What a cutie!

Wow, three updates in less than a week! I'm on a roll!

I told Jimmy several days ago that Caroline seems to be a little quieter than Anna was at this age. Anna babbled NONSTOP, and honestly, she hasn't shut up for a single moment since she was Caroline's age! So the other day, I commented on how Caroline just doesn't babble like Anna did.

Apparently Caroline heard me and decided she could NOT be outdone by Big Sister! Over the last two days, she has been doing a lot more babbling. Today in Sunday school, she had everyone in stitches because she talked and laughed and blew raspberries the whole time. Then we went out to lunch after church, and she embarked on a one-sided dialogue that was almost embarrassing in its volume. She's saying lots of "buh" and "bah" and "mah" sounds (yes, I've even heard a couple of Mamas in there, but Jimmy refuses to let them "count"!), and she peppers her "speech" with lots of squeals and squeaks. It's hilarious.

She also learned a new trick at dinner tonight. I tried to feed her some avocado, which was not exactly a hit. After a couple of bites, she decided that thrusting the green mess out with her tongue was not efficient enough, so she decided to try blowing a raspberry instead. So with each bite, she would wait until I pulled the spoon away from her mouth, and then....pphhhhhhbbbbbbttttttt! Green slime all over the place! I have to give her credit for coming up with it so quickly. I think it took Anna at least a month of eating solids before she figured out that trick!

A week of firsts

Caroline seems to have hit a "maturity spurt" over the last week or so and has had a lot of firsts. Monday morning, she cut her first two teeth. They are the front bottom ones, and they are SHARP! She's still trying to chew on whatever comes within her reach, so I've gotten my finger chomped on several times now. I've been amazed at how fast the teeth are growing. Monday, they weren't even really visible, but you could feel the little ridges just above the gumline. Today, you can see them poking above her gums if she opens her mouth. They're so cute, but I already miss her little toothless grin!

Caroline has also learned to sit pretty well on her own this week. Previously, she could balance for a few seconds if I sat her up just right, but she usually fell over fairly quickly. But yesterday afternoon, while we were waiting for Anna's bus, I set her on a towel on the front lawn, and she sat really well for over a minute! She also sat on the living room floor last night for Daddy.



Since Caroline will be six months old tomorrow, we decided to go ahead and start some solids with her yesterday. I was originally going to start with avocado rather than cereal because it actually has some nutritional value (cereal is mostly empty calories), but the avocado I bought several days ago still felt a little firm, so we did some cereal mixed with breastmilk instead. Last night, she actually seemed to like it pretty well and ate about a tablespoon. Tonight when I tried it again, though, she made a disgusted face and refused to eat much. She might have swallowed a tiny bit, but most of it came right back out as soon as I put it in! Anna thinks it's hilarious when she spits her food out!



We've also had some great advances in sleeping over the last few weeks. Around the time I posted about all of our sleep issues, I came across some information about the "4 month sleep regression". According to what I've read, it's very common for babies to become terrible sleepers around the time they're 4 months old, and Caroline is apparently the poster child for this problem. Apparently, this can cause a real problem because many parents decide they have to "do something" about a baby's sleep habits around 4 months because that's the point at which sleep deprivation really starts to wear on you as well. Because of this, lots of parents and babies get really frustrated because the parents are trying to train the baby to sleep at exactly the time that the baby is developmentally programmed to start waking up every half hour or so. Supposedly, most babies are ready to fall back into some more agreeable sleep patterns around 5 months or so.

So just after Caroline turned 5 months old, we started some gentle sleep "training" with her. I'm not a big fan of sticking a baby in a room to cry for hours by him/herself, so for us, this meant that Jimmy started going in if she woke up right after I put her down, rather than me going in and nursing her back to sleep. The first night, she cried for a while, but he managed to calm her down and get her back to sleep. After a few nights, I guess she figured it wasn't worth waking up if she didn't get to nurse, and she started sleeping 5 hours or so before waking! Woo-hoo! She's also going to sleep now without having to be nursed into a coma first, and we've been able to stop swaddling her. She's actually taking naps in the co-sleeper next to our bed instead of the swing now, too. She does occasionally cry a bit after I put her down for a nap or bed, but she rarely cries more than 3-5 minutes, and it's usually more of a "winding down" sort of cry than an outright screaming fit. She's now sleeping at night from about 9-2 and then from about 2:30-5:30 or 6:00, which is a vast improvement over the constant waking from a month ago.

We have a doctor's appointment Monday morning for the official stats. According to my scale, she's weighing somewhere between 16.5-17 pounds, but I have no idea how tall she is these days. It's definitely getting harder and harder to carry her around in the carseat (which adds about 10 pounds on top of the baby weight!), so we do a lot of baby wearing because it's more comfortable. Caroline also seems to like to be up where the action is. Here's a picture of her "helping" Daddy grill burgers the other night.



She also loves to give and receive kisses. Anna managed to capture this one of Caroline kissing me the other day. I just love sweet baby kisses!

Celebrity Baby Sighted in Houston Suburb!

This particular celebrity has been spotted at various malls, grocery stores, and shopping centers in the greater Houston area. It is suspected that she is hiding out in a Houston suburb, spending her time napping and enjoying chauffeured rides in a silver minivan.

Yes, Pebbles Flintstone is alive and well. You may remember the child star from her role in the Saturday morning cartoon The Flintstones.



Here is the star today. She appears to have aged well!



Miss Flintstone has been attempting to travel incognito to avoid the paparazzi, but one astute photographer snapped this picture while she was traveling with her entourage.



When asked if she has anything new in the works, the star commented, "Aaaahhhh baba bebob mamamada brrrrr pbbbbbbt."

Five Months Old!

Today, Caroline is officially five months old. And what a difference a few months make! Looking back on all we went through the first couple of months trying to get the breastfeeding started, I'm really amazed at how far we've come. Caroline has gone from her birth weight of 8 lb. 14 oz. to a low of 7 lb. 8 oz. to a current weight of 16 lb! And that's all on Mama's milk! Woo-hoo!

I was looking through some pictures of her the other night, and I was amazed at how skinny she was. Here's a picture of her when she was around a month old. She was so scrawny!



And here she is with Anna recently. Don't you just want to nibble on those fat little cheeks?



Developmentally, she's doing very well, too. She's still only rolling front to back, but she's working on the back to front thing as well. She can get herself over onto her side from her back, but she can't quite figure out how to get all the way over. I'm sure it will be soon, though! She still loves to stand and bounce, and she enjoys her Jumparoo and her new exersaucer that has lots of spinny, boingy, flippy things on it. She's really showing an interest in toys lately, too, and she grabs and manipulates them pretty well now. She also has learned to spin herself around on her belly pretty well, so if I put a toy just out of her reach on one side, she'll turn herself so that she's facing it. It would appear that we need to start thinking about babyproofing, since she's showing the first signs of becoming mobile!

Unfortunately, one thing that is NOT going well is the sleeping. I've never met such an unsleeping baby! She'll go down for the night fairly easily, but she's up every hour or two until I finally give in and bring her to bed with me, usually around 4 a.m. I don't mind her sleeping with us for a couple of hours in the morning or something, but I refuse to do the all-night co-sleeping thing. For one thing, it's just uncomfortable for me, since she wants to be nursing All Night Long when she's in bed with me. Unfortunately, that means a LOT of getting up and nursing back to sleep, so I'm not getting much sleep, either. She does nap during the day in the swing, but with Anna's school schedule, etc., I've had to wake her up from every single nap over the last 3 days. She's probably overtired (she's been EXTREMELY cranky the last couple of days), which might explain some of the night sleeping problems, but I don't know what to do about it, since I can't very well let my six year old hang out at school for an hour while I let the baby finish her nap! So I'm going to have to think on it and come up with a solution. Somehow.

In other news, Anna won an art contest at school today. She drew a cowboy for the rodeo contest, and she won first place in her class! I think they'll send her picture on for judging against all the winners now, and if she wins again, she'll get a ticket to the rodeo. I haven't seen the picture yet, but as soon as we get it back, I'll be sure to post it here!

The school has also been putting an emphasis on showing character (which they define as "how you act when you think no one is looking") over the last few weeks, and the kids can earn "character tickets" for doing nice things for people and being considerate. Anna has won more character tickets than anyone else in her class! I think the tickets are entered into a drawing at some point, but I'm not sure what the prize is. It sure does make a mommy proud to know that her baby is doing sweet things for people without being asked. She sure is a great kid! And I am a very blessed and lucky mommy!

Christmas!

Yes, I'm REALLY late with this update!

We went to Jimmy's parents' house for Christmas this year. We had a great visit, and Anna enjoyed hanging out with her cousin, Megan, who is 12 years old. It's funny, all of the grandchildren are spaced 6 years apart -- Megan is 12, Anna is 6, and Caroline is 0!

Anyway, while we were there, we had the traditional Swedish Christmas Eve meals. The afternoon meal is bread dipped in a kettle of meat and broth. I'd tell you the Swedish name, but I have no idea how to spell it! But it's delicious, and it generally includes my favorite Swedish dish: lefse. Lefse is a thin potato pancake that resembles a tortilla. You heat it and roll it up with butter and sugar -- YUM! The Christmas Eve evening meal starts with rice pudding (yum!) and finishes with lutefisk, which is cod soaked in lye and then boiled until it becomes a jiggling, gelatinous mass that I not-so-affectionally refer to as "fish jello". This non-Swede has not quite taken to it, but the rest of the family seems to like it. Even Anna, the oh-so-picky eater ate 6 bites (one for every year she's been alive!) and did pretty well with it.

After the evening meal, we opened the presents under the tree. Caroline got a Rainforest Jumparoo, which is a fabulous product that combines the concepts of an exersaucer and a doorway jumper. She loved it, and she spent most of the evening hanging out in it, bouncing and watching everyone open their gifts.



Anna got a variety of gifts, including books, DVDs, and some new nightgowns, which she loved and decided to model for us.



Christmas Day, we did the traditional Swedish feast of St. Lucia, which involves making breakfast in bed for the parents. Anna and Megan prepared the meal, and we all ate around MIL and FIL's bed. After that, it was Santa presents, and then it was off to my aunt's house to have Christmas with my family. It was a busy day, but we had lots of fun!

Visiting Santa

I took the girls to visit Santa at the mall yesterday. Amazingly, we managed to get a picture with BOTH of them smiling! Check out Caroline's "Marilyn Monroe" pose!



They also visited Santa at our church a couple of weeks ago. Actually, both Santas were "Santa's helpers", since Anna mentioned that they didn't look the same! Oops! We got some pretty good pictures of both the girls on Santa's helper's lap, as well.

4 Months Old!

Well, Caroline is officially 4 months old today! I can hardly believe it's been that long since we brought our tiny baby home! She went to the doctor today, so I have the new official stats: 14 lb 8 oz, 26 1/4 inches long. She's even longer than I thought! That puts her in the 75th percentile for weight and over the 97th for height. Wow! Her head is also in the 90th percentile -- plenty of room for that big, smart brain!

The doctor asked if Caroline was still happy on her liquid diet, and he was quite happy that I wanted to wait on solids. He encourages most moms to delay solids until around 6 months, but many are anxious to start earlier, so he always asks at the 4 month visit and lets them start if they're super eager. I'm not. I don't need the hassle! Caroline is very content on just breastmilk at this point, so there's no rush to add solids to the mix. I love the convenience of just being able to take my baby and my boobs and go, so I'm all about waiting!

We had big day yesterday. It was Baby Dedication Sunday at our church, and Caroline was dedicated. She did really well and didn't cry at all. In fact, she blew some bubbles for us while we were up in front of the church! My parents were able to come in for the dedication, which was wonderful, especially since they couldn't be here for Anna's dedication six years ago. Here's a picture of Caroline receiving her blessing in front of the church.



Right after the dedication, Anna and I sang a duet. It was Anna's first time to sing a solo in church, and she did a GREAT job! She was so poised and calm. She wasn't nervous at all! She sang her part perfectly, and her rhythm and pitch were impeccable. It's a miracle I even made it through the song -- once she started singing, I got all choked up! I don't think there was a single dry eye, especially in the choir. Anna has been the choir "mascot" practically since she was born, so everyone was amazed at what a big girl she has become. After we sang, she looked up at me and said, "Mommy, I want to do it again!" So I guess I need to look for more reportoire for her to sing in church.

I hope to get an audio recording of the service in the next week or so, and when I do I'll post it here for your listening pleasure. Until then, here's a (rather blurry) picture of the two of us singing together.

Rollin', Rollin', Rollin'...

Caroline is rollin'! It's actually been about 2 weeks since she started doing it. I put her on her tummy time mat one day, turned my back for a second, and then when I looked back at her, she was on her back. So I flipped her back over and watched her do it again. After that, she was a rolling fool. The next day, I managed to get this video:



She also loves to stand and bounce. I'm working on getting her one of those stationary bouncer things so that she can bounce to her little heart's content. I have a feeling she'll love it! In the meantime, she'll have to be happy with standing and balancing on Jimmy's hands. Check out this video!



Also, an update on her stats. Caroline is now weighing in at a very healthy 14 pounds, which puts her somewhere around the 50-60th percentile for weight. I also got out the tape measure the other day and discovered that she's between 25.5 and 26 inches, which would put her squarely in the 97th percentile for height. She's my tall and skinny girl! She loves to babble and is starting to make some "ga" and "ba" sounds in addition to the generic "ah" and "uh" and "oo" sounds she was making before.

Caroline is also starting to recognize people, I think, and with that is coming a tiny bit of separation anxiety. At Sunday school yesterday someone was holding her, and she was perfectly happy until she heard my voice. Suddenly, she wanted ONLY MOMMY! She's also reserving her biggest smiles for Mommy, Daddy, and Big Sister (whom she seems to adore recently!). Here's a picture of my beautiful girls together!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Has it really been almost a month since my last post? Time sure does fly with a little one around!

Caroline is doing great! We took a many-legged road trip for Thanksgiving. First, we drove to my parents' place in East Texas for T-day. We had a great time, with lots of food! Caroline spent the entire meal asleep in her swing, but she got turkey and pie vicariously a few hours later!

That night, we drove up to Jimmy's parents' house near Fort Worth and were treated to ANOTHER Thanksgiving meal the next day along with a few of their friends who were really excited to meet Caroline. She got passed around a lot that evening, and I think she got pretty over stimulated because bedtime was an absolute nightmare that night. But she did eventually go to sleep and was in a great mood the next day.

The in-laws' house also has the benefit of Cousin Megan, who is 12 years old. Anna idolizes her, and she got to have TWO sleepovers with her -- one at Grandma's house, and one at Megan's house. Anna couldn't have asked for more!

Saturday, we drove from Fort Worth to College Station for a wedding. We gave ourselves plenty of time (we thought), but then we discovered that I-35 was completely shut down between Hillsboro and Waco. Since Caroline wakes up and screams whenever we stop moving in the car, she did a good bit of screaming during the delay. I felt so bad for her! Anyway, what should have been a 3-hour drive ended up taking almost 4.5 hours, and we got to the wedding with no time to spare. But at least we got there! There were tons of kids there, so Anna had a lot of fun. Caroline did great and was very smiley and flirty while she was being passed around at the wedding.

All-in-all, it was a great holiday week, but we're definitely glad to be home. Traveling with a baby is stressful, no matter how well it goes, and it felt amazing to be back in our own bed when we got home.

Happy Halloween!

Okay, so I'm a little late with the Halloween post!

We went trick-or-treating with my friends Gayla and Michelle and their kids. Anna went as a witch this year, and we decided that Caroline should be her little black cat. They were both adorable, and we had a great time.

Here are a few pictures of our crew.

The group picture is, from left to right, Hans and Gunnar (Gunnar is 3 weeks older and 5 pounds heavier than Caroline -- and they're betrothed, LOL!), Anna, Riley, Jimmy and Caroline, and Gayla with her twins, Ryan and Evan.



Here is a picture of Anna and Caroline together. Aren't they cute?



And here is a picture of Caroline and her "boyfriend", Gunnar.



Gunnar is quite possibly the most laid-back baby I've ever met. His parents can put him on the couch, and he'll sit there just staring at the ceiling fan, happy as a lark. Caroline lasts approximately 15 seconds (give or take 15 seconds!) before she's screaming to be picked up. We do not grow laid-back babies in our family, apparently!

As a further update, Caroline seems to have turned a corner over the last couple of weeks. She has gotten much less fussy, and she's going longer between feedings. I still wouldn't call her an "easy" baby, but she's definitely doing a lot more smiling and cooing lately, and she usually gives me 2.5-3 hours between feedings, compared to the previous 1.5-2 hours. She's also eating faster, so I can now usually feed her in around 30 minutes compared to the 45+ minutes it was taking before.

Unfortunately, with this kinder, gentler daytime personality has come a much more difficult time getting her to sleep at night. Bedtime has now stretched out to an hour or more of nursing her into a coma, followed by very carefully placing her in her cradle to avoid waking her. If she wakes up, we have to start all over again. For a while, she was also waking every 2-3 hours again at night, and that got old REALLY fast! But over the last few nights, she's gone back to her 5-6 hour stretches, so at least we're making some progress there. I could probably guarantee myself 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep if I'd let her sleep in her swing at night (she LOVES her swing!), but I'm really trying to get her to sleep on a flat surface for at least part of the day. Hopefully she'll grow to love her bed the way she loves her swing. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...right. But it's a nice thought!

Caroline is also lifting and holding her head up very well these days.



Anna adores her baby sister, and the feeling appears to be mutual. Look at those precious smiles!