Today on our way from Atlanta to Fayetteville she didn't fall asleep until about 25 minutes left in the flight. She was happy looking out the window and playing with a few toys. I was worried about the flight back as I wasn't flying with another adult to help me with her. Luckily since I was flying standby, and there isn't a lot of people traveling to Fayetteville, I was assigned an empty row. The ticket agent and the flight attendant were gracious enough to let me keep Kathryn in her car carrier and use the empty seat next to meet. That made the flight really enjoyable. I even got to drink a cup of coffee!

dinner?

kathryn is six months

Kathryn is six months... plus a little at this point. We went yesterday to the doctor for her normal check-up plus to get some advise on this cold we are passing around. Everything is good and she is growing well. She is now 17 lbs 2 oz (75%) and 27 1/2 inches (97%). I think her head was about 17 inches, whatever it was, it was around the 75% mark also. The doctor said she is growing fine and everything looks and sounds good.

We now have a rolly polly on our hands. She no longer stays on her blanket on the floor. She'll sit there by herself for a little bit, but you have to get her to the sitting position. Still no crawling, but she can wiggle her way to what she wants. She does a lot of backward wigglying so most of the time she ends up no where near what she was going for. Everything is going in her mouth. She's been eating my hair on purpose lately. She used to grab my hair just to hold on (it is almost always in a pony tail at this point). But lately she'll grab a small section to eat. It is quite funny until my hair is soaking with slober.

Let's see what else has been going on... Kathryn regularly holds herself up on her hands. Usually with the legs kicking away.


She is eating better. I had only been feeding her baby food for lunch & dinner, but the doc told me to get breakfast in there also. She doesn't like just plain rice so I'm mixing it with her fruits & veggies. Carrots & sweet potatoes are still her favorites. She is beginning to take to apple sauce and pears. The face she made the other day when I tried peas for the first time was a wonderful face!

I think that is about it. Oh, still only the two bottom teeth, but the upper two have to be really close to coming in. The gums are obviously swollen and she loves to gnaw on everything!

I'll leave you with a few new pictures.