First Father's Day and First Day Being Sick :(

Here's the newest update from our not-so-new arrival!

We had Quinn's 9 month check-up (although it happened at 9.5 months) on Friday.  The nurse took Q's measurements and weight...and then plotted them.  Her head circumference is staying stable on the 75th percentile, but both her weight and length have dropped below the 50th percentile.  Her length was 29.5" (I think...should have written it down...I'm probably way off...maybe it was 39"?), and her weight was 15 lbs 15.5 oz.  When the doctor came in, I asked her about her weight and we went to go re-weigh Q since sometimes their scale can be off.  We got the same result.  Our doctor wasn't concerned though as she said that Quinn definitely looks healthy and strong, and that we would just re-weigh her in a month.  I'm sure that this next appointment is more for my sanity then anything and the doctor also explained that at this age it's not uncommon for the curves to change.  She didn't give us any special instructions about changing the way that we feed her or anything, so that was great news.  She mentioned that we should start giving her eggs now (first the yolk only, then the white only, then both together if tolerated well) before her first year immunizations.  It's crazy to think that that appointment is just around the corner!

We've started trying to get Quinn to eat some finger foods along with constantly trying new foods.  For finger foods, we've tried giving her some cut up green grapes (which she loves), some of the Gerber puffed bits (also likes quite a bit), and finally we've had some success with eating bits of bananas with her fingers.  It's actually quite funny to watch her eat with her hands - she grabs on to the morsel, then sometimes it goes in her mouth, and other times she thinks that it's in her mouth and starts chewing when it's actually on her bib or in her lap.  The Gerber puffs are funny too - since there still aren't any teeth poking through her gums (I swear I see some though!), each puff seems to have to take 3 separate trips in her mouth before she starts chewing.  She'll pop one in, then let it drop out, and this cycle continues until she finally decides that they're soft enough to chew.  Next on the list of "to try" finger foods are toast fingers, cucumber and cantaloupe!

New pureed foods have included edamame/yogurt (not too sure if she likes it), egg yolk/cheese (also not so sure), and chicken/sweet potato/apple (HUGE fan). 

The food issue brings me to our next point...on Saturday evening, Quinn decided that she wouldn't be a good eater as she normally is.  We tried everything and she finally decided that she would only eat Mum Mums and a Farley biscuit.  Oh well.  At least it was something!  So on Sunday I made the chicken puree for her to try, since she hadn't tried chicken before.  She LOVED it...so much so that she ate A TON!  Since she wasn't waving off food, we continued to feed her, figuring that she was hungry since she didn't eat well the night before or even at lunch that day.  Well, after we had put Quinn down for bed we were settling in to watch the conclusion of the U.S. Open when we heard her coughing and gagging over the monitor.  I don't think that our legs could have gotten us up the stairs faster...and we found our poor little peanut had been sick all over her bed and was continuing to get sick before our eyes.  Poor thing!  We gave her a mega bath, changed the sheets, changed her clothes, and took her downstairs for some cuddle time...when she decided to get sick again all over the blanket we had her in, all over Steve and myself.  So back up to the bath we went and I called Telehealth for some advice.  I also insisted that Q sleep in our bed that night because I was nervous about her being sick again.  Luckily, she wasn't and the advice from the RN from Telehealth was fantastic.  We only fed Quinn cereal yesterday and she's as right as rain...and currently yelling at me from her jump-jump.

Oh!  Last thing - Quinn pulled herself to standing on the weekend!  So far it's only been on lower things (about a foot-foot 1/2 high) but it counts!  Anything higher and she can't seem to figure out how to get up off of her knees to pull up...but it's coming!

Sorry for the novel...here are some pictures to make up for it!

Pretty blue eyes

Conked out in her favourite spot

Happy Father's Day!!!

In Awe

Standing up like a big girl!

My last post was about how much had happened in two weeks...and it's still going on!  Last Wednesday while at bootcamp, Q was fussing a little bit, so I decided to just stand her up next to a small foam bench for a change of scenery.  Lo and behold, she just stood there, proud as a peacock!  She hasn't yet figured out how to pull herself up to stand by an object, but she'll stand pretty solidly if put by an object.  It's quite funny when we stand her up in her crib as she squeals in delight and her blue eyes just sparkle.

Quinn also has been babbling non-stop.  Her little voice is so sweet and I think that she just likes to hear herself talk...which she comes by honestly!

Another very cute development is the morning snuggle.  Whoever is lucky enough to be the one to get Q out of her crib in the morning is also the lucky recipient of her snuggles.  You pick her up and she just lays her head down on your shoulder, content as can be.  I love a snuggly baby!

Getting into drawers...trouble is definitely afoot!

Making a mess of her bib and facecloth basket

Caught red-handed as I write this post!

9 Months Old Today!

Wow - it's been 9 months since we first met our beautiful daughter and every day I can't believe that we're parents.  Even as I'm writing this post I'm getting emotional.  I know that you always hear that you will never know love until you have a child...but it's amazing how true that is.  Obviously it's not the same for everyone as not everyone wants to have children, and they find their happiness and joy in other ways.  I always knew that I was meant to be a mom (and Steve was definitely meant to be a dad) and now that that has been realized, it's just the most amazing joy of life.

OK, enough with the sappiness!  So much has happened in the past 2 weeks!  I swear that we have a little genius in the making. :)  Q had been getting kind of close to crawling, although backwards, for a while.  Then last Wednesday morning when we were in Digby at my grandparents' house, she started to get up on all fours with ease and just hanging out there.  Then later on that night, in front of Daddy on Skype, and both sets of grandparents at the house, she crawled!!! It was so amazing!  Q's way of crawling involves getting up on all fours and then launching herself forward into a sort of bellyflop.  It's not the most graceful thing in the world, but she gets where she wants to go, even with some funny grunts along the way.  Quinn's also getting the hang of waving.  Sometimes she needs a little prompting, but other times she'll start waving when you say "bye bye" or the occasional "hello".  It also turns out that Quinn has learned how to dance.  This involves bouncing up and down when she's being held and sometimes when she's sitting in a chair or on the floor.  She loves music, especially "Bird is the Word", much to my chagrin!  She also LOVES to play peek-a-boo.  Sometimes she needs you to put the blanket over her and she'll pull it off, but other times she'll put whatever is in her hands at the time over her face (e.g. napkin, baby wipe, foam number from her playmat, your hand) and pull it down before you even have time to ask "Where's Quinn?".

Foodwise we're doing well!  Quinn loves yogurt, especially mixed with bananas.  She also tried some potatoes and some mixed berries (the berries were in prepared baby food pouches).  I'm going to make some baby asparagus and a fish/veggie dish...we'll see how those go!

Stay tuned for some pictures and video!

First Road Trip

This past weekend was the first time that we've taken Q on a trip in the car any longer than the hour drive to/from the airport in Phoenix - we went to Toronto for my friend's wedding.  Things went very well on the 4 1/2 hour drive actually!  We stopped halfway in Kingston for something to eat on the way there.  Quinn slept pretty much the entire ride to Kingston and only fussed a bit on the second leg, but nothing that a little bit of singing didn't help!  Saturday was the wedding and our friends babysat for us...and luckily Quinn was as good as gold!  We missed her while we were gone though and couldn't help but smile when we saw her fast asleep with her little butt in the air!  The drive home today was also fairly easy - just a couple of stops for gas and food, but that was it!  Quinn behaved like an angel!

The past few days, Quinn has started shaking her head "no".  Obviously she's too young to really understand what "no" means, but it's very cute to see her do it.  I'm going to try to get her to do it on camera, but we'll see how that goes!

This past week I also got professional photos taken of her and am anxiously (not patiently!) awaiting the proofs!  As soon as I get the photos, they'll be posted, trust me!

Other than that, not a whole lot to report!  Still no teeth or any true crawling, but we're waiting with baited breath for both!

Barrage of Photos and Videos

Since my last post, I've been busy making Q lots of baby food and filling up our freezer.  Here are the latest food stats:

• avocado (she tried this a little while ago and now seems to quite like it! She ate half of one the other day actually)
• cauliflower (not a fan and makes quite funny faces and gag noises occasionally...but mix it with one of our secret weapon foods [aka sweet potato or parsnip] and she'll eat it)
• broccoli (same deal as with cauliflower)
• plums (yum!)
• corn on the cob (big fan of this...must have gotten that from me!)
• green beans with mint (same deal as with the cauliflower and broccoli...although her breath smells delicious afterward!)
• ground turkey (mixed with either apple or pear and she's a happy camper!)
• turnip (tried this tonight and was a big fan!  We might have now added something else to the secret weapon list!)

I also have papaya, tomatoes, green beans (no mint) in the freezer to come!

Still not a lot to report on the crawling front.  Quinn is getting really good at scooting around backwards and in circles still...but is moving a lot faster!  Today we put her down on the foam mats and watched her as she made her way across the floor to the stools with ease.  She also seems to get herself stuck underneath the coaches or table in the living room...silly girl!

Here are a bunch of photos and videos! :) Enjoy!

Easter Bunny in Arizona

Q and Mama in Arizona

Trying Mum-Mums for the first time.  She loves them!

Bundled up

Sleeping on the couch past her bedtime

Happy baby!!!

Happy Easter + Vacation + New Foods!

So it's been a while since I've updated the blog, but we've been crazy busy!  We left for our annual Easter Arizona vacation on April 6 and just got back on Tuesday, so it's been nuts trying to get the house organized!

Quinn wasn't such a great traveler on the journey down to Phoenix, but it was a really long day for her.  She slept through the morning flight to Washington-Dulles, but then we had a 6 hour layover in Washington.  Through most of it she was pretty good - playing on the floor, napping a bit in her carrier...and then it all went downhill.  She started to fuss quite a bit before getting on the plane, so all I could think was "well, I'm pretty sure that the whole plane already hates us" (lol), and then on the plane, she did a lot more fussing before eventually falling asleep for the last 45 minutes of the 5 hour flight.  Didn't help that she was really backed up and that was definitely bothering her.  I thought that the guy sitting next to Steve was going to jump out of the plane.  Oh well!  We made it there safe and sound and Quinn slept through the night that night.  Truthfully, she slept through the night every night except for 1, which is nothing to complain about!  My Mom had bought a "sleep spa" that has music and a light projection on the ceiling that seemed to keep Q asleep as it played all night.  Golden!

Quinn's first Easter was a success!  The Easter Bunny found her all the way at Nanny and Pepere's house in Arizona and spoiled her rotten.  I'll post some photos soon once I get them downloaded from my camera.

Quinn had a lot of fun in Arizona!  It's so great to see her so interactive.  She met lots of new people and was good as gold for her babysitters when we had some different things going on later at night.  No troubles with her taking the bottle from them either!  We took Quinn in the pool and she is improving on her kicking skills, but only likes to paddle with one arm.  She also received 3 new bathing suits as gifts, including a bikini which is super cute! (Again, pictures to follow on my next post)  As usual, Quinn charmed everyone around her and is a big flirt!  I swear that if she had more hair that she'd actually flip it!  We were at this one restaurant and it was getting close to nap time, so Nanny was carrying Q around so that she'd fall asleep.  But every time that someone walked by, she'd pop her head up and give a great big gummy smile.  If it was a woman, they'd only get the smile...if it was a man, he'd get the smile and a happy sound to go with it.  What a nut! :)

Since we've been home, I've started making her some new foods to try.  We also started feeding her some oatmeal cereal in place of the rice, hoping that that will make a difference in her digestion.  Quinn's eating 3 meals of solids a day now that we're back and more on a schedule.  Here's the new food update:

• oatmeal cereal - loves it!!! Plus I love the smell of it in the morning.
• zucchini - big fan of this one too!  It's also so easy to make that I'm a big fan of it too.
• blueberry sauce - added this to her cereal this morning.  Quinn gobbled the purple cereal all up!
• cauliflower - going to try this one tonight for dinner.  Since she likes parsnips, I'm thinking that this one should be ok too!

The other foods that I'm going to be trying with her are apricots (already made and frozen) and turkey.  One of the baby food recipe books that I have recommends adding apples or pears to the turkey to help with the consistency and to add a familiar flavour.  Quinn's a huge fan of both apples and pears, so I'm suspecting that it should go OK!  There are so many recipes that I can't wait to try with her!

Bottle Progress Has Been Made!!!

There are definitely pros and cons to bottles and soothers as we've come to find out.  Quinn has historically not been a fan of either.  I'm very happy about the no soother thing because it means that we don't have to wean her off of it later...and that's less work for us!  She usually just chews on the soother anyway, so sometimes it does keep her occupied, she just doesn't suck on it.  And that's the same thing that she has been doing with bottle nipples and sippie cups.  She'll take the bottle nipple or the sippy cup spout in her mouth, slide it to the side, and just chew on it with her imaginary molars.

When we think back about Quinn's feeding history, it hasn't been the easiest road as I've outlined in earlier blog posts.  She fed well in the hospital and then when my milk came in, she couldn't feed very well and we actually had to feed her off of a syringe/feeding tube.  Then we hired a lactation consultant and she got me using a nipple shield, which helped Quinn actually eat.  The next part in the series is what gave us the big brain wave about bottle feeding - I did the "bait and switch" with the nipple shield and she actually started feeding without the shield.  So what I did this time, was start to nurse her and then stick the bottle in her mouth.  The first time that I did it (last week), the bottled milk had gotten a little too cold for the bait and switch to really work well, but she did suck a couple of times off of the bottle before pushing it away.  So we tried the bottle again yesterday...and success!!!  With the bait and switch method, Quinn actually ate the 2 oz of milk in the bottle.  It was so hard to contain my glee!  Today we tried it again with freshly pumped milk (about an ounce), and I didn't even have to do the switch.  We're currently trying to see if she'll take any more of some frozen milk that I thawed, but I think that she just might be too tired tonight to try again.  Oh well!  Progress has been made!