6 months later.....

It's official, I'm the world's worst blogger! At least I'm getting to this now instead of when she is 5! We are coming up on birthday number 1 in less than a week! Time flies! And she has changed so much in the last 6 months! It's been so much fun! I was reading my last post...yeah, about all that fussiness...it was all due to ear infections. In mid November her ear started draining and continued off and on until February when we FINALLY got tubes (one of the small joys of living in a small town is that you have to wait for the specialist to come to you. It would have been later because her original appt was delayed due to weather, so we drove to Mason City to have it done ASAP!) Up until then she still had no interest in moving much. Come to find out it was probably because she had no balance and heard things like she had her head under water! Poor baby. So she got the tubes on February 10 and within a week and a half, she was crawling and pulling herself up!

She took her first steps on March 18th. For about a month she would only walk to me or Tom...not to the couch or a toy. She had to have someone soft to fall into because she couldn't figure out that whole stopping thing! But for the past 3 weeks or so, she has been all over the place. She's a quick lil thang too!

And remember by ultrasound picture with her hand on her forehead where I said if she's a girl, she'll be a drama queen??? I was soooooo right!!!! :) When she falls onto her butt, a lot of times she starts "crying". And when we told her "no" a few months ago..."waaaaa"...tears and everything! And she tears up so easy! She'd be a great dramatic actress, pull out a tear at the drop of a dime!

She is saying mama and dada...and has been for a couple of months. But her first word besides that is "Hi!" I don't know if any of the videos I have on here have me saying Hi in kind of a sing-songy voice...but that's how I say hi to her...apparently a lot! She came around the corner one morning waving and saying Hi! And she started giving her lil dolls kisses the other day too. Mommy even got one last night! :)

We're still working on the sign language. She will sign milk now...not very consistent, but she does it. And she knows all done and more, too. I think she mixes those two up though! She started real finger foods around the beginning of April. She loves ham, carrots, peaches, and applesauce. She's eating chocolate cheerios as I write this and seems to be enjoying those very much (thanks Steph!).

Sometimes I think I should put a helmet on her lil head. This child gets more bruises... She's split her lip open twice (thought we were gunna lose a tooth once!)...(no stitches needed thank god!), I don't know many bruises she's had on her face from doing faceplants in numerous locations. Right now, she's got a big ol' honker right in the middle of her forehead (imagine an Ash Wednesday smudge) from her first run-in with Murphy. See, Murphy likes to hurdle things. We now know that he can't hurdle a 1-year-old. Yikes. We both had our backs turned and just heard the thud and wail, so we don't know exactly what happened, but I think she got kicked by his back leg which then made her wack her lil face on the floor...so she has a sister bruise on her lil cheek. Stupid dog. Lesson learned.

So other than a few bruises, we're all happy and healthy! I took a new job in January, so I'm finally on a normal day schedule. That has been an extremely welcome change! I love what I'm doing, so that's even better! So there's a quick summary of the last 6 months, and here are some pictures to get you up to date too!

December 2009: 7 Months Old

With Cousin Macy

January 2010: 8-1/2 Months Old

February 2010: 9-1/2 Months Old

March 2010: 10 Months Old

With Cousin Cameron

April 2010: 11 Months Old

Almost 1!!

Saturday Morning...bummin in my pj's, robe, and slippers...just like mama!

6 Months Old! Should have made a cupcake with half a candle!

It's so hard to believe a 1/2 a year has already gone by! Yet again, I've fallen behind in my updates...so here's some stuff that went on this last month!

She is now sitting up all by herself! She's got great balance...but we keep pillows behind her still, just in case! We've moved past cereal and are on to veggies and applesauce. She's a great little eater! She's still not very mobile, still hates her tummy. I guess she is just content chilling out on her back and rolling from side to side! She somes pretty close to rolling onto her tummy, just can't quite kick all the way over. She got a little door jumper from Aunt Laura and Uncle Andy that she loves! It's so cute to watch her jump and play...she entertains herself for quite a while in that thing. She babbles away, and likes to spit/make rasberries! And she does a weird little shriek by breathing in...it's in 1 of the videos. What a goof!

October was a bit of a challenging month. A bit of sickness went through the house. We were told we had H1N1, but I'm not really sure...no one ever had a fever, so who knows. It was definitely viral, and Kenley and I both had it for about 3 weeks. Uck. It finally turned into something bacterial so we could at least take antibiotics to help get rid of it. So we got our happy baby back for a few days, then we started having some troubles with formula. Complete bottles that she would chow down eventually ended up all over daddy! And once on Steph...poor Steph! Bless her heart for dealing with fussy, gassy girlie for the past week! So we've changed formula for the 3rd time, and hopefully this will be the magic charm!

Halloween was fun...we headed to Emerson and South Sioux for the weekend to visit the family. Thankfully they got to see happy Kenley! She was a little lion...she wasn't cracked up on the whole costume thing, but she handled it pretty well! We went to Omaha earlier in the month to see Macy and Cameron....and Laura, Andy, Ty, and Ashlee :). We put them all in their costumes then...the girls were not to excited about that, but it was cute anyway!! Macy was a little chicken, and Cameron was a monkey....too cute!

Here's one more little tidbit that I'm quite impressed by. Since Kenly was probably a month old, I've been doing the sign language sign for milk before I give her a bottle. In the last couple of weeks, if she gets a little fussy, I'll do the sign and she opens her mouth and reaches for my hand like she reaches for her bottle! And sure enough...she's hungry! I just think that's pretty neat...I'm a proud mommy!

So here are some pictures and videos from the past month...

We're Rollin Now!!

Kenley started rolling over by herself on October 1st! Mama was pretty excited!! She hates being on her tummy so much, she would get so mad when we tried tummy time. She's not going to stay on her tummy at all now that she's figured out she can roll over...it might be a while before she rolls the other way to willingly get on her tummy! This video was the first time I saw her rollover...she had done it at Steph's (daycare) 3 times that day. It takes her a while to finally flip in the video, but now she does it as soon as we plop her on her belly!

Pics from September...4-1/2 Months Old

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Daddy with all his babies! The big 2-8! Again, a little late getting this up...his b-day was 9-14-09.

4 Months Old and Lovin It!!

Kenley turned 4 months old on Labor Day! We had our 4-month appointment on Friday...she weighs 15 pounds 10 ounces! Our little chunky monkey!!! And she's 26 inches long. She's really starting to hit some milestones now too! On August 31st, she laughed for the first time! So cute!! It brought tears to our eyes! I caught her laughing on video a couple of days later...it's down below!

She's really good at grabbing things now too, and bringing them to her mouth to suck on whatever it may be! She's getting really good at taking the bottle and shoving it in her mouth very forcefully! It's pretty cute! We tried cereal for the first time last night, but it didn't work out so well...I think she was a little too hungry and impatient for it this time. I think we'll wait another couple of weeks to try again. We got that on video too, with the "gimme bottle" action at the end. She's still not rolling over, or showing many signs that she wants to. She just started kinda rolling onto her side today when she was going after one of her toys to suck on it! And finally, we're pretty sure she's teething. We can see some little white shadows in her little gum on the bottom and she's gnawing on whatever she can like crazy...and seems to be a little more fussy...imagine that! Oh, and we started supplementing formula, too, last week. Her diaper blowouts were reaching about 4 a day, and mama's supply was dwindling, so we thought we'd give it a shot. She took to it like a champ, so now we're alternating breast milk and formula. Her blowouts have gone down in number, but when she does have one, watch out! Holy stinky mess! It gets everywhere! Hopefully I figure out a way to contain the mess eventually!

She's just so much fun! She has her fussy times, but for the most part, she's such a happy baby and full of smiles! She really misses her grandparents and cousins and aunts and uncles and other friends, and can't wait to see them soon!!!

GO HUSKERS!!!

My first Husker outfit!!! I have bunches of little cheerleading uniforms, but I'm not quite big enough for them yet! Later this season I will be, so watch out!!

3 1/2 Months Old

Mama started back to work, and everyone made the transition quite well...a few tears shed my mom, but that's to be expected! She loves Stephanie, her babysitter, and Daddy has his morning routine down. She sleeps through the night, he wakes her up to feed her and get her dressed and out the door by 6 a.m. Then I come home after work, sleep, get up, do some transcription, and go pick her up at about 4 p.m. So it works perfectly! We have all evening to play...she goes to bed between 9 and 9:30 every night. Here's some more pictures! That other little cutie patootie is Cameron, her cousin.

Videos

The first video is of Kenley and Macy, her cousin. Kenley is very hungry and thinks Macy's arm tastes purtty yummy! She's about 6 weeks old in that one. In the second, she's about 11 weeks old and chatting with mama.

Summertime

Here are just some miscellaneous pictures that I love. Everyone is doing great. Kenley is now officially sleeping through the night, usually 8 to 10 hours...Tom is going to love that! I go back to work Monday night :( not looking forward leaving my lil punkin, but she's going to a great babysitter, so that makes it a bit easier! She will officially be one of Steph's Barnyard Babies come Tuesday morning!

She's really sad that Mommy won't take her out in the sunshine too much this summer, but she was all smiles when she got to model her swimsuit that Gramma Jenny bought her! I'm really glad she didn't get my transparent complexion...the kid is already darker than I am and she hasn't even been in the sun (long enough to tan anyway!)! She's gunna be one of those little mexican looking white girls! Pat! She did get somethin' from you! :) I'm thinking she looks quite Zoolander-ish in the last pic...look at that aloof model face! Strike a pose! Lol!