Averi

11 Months

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11 months old. I can’t remember Kaili at this age, even going back and looking at her pictures it’s like I lost all memory of what she was doing at this age.

Averi is cruising around the furniture like a pro and has stood on her own for .2 seconds but that’s it for now.

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I can’t tell you how excited I am to get rid of formula and stop washing bottles. I’m like really really excited about that.

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She still puts anything and everything she can grab into her mouth. She is also getting better with eating solids. She loves her carbs, bread, crackers, pasta, pizza, bagels, waffles, veggie chips you name it. She usually takes a bite of her fruit and then drops the rest on the floor, along with anything else healthy.

Not sure how much she weighs but I’m betting she is gaining on her sister.

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She has 4 teeth and two pushing through as we speak. She is getting her own little personality and for the most part is a happy girl. She is easy to take places, she likes to people watch and is happy to be pushed along in her stroller. A friend of ours got her to fall asleep in her stroller at a party. Kaili never did that, as a matter of fact Kaili has never fallen asleep anywhere other than her bed or the carseat and that has only happened about 3 times.

I can’t wait to see what the next few months brings.

Happy almost 1 year baby girl.

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Sisters

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Averi is 11 months old today, more on that soon. Kaili has turned a corner in her maturity and it’s awesome and scary at the same time. We moved her kid table into her room and now she can do her activities at our dining room table. She spends a good amount of time in her room playing by herself…(A dream I never thought would happen.) Last week I let her stay up until 8:30 (GASP) to finish Frozen. I thought maybe she will sleep later than normal but no, she woke up at 6: AM.Bullshit.

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 Isn’t she beautiful? Little sister, just as cute, has been making this weird face. I love it and luckily strangers adore it.

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Kaili moved from the 3 year old class to the 4 year old class this past week. Luckily her bestie moved up with her, that made it an easy transition. Along with gymnastics I am hoping to sign her up for a two week swim class at a new pool this month.

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Kaili is mostly nice to sister but not really. She is really starting to piss me off with the way she goes out of her way to poke, prod and irritate little sis. She is spending a lot more time “thinking” these days…sigh. They will be besties soon right?

10 Months

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Averi is 10 months old and I can’t say its been easy. She is waking up at night again and has NOT slept past 6:00 am it seems in weeks. She is whiny, clingy and cries if I put her down, walk away or even look in a different direction.

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She looks so cute and happy there doesn’t she. Well really, it’s all a ruse. This is how she usually looks, at least when no one else is around.

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In her defense, she is getting two more teeth, so that probably isn’t helping. She has also mastered pulling herself up on furniture or anything sturdy or not. But she is afraid to sit back down because she has bumped her chin a couple of times. This is a big problem, huge problem. She will be happy and crawling around then she will reach the couch and pull herself up and then cry. Then someone, usually me will go to her and help her sit back down and she will cry even harder. This continues all day long. She does the same thing in her crib, so that’s how that goes.I think she just wants to walk and strut around the house like she owns the place and honestly I will welcome that if it stops the crying.

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She isn’t the best eater. She doesn’t like anything other than purees and yogurt, I am wondering if it’s a texture issue. She turned her nose at avocado and mashed banana, and sweet potato bits. So I haven’t gone out of my way to try much else. She touches the food and then makes a face and wipes her hands on her clothes. Aca-awesome. She does love her baby crackers, puffs and cheerios, probably because they aren’t mushy or sticky, or who the hell knows. I am not going to worry about it until she turns 1.

Kaili is a pretty good big sister but she is super territorial and doesn’t want to share any of her toys with Averi but Averi HAS to share her toys with her because…duh. But when Averi is crying Kaili will bust out singing “Hush little baby” and Averi stops, at least for a minute. I finally googled the rest of the lyrics to that song, and what baby wants cart and bull?

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These two, I love them to the moon but they do a good job keeping me on my toes.

April

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I finally got my computer fixed after I spilled apple juice on it, ironic huh? Apple on Apple? Gah, no more liquids around electronics for this girl. It was really hard to motivate myself to write on my iPad.
So all of the sudden it’s April, birthdays are looming ahead of us. Little Averi turned 9 months, she is moving along with her own unique crawl where she uses her upper body strength to pull herself along while her feet kick about. It doesn’t slow her down. We got a baby jail for her which is great when I need to turn my back, she will find anything and everything on the ground, put it in her mouth and then gag on it. Where there’s a will there is a way, she is a determined little thing.
She is still on purees because she chokes on anything that isn’t and it scares the hell out of me. I didn’t make my own food this time around because it’s so easy to buy and the variety of food available is amazing but it’s not cheap.
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She has been sick the past month AND her two top teeth just poked through so sleep has been a mess, with wake ups sporadic. Like her sister she is an early riser and I have come to the realization that these girls are not late sleepers and I will never sleep in again.

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Kaili turns 4 in a couple of weeks, this amazes me. She is doing great in school, can write her name and is working on writing MOM and DAD. I can look at her and say Shane and I have done good. She is compassionate, empathic, funny and relatively a good listener. She is starting to act out a bit which is actually coming later than I expected. Nothing that’s not age appropriate but her baby sister usually gets the brunt of it. This sharing thing is harder than in looks.
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She started swimming lessons twice a week at the Y and she loves it.She is picking it all up really fast.
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We got her a bunk bed for her birthday with Frozen sheets to go with it, of course. She is excited to share her bed with anyone really, and soon enough Averi will be her roommate. I told Kaili she will be in charge of getting Averi back to sleep once that happens! Good times ahead!

Averi

~ Girlmom ~ 1 Comment

This kid!

She is sitting up on her own, which is great because now she will play with her toys. I no longer have to entertain her all day. She has been sleeping 6:30 to 6:30 straight with the exception of a random wake up on a random day. Her interest in food is growing and she eats more than Kaili ever did. I gave her yogurt for the first time and it went over very well. Her new thing is spitting while eating, makes for an entertaining meal time.

At her last Dr visit she weighed 15 lbs. that is still low percentage wise but she is going to be bigger that her sister, no doubt.

This is a fun age. I’ve got to soak it up because before I know it she will be on the move!

 

Weekend Things

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Oh man you guys, Averi is sick, really sick AGAIN. Towards the end of last week she showed signs of a cold and every day she has gotten worse. I took her into the Dr. yesterday worried about RSV. Her breathing was faster than normal, a tad labored and her cough very wet. The doc says she has Bronchiolitis so they took her pulse ox aka tested her oxygen levels in her blood. The results were good so we went home and  I felt a whole lot better. The past few days have been rough but she should start to get better within the week.

IMG_0984Sunday was fun, the game was great until the last 30 seconds when all our hopes and dreams were crushed….okay let’s not talk about it.

IMG_0987I have made about 7 new recipes over the past few weeks, I will have to share them with you. But now, Averi is asleep so I need to take advantage of that.

A Half a Year

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It’s been 6 1/2 whole months since Miss Averi has come into the world. This is when time starts to speed up, at least that is when it happened with K.

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At 6 months Averi is is having a bit of sleep regression and I blame it on her last cold. She wakes up around 3 a.m and wants to eat, I have to wean her off of this…sigh. She takes 2 naps a day and  has her two bottom teeth. I don’t even know how much she eats a day but it’s a lot, the girl has an appetite. I started her on oatmeal and some pureed veggies but she’s not sold on them yet. For now it’s just for fun anyhow. I showed her a sippy cup the other day but I think that’s a ways in our future, girls gotta get a tad more motor control first.

She is super sweet natured and just a happy baby. The moms at Kaili’s gymnastics are always commenting how they can’t believe Averi will just chill in her carseat the entire time, I guess we one of the lucky ones because she is just fine in her carseat and stroller.

She is becoming a little football fan. If that sport is on the television she watches. She will even arch her neck to get a better look, it’s funny and a little scary at the same time. I put her on our bed to put clothes away and turned the TV to the NFL network, that gave me almost 1/2 hour.

She is the noisiest baby. She gabs, yells, growls and laughs, all.the.time. I’m pretty sure Kaili didn’t make any noise until 6 months. It’s cute and annoying, the screeching is ear piercing.

We had our first bout of constipation and I will associate that to the squash she was eating. She was getting uncomfortable so I picked up some prune juice. 4 oz and a day later the problem was, lets say unplugged and we have been good since.

She is on the low end of the spectrum in weight at 14 lbs and at the higher end for height. I look forward to watching her change each month, she’s just the cutest. Happy 6 months Monkey butt.

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6 Months Stalling

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I have a 6 month blog post written and waiting but for Averi’s half birthday she was given another bottom tooth and a bad cold. It’s the type of cold that came on really slow and gets worse each day. Yesterday she developed a cough which kept us up most of the night. So before I post about how amazing she is and all, I want to make sure she gets through this and returns to her awesome self and that her wonderful sleep habits return because lately it’s been a tad challenging and I am tired.

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Right now she is happily playing in her exersaucer allowing me a few minutes to write this because honestly by the time K goes to bed I watch one show and then head to bed, I gotta take what I can get.

Saturday, Kaili  started complaining about her ear hurting. This is new, she has never had an earache before so I was semi-concerned. When it wasn’t gone Monday I took her into the Dr. I assumed it was associated with her cold but it turns out she has Swimmers ear. Must have been all the mermaid action in the bathtub. We have been putting some prescription drops in her ear and three days later it’s already getting better. If you have had Swimmers ear before than you know how painful it can be, poor thing.

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“which ear hurts?”

There ya have it, our exciting life thist past week. Averi has her 6 month well check tomorrow, thankfully and hopefully she will kick this cold sooner than later. Once she is snot free I will take her 6 month photos for all to see. I am off to wipe a nose.

 

 

Feeling the Chill

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Our first night in town everyone was beyond exhausted. Averi quickly showed symptoms of a cold and spent the ENTIRE night sniffing and moaning…so tired.

The next morning, with two sick kids on our hands we knew we too were probably doomed to be hit with the sickness. However the sun was shining and it seemed like a fine day to go check out the new cabin the folks had just purchased in Tollgate, OR. We left Averi home to sleep with grandma and Shane, Gordon, Kaili and I hit the road. Just about 3/4 of the way there Kaili got sick, really sick, all over herself and her carseat…barf. We were in the middle of nowhere, literally. We had nothing, no water, no wipes, just a few tissues and luckily a change of clothes in her backpack.  We were headed to a cabin that was basically closed up for the winter, meaning no running water. We did the best we could wiping it up and turned around and headed home. That was a long 30 minute drive.

After a bath, Kaili perked up and as the day went on Shane started to feel worse. I have been dosing myself with everything including naps to stay healthy. This is how our trip is starting and come to think of it, pretty much the way our trip here always starts…minus the throwing up.

Poor Averi is super congested but Kaili is already on the mend, hopefully this is a short lived cold and we can all survive before wine tasting and football commences.

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GO HAWKS.

5 Months

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Our little monkey butt is 5 months old and I have to say she is a bona fide cutie.

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She eats a lot, at least a lot more than K did and more frequently. She goes through 5 ounces every 2 1/2 hours. I feel like I am perpetually  making or washing bottles.

Sleep, for the most part is great. She takes two naps a day ranging from 1-2 1/2 hours. Bedtime is at 6:30 and if she wakes up its anywhere from 1-4 am. Recently she has mastered rolling onto her tummy, if you put her on her back she WILL roll but she can’t roll back over, so you can guess what that means.  This has thrown a wrench into sleep, I found myself walking into her room a good 5 times early this morning to flip her back over. That was not fun.

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She thinks her sister is hilarious, Kaili just has to make a funny face at her and Averi will crack up. I come in second in the comedy department, apparently my singing is pretty funny, not sure how I feel about that.

I feel really lucky with how easy she is.She does have her moments and they arrive around 4-5 pm or also known as “witching hour”. The hardest part for me is when Shane is gone and I am trying to make dinner. Some days are better than others, like Friday through Sunday. The outcome is that Kali’s weekly dinner menu has really weakened in creativity. Occasionally I beat myself up over it because her palate is getting fussy but honestly as long as she is eating I will not stress over it.

After the holidays I will start Averi on some oatmeal and veg. I would like to say I will make all her food but… ya, probably not going to happen.

Happy 5 months baby girl.

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