Motherhood

Baby Emma | Seven Months

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FRIDAY, 28 NOVEMBER 2014

Happy day after Thanksgiving. That probably means you are all wearing the loose pants today. Or as Joey Tribbiani would wear, Rachel’s maternity pants. Oh the Friends Thanksgiving episodes were the best… Wait, what were we talking about again? 

Oh yes. 

Emma turned seven months old today! She is at such a cute age. She is interacting with her surroundings much more and she’s developing her little AT.TI.TUDE. Truthfully, it scares me sometimes how quickly she’s growing. But I suppose that’s all part of it. The old adage, “they grow up so quickly” isn’t said for nothing. Dang. If I could turn back tiiiiime. (Name that song)

By the way, can we all just take a moment to appreciate this little girl’s comb-over?

Miss Emma is on the move. Watch out. She crawls faster than something that crawls really fast. Sorry, I couldn’t think of anything else. Oh, a lizard! Yes, she crawls faster than a scurrying lizard. Except her skin is much more hydrated. She also pulls up to stand against everything. Couches, chairs, walls, my legs, trashcans (it was just the once, I freaked out and disinfected the whole building).

Emma is a big fan of stroller rides. She loves getting outside and observing her surroundings. She is a scientist in the making. I swear I saw her pull out her composition notebook and reading glasses one time.

Can we talk about pureed foods for a minute? Emma luuuuurves them. I, on the other hand, don’t enjoy what they have done to her poops. I’ll let you fill in the blanks with that one. Emma if you read this 15 years from now, I apologize. But really, yikes.

Now that we are seven months into this whole parenthood thing, I can tell you I’ve learned some things.

1. There is nothing more delicious than baby hands and feet.

2. The spillage of bodily fluids all over your own body is nothing.

3. No matter how many times she falls on her butt/head/back/face, I will never not gasp and clutch my heart. #dramaqueen

Oh this pudding. I could scoop her up.

One of the things we’ve enjoyed most is reading books together. Whether it is the colorful pages, the rhythmic prose, or mama’s uncanny impersonations of hungry caterpillars or mischievous bunny rabbits, she’s enthralled. It is such a joy to watch her reach for the pages. The book worm in me is very happy. Paul is looking forward to the day she can catch and throw a ball and hold a tennis racket. At this rate, she’ll be on the court in 2 months.

Emma is our absolute pride and joy. Emma is going to be baptized next month when the three of us head down south for the holidays. My sister is Emma’s Godmother and Paul’s best friend/best man is Emma’s Godfather. Oh so cute.

And now for some pictures. That’s why you’re here isn’t it? I’d like to think it’s my sparkling personality, but Emma has the trump card. Baby chub wins all the awards.

This girl. SWOON.

Check us out on Instagram and get all your Emma updates here.

OHMYGOSH. She just strung together some consonant sounds that sound remarkably like “ma-ma”. I’m going to pretend she was calling out to me.

Baby Emma | Six Months

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I almost titled this post, And then the mama cried all the live, long day, but I figured I would definitely scare you off with that one.

This is coming a day late, but let’s just forget about that one. And what’s a day late really? Why are we always rushing things? Can’t we just slow dow… And you’re gone.

Well I hope you’ve returned because I’ve got some scrumptious baby feet, ears, and eyeballs coming your way. I’m sorry I said eyeballs. 

Let me start over…

Emma turned six months yesterday!! You know what that means? I only have six months left to plan her first birthday party. 

I interrupted her dance moves.

First of all, I cannot believe she is six months old already. Second of all, I’m pretty sure that means I haven’t been to the gym in 15 months. But let’s move on from that, shall we?

At the moment, Miss Emma is squealing and sucking on her thumb. She also looks like she’s plotting her escape with her stuffed animals. Good thing my friend Lily gave us her baby fence because now she can’t escape! 

Watch, two days from now you’ll get a Tweet from me saying, “So Emma escaped from Alcatraz today…" 

I think she was looking at the steak I was dangling over her head trying to get her to smile. 

Well let me tell you, they all said that kids would change everything but they didn’t say that a baby would change everything. I don’t think Paul and I have just sat on the couch and watched a whole movie in six months. But we have changed 14 zillion diapers and wiped up enough slobber to end California’s drought. Priorities? 

Oh yes and you know what is tough, anything that involves leaving the room for 0.2 seconds. This girl is having none of that. She either crawls to follow us or screams in her crib until we pick her up. I always thought I was tough. Nope. She wins.

She was really brave at her six month check up. The doc told us she is growing like a weed but not too much, so more like a goldilocks situation. Just right. She’s also impressing everyone with her standing. But I do get a call from the daycare at least twice per week that she’s fallen and bonked her head. It doesn’t even phase me anymore. 

Emma’s personality is shining through. She’s got some spunk, she’s got some pep, she’s got some pizzaz, she’s got some of this and some of that. She reminds me of someone. Were you thinking Tina Fey too? 

Nope, this girl is all spazz. Definitely takes after mama. 

This past month Emma went to a pumpkin patch, she went to the zoo, and she went skydiving off the couch. I told her to wear a parachute but she didn’t believe me. 

She seems to be quite the daddy’s girl too. Those two have a secret language. It usually involves the two of them spitting on one another.

So this might be one of only two photos I got of her actually looking at the camera. You’ll see what I mean in a second. 

This girl is obsessed with music and dancing. She always lights up when I sing her songs and we may or may not have sung some questionable ones. Hey, parents have to stay entertained somehow. 

She is quite the needy lady *cough* high maintenance *cough*. She loves being held and watching us do everything from unloading the dishes to brushing our teeth. But we love introducing her to new things. I can’t remember if it was before or after the box of mac and cheese did we show her how to change a car tire. Just kidding, neither of us knows how to do that.

She also has an attention span shorter than a goldfish. Everything is just so interesting to her. Let me give you an idea. 

Yes Emma, that’s incredibly helpful.

We are looking forward to what this month will bring. We are going to be incorporating mushed up foods into her diet on a regular basis. I asked the doc if baked brie was on the menu. He looked at me funny. It was awkward. Fine, I’ll just go with sweet potatoes.

I’m pretty sure I could write a new encyclopedia entry on Emma alone but I won’t bore you with my analysis of her right ear lobe. Unless you want that sort of thing. Call me, we’ll talk. 

I’ll leave you with this uterus puncher.

As always, check us out on Instagram and all her previous updates here.

Emma played hooky

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WE ARE YOUNG, HEARTACHE TO HEARTACHE, WE STAND! 

(Name that song.)

So as it turns out, the expression up to my elbows is a real thing. Washing baby bottles might be the most tedious thing on the planet. Well, besides counting the number of cells on a slide under a microscope (yes I’ve done that, hashtag nerd). But you know what we get to add into the up-to-the-elbows washing game? Baby spoons! Yup, that’s right, Emma tried her first solid food and now I have more dishes to do! Wait, why am I celebrating?

Things are pretty crazy over on these parts lately. I’ve been exceptionally busy at school and miss needy Emma has decided that she is wildly unhappy unless she is in our arms at all times (teething? allergies? evil-plotting?). We have gotten great at the game pass-the-baby. So far Emma is winning. 

Emma badger is not amused.

My momma and sista were here for a few days and Emma got to play hooky. That girl gets away with errathang. We had a great few days and all was swell. Emma is spoiled. But as of right now, I am completely okay with it. 

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Look at those gams! Emma was jazzed to see her auntie Mariah and I was jazzed to be able to pawn her off so I could finally take a shower (remember that needy thing we were talking about). And I’ve said jazzed too many times.

She got so excited to see her auntie and grandma that she passed out. Either that, or she was day-drinking again. She has been hitting that milk HARD lately. Lush. But the better to grow that baby chunk my dear. 

After a long and deathly hot car ride, my mom and sis finally made it to grand old San Francisco. They blew right past me and started smothering the little girl with love. Welp, I guess I’ll just sit over here.

We enjoyed some good conversation, great food, and partook in something exceptionally important. We organized Emma’s crayons.

No, I am not crazy. And yes, I have a need to color-code everything. I don’t know if you all did this when you were kids (or 25 like me, whatever) but I always needed to organize my crayons. My sis got Emma this gigantuous set of crayons and one single tear fell down my cheek. We had debates of about the various hues of blue verses purple and my mom laughed at us.

On Sunday, we took a walk in the sunshine and my skin yowled like the melting wicked witch. I need to get out more. I promise I grew up in the land of the sun. I hope they take me back one day.

The benefit of warm weather is baby tank tops revealing delicious baby arm rolls. I swear, I am seconds away from writing a post about baby chub. Yowza, my legs are white. Baby seals could hide near them and just blend in. Okay moving on. Hello?

We got some lunch at our favorite lobster company and my sister and I slurped on some oysters. Paul thought we were disgusting. I was all like, more horseradish please! I don’t think he’s kissed me since.

We also got a lovely flat tire and noticed it when we were trying to leave the restaurant. Good thing we had AAA. They asked me if I had a doo-dad to remove the wheel from the whats-it. I told them I don’t even know how to open the hood of the car. Awkward silence.

Emma was obviously jealous of all our oyster slurping so we decided to let her try her first solid food! By the way, rice cereal looks like what happens when you leave yogurt in the fridge for too long, but Emma really seemed to like it. What do ya know? It went a little something like this:

“What is this contraption you’ve put me in? And why is my cape on backwards? Unhand me you brute!”

“Hmm, this is interesting. Let me just put this in my mouth. What else do I not though?”

“What. The. HEY.”

“Oh wait, I like that. Give me more of that. NOW!”

She seemed to really be enjoying herself and I seemed to not enjoy cleaning rice cereal off of the ceiling. We are just giving her small amounts of rice cereal mixed with breast milk. At her six-month check up, her doc is going to tell us all about starting pureed fruits, veggies, and oysters. Oh wait…

On Monday, Miss Emma got to play hooky with her Mamaw and Auntie.

And according to this outfit, Emma is working on her documentary. All she needs is big glasses and a Macbook at Starbucks for this look to be complete. Baby jeggings, COME ON! You’re welcome, uterus.

I am so glad that Emma got to spend some time with the fam. I can tell she really loves them. She just lights up when she sees my mom and my sister. Plus, my sis is the queen at getting Emma to laugh. It’s so stinkin precious. 

We were imitating Emma’s complete lack of looking at the camera. What a diva.

Happy Weekending.

Baby Emma | Five Months

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Alright. Who did it? Who is fast-forwarding time and making my baby grow up too fast? You have some ‘splaining to do. Emma is five months old and I have five grey hairs, what a coincidence. You’d think they were connected or something.

Brought to you hot off the press is Emma’s five months update. Get ready for some squealing. From me. And you, let’s be honest.

Don’t let this precious face fool you. She can be quite a handful. And by handful, I mean of my hair. That she grabbed. And never let go.

Emma turns five months old today. Apparently kids are getting cell phones earlier and earlier these days because she insists she needs the new iPhone 6 plus. But I told her that thing is bigger than she is. We are still at a standstill about this one. 

Emma is the light of our lives. She is genuinely such a sweet baby. She lights up the room and has a great smile. She does this lizard tongue thing when she smiles. She slays me.

Emma is on the move, I’ll tell ya. She loves to roll around all over the place and has mastered the army crawl. She is one determined lady. Paul and I put her toys all over the living room and she goes after them like I go after sales at Nordstrom. 

So this girl is huge like, ate the wrong side of the mushroom in Wonderland, huge. Paul and I need to do some dead lifts to get her out of the crib. Heave! But that’s okay, she’s chunky and healthy and we love it. There is nothing like baby cub. Am I right?

She definitely seems interested in solids. She’s been staring us down whenever we have food. The daycare teachers say she also watches the other babies when they have solids. We are thinking about giving her a bite of her first food! What do you think? Pureed carrots, mashed avocado, or Maine lobster? Ice cream is definitely up there on my list. We are still going back and forth, stay tuned. 

She thinks she’s all hot stuff now that she can sit up. Show off.

Emma is definitely a talker, yup. She loves to babble all the live long day. She makes a lot of ooo and ahh sounds but she is adding in those consonant sounds. Paul and I have agreed to only call each other mama and dada around her. You’ll know the day that she says mama because my screeches of joy will shatter all the glass within a 600-mile radius. Wear your protective eyewear. You’ve been warned.

I am pretty sure that Emma knows that she can cry to get attention. One minute she’s crying her eyes out, we come running, and then all of a sudden she’s happy. What do ya know? Are there games afoot?

Can we just take a minute to appreciate how big her feet are? I mean really, we will be sharing shoes before I know it.

Emma absolutely loves books and music. She listens so intently to her bedtime story. She loves Good Night Moon, The Lorax, and Harold And The Purple Crayon. Next, we will be reading Tuesdays with Morrie. She also loves to listen to and play music, especially playing musical instrumens. At daycare they have all these different instruments and she just sits and plays away. I think she’s attempting Beethoven’s ninth symphony, so stay tuned.

Now I know you all only came here for the pictures, so here’s a few gooduns.

Emma is making it harder and harder to take pictures of her. At next month’s session she will be trying to run out the door with the car keys.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this month’s rendition of Emma Unplugged. Currently, I am trying to figure out what Emma'a Halloween costume will be. This is harder than choosing her name. I’m open to suggestions.

Okay, I could ramble all day long about her. OH yeah, the other day she was doing this adorable thing, she was chewing… oh and you’re gone already.

I’ll just leave you with this gem.

As always, you can find the chubby pumpkin over on Instagram.

Check out all monthly updates here.