More Christmas

Here are some pictures of Lily on Christmas. She loved having everyone here, but wasn't really that impressed by the gifts. She thought it was fun to rip paper at first, but then got really bored with the whole thing. (My dad went overboard buying gifts so opening them took quite awhile) It was also pretty hot here and Lily was burning up in her long sleeved Santa pants-suit so she got to hang out in her diaper for awhile.
Could you imagine if adults had the same rules as babies do? It gets a little warm so they just strip down to their undies. I wonder if that would make my property value go up or down?

Christmas

Christmas came and went so quickly for me. The last two weeks feel like a whirlwind. My entire family was here staying with us and it was so special to have everyone here at my house for Christmas. We kinda overcooked the turkey a little and forgot the baked potatoes at Publix (I swear I put them in the cart!) but everything else was excellent. Ross and I scrambled around getting everything cleaned and ready and now that everyone is gone we have to do it all over again. My house really isn't big enough for eight people, but we managed somehow. Ross got tired of cleaning up after my slob family and was amazed at how much beer we can drink. Ross and I took full advantage of the fact that we had so many people here to hold Lily. He even got a round of golf in today before Sherah left.

fatty & squirmy

Lily is getting so fat. I feel like we are feeding her too much. Is that possible? We have been letting her deligate when she eats. Because we don't have strengent schedules, we haven't really tried to get her on one either. I am thinking that might be something to work toward. She eats literally every 2 hours. I know that is fine for a newborn, but she is 5 months old now. And she eats alot too. I am not so much worried about her being a fatty, but I am wondering if this is healthy? I definately don't want to deprive my child, but I don't want to make her sick either. I did discover that giving her cereal at the nighttime feeding was what was making her wake up screaming. For the past week or so she has been waking up about two or three hours after going to bed. I thought she was teething, but the past two nights I skipped the night-time cereal and she hasn't woken up. She is funny when she sleeps though. I don't know how she can move so much while she is sleeping. I couldn't think of how to describe her movements, so I drew a chart.

Roll over

Lily has been rolling over for a few weeks, but I finally caught it on video. As you can see it isn't easy for her yet. She can only go from her back to her front, then I have to rescue her.

Eyes

I thought that Lily would have brown eyes, so I made her doll with brown eyes. But, she is 5 months old now and her eyes haven't turned yet. Brown is the dominant gene and since Ross has brown eyes I thought for sure that Lily would have brown too. If they haven't changed by now, does that mean they will stay blue/gray?

Sweet Potato

Yesterday I started giving Lily something other than cereal and formula. We started her with sweet potato because we already had some here at the house and the doctor said that it didn't matter what food we started with. She was so funny. She took a bite then shook her head and made a face like she had just done a shot or something. I guess the tartness of it compared to her formula was a bit of a shock to her. She opened right back up for the next bite so I continued to feed it to her. Today she did the same thing after every bite again. I don't know if she doesn't like it, or if it is kinda like the baby version of wasabi. Like it is torture and all, but you like it and want more. This picture is yesterday. We weren't messy at all compared to today. As I write this Lily is taking a nap and I am covered in sweetpotato. I haven't done laundry in a week and considering that I don't fit in most of my clothes, I have to continue to wear sweetpotato until the laundry is done. But instead of doing laundry....I'm going running as soon as I finish writing this. I love to run again now because I love my ipod that Ross got me for my birthday! I discovered that you can download books and NPR shows in podcasts and I am so happy listening to stories and comentary while I run.

Saturday

Lily has been very interested lately in the way things feel. She will rub her fingers on something, then rub them on something else, then go back to the first thing, like she is comparing them or something. It first noticed her doing that one morning when I was changing her and she kept alternating between feeling the diaper basket and her terry-cloth pajamas. It is so cute. Just another thing to add to the list of how amazing it is to watch a baby grow.

She is reaching for everything now. We have to be very careful about how close we let her get to things. Twice this week she has slapped my coffee and made a huge mess. Luckily, I drink my coffee cold so there weren't any burning incidents! Last night I was holding Lily while standing in my closet trying to pick out something to wear and she kept turning the light off. I am really impressed that she figured out how to do that. It is a pull switch and it takes her quite a bit of concentration to get a hold of the string, but once she gets it she has learned that when she pulls it the light turns off. She is the smartest baby EVER!

She has also finally learned how to use the Johnny Jump Up. I credit Ross because I could never get her to jump, she just spun around. She can finally do it now after Ross took care of her for two days.

no time

I finally got time today to put some stuff up on this blog. I have so much to write about and post, but I can't seem to get caught up! I've been pouring all of my free time (what little there is) into doing whatever I can to capture a piece of this holiday shopping mania. I'm not doing as well as I had hoped, but then there is still one more week, so we'll see.

Lily has been only sleeping for about 4 hours at a time for the past week or so. It is really hard on me physically. I NEED sleep. Somehow it doesn't bother her not to sleep though. She will go to bed at 7PM, wake up at 9PM, go back to sleep at 11PM, wake up at 2AM, go back to sleep at 5AM, and then get up for the day at 9AM!!! Then go the entire day with only a one hour nap. I don't know how she does it. This is about the only time I am glad that Ross and I work such opposite schedules because he is home during the day for me to beg him to let me take a nap.

My birthday was last week and I had a nice night. Brandi, Veronika and Missy came over and we played dress up. I had several items that I needed good pictures for the website, so I talked them into modeling for me. We got some great shots and had a really fun night. I made Brandi spend the night and let me sleep in as my birthday gift. I didn't get to sleep in as long as I wanted to because we had to take Lily to the doctor for her 4 month shots at 11AM. That picture is of Lily in bed with Brandi. They look like they both passed out like that. We don't let Lily sleep in the bed with us, but I guess Aunt Brandi likes to spoil her.

I have so much more to write about, but I cannot keep my eyes open any longer

Fan

I had said before that I didn't think Lily was a Florida State fan like she is supposed to be. Well, my Dad is trying to make her an MTSU fan. She didn't cry when I put the shirt on her like she does with her Seminoles gear, so maybe she wants to be a Blue Raider.
She loves having things on her head, maybe it is the lack of hair?

Daddy's games

Ross has found a way to entertain both babies at the same time. Listen to those squeels!!

testing

Ignore this, I'm just needing a website to test it out on.

Football & the Zoo

Saturday I was singing the praises of modern technology. If it weren;t for my DVR I would never have gotten to watch the game. I think Lily gets tired of being in the house sometimes. She was so hard to entertain, but I discovered that the sugar canister keeps her happy. I guess because it is shiny and makes a funny sound when she bangs on it. And I don't think she is an FSU fan. She cried so loud when FSU scored and threw up on 3 different seminole outfits and kept pulling off her FSU socks.

Yesterday we went to the Zoo with the Starnes family. Lily was an ANGEL. She just sat in the stroller all day smiling and flirting with everyone who looked her way. She had cerel next to the elephants and played so nicely with Emily, Mike & Max. We can't wait until Lily gets big enough to run around with Emily. She is 10 months younger so right now the difference is pretty big, but not for long. Sam & I were also talking about how fun it will be when M&M are old enough to babysit for the girls and we can go out for a night on the town. They turned 8 on Thursday, so just a few more years.

Turned over today

Lily finally turned over all by herself today. She has been oh-so-close for a week now. She can only turn from laying on her back to her stomach, not the other way around yet. She can even get her arm out from under her once she is on her stomach too!

I really thought she would never do it because she hates tummy time so much. She gets so frustrated on her stomach that I have to turn her back onto her back. I think she gets angry either because she is too weak to pick herself up, or because she wants to crawl and can't.

The picture is Lily modeling her new belt that I made for her. I have this OCD thing that if pants have belt loops than they must have a belt. Well, Lily's pants had loops, so she needed a belt. Good thing her mom is a seamstress!

Thanksgiving

Lily gave us something to be thankful for....an extra long nap. She napped for about 4 hours in the middle of the day. I got some sewing done AND a nap for myself!!

We didn't do anything but take a walk at the beach. I finally figured out how to use the auto function on the camera so we attempted to take a family picture. As you can see my jester of a husband was "standing like a soldier". Also, do you notice that I am wearing a sweater and pants and Ross is just crazy enough to go swimming? There was absolutely no one in the water and I had to put Lily's jacket on her because it was so cold.

Birthday week

I am beginning to hate holidays. I am starting to hate them because I love them. I know that doesn't make sense, but hear me out. I love holidays, I love the holiday preparations and the excitement & anticipation. However, now I hate the holidays because there isn't any of that anymore. Halloween sucked. Thanksgiving is tomorrow and this is my birthday week. I have no plans for either. I wanted to cook thanksgiving dinner here, but we really couldn't afford it so we passed on that plan. I keep asking everyone I talk to what their plans are hoping that there is something going on that we could participate in, but nope. So, because Thanksgiving is my least favorite holiday anyway, I figured I would forget it and concentrate on planning something fun for my birthday. Well, that doesn't seem to be working out either. The one person who actually did call me back has to work. :( I guess all my fun days with adults are over.
enough depressing thoughts. Here is a video of Lily in her Johnny jump up. Notice how she is learning her name and looks when we call her (sometimes). She likes this toy because not only can she jump, but she can spin around following Zelda.

Funny pics

In this picture, doesn't Lily look like Ross when he is wasted? And the one with the remote, she chose the remote over her toys. Every morning after she eats we go into the studio so I can either ship some orders or get some sewing done. This seems like the only time of the day that she will sit for a half our or so. Well, I was turning on the TV and Lily threw down her toy and squeeled for the remote. It is neat that she is starting to show interest in certain things but she gets frustrated alot because she can't really express what she wants. She has figured out that making a loud noise always gets someone to look at her. Her little way of demanding attention. I am sure it will get old soon, but I think it is sweet because she screaches, I look, and then she give the super-big dimply smile. Like she is flirting with me.
She has finally figured out the johnny jump up. At first she just hung there and would kick one leg a little, just enough to make her walk in circles. Then she started stamping her feet, and then I think on accident, she kicked both of her feet at the same time and it jumped. She squeeled in delight and then instantly started jumping. I got it on video, I just don't have the time to upload it right now. I need to get to work...got a bunch of sales to process:) :) :)

Couldn't help but to show you

Sorry, I know that anyone reading this is reading for the info on Lily, but I couldn't help myself. I am so obsessed with my business right now that I can't think of much else but Lily and how to sell more stuff. I just got in these shoes and I absolutely love them and want to keep them all. Maybe if sales are good over the holidays I can. I actually have gotten myself into a bit of a pinch right now. I started this business with only $3,000. So, in order to build an inventory worthy of hosting a website I have been ordering things on credit and then putting every dime back into the company. I have been emptying out my account every week writing checks to credit card companies. Sales have been good, but these next two weeks are going to be a crunch because I think I over ordered for the holiday season. There were a few weeks where I didn't have any inventory coming in, and I was selling well so I kept ordering more stuff. I have a shipment coming in next week that I need to pay for and I don't have enough in my account or on my credit card! Yikes! I'll make it if I sell $300 worth of merch this week. Last month I sold $2,000, so $300 in a week is definately do-able but it is making me a nervous wreck. It is exciting though. I love the excitement! I gotta go, I have a design for a new jumper that is bouncing around in my head that I have to get sewn in order for me to get any sleep.
Yes, on top of caring for Lily, running a business and working at monstertixx, I am still sewing.

Spoonfed

Wednesday we started feeding Lily cereal with a SPOON!! I was so nervous but Lily took to it well. She had been getting to the point where she was eating a full 8 ounces of formula at just about every feed, so we felt that it was time to give her something more to fill her tummy. She only gets down maybe a teaspoon or two before she gets frustrated, but it is a little milestone.

Gangster Lily

Brandi's ex-boyfriend collects air jordans (yes... the shoe...wears 'em once then they join the collection) so he bought Lily some Jordan presents. I love the hat and the shoes match. She looks like a little gangster, and Ross makes fun, but I think it is adorable.
Lately Lily's interest in the dog is increasing. She loves to lay on the floor and watch Zelda run all around her. Zelda is really great with her too. She sits very still when Lily reaches out to pet her, and doesn't react at all if Lily grabs her fur. I know she has got a strong pinch and Zelda probably hates it, but she doesn't act badly when it happens. In this movie you can see that Zelda runs past and Lily loses interest in everything to watch Zelda.

Pumpkinhead

Lily has the biggest head on earth! Every time I am out somewhere and see a baby her age I always think that they have a tiny head, only because I am so used to seeing my pumpkin-head every day. Ross and I have been joking that she probably thinks her name is pumpkinhead because we call her that so much.
She has a ton of clothes and is outgrowing them very quickly so I have been going through stuff and putting her in it "one last time" before putting it in a box for #2 later. Yesterday I dressed her in the dress pictured and laughed and laughed all morning because of that hat. If any of you have been following my blog for awhile you may remember a post about a hat that Ross thought was ridiculous because it was so big....well now it won't even cover her head! One pic taken at 4 weeks and the other on her 4 month birthday. Notice how the legs have gone from skinny little things to big and chunky!