Blog | 2008
This past weekend, Brianna’s Grandma and Grandpa came to visit all the way from Texas. She has now had visiting grandparents two weekends in a row — what a lucky baby! She was her normal sweet self and seemed to delight everyone with her coos, smiles, and general animated activity. She loved all the attention. Now she is going to have to get used to just Mommy and Daddy again.
She has a new sound these days — I think she is trying to imitate her Poppa. While her Poppa was here, he kept clicking his tongue. Brianna is nowhere near that skilled, but she keeps smacking her lips to make a similar sound. She cracks herself up! Grandma and Grandpa got a kick out of it too… Other accomplishments to date include banging together two objects after watching Jason or I do it, and eating bananas. She still is not too sure about this sweet stuff. While she eats them, she scrunches up her face when she eats applesauce and bananas. Vegetables, on the other hand, are currently not a problem at all. Hmmmmm…
The past couple of days it has been quite cold so when we went out, we bundled her up in her Pooh snowsuit. Isn’t she adorable! She hasn’t quite figured out that she can actually move while in this thing. Instead she just hangs out and occasionally flaps a “paw.”
Jason’s brother, Matt, gave us this adorable onesie for Christmas last year and Brianna is just now fitting into it (still with room to spare). What this picture doesn’t show you is how she leans as far as she can go whenever she is near the computer keyboard — she wants that keyboard so badly!! She is definitely Daddy’s girl, don’t you think?
This past weekend, Nana and Poppa (Jason’s folks) came for a visit. Brianna’s “power” is so amazing, she can entice her grandparents to drive all the way from Tallahassee, FL just for the weekend! We had a great time watching football and visiting. I can’t say I rooted for Bama to beat LSU (especially since I strongly dislike both teams), but for Poppa’s sake and for the good of the Gators, I didn’t actively root against them either. Besides, this debate will be resolved in Atlanta at the SEC championship game. May the best team win!
Brianna spent her first baby playdate this past Thursday with with William, Miss Marty’s little boy. I used to work with Marty at C&B. William turned one this past Thursday, so we went to their house to celebrate. It is amazing how big he has gotten!
Brianna has visited her buddies Corinne and Jack before, but they are quite a bit older (5 and 3, respectively), so I don’t really count them as playdates for Brianna — more like playdates for me. 
Anyway, Brianna had a great time playing with William’s exersaucer and blocks. William was very sweet and even tried to share a block or two.
A 5 months age difference is quite a lot, but I think they did pretty good. I am sure they will be great play buddies when they get a bit older. We had a great time and can’t wait to get together with them again.
Our little munchkin is seven months old today — hard to believe! She is quite the wiggly one these days and practically oozes personality. Hearing her laugh is one of my favorite things.
Based on home measurements, Brianna weighs ~15 lbs. and is ~26.75″ long. She seems to more or less follow the sizing applied to baby clothes, which is interesting since everyone kept telling me she would be in 12 month clothes by now. Not my sweet pea! She can even still wear some 3 month clothes.
Accomplishments to date include:
*rolling from her back to her tummy – this rarely occurs and mostly only happens in her crib at night (no, she is not playing in this picture, she is asleep);
*spinning/rotating while on her tummy – she will wiggle until she moves in circles (I am told this is a precursor to crawling);
*starting to reach and try to move towards objects that are out of reach;
*eating solid food while sitting (more or less) in her chair – rice cereal, whole grain cereal, sweet potatoes, and pumpkin to date, no complaints so far;
*increased talking – lots of da-da-da-da, with the ocassional ba and ma thrown in for good measure;
*sitting up right – I would say she is 90% stable (she rarely pitches herself backwards anymore);
*longer daycare naps – lately she has one nap about an hour long and a couple other naps between 25 and 45 minutes, so she is getting there;
*when home with me she naps three times – lately that includes a short (~50 min.) nap in the morning, a long (~2 hrs) nap in the afternoon, and a medium nap in the late afternoon;
*she goes to bed with little to no fuss and generally sleeps from 8PM to 7 or 8 AM – this is rarely straight through, but hopefully the trend of the last couple of nights will continue;
*amusing herself for relatively long periods of time – if well rested and fed, she can go 20-30 minutes in her exersaucer or her pack-n-play with little interaction from us;
*starting to turn book pages on purpose;
*has a serious fascination with my keyboard – she wants to “type” too;
*just starting to sit in her stroller without the car seat;
*loves to beep the horn and move the zippy widgets on her exersaucer;
*fascinated by patty-cake and peek-a-boo
*would really rather you not wipe her face or change her clothes;
*loves to splash in the bathtub, but shows little interest in bath toys;
*has pet both kitties, although Leia might argue it was more of a fur grabbing event;
*gnaws/sucks on everything, particularly her fingers – showing a stronger preference for her thumb these days
*blows raspberries
As some of you may know, I LOVE Halloween! This is how Brianna began her first Halloween. The adorable bow in her hair was a gift from Mimi, and the fabulous bib was a gift from Tatie Kat, two other Halloween co-conspirators in this family.
The hat and onsie I found at a local store..
One of my favorite parts about Halloween are all the little ones in their costumes. This evening, one delightful “puppy” tried to move in with us. Needless to say, Mom & Dad, were somewhat flabbergasted. I thought it was cute. Too bad I couldn’t say as much — I have had a rather nasty case of laryngitis all day! As for our little one, can you guess who she is? I know the one on the left is a little fuzzy, but her little face was too cute. I had to include it!
Poor thing — by the time she participated in the Halloween parade at school, she was all worn out. Happy Halloween everyone!
Brianna is sitting up very well right now. I don’t even have to be particularly careful when I sit her down anymore. It is as if a switch went off in her brain a couple of days ago that made her realize she could sit up if she wanted to. I still tend to only sit her down in the pack-n-play or the middle of the bed since she still tends to throw herself backwards unexpectedly from time to time. Those hardwood floors are, well, hard! I took the above picture last Saturday before UF pounded UK. Hopefully, the good luck of her cheerleader outfit will continue through the rest of the season (especially this weekend against UGA!). I took the picture below on Tuesday while she played in her pack-n-play. She was too busy to smile, and in fact, seemed a little annoyed that I kept asking for a smile while she was clearly busy playing!
We started Brianna on sweet potatoes this past weekend. As you can see, she really likes them!
She also likes to “experience” her sweet potatoes with more than just her mouth. Hmmm… how do sweet potatoes feel on my face (commonly occurs when fingers enter the mouth right after the food, followed by fingers rubbing the face, eyes, nose, etc.)? If you look closely, you can see them on her cheeks, eyelids, and eyebrows.
How do sweet potatoes taste with my socks?
I think we will need to strip her for a while when she eats…bibs only help with the front of her. They have absolutely no impact on her sleeves or any part of her clothing that she can reach after sticking her fingers or feet in her mouth.
This past Tuesday, we took Brianna to the State Fair. My company graciously treats all of its employees and their families to fair tickets along with ride tickets and/or food money each year. So, Jason took a couple hours off work Tuesday afternoon (to minimize the crowds) and off we went. It was a perfect fall day — lots of sunshine and mild temperatures. She had a great time looking at all the lights and all the people. Obviously, she is a bit small for the rides, but we took her on the merry-go-round (one of my favorite rides). All in all, we think she had a great time!
Brianna was quite the wiggly one this past weekend. It is interesting how her movements don’t seem to change much over time, and then wham! All of a sudden she does a bunch of things. The fun began Saturday night when she started fussing shortly after we put her to bed. Jason went to check on her and immediately called me upstairs. This is the sight that greeted us:
Our little sweet pea had rolled over onto her tummy and didn’t really care for it. Apparently, the fact that she could roll herself right back over onto her back was lost on her. We had been told that she had done this once or twice a week or two ago, but this was the first time we actually witnessed it. Anyway, after we played a few games of roll-Brianna-back-over-onto-her-back-so-she-can-roll-right-back-over-onto-her-tummy, she finally fell asleep on her tummy. We repeated this game a few times at 5 AM when she woke up to eat. Other than that, she slept really good that night! Interestingly, she hasn’t tried to sleep (or even roll over) on her tummy since then.
She has also been sitting up more. I don’t really let her do it by herself yet unless she is on a nice padded surface (e.g., a bed or thick pad) because she tends to lurch backwards unexpectedly and hasn’t quite figured out how to correct her balance before she falls onto her back. Anyway, Sunday afternoon she decided she was tired of leaning back in her beloved bouncy seat. Not only can she sit up now, but she can pull herself up from a reclined position and maintain her balance. While it is a little hard to tell, in the top picture below she is sitting up in her bouncy seat while gnawing enthusiastically on Gina’s head — poor Gina. She also leans over the side of her bouncy seat now to try to get at her toys (see bottom picture). The bouncy seat safety buckle has suddenly become very important!
Today, she did even better. I don’t have a picture, but I personally witnessed her sitting up completely unassisted for at least 15 minutes while she happily played with various toys in front of her. She still lurches backwards unexpectedly, so she still has a ways to go, but I believe the days of her staying where I put her are numbered!
