Almost 7 Months!

Ok, so I have really been slacking as far as documenting Adelaide's stats from her visits to the doc.  Next week she will be 7 months old!  What happened to my little baby?

4 Month stats

Height: 25.25 inches (75th percentile)

Weight: 14 lbs 9.5 oz (54th percentile)

6 Months stats:

Height: 26 inches (45th percentile)

Weight: 15 lbs 13.5 oz (40h percentile)

 Adelaide has such a cute little personality!   She is such a happy and content little girl.  She is very social - she always wants to face out while she is being held, and loves to watch other people, especially kids.  She is starting to be a little wary when someone else is holding her.

Calder's using my phone so he could take pictures, too. :)

She has the cutest laugh! Craig and I can get her to laugh pretty easily now, but she laughs the easiest for Calder.  It is adorable. One of her favorite games is to chase Calder (it's one of his favorite games, too).  He will run or ride his bike around the loop (going through the kitchen and living room is one big loop - it's a perfect track) and I will hold her and we will chase him.  She just kicks her legs and moves her arms like she's running right along with him, and will let out little squeals of joy.

Adelaide loves singing! Anytime someone sings to her, her face brightens up and she gets a big smile!  When we sing in church, sometimes it seems like she is just singing right along.

She is such a wiggler!  Is is nearly impossible to change her diaper because the second I lay her down she's rolled over and moving away.

There's that tongue again...

She has been teething for a while - hopefully those darn things will pop through soon!  She went through a phase where she just stuck her tongue out all the time.  I think maybe because her gums felt different?

Adelaide will babble a little bit - mostly when she's mad.  That's when she "talks" the most.  She does blow raspberries/bubbles with her tongue quite frequently, though.

Love these three.

 She enjoys the swing occasionally.  She likes it best when Calder pushes the swing as high as it can go - nearly giving me a heart attack, but she just laughs.

 This girl is not a jumper!  This was the first time I put her in it, and she was thrilled she could stand by herself, but as soon as it started twisting and she was not in control anymore, she was done!

Adelaide loves to stand.  From the time she was super little - one month old - anytime we hold her she just wants to use her legs and stand.  Not jump or bounce, just stand.  She is very stable.  I think if she would sit long enough, she could sit up on her own on the floor, but she just stiffens up anytime I try to get her to sit!  If I hold her there long enough, she finally consents to sit up on the floor, but after about 3 seconds, she straightens her legs again, trying to stand, and just tips over!

She is just about crawling.  She skipped the army crawl almost completely.  As soon as she realized she could roll around to get places, she started popping up on her hands and knees.  At first, she would pop up on her hands and knees and just lean forward so when she collapsed she traveled forward slightly.  It looked like so much work!  But now she's been working the legs in there in between the collapses.  She's getting faster every day.  

Adelaide is so happy now that she can move around on her own!  She is so content just to play with her toys on the ground, and find everything that's not a toy to play with, too.  When I have to leave the room she's in for a bit, often I will come back and she's making her way over to follow me.  It's the cutest thing!

We went on a hike last week.  She was in heaven!

She LOVES being outside.  She will just kick her legs like crazy when we go outside because she gets so excited.

Adelaide loves her baths.  Every time I turn the water on and start getting her ready for her bath, she just squeals in delight!

Sleep habits - we are still working on making good ones.  Sleeping through the night hasn't come quite as easily for her as it did with Calder.

She started eating rice cereal and oatmeal, and loved them!  So I started her on squash, and the first time she had it, she didn't even react - like she was just used to it already.  She ate it super well!  Then I tried sweet potatoes, and she all the sudden entered a phase where she won't eat any solids.  Not even the cereals anymore!  I sneak in a couple bites every day, but she just hasn't been interested.  However, the last couple of days, she has eaten the cereal way better, so maybe she is regaining interest.  She does seem very interested in the food we eat, though.  She still has a hard time when I eat too much dairy, so I stay away from drinking milk, and eating yogurt.  I have started eating cheese again though, and that has been ok as long as it is in small doses.

We love our sweet little girl!  She is such a joy!  I am so grateful I get to be her mom!

Family pictures

Luckily while we were in Utah we were able meet up with my friend Jenny who takes our pictures every year.  So here are our end-of-the-year 2013 pictures!  I tried to narrow it down to a few of my favorites - this is the best I could do!

Adelaide!  Love her big blue eyes.

Calder!  My sweet little man.

I love how cold both of our kids look in this one.  We layered them pretty well, and took lots of breaks inside to stay warm.  But they both look fairly miserable in this one!

Time to Go Outside

It was 60 degrees outside on Monday!  Hooray!  I'll take that weather for January any day.

While Adelaide was sleeping, we went outside for a little while.

He still LOVES jumping on the tramp.

Bubbles!

And sidewalk chalk.

Thank you, Arkansas for giving us some warm days in the winter!

Thanksgiving

We stayed out here in Arkansas for Thanksgiving this year.  We were fortunate to be able to spend it with some friends.  It was a wonderful day!

The meal was DELICIOUS!  I don't remember a Thanksgiving where I wanted more of every.single.dish.  But this year, I couldn't even pick a favorite.  The food was phenomenal.

After dinner the kids all made an apple turkey (they made feathers with toothpicks and various candy).  Calder was quite proud of his.

 We walked down the street to the park before feasting on some pie.  It was a beautiful day.

Had to document Craig's mustache he grew in November.  I was thrilled when he decided to shave.

I am so thankful for my sweet little family!

Fall 2013

Yep. I'm a whole season behind.  Here goes!

Fall here in Arkansas was BEAUTIFUL!!  And it lasted sooo long! We tried to take advantage of the beautiful weather as much as we could.  In a nutshell:

Craig and Calder got to go see a Razorbacks football game. SEC Football - it is HUGE here.

The stadium is SO big - I think it holds 72,000 people.

 We went to a "Farmland Adventure."  The original idea was for a pumpkin patch, but this place had so many fun things to do!  The actual pumpkin patch was really lame, (the pickings were slim) and we ended up buying pumpkins at Walmart afterwards.  But we had a blast at every other activity they had there.

One of Calder's favorites - they had a pit filled with corn kernals, kind of like a sand box.  It was tough getting him out of there!

Calder's first experience on a pony!  He wasn't quite sure at first, but he got the hang of it.

They had tons of animals in a little petting zoo.  The goats were definitely Calder's favorite!

They even had a camel there - random, I know - but I love this picture!  Our friends the Abrams, came with us.

We even got to go through a corn maze! 

 Calder and I decorated Halloween cookies.  He was very meticulous about where he put the candy corn.

I made these clipboard frames!  They hang in our kitchen/dining area, and I love that I can display Calder's art projects in a more organized way.  Plus, I can change them out with each season/holiday!

 We went on tons of walks.  This particular area is just outside of Crystal Bridges, the art museum here.  So beautiful!  We came to this area several times this fall.

They have tons of different trails you can walk on.  All of them are so beautiful!

They had an activity on the lawn outside of the museum - we got to add to the giant spider web!

 Halloween!  Isn't this the cutest dalmation puppy and orange dinosaur you've ever seen? Calder told me he wanted to be a dinosaur this year.  I asked him what color, and he specifically said "orange."  I had fun making their costumes.

Calder wears his dinosaur costume still at least a few times a week.  It's cute he loves it so much!

He LOVED trick-or-treating.

We had a few Halloween parties.  One at Craig's work, a ward fall festival, and another party with friends, and then the normal trick-or-treating to top it off.  I think that is the most Halloween parties I have ever gone to.  We were celebrating here for almost a week straight.  It was a little ridiculous! :)

Craig and I were Clark Kent and Lois Lane.

I mean Superman and Lois Lane? Wait a second...

 We carved pumpkins, too!

We definitely had a fun-filled fall!  

Blessing and a Temple Trip

We blessed Adelaide on Sunday, Oct. 13th.  Our families weren't able to come out, which is a definite downside of living out of state : ( but we had the support of several great friends to stand in the circle with Craig.  Adelaide wore the blessing dress that I wore, which was kind of fun to see her in it!

Both family pictures are a little awkward. :) I guess that's how it goes when you have 2 kids - how do you get both of them looking decent in one picture? :)

It was a beautiful blessing.  I was reminded of how precious she is -that she is a daughter of God!  We are so grateful for this sweet little girl!

 This last Friday (before our Stake Conference) was a Stake "Fill the Temple" day.  We felt like it was important for us to make an effort to go. So we did!  Our Stake is in the Oklahoma City Temple district.  It is 3 1/2 hours away.  So not way far, but far enough that it definitely takes some planning to be able to go.  

Craig took the day off of work, and we left at 5:30 in the morning, so that we could make it in time for the 10:00 session. (Turns out it was a 10:30 session, so we were a little early.  But that's not a bad thing!) On our way, we ran into some toll roads...which we were not expecting.  And we didn't have any cash.  And they don't take cards.  So there we were, counting out $2.50 all in pennies!  Luckily, we did have quite the stash of pennies in our truck.  After we got to $1.50, the toll worker was so annoyed and told us that she would just pull $1.00 out of her pocket.  We were grateful!  But seriously - we had no idea there would be toll roads in Oklahoma!  I thought that was only a back east thing...apparently I was mistaken.  So we made sure we had cash the rest of the trip.  And then we came to some that had no toll workers, just a big barrel that you throw your money into.  Toll: $0.60 - exact change required.  And these ones didn't accept pennies.  What?!  Who has exactly $0.60 just lying around? Luckily, we happened to find a $1 coin, so that worked.

We finally made it to the temple!  There was a church that shares the parking lot with the temple, and it was open and available for people to wait there with kids, which was very convenient.  

I went to the temple first while Craig watched our kids, and then we switched.  It was a wonderful experience!  It always is - I really enjoy going to the temple, but it had been a while since we've been able to go, so this visit was exceptional. I love the feelings of love and peace I get when I go, and that they stay with me for a while after.

 

Our stake definitely filled the temple!  The sessions were all overflowing, all day!  It was exciting to see so many people there.

We decided to drive home that night.  We left at 6:00, and what usually is a 3 1/2 hour drive ended up being close to a 6 hour drive!  We were stuck in traffic for 2 hours! It was crazy.  But our kids did awesome. I was so impressed!

Next time we go, we will be much more prepared for the logistics!