June 27, 2016

Selah June got to eat lunch with Jules at Mellow Mushroom for her Aunt Abigail’s birthday.  This was the first time we tried her in a high chair at a restaurant.  It was also the first time she tried peanut butter crackers.  Jules was having one, so why not??

What I learned from this is that she’s a great faker.  While I know she’s tried crackers over at Jessica’s house, I know she’s not had them regularly.  And she’s never had a peanut butter cracker.  But she just followed Jules’ lead, and next thing I knew it was gone!

All that remained was some cracker drool and crumbs.

June 26, 2015

Selah June had her 9 month well check on Friday.  She was in the 25th percentile across the board – for height and weight.  Dr. Jen is proud of her.  She’s been eating lots of foods, including some healthy fats like peanut butter and avocado.  She’s eating vitamin-enriched oatmeal cereal.  And she’s starting to think about eating finger foods.  With all those teeth coming in, she better start putting them to good use!  She’s constantly teething.  Right now, she has both bottom teeth and both top teeth, and she’s thinking about getting in her top lateral incisors.  It’s made swimming loads of fun….

Everything checked out great.  We have an appointment with Dr. Cleveland in two weeks to test for allergies.  I’m betting we’re going to here verification that she has a soy and dairy milk allergy as well as a cat allergy.

Daddy was thrilled that we didn’t have to get any shots.

June 23, 2015

We spent another day out at the condo with Chris and Carrie in Orange Beach… totally playing hooky from our real lives.  Miss Selah June had more fun playing in the pool with the kids.  We skipped swimming lessons for the day, and I didn’t push her to practice anything.  We just enjoyed the water.

For dinner we tried to go to LuLu’s, but the wait was crazy!  Two-and-a-half hours!!!  So we just spent some time in the arcade with everybody else and made our exit.  McDonald’s chicken nuggets never tasted so good.

She’s been doing so many little new things lately.  She now will wave at herself in the mirror.  We all say “hey, baby!!” and she waves and grins from ear to ear.  She’s also really into a routine we’ve developed before bed.  Daddy fixes her a bottle and gives her to me in the recliner with her soft green blanket (that matches Sebastian’s red blanket and Satie’s yellow blanket).  I can try to give her her bottle, but she won’t have anything to do with it until that magic moment when Daddy gets YouTube on the tv to play Elmo’s Song.  Then and only then is everything right with the world.  She smiles at Big Bird and Snuffy.  We cuddle and watch our sequence of about 6 Sesame Street songs before she’s fully ready to go to sleep.  It is pretty magical.

She’s also started really hugging.  I noticed it just the other day.  She’s more purposefully holding onto us for comfort.

Today at swim lessons, I laid her down on my legs to change her from her onesie and diaper into her swim diaper.  She just relaxed and turned her head to one side to let the sun shine down on her cheek.  Her eyes were closed, and I realized she really was just bathing in the sun.  It was pretty cute.  We spent a few extra seconds that we didn’t have to soak it in…  The rest of the day would happen soon enough.

June 22, 2015

With Grammy and Grandpa out of town and SJ in 4+ weeks of swim lessons, it’s been quite the challenge to get in full days of work.  Dad took Selah June to swimming this morning, and then she spent the day with Jessica and the kids.  Apparently, it was Jessica and Aaron’s anniversary, but somebody neglected to mention that minor detail when I so thoughtlessly asked for help with childcare.  (Grrrrr……)

We’re ready for Grammy to come back from galavanting around Israel with her church buds.  SJ has had quite the adventures without her.  Thank goodness for Jessica today, man.  I was up the creek without a paddle!  Luckily, I’m now traveling with a little swimmer.  🙂

June 21, 2015

I love this little picture.  It captures her little spirit so perfectly.

We spent Sunday in Orange Beach at a condo with Chris and Carrie.  Chad and Mary (Chris’ brother and sister in-law) and Carla were at the condo too.  Selah June wore her new 9 mo. Carter’s outfit with matching neon yellow headband.  She was too cute for words.  Though all the adults wanted to hold her and squeeze her all up, she really only had interest in the kids.  And particularly she only had interest in Cody… Chris and Carrie’s nephew.  Cody is about 10, and Selah June wanted to crawl all over him.  Cody was a good sport.

The most exciting thing about our adventure to the condo was our time in the indoor pool.  Carrie and I took SJ and Carrigan inside to get away from the direct sun.  (NOTE: I did really well covering SJ in sunscreen.  She had no noticeable sun anywhere.  I was awfully proud of myself.)  SJ did pretty well sitting in my lap on the steps of the pool while Carrie and I visited.  Before too long, she started craning her neck around to see what was behind her.  So I turned her around to face away from me.  Within a minute or so she was leaning back into her float.  So I just went with it.  She would lean back into her float and then just grin and grin at me.  I kissed her on her forehead and praised her for such a good job!  And then it became a thing.  From sitting up to laying back into her float to grinning and waiting for a kiss from Mommy.  It was awesome.  I just hated that Jeremy missed such a priceless moment, a definite reassurance that swim lessons have been money well spent.

June 19, 2015

After the cat fiasco, Selah June and Mommy stayed home on Friday.  We don’t usually get to spend the whole day together, so I tried to break the mold and do something crazy for a change.  And what’s crazier than trying to eat a real banana??!!  Okay, I’ll admit it.  It’s not that adventurous.  But I’m the type to try to contain the mess…  so letting her play with mushy banana was a real stretch for me.  I just kept envisioning birthday cake all in her hair and smeared all over her face.  It’s coming….

She liked the taste of the few bites of banana that actually made it in her mouth (because I fed them to her…  She never did try to feed herself).  But she really liked the feel of banana between her fingers and the fun of banana rubbed all around on her highchair.

Here’s the silliness in action…

bananas

She’s a mess.

I’m just glad that she bounced back from her cat reaction so quickly.  There are still some bumps all over her legs and on her cheeks, but she seems to feel fine.

June 18, 2015

This little monkey stayed at Erica’s for the last few days.  With Grammy in the Holy Land and Katie busy with a new social work job, we found ourselves up the creek without a paddle!  Erica is between jobs right now, so she kindly offered to watch the little one.  The first day with Erica and GiGi and Adriana went well enough.  SJ cried a bit after I dropped her off, but she soon settled down and played and ate like a horse and even took a little nap.  The second day went much better.  She didn’t cry at all, and she seemed to do even better with the girls gone to daycare.  Go figure…

Today, however, we discovered that what looked like little mosquito bites was actually an allergic reaction to Erica’s cat.  So I left work early and picked her up, gave her a bath to get rid of the dander, and spent the afternoon with her at home to make sure the hives calmed down.  She was a little fussy tonight, but I think she’s fine.  The reaction did prompt us to follow up with the allergist to get her in sometime soon.

June 17, 2015

We are in our fourth week of swim lessons, and Selah June has become a professional floater.  Carrie is really proud of her.  She still protests the experience with little cries of frustration, but she’s resigned to a wonderful float with no kicking and no bucking.  Carrie is so pleased with her float that we’re moving on to dipping our face in the water.  Miss Selah June does NOT like that at all.  It seems to surprise her every single time.  She screamed and gasped so much today that she let out several burps and toots before even getting out of the pool.

She’s so funny.  She screams and screams and screams while she’s in the pool, but she calms down and smiles as soon as Carrie lays her on the changing table.  It truly is a protest scream.

Four weeks of swim lessons is starting to wear momma out.  I’m certainly ready for the weekend.

Here’s a short video of the float in action.

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June 16, 2015

Selah June is taking swimming lessons (still), and I become a little (okay, a lot) lax in how often she gets a bath.  It’s hard to enforce an evening bath routine when you know she’s had a good dunk for the day in a pool.  But tonight I decided that it had been far too long since shampoo had happened to that little scalp.  Baby hair can start to smell a little funky after too long (good to know).

She seemed a little confused because she’s spent so much time practicing her float that her whale tub just felt weird.  Who gets to sit up in a tub full of water?  That’s just crazy talk.

This little baby knows how to enjoy herself a bubble bath…