It’s only month 10 and I am already starting to run out of words for you.

There is so much that you do, so much that changes on daily basis, and so much love that grows with you.

This whole “having you as a daughter” gig keeps getting better. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t wish I could bottle up every single ounce of your cuteness for posterity.

Sometimes, I just stare at you trying desperately to commit every roll, every hair, every finger and toe, every single expression and sound you make, to memory, because I am so afraid that soon I won’t remember what you were like. A part of the reason for why I take so many photos of you ( and photos in general) is because, while I have excellent short term memory, my long term memory has always sucked. I don’t want to not remember every single thing about 10 months old you in 10 years. I want to have it right there on video and photo. So you and I are stuck with tons and tons of memories keeped in a digital file.

Dear Lexi,

This is the age! The age when I considered other people’s kids BIG. I look at you, though, and you’re still so small, so fragile, so vulnerable. There’s yet so much for you to learn , so much to master.

But you are growing at warp speed. Mastering one thing after another. One morning you would wake up and just have this new skill. Since the earlier months I have noticed one remarkable thing. I can SEE cognitive jumps in your development. Like, one day you would just be MUCH smarter than the day before. A HUGE JUMP!

This video is two weeks too late and so many changes happened development-wise in the meantime, but this is what life was all about for our little Alexis between being 7 and 8 months:

Learning to Crawl
Learning To Pull Up
Playing Reading Bathing
Talking Destroying Hugging
Laughing Whining Yelling

all the wonderful things that a baby can do.

ENJOY! { click CONTINUE READING below to see the video }

Since I had to post the 8 Months Update before I had a chance to download the 8 months pictures, I am posting the photo and outtakes now.

WHAT?

No wait, wait! *Shaking head*

You’re 8 months? That can’t be.

I remember reading blogs where babies were 8 months and thinking how big they were, but you’re still so little. You can’t be 8 months.

*in shock*

An 8 months old YOU!

The first video here is the highlights of everything that being a 6 months old entails. The second video is her highness playing with toys, mostly boring but with a few very cute/funny/adorable moments in between.

I am putting the usual disclosure of parents sharing home movies:

-Ignore my singing

-Ignore my overly excited exclamations

-Ignore any other babble coming from me that you might hear in this video

-Ignore anything anything else that comes with being a parent

Do enjoy the adorable goofball that is Lexi!

{Also, like previous videos, this was intended for friends and family, so it’s pretty long and for most will be pretty boring.  To us, of course, it’s the best video ever. :) }

 

 

Below is a compilation of videos of Alexis playing with her toys. All the above disclosures apply.

 

Dear baby girl,

You are 7 months old. The number blows my mind. I remember reading other people’s blogs and thinking how big their babies were at 7 months. And here you are, exactly 7 months old, and yet you’re still so little and at the same time so grown. You’ve gone such a long way. I could never imagine myself as a mom to a 7 months old and yet in a blink of an eye, you are 7 WHOLE MONTHS OLD!

I am most likely repeating myself saying that this month has been the most amazing one so far. When I day-dreamed about you, when you were in my belly, I couldn’t imagine that we would have times like this where every single day is unbearably precious and unfathomably fun.

There have been so many changes this month that I had to start a list, not to forget a single thing when it was time to write this letter. But the biggest change is that you enjoy life to the extent that I have not seen you do up until now. YOU ARE FUN! It sums up your whole being!  There hasn’t been a day this month that you didn’t wake up and gift me the most amazing day of them all. Each day, every day. I am not saying this to be sappy or poetic. I am not either of those. I am saying that because it is true.

You day ALWAYS starts the same. At 6 or 7 am you start moving around next to me, looking for my breast. Once you find it, you nurse for a bit until it wakes you up. You open your eyes suddenly- and there, you’re awake! Instantly a slew of babbles and laughs and screeches comes out of your cute little mouth, making it evident for anyone in the room that THE PRINCESS IS AWAKE!

Both mommy and daddy are usually way too tired from a poor night’s sleep to react to it immidiately. You continue playing with your toes and attempt to engage me by grabbing my hair or my earrings. At some point you get me to open my eyes and THERE- you give me the brightest happiest smile of them all! “MORNIN’, MOMMY! IT IS TIME TO HAVE FUN!” – it says!

Who can resist that? So we get up, and groggily change you and put some clothes on to go for a walk with you. In the meantime, you’re just a ball of ENERGY! You pump your legs, you smile, you laugh, ready to start the day. You look at me with a sly smile, jumping from joy every time I smile back at you. There’s just no way to resist that kind of positive energy- it wakes us up!

When we’re finally out, around 7-8 am, we take a nice 30-40 minute long walk, during which you relax and enjoy the views. By the end of it, you start to fuss indicating that you’ve had enough and you are getting hot ( which we have since remedied by buying a much better stroller fan).

You get hydrated, and then play a little bit and soon it is time for your first nap.

Your big achievement this month is growing out of having to be rocked. One day you just up and fell asleep while nursing, lying on the bed, and then you did it again and again. We stopped rocking you completely and now you purposefully turn to me to nurse to sleep for each nap and bedtime. I am absolutely over the moon about this big step you’ve made and I am so happy we’ve had the patience to let you do it on your own.

What’s next, girl?

I know what’s next! Next, you decided that you will gift me with normal sized naps for a few days. I am talking- napping for 1.5 hrs, without or, possibly, with one wake up. We are still working these out, but I have never had you just sleep for an hour on your own, so it’s a big deal for me. I have hope that with a few tweaks here and there, you will be napping good 1.5-2 hrs at a time. I can see you stir at the 30 minute mark on the monitor, but 80% of the time you’re able to fall back asleep. Hooray for that! {edit: you went back to 30 minute naps for a few days and then back again to 1.5hrs. }

After you wake up with babbles and big smiles  again, we get to play with your favorite toys. You love talking to them and playing, with me in the vicinity cleaning or doing a few things.  Your favorite toy of the moment is the Fish and Splish by BToys.

This whole month we’ve had different out of town guests  and you’ve been loving the attention and all the impromptu trips we’ve been taking.

Around this time of the day, we make lunch and something for you. You had started BLW last month and it’s going really well. You’ve been going through the “I’m not interested in eating, I am interested in playing, throwing food, dropping dishes and making a mess of myself” stages in the last two weeks. You have so much fun doing it that we don’t mind the mess and the waste- it’s all a part of learning. Even when I serve you a whole bowl of split pea soup and you promptly pick up the bowl and pour the soup over your head. Yeah…. That has happened! In the last few days, you suddenly started actually eating again. I cannot wait to write a post about your BLW adventure.

You LOVE drinking out of a cup or a glass! You’re obsessed with it! I’ve decided not to introduce you to a sippy cup, but instead wait till you learn to drink from a cup, since you love doing it so much. You need our help right now not to spill the whole thing on yourself, but you grab it with both your hands like a big girl and let us tilt it a bit.

You JUST figured out why we keep handing you a spoon and how to use it. Sometimes you get confused as to which end to use, but most of the time you actually get the right end with food into your mouth (and squint from the unexpected taste).

You’ve gone to restaurants with us on multiple occasions and each time I’ve ordered you steamed vegetables or  a bowl of soup and you’ve eaten them like a big girl, enjoying the taste of everything that gets served.

To my surprise and joy, you’ve become that proverbial baby that can be taken ANYWHERE! What a change from just 2 months ago when we couldn’t even take a car ride with you. Now? Phew! You go on boats, long car trips (not without some fussing), to restaurants, late night dinners, stay up happy and engaged till 10pm, beach, stores, you name it! You barely ever have a problem, you never want to sleep and will stay up as long as there is interesting things to look at and do. Again, Disney just can’t come soon enough. Seeing your personality you’re going to enjoy the heck out of it. Like one of my IG peeps said “Looks like you have gotten that baby you can take anywhere that you dreamed about!”. YES!  I know it can change, so for now I am enjoying every moment.

This month we’ve had the privilege to celebrate both our birthdays with you and you did so great! We had a blast dressing you up, staying at the beachside hotel, going to the ocean the next morning.

Speaking of ocean, this month signified your official beginning of becoming a water baby. You’ve been Floridified! You’ve had your first ocean swim, and second, and third, and ….. You get the point! You LOVED IT! Squealed from joy, mouth open, drinking salt water, kicking your legs, attempting to swim. Sand? You thought it was the coolest thing ever! Burying your toes into it, grabbing fistfuls and attempting to eat it. No fear of sand here so far.

Aaaand, get this, YOU FELL ASLEEP AT THE BEACH! And not once, but twice! Whoa! Must be the sound of the waves, but it was so cool to watch you sleeping while we’re out.

You can splash and jump on command now, you understand what those words are. You love going to the pool. Every time we swim, you get really sneaky. You pretend like you are splashing, but really what you’re doing is trying to grab some water in your palm and carry it straight to your mouth! It’s hilarious! If you’re lucky enough to be put into a floatie, you make no bones about just lowering your mouth and drinking the water pooled on the float.

We try to read a ton of books to you. Every morning, afternoon and evening, before every nap. Between me and daddy, we probably go through 6 full length books ( Cat in the Hat length) and 6 shorter baby books a day. And you love it. It’s by far your favorite activity to do. No matter what kind of mood you’re in, if we pull out a book, you’re all smiles and attention. You have to have a book or two before naptime, it primes you for sleep. I love watching you react to what we are reading. You are not a passive listener, either. You attentively study every single picture in the book and react to our tone and certain words, smile, wiggle, kick legs, frown. You have favorite books, favorite pages of books, favorite words. You get a kick out of the word “GOO-GOO GOGGLES!” and you laugh each time. I can tell you’re going to have a huge love for reading when you grow up. I just ordered you 15 different Disney books from Amazon and a bunch of Russian books and you just have no idea what you’re in for.

You also love reading books with activities in them. You turn pages of board books and pull on tabs, touch the fussy parts, tear off heads of the paper puppets that stick out.

The car seat is no longer your enemy. You do pretty well in it, and I am starting to get a feeling that you get excited when we take you to the car, because you know we’re going somewhere. Again and again, every time I think about your car seat relationship, I want to kick myself in the butt for not getting you the one we have now, right away. It could have saved us a lot of stress and tears.

You’re almost exclusively in cloth diapers. We still use disposables for the night as we try to figure out what works for us, but I can see us switching to cloth for the night within a month. I love seeing your fluffy butt around the house.

You POSE! Oh how you pose! With the right lighting, I can take the most amazing photos of you. You’ve gotten into this cute little habit of twiddling your thumb on your leg whenever you’re feeling shy or contemplative and it looks adorable in photos.

You still play with your gym, but now instead of passively lying under it like you did at three months, you FIGHT with it! It’s hilarious to watch you struggle trying to push the arches above your head.

You’re the most expressive baby I know (I don’t know that many babies, though)! You go through a million expressions per second and, your arms, oh, your arms fly around like you’re on stage performing Cats. And those little hands… you make cute gestures with them that make me melt. You talk to yourself, me, daddy, your toys- using a trillion of sounds you invented, smacking your lips in a million cute ways. And those faces! Once in a while I’ll catch a face that I just can’t bring myself to delete, so I’ve started a FUNNY FACES folder for you to laugh at when you’re a teenager.

You know the word Kitty in Russian (KISA), and daddy in Russian (PAPA) and you always look for them if I ask where they are. You understand that very well. Kitties are your favorite things EVER! Like, seriously, you LOVE cats! Oh boy, do they not know what’s coming when you finally start crawling…. Brrrr….! And you think dad is alright too! LOL! No, you really adore him! If you see him somewhere in the distance, you stop doing whatever you are doing and just stare. Or if he’s close enough to see you, you put your hands in your mouth and smile shyly, sometimes hiding behind mommy’s shoulder. And then your eyes meet and it’s a giggle/kick fest.

Like I wrote in the mid-month post, you said your first word: MAMA! I have still not digested what happened, but it’s pretty darn cool. You haven’t said it again since then, so it’s quite possible it was just a sound you were making, but I will know that once you say it for real. For now, THAT seemed pretty real and different from a similar MAMAMAMAMA sound. I also think ( though here I am not sure) that you MIGHT have signed your first sign. I didn’t recognize it at the time, but you might have signed MILK. I am yet to confirm that, because signs are sometimes very hard to recognize. You keep signing it, but I am not 100% positive that you know what you mean. I think you’re just copying a gesture that you often see me doing.

Your sound repertoire includes the following: MAMA, DADADADADADA, TATATATATA, TITITITITITITI, PAPAPAPAPAPA, BABABABABA, BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH, WAWAWAWAWA, GOO-GOO, Ge-GE-Ge, AhGOO and a million others I can’t even repeat. But your favorite sound, by far, is BAH-BAH-BAH! You make it by smacking your lips together and I just DIE!

The biggest change in how you play is that I see SO MUCH purpose in it now. Everything you do is done with an idea or goal in mind. You’ve had such a jump in cognitive development this month, it’s crazy!

You play so fabulously on your own! It’s definitely something that happened this month. You talk to your toys, you bang them together, you grab plastic cups and make sounds. If you are holding one toy, you try to hit it on something that will make a sound.

Your favorite game is when you pull one toy after another out of the bucket, inspect it, and chew on it, and then put it back. You love fishing in the full bucket, making sounds, until you find THE toy you were looking for. And no other toy would do. Other times, you take the bucket and just EMPTY the whole thing on the floor.

You have so much dexterity. You reach, pull, bang, grab, move in any way and direction you want. You get from sitting position into crawling, you flip from sitting up to your tummy and play there for a bit. You pull up on your knees, you try to crawl but you just haven’t figured out how to do it yet. You get to your toys one way or another: shimming down the carpet, reaching while straining, squrming- anything to get to your goal, especially if that goal is kitties. You do this hilarious move when you’re sitting and see kitties and you want to get to them. You basically attempt to move while sitting, shimmying really fast. You do the same thing when you’re on your tummy. So funny!

You hold your arms to be picked up, you say NE NE NE NE or AH-YA-YA-YA-YA-YA when you’re upset. You laugh when I laugh. Like literally, we’d be lying on the bed together and you’ll look at me and laugh and I’ll laugh back and you’ll laugh back… And we’ll just lie there laughing at each other for no apparent reason :) I really love when you laugh and smile- your eyes sparkle and you get the most adorable look  on your face. You say “Eh! Eh! Eh!’ at the end of each giggle and I just can’t handle the cuteness.

You play all kinds of silly games with me. Our favorite is Rumble- Tumble that we play after each nap.

When your daddy holds you, you sometimes twist and turn until you find me. And when I run up to you excitedly and get my face into yours, you grab it with your little hands and then happily “slap” me all over!

You’ve dropped your third nap completely, unless your first two sucked, and then you do need a cat nap around 5 pm.

A recent development is you’ve figured out how to take your clothes off. It’s virtually impossible to put anything over your head, because you will fight and fight to take it off! I was dying watching it the first time.

You love using your open palm, splashing, banging on the table, aaaand CLAPPING! You now clap! It’s so cute to see! Sometimes you clap on your own when you’re excited, other times you copy us! But you definitely know it’s a happy thing! You smile and laugh when you see us clapping. Just in the last 2 days, you’ve been clapping to the songs “If you’re happy and you know it” and “Ladushki” (russian clapping rhyme) whenever we recite it. You even clapped with grandma over skype when she sang Ladushki to you and completely blew her mind and made her eternally happy (it’s something she did with you when she was here). You clap on your own when you hear Ladushki rhyme too. You are one smart cookie, let me tell you!

Most of your “achievements” are recorded on video and played over and over again by different family member ( aka Grandma from Russia). {Click here to watch}

For readers:

Items seen in this post:

Blue boat with toys: Fish N Splish BToys

Yellow Giraffe: Lamaze

White tank top onesie: Polarn O Pyret 

Hairbows: Hopscotch Boutique

Highchair: Boon Flair

Chemical Free Rashguards: Tuga

Red Romper: Polarn O Pyret

I’ve been pretty busy for the past few weeks attempting to get things in a semblance of order as well as having fun with friends and thoroughly enjoying my baby girl who is at an amazingly fun age.

We are in the process of getting our house painted which has resulted in a chaotic mess with furniture everywhere and lots of time wasted gabbing with the painters.

I celebrated my birthday with the few friends that are still down here during the summer and a few that drove/flew to visit. We finally made a trip to the beach with Alexis and then another one and it was more fun than I’ve had for a while.

Days are split  between playing and snuggling with an adorable six months old and trips to the pool, because I, in fact, have given birth to a water baby.

I have gotten much better at time management with an infant, a topic I am in the process of writing about. I am much more organized and focused. The problem has been and will be that when it comes to this blog my working time is extremely limited: nap times is THE ONLY time I get to edit photos, put them together, write posts, put together videos, answer emails (thankfully, comments can be answered quickly on my cell at any time). And with nap times being short (though extremely predictable), I am left with 40 drafts of great posts I have started writing but no time to finish them up properly.

Things won’t get better until everything slows down. I have more friends coming down to visit in a week, then a Disney trip for a week, then possibly another visit from friends, and then depending on how the first Disney trip foes, another one. All that yields colorful photographs that beg to be shared and no time to share them.

So I guess what I am trying to say is that at times I don’t blog about the things I want to blog about, or the things I think I should blog about, because those are usually more time-consuming involved posts that I want to sit down and write in peace, gathering my thoughts and laying out everything exactly the way I feel or think.

The photo below sums up some of the upcoming photo posts I am hoping to schedule asap, so that I could be free to share more current events as well as more serious posts.

And 10 minutes into my writing, Alexis is up, so I will be right back. {…}  Ok she’s asleep now. But of course I lost my train of thought. That is presicely why i’ve been putting off longer more important posts on parenting because I just can’t rely on more than 20 minutes and Andrew is so busy that he cant give me a few hours at a time right now.

What else is new? We’re currently “struggling” with what seems to be separation anxiety (OK, Lexi is up again… BRB… ). For the past week or so, she has been watching me like a hawk, with wide eyes and fear apparent on her face. I can’t even leave her for 2 seconds without her erupting. I feel so bad for my girl, and try to not leave her alone unless I can see she’s engrossed into what she is doing and I need to throw in a load of laundry or something. If I am around but she can’t see me (like when I am in the kitchen trying to make lunch), I try to sing her a song so that she’d feel I am still here.

It also could be the growth spurt she is going through. She’s been eating pretty much every hour and if I miss her hunger cues, and daddy goes to spend time with her, so that I could get  a few things done,… (Ok she is up again… and I am back.), as soon as I leave, she starts crying and if I am in the same room, cleaning up or moving around, she just watches me non-stop. It’s really kinda cute. I bet she’s just keeping tabs on her food source lol

It also looks like we might be ready to drop the third nap, though I am not sure if she can go all the way to her actual bedtime which is usually 8-9 pm depending on when she took her last nap. Never once though has she been able to go to sleep before 8pm.

Alexis has really changed again overnight. She does so much more and just a much bigger, even more aware baby. She seems so smart, her cognitive development has exploded, she reacts to things in a different way. She’s also such a profecient sitter and are able to reach for toys easily all around her. I just love watching her bloom into this amazing capable human being. I’ll write about everything that she’s been doing in her “7 months” post, but so many things already happened and she’s not even half way to 7 months.

She’s also developed object permanence, which is probably where the separation anxiety comes from.

I am also excited to write about Baby Led Weaning and the whole solids introduction, because it’s going fabulously and I cannot IMAGINE doing anything but that. If any of you are on the fence about trying it out, I would totally recommend this method and the book (though I am not crazy about how it’s written, I do love the concept behind it)

I started a #30daysofbreastfeeding challenge on Instagram. So if you are a supporter of breastfeeding, join me in posting a BF picture a day for 30 days with the hashtag #30daysofbreastfeeding. My IG name is @girl_on_e

Also I reset the numbers on the poll for future posts on the right, so if you feel like it, go ahead and vote for what you’d like to see. Again, I mostly go by what I feel like at that moment and the time I have when it comes to writing posts, but I do try to take the poll into consideration.

And finally, the biggest, most amazing thing that happened at 6 months and 1 week was ALEXIS’ FIRST WORD!

MAMA!

I didn’t want to believe it at first. She’s been babbling and using mama, baba, papa for a few weeks now, which is normal and does not constitute an actual meaningful word. For the past week, though, she’s been saying mama whenever she “appeared” to need me. Which I considered a coincidence or her new cry for food or something. She’s been saying mama and lifting her arms for me, also while crying for food, all the times either looking directly AT me or looking for FOR me. But again, I just wasn’t sure that she knew what she was saying. Last night, however, when she woke up during her witching hour at 4am and refused to go to sleep, Andrew got up to rock her (I wake up to feed her and soothe her, but if nothing works, he gets up to rock her so that I could get some sleep). He ALWAYS rocks her at night. This time, however,  she broke down into hysterics, crying “mama” and looking back at the bed where I was. I got up and she followed me with her gaze while repeating “Mamamamamamamama!” and only after I took her into my arms, she calmed down.  And with that, we have decided that, while she might not be realizing she is actually speaking or what words are, she has said her first word with intention: MAMA!

{mind explosion over}

Next up: Father’s Day in photos

 

Here is what you’re about to see:

• her first crawl-like move
• lots of playing
•  attempting to grab kitty’s tail and laughing her butt off
• hilarious peekaboo
• talking to grandma over skype
• stealing mommy’s drink
• first swing ride
• and more more more

 

The video is pretty long and was not made for the blog but for us, so if you sit through the whole 10 minutes, I’d be surprised. I did leave the funniest thing for the ending.

{all music is by Disney}

Dear baby girl!

This is getting serious! You are one amazing curious wonderful determined hilarious fun bundle of energy! I don’t know for how long I’ll continue repeating that it just doesn’t seem like you’ve been here for mere 5 months and yet I can’t believe how much you have grown in such little time.

You’re getting more and more fun to be around. Everything makes you laugh, you’re interested in everything, you want to touch everything, you want to move, move, move. I just love you so much more with each and every day. You are a true joy to us!

This month it has been picture overload here because you’re just the cutest little thing and you’ve been doing so many new things. I have not been able to capture even 1/10th of your charm and sweetness and character. The way you look at me when I carry you or nuzzle me and give me open mouth kisses when we lie next to each other is just not something I will ever be able to properly describe or capture on camera. It will be something special for me to remember forever.

Here’s what is new this month:

at 4 months

You all of a sudden started reaching out and touching things when we carry you. We can’t go past a blank wall, let alone an item, without you reaching for it, or running your hands down it. Our bedtime routine has evolved from “saying good-night” to windows,pictures, lamp and monitor to “touching good-night”. Your favorite are our lamp and the monitor. When the routine starts, you are barely paying attention to windows and armoire, your eyes are on the lamp. Once we get to it, you grab the hanging switch and turn it on, then look at me in amazement, and then pull on it to turn it off and look at me again. You used to love touching the toy we call “no-fall-downer” (nevalyazhka), because you can’t tip it over, it just keep popping up. But you’ve moved onto the lamp. You love the monitor because you can attempt to get it in your mouth, though, of course, we don’t let you. (see video)

You have noticed our kitties. You stare at them in wonder like they are the coolest things you’ve ever seen and I can see your mouth curve into a smile and you yelp “Ah!” Of course, you always try to touch them whenever they are close enough AND put them in your mouth which is pretty much impossible. Initially you’d tentatively copy how we pet the cats, you’d gently stroke their fur, but now you just go and grab them with your hands full of fur. It’s so cute! Putting that hand in your mouth before we managed to wash your hands- isn’t so cute! The cats are strangely ok with you. They let you pet pull their fur.

You ADORE playing peekaboo. You laugh until you start hiccuping. When I hide and say “Where’s mommy?” you quiet down waiting for me pop up with “Here I am!” (see video)

I can’t tell whether you hate not being around us or you have started the whole “separation anxiety” but there are times (most of the time) when, if we leave your side, you crane your neck and follow us with your gaze and as soon as you can’t see us, you start crying. There are other times, when you’re so consumed with a toy, that you don’t notice it, until you do and you start crying. I hate the idea that until you have object permanence if you don’t see us, it’s like we fell off the face of the earth.

A couple of nights you have been waking up with your eyes wide open, ready to play and wouldn’t go to sleep. You’d fuss and fuss and fuss, until you start crying. Sometimes even the boob won’t put you to sleep. So daddy gets up and rocks you until you’re asleep again, unless you won’t go to sleep and then he wakes me up and I try to rock you, too. You usually fall asleep, but often it takes us 1.5 hours and neither one of us gets to sleep. Then other nights you wake up every 2 hours to be comforted by the boob or just my hand on you. I realize that you will not be sleeping well for many months. You’re not a sleeper and right now there’s just too much going on with you to sleep. I’ll wait, I’m in no hurry.

Your favorite activity is still scooting with leg support. If we don’t give you leg support, you somehow squirm yourself around the mat to face whatever it is you want.

4.5 months

Your hand coordination spiked up. You can now hold small board books and flip pages (but mostly shove them into your mouth). You can hold and pick up everything in your reach: calculator, bottles, toys. It’s so much fun carrying you around because you reach out and try to touch everything in sight and you’re just so interested. I love curiosity- that’s the cornerstone of learning.

You have now figured out the concept of purposefully calling for attention. Daddy was folding laundry while you were sitting in a swing one day (the hope was that you’d get rocked to sleep). Then suddenly you make a “fuss” sound. When daddy looked up to see what’s wrong, he saw you staring at him with a huge smile on your face. He was so excited to tell me about your new milestone.

You rolled again (tummy to back). There was no problem or hesitation in you. You just looked up at me, and rolled, as if to say “Silly mommy! You forgot that I had already rolled twice at 2.5 months, I can do it, I just don’t care to.” So that’s that. You like being on your tummy, so there has never been the need to roll more than a few times. And obviously, you’re much more focused on crawling, that rolling seems boring to you. Point taken. Moving on.

UPDATE: I keep having to add to this post, as days before turning 5 months, you keep reaching milestone after milestone. As we were reading the cloth Peekaboo book, for the first time ever, instead of try to chew on it, you actually kept reaching out and opening the covers to see what’s under them. I don’t know if you really got the concept of hiding or it’s just a coincidence but it’s pretty cool either way.

And here’s a big one: you can sit unassisted. You can’t get into a sitting position on your own yet, obviously. But if you are sat up, you’ll sit for as long as you want or until you decide that you’d like to move now, at which point you’ll roll into a crawling position. You really dislike being stationary. Sitting is a new thing to you, so you’ll do it for a few minutes or more if there are toys involved. But otherwise, you just want to go, go, go. You still tip backwards once in a while, though, especially when mommy is behind you and she starts talking, you HAVE to see what she’s saying, so you look up and bam! I always catch you, of course.

You are slowly working on rolling from back to tummy. Obviously, you’re more interested in that type of roll since it would put you on your tummy and into crawling position. You can’t do it yet, though. You get as far as your side and you haven’t figured out that you can go further. But you have plenty of time, you’re only 5 months, little girl. I do love watching you figure things out, though. All I ever want for you is curiosity and determination. And then success in everything will follow.

A new thing you’ve been doing is vigorously shaking objects in your hands. Whether it’s a rattle or a cloth book, you’ll grab it and just go crazy shaking it. I really want to get it on video, but so far I haven’t been able to. Sometimes, you’ll shake your arms when there’s nothing in your hands and it looks like you’re beating your chest like a gorilla. It’s kind of funny! :)

At almost 5 months

Your first crawling motion. You’ve been trying to crawl, but you haven’t had enough strength to pull yourself up. That is until 1 week ago, on Father’s Day, when you started to pick your butt of the floor just a little bit when your scoot with leg support in an effort to get on your knees. It’s so much fun to watch you try to do it. AND I managed to catch on video your VERY FIRST ATTEMPT at REAL CRAWLING! You pulled yourself up all by yourself and moved forward! YAY! It’s funny because I was so excited, that I would be walking around all pumped and then forget why I was so excited, until I’d remember “Oh, I caught Lexi’s first “crawl” on video!” {the joys of first time moms!}

Now after that first crawl attempt, you’re much more efficient at moving around. If I leave you on the mat to go grab a cup of tea or throw in a load of laundry, I always come back to see you a foot or two further than where you were facing a completely opposite direction. I think with this kind of determination a few more weeks and you will start moving on your own, which means we have to begin baby proofing. Hey, at least you’re super adorable in your knee pads.

UPDATE: Things seem to change daily now. You have been getting up on your knees pretty well all day today (6/28/12) and trying to move. You still need leg support to move or you get frustrated,but you have grasped the main concept for crawling. You flail your arms and legs and when that gets you nowhere you try to pick your belly and butt off the floor by getting on your knees. Keep up the good work!

You’re losing your hair, girl! We cannot wait to see what it’s going to come back as. I am sad, though, because I LOVE your hair! And I also cannot even picture you as a blondie!

 

It’s very apparent to me that you’re growing and changing in more ways that we can see. We finally installed a new convertible car seat ( to hell with that infant one that was too hot and uncomfortable) and you love it. You spread your legs like a baroness and enjoy the ride. We went out to get some food and walk around with daddy the other day and you didn’t mind riding in the car one bit. You had so much fun being out and 4 hours after your previous nap, you blissfully fell asleep in your new car seat. That has NEVER happened before. We’re so excited to be able to take you places now and now that you are comfortable enough that you can fall asleep in your car seat.

You now look for fallen objects. This is HUGE, girl! You drop your toy and look down to see where it went! You actually understand the world. I love all the thinking going on in your brain.

You have developed a sense of humor too. Besides, laughing at pretty much anything, from a goofy face to a sound , you now crack up at specific things like the first time you put your toe into your mouth sent you into a laugh, or when one of our kitties sniff you, or when mommy carries you around in a funny way. I love that!

And just a few days before turning 5 months, you’ve developed a pincer grasp. You know what that means? That you are officially ready for solid foods, since that was the last thing we’ve been waiting on. We won’t do solids till your 6 months birthday anyways and we’ll be trying Baby Led Weaning method, but it’s still fun to reach that milestone. (which means I need to hurry up and research high chairs, safe dishes and read the book on BLW)

You’re not really crazy about playing with toys (you do love to chew on them, though), you’d rather socialize with mommy and daddy, but lately since you started being able to move on your own a bit, you’ve been giving me 2-5 minutes at a time to do things while you try to crawl and squirm around the mat.

You also started sticking out your tongue and keeping it out. So for the past few days, all your photos look like this, you silly girl!

It’s clear how much you love your mommy and daddy and how much you enjoy our company. We have inside jokes already and it’s so much fun that you get them. When I put you on your tummy on top of my chest and you start crawling forward, you always end up with your slobbery mouth on my nose or eye or cheek and I start screaming saying “Ne kushai moi nosik!!! Ne kushai moi nosik!” (Don’t eat my little nose!) and you laugh and purposefully put your mouth on my nose and try to eat it. Same thing happens with the eye once you’ve moved past the nose!

You also have the most precious relationship with your daddy and he’s just SMITTEN by you!

You have no signs of teeth. Zero. And I am happy to keep it that way.

Your favorite toys currently are this Apple Park Organic Bunny teether & rattle (since you love it so much, I just ordered a Bunny Lovey from the same company) and Wonderworld Twisty teether and there are so many awesome things that we’ve discovered you love that I cannot wait to write about. But it’s definitely trial and error with you when it comes to baby products.

Soon we’ll be going to see grandma on daddy’s side in Orlando, so that will be a lot of fun and I am a bit scared since it is a 3 hour drive and we’ve never really driven that far with you. I hope you’ll do good.

I’m not sure how I feel about all these milestones. You’re going through them way too fast, I already miss my little girl. You are really something special. I am starting to see how you’re so much more than we ever imagined you’d be, so much better. And do you know what I love the MOST about you? That you have such a a STRONG personality! You know what you want, you demand it, you go for it, you’re curious and interested in everything. You have determination and drive, along with a fun spirit, even at this early age. These will be your best gifts when you’re older, trust me!

It was almost impossible to get a good picture of you this time, because you wanted to wiggle your way into a crawling position. I ended up with 2 decent pictures: one way – too serious, another – cross eyed. I chose crossed eyed because you can just see your personality shine through it. So when you read through this in many many years, remember- you didn’t give me much choice! LOL

I’ve put together a 4th month video illustrating a lot of what you do these days and I’ll try to do one each month until you stop changing so fast. I’ll post it in a few days, if you nap well. :)

For my readers:

While I will be writing about all the things we’re discovered that have proven to be useful or that Alexis loves, since I get asked a lot about things you see in the photos, here’s a list of everything I can think of:

Tiny Love Gym
Tiny Love Supermat ( the best freaking thing EVER)
Tiny Love Sunny Stroll Arch
Infantino High chair cover
MiYum Cat in the Hat toy
Brown Hairband from Etsy
Maxi Cosi Pria convertible carseat.
KneeBees red knee pads
Crawlings yellow knee pads
Fisher Price Excersaucer
Lamaze Cloth Book
Mutsy 4Rider Stroller
{if I missed something, feel free to shoot me an email}