An update in pictures

So Friday Penelope turns 6 months! She's on to solid foods (and loving it) and has gotten the crawling "position" down pat... no actual crawling yet. So here are some pictures - enjoy!

Really Quick...

Tomorrow we go to the SF Aquarium! Bryan got the day off and a bunch of my mommy friends from Wednesday's play group are also going - fun fun fun!

This weekend is my cousin's wedding in Reno, Penelope has the cutest ladybug outfit to wear.

Today Penny charmed a little two year old boy, he & his family were eating dinner at the table next to us and he came over twice to talk to Penny. She flirted up a storm - we're so going to be in trouble when she's older!

I am thoroughly disgusted with the state of California. Bigotry is now state sanctioned, whose rights shall we take away next?

Being political for 2 seconds

Tomorrow the Supreme Court of California will (hopefully) right a very serious wrong. I am hoping to be very proud of my State tomorrow...

Teething, Growth Spurt, or Both?

For the last couple of nights Penelope has been waking up twice a night, usually at 2 am and then at 5:30 before she's up for the day at 7:30 or 8. She actually gets more sleep (cumulative) when she does this, but I don't think it's quite as restful.

The last time this happened, it was for 5 days and we got 2 teeth at the end of it. But Bryan and I have noticed that she also seems bigger lately... significantly bigger. So maybe she's going through yet another growth spurt.

I hope it's teething.

There are about six 12 month sized outfits she can still squeeze into, but we're pretty much in 18 month.

I have to schedule her 6 month well baby check up soon, should be interesting to see just how big she's gotten!

So this weekend has been fun, Saturday was my Dad's graduation (he got his BA in Anthropology from CSUS) and Sunday we had some people over for an improptu BBQ. More later, today Miss P is going to Granny & Grandpa's so Mommy & Daddy can go see Star Trek in IMAX.

I love May

Actually, I love today's like today. It was upper 80s, no clouds, and just a bit breezy. Penelope was nice to me and took an hour long nap this morning and the we headed down to the Land Park area of Sacramento to meet up with our mommy/baby friends Kim & Orson. Thanks to one of my best friends Meagan, we were able to get into the zoo for free! It was pretty crowded, but not too difficult to manage with two strollers.

We wandered around the zoo (Kim and Orson had never been!), ate lunch, and wandered some more. It was a lovely day, one of those days that makes me glad I live in Sacramento (note: August is one of those months that makes me dislike this area with an intense passion).

Anyway, it was fun. Next week a bunch of us from Mom's group are going to the aquarium... hopefully we can schedule a regular 1-2x a month outing.

I wish I had taken pictures - Penny and Orson had fun together. They're both screechers, so they laughed, smiled, and yelled at each other.

Oh, and Penelope had a conversation with a hawk today.

AND Wednesday she made a little boy cry. Linden (who is about 8 months old, and we've known since before P's birth) was playing with Penelope during group on Wednesday... he had a toy that Penny apparently wanted very much, so she screeched - which made him burst into tears. Poor baby! I made her apologize (which was another screech) which just made him cry harder.

I have video of her glass shattering screech. I'll upload this weekend. Fair warning, it may break your computer speakers.

Penelope 2, Mama 1

I won this round!

Nap Boycott

We are currently on Day 3 of the morning nap boycott.

I. Will. Win.

Or not.

Maybe she's in the process of combining her morning and afternoon naps to one long nap... only that doesn't work for my schedule.

Welcome to motherhood, right?

Don Lemon

Penelope has a crush... on Don Lemon. He's an anchor at CNN, and when he comes on she squeaks and grins. It's really cute :) He's pretty cute too, so the child has good taste! Here's a picture:



I'm thinking about writing him to let him know Penny's his biggest fan...

In other Penelope related news, she's getting so much more coordinated. Her favorite toys are ones that spin, and she is very good at getting them to keep spinning! She's also gotten quite good at turning pages in books. She does this really well with my Dad, but she does it for the rest of us as well - her and Grandpa love their story time!

Oh, and she has a "big" friend. Her name is Annalise, and she's almost 4. Her mom goes to the support center that we go to 2x a week, so we see her pretty often. Here's a picture of them playing:

Sleeping

While we have a bedtime routine, Bryan and I generally alternate who does said routine. It consists of the "three b's": bath, bottle, bed. We each interject our own little variations, Bryan is really good about lotion/baby massage (I'm sporadic in my use of lotion with Penny), and I always rock/lullaby (B sometimes uses the rocking chair, but isn't a lullaby man).

Anyway, Penny is very aware of who is putting her to bed and so is markedly different for either one of us. She splashes a lot more in the bath when Bryan bathes her... and she is harder to put to bed when I do the bedtime routine. Tonight she fell asleep in the rocking chair so I put her down, then she woke up, I rocked her again, put her down, she woke up... you can see where this is going. Each time I put her in the crib, she woke up, smiled at me, and held out her arms - so cute and slightly annoying.

I finally just put her in the crib and left. She fussed for about 2 minutes and then was fast asleep.

Le Sigh.

Oh, and she does this super cute thing when she's really tired - she rubs her head. So adorable!

Splish Splash!

Penelope really enjoys her baths...

Cereal

I finally uploaded the latest videos... I should have been doing homework, but oh well.

Penelope and rice cereal:

Seattle

So I'm finally getting around to posting about our trip to Seattle...

We left Wednesday afternoon and timed it perfectly, Penelope fell asleep just before take off and didn't wake up until we landed. Yea! She didn't seem at all bothered by the plane, the crowds, or anything else. Sweet.

We took a town car to the hotel (no shuttle, same price as a taxi), checked in and unpacked (well, sorta). The hotel had cribs, so we had them bring one up, even though we didn't use it the whole time. Dinner was room service (we had gone down to the hotel restaurant to eat, but the service was terrible so we went back up to the room and just ordered food).

This was the view from our hotel window at night:


It was pretty nice - the hotel was Best Western Executive Inn, so a little sparse, but we didn't need or want fancy... BONUS, they recycle AND compost. Score! An environmentally friendly hotel!

Penny thinks going Green is yummy:


The next day we ate breakfast and headed out to Fremont (on the bus, hooray for decent public transportation!!), which is where my cousin Fredd lives. Before stopping in to see Fredd (who broke his ankle the week before), we went to the Woodland Zoo. Now, I've visited my fair share of zoos, and the Woodland Zoo is definitely in the top 5 of all the zoos I've visited. They had a super cool penguin exhibit (among other things). It was a bit rainy and cold, but we had a good time.

Here's a sleeping Penelope and I in front of the penguins:


As an aside, wearing P in the Moby for most of the trip has given me a bit of a hunchback.

Anyway, after the zoo we walked to my cousin's apartment, spent a few hours with him, went out and got lunch (delicious Cuban food), and then headed back to our hotel.

After re-supplying ourselves at the hotel, we walked over to the Seattle Center and did the Space Needle:



After that was dinner with my cousin Anna (Fredd's sister) and her son Zander. We had pizza :) It was fun, although by the end of it Bryan, Penny, and I were pretty exhausted...



So we slept. Well, tried to. Penny kept scooting herself close to the bars of the crib and then waking up and crying. We eventually brought her into bed with us and she slept much better (although I'm surprised I didn't wake up with a black eye).

The next day was jam packed. We toured the Science Fiction Museum & Experience Music Project (SMF/EMP) in the morning, took the Monorail into dowtown, walked to the Nike store, walked to Pike's Market, walked to the Aquarium, walked BACK to the market, then walked to Safeco field for the Mariner's game. 80% of the time I was wearing Penny and Bryan had the stroller and diaperbag. Needless to say we were exhausted. But we had a fun day. I have a lot of pictures, but here are some of my favorites...







In the last picture she's with my friends Cassie & Mike... our friend Ray also came to the game. It was fun even though we had to leave early (P ran out of formula so we had to make a mad dash to a grocery store).

We all slept well that night.

The next day was our departure day, but we managed to squeeze in some more fun! In the morning Anna and Zander stopped by and we walked over to the Seattle Center for coffee. My friend Lorena, her husband Todd, and their December baby Josiah also made it out. Lorena and I met online while we were both pregnant, so it was super cool to meet her and her beautiful baby!

Our December babies:


After coffee, we had lunch with Bryan's Aunt Pegg and her significant other Rick. It was a nice lunch, the place we went to was recommended by Lorena's husband Todd and was really good!

The trip back was rather uneventful, thank goodness. Penny slept halfway through the plane ride, she's a good traveler!

Some things...

I have a post planned about our trip, but before I forget here are some things:

*I'm still going to try and make Penny's baby food, but due to traveling, Grad school, working, housecleaning, and the dozen other things I need to do this week I decided that we're going to do organic baby food in a jar. Except avocado, that will come straight from the rind!

*I'm so happy to be back in cloth. The disposables are certainly less bulky, but I heart our cloth diapers. And my friend Kathy was right, pre-folds are super easy.

*Penny has been sleeping a lot today, I hope this is just travel recovery and not the sign of another growth spurt...

*Oh, and she's in 18 month clothing. Some of her 12 month stuff still fits, but for the most part we've moved up a size.

*I will NEVER go grocery shopping solo (w/ baby) again. No way, no how. Either I need a shopping buddy or someone needs to watch Penelope. It's WAY too hard to get everything done and my back is KILLING me.

*Wearing Penny during the trip has done a number on my posture. It was never perfect, but it's downright horrid now.

*Penny is getting too big to wear. A 20lb baby in a sling is not really enjoyable (except for her, she loves it).

*Right now P is in a diaper and a bib. It's freaking hot in Sacramento today and even though we have on the air conditioner, clothing just seems a little silly.

*P officially likes oatmeal way better than rice cereal. Tomorrow we try carrots.

*P has a rash on her chin from all the drool... she doesn't seem to mind it, but it looks like she got a terrible sunburn and is now peeling. Poor baby...

My two favorite people...

So I have trip details and pictures to come, but I wanted to share this. This is what I saw when I got out of the shower this morning:



I love it!

Look what I can do Mommy!

Mother's Day

So I really, really, really should be doing some homework right now... but we just got back from brunch and Penelope is asleep so I wanted to upload some pictures from brunch before I forget.

Oh! And last night we tried rice cereal for the first time (and by 'we' I mean the baby), I have video and will upload it once my homework is finished :)

Pictures!


Penny and Mommy


Penny and GiGi (great-grandma)


Penny and Daddy


Penny and Granny K (my mom), in this picture she's saying "Stop Kissing Me Granny!" :)

Oh, and Uncle Nic loves his Niece

Mr. Mousey

So my Dad had a favorite stuffed mouse when he was a kid. Not a Disney mouse, just a regular mouse.

He passed it on to me when I was little - it was pretty beat up. No more fur, one eye falling off, nose gone, mouth peeling, and the stuffing was chunky. I re-stuffed him, sewed on a new "mouth" and fixed the eye. I couldn't do anything about the fur, but I like Mr. Mousey bald.

I hung on to Mr. Mousey to one day give to my children... so today I gave it to Penelope. She likes him :)

Nappy Nap Time

Today has been an awesome nap day for Penelope... I really really hope this means she'll sleep well tonight. Although I won't hold my breath.

Non-sequitur - I have nothing to wear to the women's caucus tonight.

What happened to my sleep?

Day 4 of our sleep regression. Penelope was up at 2, 5, 7, & 7:45... Mommy & Daddy are tired.

To make matters oh-so-much-more-awesome, I woke up with a killer headache. Joy.

It's gone now, but man that sucked.

Anyway, I'm hoping that we'll get better sleep after the weekend. We may decide to try solids next week if we're still not sleeping. It may not help at all (probably won't actually) but it certainly can't hurt. Since she has teeth, is over 5 months, and is very interested in what we eat then I figure she's pretty ready. If we don't start next week then we will start after we get back from Seattle.

In extended family news:
*Grandma Barbara is moving to Reno! This means we'll get to see her more often, yea!
*Bobby (Bryan's cousin) was drafted as a free agent for the Vikings, congrats Bobby! He also graduates with his BA in Communications from CSU Fresno this month - go Bobby!
*My Dad graduates in May with his BA in Anthropology, yea Papa!
*My brother has a job - woohoo!
*Ari & JJ turn 2 this month (our niece & nephew), they're getting so big! I remember when they were little babies, it was the first time Bryan took me out to Wyoming to meet that side of his family. They were so beautiful (and still are!)

I'm sure there's more news, but I'm totally drawing a blank.

Maybe more later, today we're hanging out at home until this evening when I'm going to the CA Women's Caucus.

More pictures before bed...

Pictures!

Here are some pictures of Penelope on her 5 month birthday (btw, she weighs 19lbs 9oz!!!)



TEETH

Update

I should be doing homework right now, but Penny just went down for a nap and if recent history is any indicator of the future then this nap won't last long.

We've had three poor nights of sleep, the first was at my parent's house (her first sleepover! I was a wreck, but she was just fine). It seems to be getting progressively worse; Saturday night she was up at 3:30 and then stayed awake for my mom, Sunday night she was up at 2 and then again at 6, Monday night up at 1 and then at 5:50. I hope this is just a quick-ish phase due to teething or maybe she's about to do something new - who knows. Granted, her sleep pattern is still pretty good for babies her age, but when you compare it to how awesome she was sleeping before then it's definitely a regression.

I think we were due for a sleep regression anyway.

And thank goodness for coffee.

In other Penelope news, she's 5 months old today! Happy Birthday baby! :)

I measured her this morning and she's 29 inches long, which is a half inch of growth - definitely a slow-down from her previous rate. I'll weigh her later. She's still way off the charts, but maybe this means we'll get more wear out of her 12 month sized clothes now.

As for mommy & daddy, Bryan is still working. His company isn't doing so well financially and we're crossing our fingers that they stay afloat. His boss has mentioned pay cuts, which we can't afford - but a pay cut is better than no job. We'll see, the economy is starting to look better, so hopefully we're on an upswing and nothing comes of the pay-cut talk. He's still thinking of going back to school, but it all depends on his job, so he's putting that on the back burner until after the summer.

I finished my first two grad school classes and aced them both - yea! I got 100% on my last paper, which felt great. Thankfully pregnancy & motherhood didn't completely zap my brain cells. This next class is annoying (aren't they all?) but they only last 4 weeks so it's not too bad. I should start student teaching in the spring (that's going to be one busy semester!).

Oh! And today is my mom & my nanny girl-child's birthday - Happy Birthday!!!

I have a lot more I could write about, but I'm going to take the nap-opportunity and get some reading done. Hope everyone has a great Cinco de Mayo!