Bath with daddy

Vanessa likes playing on her tummy pretty well now, especially since she's so good now at rolling over to her back! Just in the past couple of days, she's learned how to support herself on all fours. She hasn't made too much progress in crawling, but in a way, that's a good thing for us! James and I still have a long way to go in baby-proofing our house.

Vanessa has been taking baths in the big tub lately. Sometimes Daddy helps her!

6 months!

0, 3, and 6 months! It's amazing how fast she grows!

6 month check-up

So Vanessa was 25 and 1/4 inches long (average) and 18 pounds 7 ounces (95% percentile) at her six month appointment today. Good thing that pudgy babies are so cute!

Some fun pix from a visit with Revie

Vanessa visited her friend Revie about a week ago. Here are some fun pictures!

I'm gonna getcha!

Gotcha!

Vanessa pauses from admiring Revie to admire the camera.

Oops!

I keep thinking this looks like Vanessa trying to act in a Shakespearean play.
Guess who's ticklish!

Warm and snowy

It was so warm last Thursday that Vanessa and I went outside in our short sleeves, despite the snow still on the ground!

Crawling! (sort of)

So Vanessa has started to make a little bit of progress forward when she squirms around on her tummy. This is how it goes:

She burrows her head in the bed and grunts while she lifts her bottom in the air and pushes forward with her feet. Then she lays flat on the bed, lifts her head, and protests that she's not making much progress. Then she repeats the whole process. She can move about 6 inches forward in about 3 or 4 minutes. Then she's pretty much had it with being on her tummy!

Vanessa's aunt Heather visited on Thursday. Vanessa slept through some of the visit, but still had time to show off her piano playing and slobbering skills. I was so excited to have Heather visit! She helped me solve a problem I was having designing a plate tectonics lab. I had been thinking about this problem for weeks, and Heather solved the problem in about an hour with Ziploc bags, permanent marker, and some water. I have an amazing sister!

Heather was impressed by how big Vanessa has gotten since last she saw her. We'll get to find out on Thursday exactly how big -- it will be her six month appointment. Six months already!

To Michigan and back!

James's great-grandmother Edna just passed away last week at nearly 101 years old. I had the pleasure of meeting her several times, and I was always impressed with how much energy and compassion she had. This was a much-loved lady. This past weekend, we drove up with James's parents to Kalamazoo Michigan to attend her funeral. We joined Edna's many relatives in celebrating her rich, long life.

I had some concern with Vanessa's ability to handle a 13 hour drive in wintry conditions. But Vanessa was probably the cheeriest of all of us! I think she fussed less than she usually does on an average day!

Vanessa got to see her great-grandparents again. I'm trying to remember if her great-grandpa ever let great-grandma hold her!


Vanessa meets her five-year-old third cousin, Donovan. Donovan's good at reading, can write his name, and as we found out, is very good at building extremely tall towers out of play bricks! Vanessa's sitting in her great-aunt Kathy's lap.

How many concentrating ladies does it take to get banana from a cup to Vanessa's mouth? Well, as you can see here, sometimes three!

Nana with her sister Kathy and brother Kevin. I don't usually post pictures when Vanessa's out of the frame, but for such a charming bunch, I guess I'll make an exception.

Vanessa's dinner was also bananas, I think. Vanessa was so focused on her bananas that she got her great-great aunt Jean giggling. This made Vanessa stare at Jean, which made her laugh even harder! Vanessa kept staring at her, and Jean kept laughing -- a vicious cycle! Grampa kept his composure, but Jean and I were in stitches.

Great-great aunt Jean and I relaxing after a good laugh. Vanessa says, "What was so funny?"

Snowy Valentine's Day

It snowed for Vanessa's first Valentine's day! That was especially exciting because James's grad school classes were cancelled, and he came home early and got lots of cuddling in with his little Valentine.

Vanessa is just barely tall enough to measure up on her new growth chart. It starts at 2 feet! Her onesie that she's wearing is one of the first articles of clothing I've bought for Vanessa. I have such generous friends and family, I haven't had to buy much else!

Last night while I was trying to let her go to sleep on her own, Vanessa had scooted her way up to the top of her crib and was banging her head against the crib slats. That would make her mad, so she would kick her feet and bang her head against the slats again! I had heard that crib bumpers weren't really safe (suffocation hazards), but I had had enough!

This wasn't the first time Vanessa had done this, so I put the bumper on her crib. She really likes her bumper! It has such pretty pictures on it. She took her most recent nap without a fuss because she was so busy checking out the little critters on her bumper.

Vanessa says, "Thanks, Mom, for my new bumper! Now, when I feel like head-banging, it won't hurt quite so much!"

Old friends, new friends

James and I really enjoyed a visit on Friday to an old high school friend of James's, MaryLu. We had met MaryLu's husband Michael once before, but we had never met their fantastic kids, Jackie and Isaac. Isaac is 9 months and can crawl. I haven't seen a crawling baby in a long time. I was so impressed by watching him -- ah, so that's crawling. I didn't manage to take a picture of him while we were there. I guess he was too quick to catch on camera! Jackie is about 3. She can do a somersault, put together a puzzle, and tell you what happens in a story.

I really enjoyed talking to MaryLu. She had a wealth of information on baby food, toys, napping, scheduling, etc. Plus, she made the most delicious vegetarian dinner. I know it was good (and not just my bias) because on the car ride home, James asked that we start incorporating something like that into our weekly meals.

Vanessa's a little nervous about putting together her first puzzle. She knows how to put the pieces in her mouth, but will she be expected to do anything else? Jackie sets a good example by helping to put together the pieces. MaryLu is in the foreground, and James and Dean are in the background (Dean went to high school with James and MaryLu too).

Jackie and her Daddy break down a house of bricks that they had been hiding inside.

I finally mounted the ribboned V that Vanessa's cousin Katelyn made for her. I think it adds a lot of pizazz to Vanessa's door.

Preliminary results from her new sleep schedule

Vanessa's sleep schedule has been a little bit better since I've been trying to change it. She usually goes to sleep around 6:30 or 7, wakes up at 10 PM, 2 AM, and 6:30 AM. So she's not sleeping through the night consistently yet, but there's only one middle-of-the-night feeding.

Her first nap of the day is always awesome -- she hardly ever fusses at all to go back to bed. (James will probably tell you that's because she's his daughter!) The second nap of the day is a little worse -- she usually whimpers very quietly for 15 minutes or so, but she did really well with it today! If she takes a third nap, she really cries for 10 minutes before going to sleep, and bedtime is hit or miss -- either up to 30 minutes of crying or she'll just go to sleep without a fuss.

It seems to me that if I accidentally give her the impression that she's about to get fed, that triggers the fussing.

I feel like it's all about me guessing correctly when she's ready to go down for naps. This is definitely the trickiest part of parenting so far.

Here's Vanessa at my Aunt Teri's this past weekend. She was wearing Redskins garb to match her daddy. He was hoping that Redskin receiver Art Monk would get chosen for induction into the Football Hall of Fame that day, but alas, no luck this year.

A wailing party

So yesterday I agreed to watch my friend Jessica's daughter Revie for a few minutes until her husband Jeff came home. I brought both Revie and Vanessa down to the basement for playtime. They both had some time in the Jumperoo (Revie is an excellent jumper, by the way). Then I set them both down on the playmat and they were playing happily together (or at least, next to each other).

"Oh wait," I thought, "When Jeff comes by to pick up Revie, I won't be able to hear the doorbell in the basement. I'll be really clever and set up the baby monitor to pick up the doorbell chime. I'll rush upstairs really fast and get the baby monitor from the nursery." I ran to get the monitor, set it up, and was downstairs again in 2 minutes or less. The babies were still playing happily, although Vanessa had taken away Revie's rattle. Vanessa, be nice and share!

All was going well until Vanessa peed. I changed her diaper. Then I decided to check Revie's diaper. It was wet too. As I was changing Revie's diaper, though, Vanessa started fussing just a little. I normally would have picked her up to comfort her but I was in the middle of changing Revie's diaper. By the time I finished changing Revie's diaper, Vanessa was fussing a little more. In fact, fussing too much for Revie! "Waah!" Revie started howling! Then Vanessa thought, "What a great idea, I think I'll howl too!" I picked up the wailing Vanessa. It turned out she had a burp that had been bothering her. But there was no calming her now.

I felt like I was babysitting a pair of wolf cubs. They just couldn't help howling when the other one started. I should have been worried about them, I guess, but I couldn't help laughing at my situation. Ah! What does one do with two screaming babies? When I calm one down, the other is still wailing and then the first starts right back up again! I had picked up both of them and was walking to other rooms hoping to distract them into calming down. It wasn't working, of course.

Thank goodness after only about 5 minutes of this, my phone rang and it was Jeff to rescue me. Apparently my baby monitor system didn't work for the doorbell and the poor guy was outside in the cold trying to get inside. I wonder if he could hear his baby screaming at the top of her lungs! I realized later that we had turned the volume way down on the monitor the night before so that must have been why it didn't work.

Ah, well, adventures in babysitting. I didn't mind so much the 5 minutes of dueling wailers, but I have to say, thank goodness I don't have triplets.

A busy Saturday

So, when we decided to go visit three different homes with Vanessa on Saturday, I was at least partly worried that Vanessa would get a little tired of visiting! But she enjoyed hearing cousin Brett play the piano and cousin Danielle sing at my Aunt Teri's house. And she enjoyed meeting new people at my friend Rachel's house. Vanessa did get a little fussy at Rachel's house for about 10 minutes or so before I remembered it was time to feed her!

At James's friend Ryan's house, I was sure that Vanessa would be at her visiting limit. But even though she stayed up 3 hours past her bedtime, she still was happy being passed from person to person. There was a very adorable two-month-old baby boy at Ryan's house too. At five months, Vanessa looked about twice his size! I can't believe she was so tiny only a few months ago. James and I were remarking that Vanessa has gained about 2 feet and almost 20 pounds in one year (counting the months in utero). A pretty incredible growth spurt!

High stepping

Vanessa has been lifting her feet as if walking lately. (She eventually got the flowers and knocked over the vase.)

Tricks and treats

Vanessa has been treating us with all kinds of tricks lately.

She'll giggle and coo if we tickle her.
She complains much less about being on her tummy.
She sits up by herself to play!

Today, we went over to her friend Revie's house. It was really cool to see the two of them interacting: petting each other's faces, eating each other's fingers, and talking to each other. I like that Vanessa has a little friend!

Letting her cry?

Well, I've finally decided to do something about Vanessa's midnight bedtime. I am usually the sort of mom who responds immediately to Vanessa's cries or signs of discomfort so that she really hardly ever cries. There are times when she's grouchy and needs to be held or bounced to keep her from crying, but I hardly ever hear her cry and I always feel like I'm doing something about it when she does cry.

I've been doing a bit of research and there are compelling studies that show that babies who are put down to bed while awake learn to put themselves to sleep. The only trouble is, being put to bed awake usually means crying, at least in Vanessa's case. So, over the past two days, when she is really tired and needs a nap, instead of feeding her and then putting her down for a nap, I put her down by herself and let her cry for 10 to 15 minutes before she falls asleep. Then I feed her when she wakes up. The couple of times that Vanessa cried for longer than 15 minutes, I picked her up, checked to see if she needed burping, held her for a few minutes, and set her back down.

Last night, we finally cut the apron strings and had Vanessa sleep in a different room from us. I put her down when she was tired at about 10 PM, crossed my fingers, and after 10 minutes of crying, Vanessa slept through the night for the first time and woke up at 5AM.

There are several reasons why I think this is good for Vanessa. First of all, if I put her in bed to sleep when she's tired at 10, she won't be up until midnight and be so tired and grouchy that she can't get to sleep. (I think I've actually been keeping her awake past her bedtime by trying to comfort her for two hours.) Second of all, if Vanessa can learn to go to sleep on her own, she'll have an easier time going to sleep as a toddler. Third, she'll have an easier time adjusting to a daily schedule, getting her sleeping and eating rhythms to follow a predictable pattern, and should eventually take her naps without much fussing at all. As an added bonus, mommy and daddy will get a good night's sleep too.

In the meantime, 10 minutes is still a long time to hear a baby cry! I hope she learns to nap without crying soon. I think in any case, she'll get used to putting herself to sleep before I'll get used to her cries. We'll try this for a week or so and see what happens. But no matter what, we're definitely going to keep the crib in the other room!

First Snow!

Vanessa saw her very first snow yesterday. We don't think she was too happy about it, actually, but I bet she'll like it when she's older.

Vanessa says, "It's cold, dark, and wet out here. Can we go back inside now?"

Vanessa and mommy playing.

Vanessa was reunited with Revie last week. The two girls hadn't seen each other for about a month due to the holidays and a variety of colds between them.

Revie likes the piano too.

Vanessa likes the piano so much she wants to eat it!

Vanessa's playing with her very first Starwars toy. It's a stuffed light saber!

Vanessa's also discovered the keyboard. I thought I might let her type a little message too all of you out there in bloggerland.

bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbn,.uh,hhhhhhhhhh ,mhbnbn,,,,,,,tvc

A music lover for sure

It has come to our attention that Vanessa really, really likes music. If she's cranky, it calms her down, if she's sleepy, it helps her sleep. But what's really tipped us off is the way she plays with all her musical toys.

Vanessa really likes the musical doggy she got from her Great Grandma and Great Grandpa Webb. She likes to hold its ears and bite its nose, so we know she likes it.
Nana came over to see all the new things her granddaughter was doing. Oh, plus it was my birthday.
Vanessa wears her VT outfit in support of the VT men's basketball team. Go Hokies!
I love this picture. Look at how Vanessa puts her hand on top of daddy's to learn how he plays.
Vanessa fell asleep during her piano lesson (about 2 minutes after the previous picture was taken).I am so impressed with the way Vanessa plays with her baby piano. Not only does she like to play the keys and turn the plastic music pages, but she also uses the piano as a standing support. If she's sitting (as she so often does) on my foot for a stool, she can pull herself to a standing position and support herself there.

In this picture, I am spotting Vanessa, but not supporting her. She's using the dancing yellow sun on the piano for support. When she's not using him for a dancing partner, she tries her best to eat him.

Growing so fast!

I can't believe how fast Vanessa is growing. I feel like I've seen her grow more in this past week than any other week we've had her. In the past week she's learned how to grab objects, bounce in her bouncer, lay on her tummy (and be happy about it), roll over, be ticklish on her tummy and she had her first attempt at solid food on Thursday (rice cereal, yummy). I also feel like she really pays attention to people talking to her now, especially when its storytime. At this rate she could say dada next week! I guess it would be ok if she said mama first. :)

Rolling over!

Vanessa spent a few minutes on her tummy yesterday without fussing. Wow! And then, to our surprise, James and I watched Vanessa roll over from her tummy to her back for the first time. We put her back on her tummy, and she did it again!

What a big girl!

At Vanessa's appointment today, she was 25 inches long, and weighed 15 pounds, 15 ounces. She's big for her age, coming in at 75% percentile in height, and 95% in weight. We also think she's getting pretty smart -- she's started to bat at and grab all her new Christmas toys!

Just before New Year's, we were really excited to get a visit from my Aunt Teri and Uncle Bob, and cousins Brett and Danielle. I've hardly had a chance to get to know Brett and Danielle before. It turns out that they're much fun and quite talented at all kinds of things (Brett especially at math, and Danielle especially at singing and acting).

Vanessa stayed up nearly until midnight on New Year's. We went to a casino night at coworker Scott's place. Vanessa had lots of admirers, and was held by many. She was good luck at the craps table -- James came in second place in the evening's winnings. Hopefully she didn't enjoy all the gambling too much.

We're also excited to have seen Vanessa's uncles Zak and Terry, Aunt Heather, and Grandma Satterlee yesterday. Zak and my mom visited my brother Jake and his family in Texas over the holidays, and I loved hearing all the stories about my nieces Katelyn, Jadyn, and Bryn.

Vanessa gets to meet her second cousins and her Great Aunt Teri.

Uncle Bob came straight from work, so he's still in his pilot's uniform as he gives Vanessa a big hug.
Vanessa looks cozy with the lovely and stylish Danielle.
Vanessa and Daddy just chillin'
Vanessa loves exercising on mommy's tummy. (Only four months ago, that preposition used to be 'in.')
Vanessa can support herself to sit up with the help of her Boppy pillow.
Daddy reads Vanessa a story. "Where is my cat?"
Grandma helps Vanessa play a tune. Vanessa hasn't had lessons yet, so her fingering is a little off.