Les Miserables

No, WE'RE not miserable!  But Nick and I went and saw "Les Miserables" at the Fox Theatre on Saturday night.  Audrey didn't get to come to this one, much to all the theater-goers' relief. She stayed home and played with Grammy and Papa. 

"Les Miserables" is my all-time favorite play and it's one of my top 10 books as well. I've loved the music since I was a young teenager and I saw it at the Fox in 1997. When I saw that the Broadway production was coming to town, I bought tickets the first day they were available. I've been so excited to go and see it again. Nick didn't know the story or the music, but he loved it too.  It's just so amazing to see it in person and the music and acting were phenomenal. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves on our date. Now to get Nick to read the book! I recommend it highly, though I will say that you should read the abridged.  The unabridged is nearly 1400 pages and Victor Hugo needed an editor. He tends to ramble about his political views from time to time.  The abridged cuts all that out. And of course, the play has none of it, so yay!

Stats

Audrey had her 9 month well visit with her pediatrician this morning.  No shots today (hence the smile). She is doing very well and everyone was charmed by her (naturally). She's dropped a bit on the charts for weight, but the doctor wasn't concerned - probably a result of all the movement! She's 17lbs, 6 oz (15-20th percentile), and is 26.5 in (I was right!) (15-20th percentile). Hopefully we don't have to go back for another three months!

I am 9 months old today!!!

Ok, she looks WAY too big in that last one.  Where did my baby go!?!? Audrey is 9 months old today. I think every age is more fun than the last.  This one is certainly tiring, but oh so fun.  We're listening to Pandora radio as I type this and she is just dancing away.  So cute.

Here is what Audrey is up to these days:

• Not sure on weight and height - we go to the pediatrician for her 9 month check up on Monday.  I'll update then.  Guess - 26.5 inches long, 18.5 lbs
• She wears 6-9 month clothes, with some 12 month sizes mixed in. She's still in a size 3 diaper.
• Sleeping 9-10:30, 1-3:30, and 7-7 most days/nights. Naps can vary more, but she's still a great night sleeper.  May that always continue.
• Drinking 6 oz of formula at 7, 11, 3, and 7.  Eating three meals of real food in between. Her favorites right now are yogurt and sweet potatoes.  She also loves mango and pears.
• Completely fearless.  I'm truly dreading the monkey bar days.
• Smiles and is very happy but doesn't give out her belly laughs too freely.  When I get her to do it, it's music to my ears.
• Audrey gives the best hugs and slobbery kisses EVER.
• Crawls everywhere, pulls up on anything stationary (and sometimes NOT stationary), signed "more" this morning for the first time, says all kinds of babbling nonsense, "MAMAMAMA" being the most common (much to my delight, though I can't count it as a word yet), dances, and CLAPS (finally!).
• She could stand a haircut, but I can't bear to let her get it cut yet.  Maybe at 1 year.
• Dislikes the car or being strapped in anywhere.  No more bouncy seat or exersaucer.  Sigh.
• She still loves being outside or going shopping with me. 
• She has SIX teeth.  They sort of all just exploded in her mouth all at once.  She's had a runny nose to accompany their arrival for the last two weeks, which is just about to drive both of us crazy because of how she feels about having her nose wiped.
• I think Nick is still her favorite, but she reaches for me all the time and tries to climb on me when I'm on the floor and is very happy to see me when I pick her up in the nursery or if I've been out.  So I'm holding my own.
• She is our best girl and we love her!

So proud of herself!

Photo dump

Back to reality after our trip!  I told someone yesterday that I took a just-crawling baby to Texas and brought home a tornado.  She is EVERYWHERE!!  And she's so fast all of a sudden.  I can't take my eyes off her for a second.  And even though everything she can mess up or hurt herself with that I can control is out of reach and sight, she still manages to find the one thing she can't have and barrel straight towards it every time my back is turned. She's also pulling up on anything she can reach, and the best jungle gym is evidently me.  But she is SO much fun to watch and follow around. I'd rather be keeping her out of trouble all day long than be doing anything else!

Crawling:

Up, up, up!

Headed for trouble:

 Happy girl!

Flying baby!

Audrey took her first plane trip this past weekend.  We went to Texas to visit our good friend Dave and Meagan and their three boys. 

To prepare for a plane ride with an 8 month old who is newly crawling and really likes to practice her new skills, I brought along new toys, a bottle, water, and various snacks.  I also got a cup of just ice when the drink cart came through so that she could munch on that.  Every ten minutes we rotated what she was doing, and she was very interested in seeing all the people and especially in stepping on the tray in front of Nick (thankfully, no one sat in the seat in front of him).  Even though she missed her morning nap and was really squirmy she barely fussed.  Twice other passengers left their seats to tell us how cute she is and the flight attendant took her from Nick at one point to coo over her and walk her up and down the aisle.  As we were deboarding, the passengers around us complimented her on how well she did.  Phew!

 Thus began our fun weekend. Meg and I went to a women's conference at her church and did some shopping, the guys played golf and we all went out to dinner (sans the kids). Despite all the fun (or maybe because of it, I only managed to get a couple of pictures, and they were of the cute babies.

The flight home was not as big of a success.  It was naptime and Audrey fussed until about takeoff time when she finally fell asleep (we were in the plane about 30 minutes before takeoff). She slept for only about 30 minutes and woke up with a start and started crying.  She calmed down some and we kept her mostly entertained for the rest of the trip, but it was tougher this go around and her cuteness didn't outweigh her fussiness to the other passengers. Whatever. We got home in one piece and all went to bed very early. Now Audrey is making up for yesterday with a super long morning nap, hopefully to be followed by a super long afternoon nap.

Test post

I downloaded a blogging app for my iPad and I'm checking to see if it works and I can now blog from it.

Today (and yesterday) have been rough. Sick, sad baby. Frazzled, tired mommy.

Even through the snot, a girl can smile. And play with nail clippers. Bad mommy.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Cloth Diapers, Part Deux

Probably no one cares, but I realized I never came back and told about the results of our cloth diaper experiment. But I wanted to revisit it and post my thoughts about cloth diapering, which we are still doing about 90% of the time.

Basically from the time she wakes up until the time she goes to bed, Audrey is in a cloth diaper (not the same one, obviously). I put her in a disposable overnight because she is SOAKED in the morning and the cloth (the kind we have, anyway; I know there are solutions out there) doesn't cut it.  I did have her in a disposable for her afternoon nap, but she's started to not be so wet for that sleep, so she's in cloth now for that as well.  I don't take cloth on vacations and I do put her in a disposable if we're going to be away from the house for more than a couple of hours (it's kind of a pain to bring them along because they are bulky and I don't like having to cart the dirty ones back home).

But the result of the experiment is that I really, really like cloth diapering.  I'm not even sure I can put my finger on exactly why.  It feels cleaner to me than disposables.  Definitely less chemical-ly.  Here is a brief pro/con list for cloth diapering; it does have its drawbacks.

Pros:

1. Saves money - Every time I put her in a cloth diaper, I'm saving $0.20.  This is not the biggest savings in the world, but definitely adds up over time.  Since I didn't spend anything in the initial investment for cloth (I'm using diapers that were a gift and diapers that I borrowed), it's definitely a plus for us.
2. No chemicals - The smell of the disposable when it's dry is just awful (never would have noticed it if we weren't doing cloth), but the smell of her wet or dirty in a disposable is FAR worse than when she's in cloth. Disposables do keep her drier, so I have to change her more often when she's in cloth, but it doesn't feel like her skin is right up next to all those chemicals.
3. Her adorable fluffy booty!!

Cons:

1. Laundry - This is not the biggest deal to me, because laundry doesn't bother me all that much, but cloth diapers add about three loads/week to my laundry. This isn't so much because of the bulk (all together, it's probably just 2 loads), but because I don't like to go more than 3 days between washings because they do start to smell after that.
2. Ill-fitting clothes - This is the biggest con for us. Audrey is round, so cloth diapers add to that and make clothes fit poorly at times. This is especially challenging when she's between sizes, like right now.  12 month sized clothes fit with her cloth on, but the top part of the outfit is large. 6-9 month bottoms are too small when she's in cloth, but fit well when she's in disposables.  So it can be tricky to dress her.  
3. Movement - This is really a pro for my trouble seeking daughter, but cloth can impede her movements just a bit.  Not so much that she's stuck - she stood up while in cloth - but if it's too tight she has a harder time sitting up from lying down, etc. More of a con for her, pro for me! :)  

I think that's it!  Bottom line, I really prefer cloth to disposables. I don't think I would be using cloth if my circle of friends didn't, though. It was nice to rely on them for the research (and the goods) and not have to think through it all or figure it out on my own.  But I'm glad I went with it!

Standing!

This video is of Audrey pulling up on her toy basket yesterday. I just happened to see her kneeling and was able to catch it.  Such a big girl!

Dancing

Quick and funny video of Audrey at the restaurant last night.  The music was loud and she danced the whole meal.  It was hilarious!

Audrey Day!!

Today was a very special day in our family!  We got to finalize our adoption process and go before a judge to make Audrey an official part of our family.  Now we feel like she's been part of our family for 8 months and a couple of weeks since we were first chosen to be her parents, but more importantly, we know that God ordained her to be ours before time began.  So in the grand scheme of things, today was not a big deal.  But it felt kind of important and permanent, and it made me breathe a huge sigh of relief to know that the paperwork is done (now we just wait for her birth certificate to show up in the mail) and there is nothing left to do and nothing left to worry about (on the adoption front anyway - worrying is my game, so I'm confident I'll find something new to fret over).

This has been a LONG time in coming.  We originally filed the petition in late November after pushing our lawyer for nearly a month to do so (she's not...as efficient as I am...ahem). The courts came back and gave us a court date of February 6, which was a long enough wait in our opinion.  But then in mid-December we were mailed a packet of paperwork to complete for the judge, most of which was a redo of our home study (think fingerprints, physicals, social worker visits, etc).  Because the FBI fingerprints didn't come in on time (and because our lawyer didn't turn in all the correct paperwork - ahem again), the date was postponed.  Then after pushing to find out what the new date was for over a month, the judge decided he didn't like the copy of our marriage certificate we had turned in. So I took a different copy to be refiled and waited another four weeks! Finally, just over a week ago, the lawyer contacted the courts and they gave us today's date, April 9, as our court date.  To say I was excited is an understatement, as is saying I wasn't nervous that something else would come up to postpone it yet again.

Our court appointment was at 10am, but the judge was hearing a criminal case which didn't get over until nearly 11.  This made for quite a fun wait with an 8 month old who really, REALLY wanted to be on the floor playing.  But she did very well and didn't fuss much at all.  Finally we were called back to the Judge's chambers, and he was in a very grumpy mood.  He barely said a word.  Our lawyer had us sworn in and asked us questions like what our names are and if all the information in the petition was true. It took literally 2 minutes.  The judge glanced at the paperwork, grunted, and signed his name.  Our lawyer said she would have asked to have our picture taken with him if he'd been in a better mood.  Oh well!  We got this one just inside the courthouse. We picked up our official adoption decree that we will put in a safe deposit box and headed home.

 

Audrey took a GREAT nap and then decided that today wasn't exciting enough and that she would go ahead and just pull herself to a standing position today for the first time. No pictures yet, but I'm sure I'll get some soon since that's all she wants to do now.

We went out to dinner to celebrate, and Nick was gracious to share his quesadilla with her.  Yumm!!!

We got a cute little mini cake to celebrate, complete with three roses on top, one for each of us.  I know, gag, right?

And then Nick let her put her fingers in it.  Ick!

Such a joyful day for our family, and while it doesn't change a thing in our books, it certainly means we can continue life as a happy family of three and enjoy our little Audrey Katharine.

Audrey's first Easter

 Lives again our glorious King, Alleluia!
Where, O death, is now thy sting? Alleluia!
Once He died our souls to save, Alleluia!
Where thy victory, O grave? Alleluia!

Audrey has yet to understand the true meaning of Easter - He is risen! - but we pray that one day she will know and love our Savior who died and rose again, which we celebrate every day and not just on Easter. We had a very low key day today, celebrating with our church and then just resting as a family at home. 

Audrey was adorable in her dress handmade by Grammy.

Her Easter basket, with organic spinach puffs (yumm!!), a teething toy, board book, and two Snickers eggs just for Mommy and Daddy!:

 

Happy Easter!!

Happy birthday, Grandpa!!

We love you!!

Pool time!

I get that it's April 3rd.  It was 90 degrees here, so I bought Audrey a pool and she went 'swimming'.  I would say that she loved it, and it certainly held her attention for 30 minutes (which is a win in my book!), but she was mostly interested in getting the grass around the pool, so keeping her contained IN the pool was tough!

Fun Spring Days

My little Audrey is getting bigger and bigger and moving more and more!  She has just exploded in her ability to get from Point A to Point Trouble, and it is keeping me on my toes.  The upside is that she very rarely ever fusses anymore (save for bedtime tonight when she screamed because she had gotten overtired) because she can happily get what she wants when she wants it. So it makes her life easier, and therefore mine.  Oh, except for the part where I have to KEEP her from what she wants!  Nick bolted down a bunch of furniture this weekend and put a baby gate at the top of the stairs, so we are mostly set in the babyproofing department.  Here are some pictures from this weekend, and a short video of her scoot.

I love, love, LOVE this picture.  She is 100% Daddy's girl.  

Our little family:

Just hanging with Daddy:

Mmmm..ice for my teeth - #4 popped through and I think the fifth one is pretty close too.

Sweet baby (Nick calls this her Blue Toad look - from Mario or some other video game, I think):

Easter egg hunt with Emily's kids on Sunday afternoon (a week early - they won't be over here next week):

THIS is what I do all day.  Audrey spent about a day trying to crawl, and then discovered she can do this and it works the same way, so off she went!  She sees something and she is after it!!