Month Three

Dear Rachel,

Today you turn three months old. You're growing up so quickly!

You're doing really well in day care, and enjoy spending time with Miss Judy and your friends. We don't worry about you so much while we're at work because we know you're in good hands, and you're such a happy baby.


Everywhere we go, when we tell people how old you are, they comment about how big you are. When people try to guess how old you are, they usually guess 5-6 months, which tells us how much you're growing. You're so tall, your feet almost stick out of your car seat!

Your neck has gotten really strong, and you're holding your head up on your own almost all the time now. You've also been working on your ab muscles by trying to sit up, or at least lean forward when we're holding you.


You haven't quite gotten the sitting up thing quite right yet, because when we hold your hands and pull you up a bit, you pull your knees all the way up to your stomach and try to pull yourself forward at the same time, leaving you balancing on your butt.


While you were in your bumbo seat last week, you leaned all the way forward and touched your mouth to the center piece, then slowly sat back upright, which is cool, because it means you can sit up with support.


Of course, we still need to work on the rolling over thing a bit. We try to put you on your tummy a couple of times a day, and you're getting close to rolling, but you can't quite managed to get all the way over. It's fun to watch you hold your legs and head up and balance on your tummy with your arms back, like you are flying.

You've begun to explore your hands a lot more since you discovered them last month. You have started reaching out tentatively for things, but you won't reach very far yet. You love to grab hold of things that are close to you, like your shirts and blankets, and pull them up to your face. If we put things in your hands, you'll hold them for a while too. You're starting to get to the point where everything in your hands goes to the mouth, which should get really interesting in the next month.


You're sucking your hands a lot now, too. When you first started, last month, you'd get the thumb side of your hand up to your mouth and chew on it, but your thumb would be tucked neatly inside of your fist, so you were just chewing on your thumb knuckle. Now that you're opening your hands a lot more, you've started putting your whole hand in your mouth to suck on it.


Along with the sucking, your drooling has increased tenfold. It seems like whenever we have you sitting up, your entire front ends up wet. We can't even begin to imagine what it's going to be like when you start teething.


You're sleeping consistently through the night, now, too, which makes your mother and I very happy. Every once in a while you'll still wake up, but we can usually give you a pacifier and you'll go right back to sleep.


I think our favorite thing from this month has to be the hearty guffaws you let out when we do something you like. We start to laugh when you laugh so hard because we love to hear that sound coming from you.


It seems like the last time I wrote to you was so long ago, I hope I didn't leave anything out. You're growing and learning by leaps and bounds, and we're constantly amazed by you. We love you very much.

Love,
Daddy

Happy Birthday Mrs. President....

I've known Monica throught almost all of her twenties, and today, as she turns 29 (for the first time), I thought I'd offer up a little photo montage.

I love you Moni...happy birthday!

Peek-a-boo

Monica likes to tease and say that she's playing with an armadillo, because the blackline drawing of Piglet on Rachel's drapes somewhat resembles an armadillo. But in color...pig.

His name is Piglet, Monica, and he is a PIG, not an armadillo. Not in Texas, not anywhere. A PIG.

Cien

This post is my one hundredth here on Laleblog.

In about 10 weeks, this blog will have been up for a year.

Not exactly everyday posting, but 100 blog entries is nothing to turn your nose up at.

I don't want to reflect too much, because I'll do that when I reach my first blog-iversary in November.

Truth be told, this isn't my first blog, and I've certainly produced much more content than you see on these pages. However, in trying to find my voice, and a consistent topic to write about, I have started and abandoned a few blogs.

And so, in the spirit of keeping up with my usual topics, here's the latest updates:

Rachel is still stuffy, although not nearly as much as she was just two days ago. However, now Monica and I are both getting sick. She was feeling a little scruffy in the throat this morning, and I started feeling that way late this afternoon. I hope it goes away quickly.

Our house seems to be dead in the water. We had a call that someone was going to come look at it on Sunday, then they canceled. We haven't had anyone look at it in almost a week. Since this is the first time we're trying to sell a house, I don't know if this is typical or not. In the meantime, we're looking at houses online, but we can't really even get serious until we get an offer on our house. I can only hope that there's something on the market that we really like when it comes time for us to buy.

And now, because my mom says the blog is boring when I don't post picutres of her granddaughter, here is the Rachel picture of the day. Actually, the Rachel and Sparky picture of the day. I finally got them to pose together.

Out sick

I took the day off today.

Rachel got really stuffy over the weekend, so we decided to keep her home today and take her to the doctor. There isn't a whole lot we can do, since she's so young. So we just have to keep sucking snot out of her nose, which is quickly becoming Monica's favorite thing to do.

"Are there bats in the batcave? Oooh yeah, Mommy's gonna get those!"

Even though she's not feeling up to par, Rachel is still as smiley and happy as ever.

Paint

It's amazing the difference a little paint can make.

I had some "oat straw" left over from the big wall project (which I also used to paint Rachel's room), but just a little. I mixed what was left with some white primer to make a lighter shade of the brown, and painted our little hallway. I also repainted the trim around the doors and the mopboard so they would be bright white instead of looking like they hadn't been cleaned in 10 years.

I couldn't believe the difference it made. I knew we needed to do something to make our house look more crisp, but had no idea it would be that easy.

Tomorrow, I'm going to put a coat of white on the kitchen to brighten it up. I'm still not sure if I want to tackle the living room, though.

Our house got shown three times in two days early last week, but we haven't had anyone come by since Wednesday. Hopefully, we'll get some bites soon, and all of this work cleaning and moving stuff, and painting won't be in vain.

In our next house, we're not waiting two years to paint.

Fun on the weekend

Rachel and I played around on the floor this weekend...this video isn't anything flashy, it's just some stuff I threw together so everyone could see how much she's growing.


Click here to see the video

They should make people get a license to procreate...

WGAL.com - News - Father Accused Of Drunken Driving Says 4-Year-Old Son At Wheel

Starting her early...

I'm not raising no girly girl. Rachel and I are watching da Bears tonight. We watch the Cubbies sweep the Astros earlier this week.

She's loving it as much as her daddy because da Bears are up 14-3 right now. She's been talking to the players too...except I had to tell her to quit smiling when the Chargers players were on the screen.

Next game, I'm going to teach her about pork chahps and sahsige. Oh yeah, and beer.

Yeah, yeah...I'm eating my words

It seems that keeping up with a blog, having a child, and a job is a little harder than I thought, and since only one of those things is neglect-able, the posting has suffered.

In addition to all of that, Monica and I have decided that because our daughter has more crap than both of us, we have to move. That's right, after two years of just us, Rachel came along and made our house significantly smaller. Namely, with her clothes.

This child has more clothes than either one of us, and we just don't have anywhere to put them anymore.

Not that we're ungrateful for everything that everyone has sent us, because we're not. We love that we don't have to buy clothes for this girl until somewhere around her first birthday, but her closet is only so big. Our garage is only so big.

You get the point.

The size of our house just isn't cutting it anymore.

That, and we now have major rednecks as neighbors. That's what happens when you live in an "investment area," meaning we have a lot of rent houses around us.

I've been working all week to remedy problems we think may detract buyers from our house, and hopefully it will go on the market this weekend or early next week.

And now, the gratuitous picture of Rachel for this week...


Jane Fonda would be so proud.

Month Two

Dear Rachel,

This week you turned two months old. The summer has just flown by. Your mother and I can't believe that we have to go back to work and leave you in the care of someone else.

This month, you really started to get your personality. You've started smiling and laughing at us, as well as anyone else you like. That made Grandma Connie and Grandpa Rick really happy, and probably set you up for a nice inheritance.


Now every time we get your attention, we try to get you to laugh, just because it makes us smile so much.

You took your first plane ride this month and made your first visit to Illinois. You handled the trip like a pro, although sleeping through the flight up and the drive to Grandma and Grandpa's did screw up your schedule for a couple of days. When we got back, we just left you in your car seat, since you were already asleep, to get you back on schedule faster.


You started eating a lot more this month, too, but going farther between feedings. Your face and hands have gotten pudgy, but that's a good thing because it tells us you're getting plenty of food.


The other way we can tell that you're getting plenty to eat is by how much you poop, and you've been doing it a lot lately. At the beginning of the month, we were worried because you were going 2-3 days between poops, but now you seem to be back on your schedule of 2-3 per day. I can't say that we're excited about it, but it's better than trying to clean up 3 days of poop all at once, and then worrying in between about when you're going to explode.


There have been a few times this past month where you slept for 10 hours. That makes your parents very happy. There have also been a few times this past month when you only slept a few hours, and that doesn't make us so happy. However, we know you're growing, and that can really mess things up.


You've become a very active little girl when you're awake, and even when you're asleep. When you're awake, you will kick and swing your arms around and talk to whoever or whatever is there. You smile at your Winnie-the-Pooh mobile and talk to all the characters. Your favorite seems to be Eeyore. Your neck is getting really strong, and you've started holding your head up when we put you up to our shoulder.


When you're asleep, you move around a lot too. Sometimes in the morning, I'll go into your room and find that you've turned yourself perpendicular to the way we put you in bed, and you usually have your feet hanging out of the crib.

One of the most exciting things you've done this month is to realize that your hand is actually attached to your body. I watched in disbelief last week as you slowly made a fist and deliberately moved your hand to your mouth so you could suck on it. You're becoming quite aware of yourself and your surroundings.


Now that you mom and I are both going back to work, I'm afraid we're going to miss out on some of your milestones. Miss Judy is really good about telling us what's going on with you though, and we know you're in good hands.

We love you very much and miss you every minute that we can't be with you.

Love,
Daddy

A star is born...

Not only is our child one of the most famous babies on the internet, she's also a big hit at daycare.

When I got there to pick her up today, our sitter asked if she ever cries. She told me how much fun she was to have, and how she talked and cooed and smiled at everyone.

This kid's going to be a star.

And Monica managed to go the whole day without seeing her, so all is well.

Holding it together...

I've almost made it throught the first week at work. Almost.

Last night, Rachel decided that a 3 AM snack sounded like a good idea, and it was my turn to get up with her.

I got back to sleep just before the alarm went off.

Next week we start her in day care, so Monica and I can get used to that schedule. The following week Monica goes back to work.

The heat is on...

My mother sent my sister and I the following email this evening:

I checked weather for our 3 cities today - San Antonio was the most comfortable with a heat index of 100, dew point of 60 and humidity of 30%. NYC and Bloomington were very close with the heat index of 106, dew points of 80 and humidity in the 60s or 70s. YUCK!!!!

Hopefully we'll get a break soon - and you will too!

Have a cool evening!

Love
Mom

The only thing is that it's going to be like this in San Antonio for the next couple of months. New York and Illinois will probably get a break sometime in the next couple of weeks.