Holy smokes again!

Brooke is the talk of the office when she visits the doctor. Really, she's the talk of most places that we go, as people love to stare and smile at her adoringly. She's that cute. (Humility is one of my strongest assets.) It's typically the cheeks and the gummy smiles that people fawn over. When we go to the doctor, they aren't gossiping about her beauty; it's her size. She got another "Holy smokes!" from the pediatrician today. Apparently when the nurse handed her Brooke's chart outside the door to our room, she said "Your next baby is a BIG one."

How big? She weighed in at 19 lbs 7 oz and measured 28.25 inches long (her weight is represented on the chart by the purple dot; the red dot is average for her age, at 13.5 lbs). The doctor's absolutely not concerned over her size at all. She's proportionate, just largely so. She is currently the size of the average 10-month-old (the green dot). She's in the 25th percentile....for 1-year-olds. Yes, that's right; 25% of children blowing out the candle on their first birthday cake are Brooke's 4-month-old size.

Due to her size, the doctor and I both agree that she could benefit from rice cereal. Starting tonight, Brooke will get cereal twice a day in between regular feedings, in the hopes that this will fill her big ol' belly and squash this constant hunger I've been noticing. (Fingers crossed this helps her go back to sleeping through that 2 a.m. feeding!) After several weeks, if she's reacting well to the cereal and we get into a groove with it, we can introduce veggies and fruits! So exciting for her, as she's been enviously watching us eat (and grabbing for our food) for a while now!

The pediatrician was super-impressed with her developmentally. She is "advanced" for 4 months. So many times during our appt she would start saying "Soon, she'll start doing [insert milestone here]..." and I would stop her to say that she has already done it. For example, tripod sitting (sitting up on her own using her hands for support) is really a 6 month step - Brooke's already doing it. She told me we need to be very careful where we put her and always just assume that she will roll around (i.e. stop plopping her on the couch when we need to quickly do something...)

Poor baby girl had to have 2 shots and was not too thrilled about that. Mommy fed her mere moments after getting them and it soothed her immediately. She also got Tylenol just before which helped lessen the pain as well. (Get this - because our 10-month-old, whoops I mean 4-month-old is so big, a dose of Tylenol for her is 1.5 dropper-fulls!) The little doped-up peanut is blissfully napping as we speak and has already forgiven me for putting her through this torture :)

Belly laughs.

Just another video of Miss Brooke. Or as Daddy calls her when she makes her new fun noises, "Brookie the Wookie". Prepare yourself for precious laughs, raspberries on the belly, and baby fat rolls (this will give you a good view of the thighs, which are fantastic.) Enjoy :)

We've got a roller!

Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce the latest and greatest in ROLLING babies! The bigger-than-most princess rolled over for the first time today! She took the easy way out and went from belly to back, despite being thisclose to flipping from her back to her belly. But I am beyond thrilled that she has hit this milestone. And it was totally intentional - I was baiting her with toys and she did it a total of 5 times today. Way to go, Big Lady!

(When I get it on video, I will surely get it up here for all of you. Of course, Murphy's Law states that as soon as you set down the video camera the baby will perform what you've been asking of her. I literally set the camera down after trying to get her to roll for 5 minutes and that is when she chose to do it. Similarly, every time we've tried to show Daddy today, she just happily stays on her belly. Figures.)

Go Redlegs!

Brooke attended her very first Reds game on Thursday night. She had a great time, taking in all the sights and sounds around her. She was ready for a nap around the 6th inning, just like her Mommy. The Redlegs pulled out a victory, beating the Dodgers 8-5, meaning Brooke's lifetime Reds game record is a perfect 1-0. If I were her, I'd quit while she was ahead...

When getting her ready for the game, we pulled out her Reds hat that she got from her grandparents the day she was born. We snapped a picture of her with it on her head when she was just 2 days old (below left) and it was certainly a bit big on her. Well, I doubt this will come as a surprise to anyone but it's too small now. We STRUGGLED to get it on (below right) and I wouldn't really call the final fit "on" by any means. It looked pretty goofy resting on the top of her head (just how her Grandpa Dan used to wear hats before we convinced him that you need to pull the hat down rather than just place it on your head.) Anyway, I love seeing these pictures side-by-side; what a difference 4 months can make!

And I realize she did look rather boyish in her hat and bib. Since the hat didn't fit, she only wore it briefly and then had a bow on the rest of the time. That being said, she'll always look boyish in sports apparel because I am not a fan of the ever-popular pink sports apparel. I find pink sports stuff for babies a bit sexist, assuming girls can't wear the traditional colors. Don't get me wrong, we love us some pink in this house! But not when it comes to supporting our favorite teams. I don't wear pink in support of the Reds, the Flyers, the Bengals, etc. (let's be honest, I don't wear anything in support of the Bengals, usually - orange just isn't my color) so why should my baby girl? I'll get off my soapbox now...

Oh, hi friends!

This is the face of a well-rested, recently-fed happy-go-lucky 16-weeker, just laughing her way through a Wednesday in an oh-so-precious Sesame Street tee. Happy Wednesday :)

Such a big girl!

I know, I know, it's been a while. Blogging has taken a backseat to mommyhood. But that's a good thing, right?

Brooke is literally growing up right in front of us, both physically and intellectually. She hit the 3-month mark and apparently decided it was time to become a big girl. She's sitting up (!!), though slightly assisted. She can sit up supported by a Boppy for extended periods of time. Without any assistance she can actually stay upright for up to a minute. This boggles my mind!

She's almost rolling over. Unlike most, Brooke has decided to try to go from back to belly rather than belly to back (which is much easier and what most kids do first.) She's about 3/4 of the way there, just has to figure out how to get over that arm. I'll try to post video soon - it's so fun to watch!

Daddy set up the highchair this weekend. Though she's not eating in it just yet, she looks like such a big girl playing with toys in it. Best of all, she can now happily join us at the dinner table :)

Let's see, what else... We're not sleeping through the night anymore. But she is on a wicked schedule, so we're all getting a decent amount of sleep. She goes down about 9 p.m. every night. Then we're up for a feeding between 2-3 a.m., but it's still a brief 20 mins and then we're back in bed. Then she gets up for the day around 7 or 8 a.m. She was extra fussy and hungry last week, so on the advice of our pediatrician, we've tried giving her a big formula bottle before bed a few times to help satisfy her. No such luck. This girl is starving by 2 a.m. regardless. I'm hoping this means we'll be starting cereal next week after her 4 month doctor's visit - maybe a little extra food in the belly will help?

That's all for now. I'm off to play with my Big Lady (who is wearing her new babyGap jeans... size 12-18M. Don't even get me started on the near-meltdown I had in the Gap when we tried these on and realized this was the size she needed. Oh sister...)

One year ago.

One year ago, I had a baby in my belly.
One year ago, I was filled with an incredible amount of excitement & pride, but also anxiety & fear.
One year ago, I thought I knew what being a parent would be like.
One year ago, I had no pregnancy "symptoms", only a couple little sticks telling me I was.
One year ago, we had a million ideas about how we would prepare for a little one but no idea where to start.
One year ago, I started a blog to chronicle my thoughts as I travelled the road to Baby Reeder.

One year ago today, I found out I was pregnant. And one year later, life is completely differently...in a totally fantastic way.

p.s. Did this photo scare you? Make you think we'd have 2 under 1? Just seeing this picture again makes the husband really nervous :)

Under the weather.

Lesson learned: being a mom and being sick are not compatible. The whole familia suffers.

Yep, you guessed it. This mama was bed-ridden all day Saturday. It was rough. Haven't had a fever like that in a long, long time. It totally drained me of all my energy. I continued nursing Brooke throughout the day (don't worry, the Internet said it was okay to do so; we Googled it, as all respectable parents do) but that was about the extent of it - I could hardly hold her, let alone really care for her. All kidding aside, the Big Lady weighed too much for me to lift her and carry her around. Luckily, the fever subsided by the next morning, so I was only out-of-commission as Mommy for 1 day.

And what a weird day it was for my baby girl. This little one has her Mommy by her side every day, all day. While she got to see me every three hours on Saturday to eat, that was it. Without batting an eye, my fantastic husband put his SuperDad cape on and took over. He changed every diaper that day, dealt with all the fussiness, and kept her pretty happy. She spent a couple hours with both sets of grandparents (bless them!), but by the end of the day our usually perky munchkin started to melt down. Oh how sad she was! I managed to muster up a burst of adrenaline when I heard her screaming; poor thing just needed her slightly feverish Mommy to cuddle her and put her to bed. It's amazing how your body can find a 2nd wind when your baby needs you.

Anyway, the whole family has recovered. And now, the princess is all smiles again.
(I must say, SuperDad was also SuperHusband. He took excellent care of his ailing wife. Oh, and did I mention that Saturday was going to be our first official date night since Brooke was born? Um, big fat failure. The icing on the Craptastic Day cake, let me tall ya....)

Tasty fingers.

Mmmmm, these fingers are yummy!

Parenting styles.

Everyone parents differently. It's inevitable. Like snowflakes and Walmarts, no 2 are exactly alike. (C'mon, everyone has a Mart that they call "Sketchy Walmart". There's a killer one on Ridge Rd that I'd never take my child to, for instance.) Anyway, so parents - we all do things differently. Even spouses who share the same parenting fundamentals each do things their own way in some instances.

Tonight, as I'm unloading the dishwasher, the husband was in charge of entertaining our munchkin. Eventually, she started getting fussy; it was time to eat, he had to stall her 5 more minutes for me. The go-to method for helping quiet her is to sing her favorite song, Old McDonald. (I know, I know, we've been over this a million times. You, my faithful blog readers, are well aware how much my daughter likes this song. She and McDonald are tight. I guess she's channeling her inner-Hillsboro or something.) Well, Daddy has either never been to a farm or doesn't like traditional farm animals. Why have I come to this conclusion? Here's what I heard as I put away the dishes:

"Old McDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O.
And on his farm he had a Brooke, E-I-E-I-O.
With a waaah waaah here and a waaah waaah there,
Here a waaah, there a waaah, everywhere a waaah waaah,
Old McDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O."

And after he finished making fun of her (she doesn't mind, she thinks it's funny,) it continued like this:

"...And on his farm he had a spider problem, E-I-E-I-O.
With a web web here and a web web there..."

"...And on his farm he had a toad, E-I-E-I-O.
With a ribbit ribbit here and a ribbit ribbit there..."

"...And on his farm he had a tractor, E-I-E-I-O.
With a beep beep here and a beep beep there..."

"...And on his farm he had a hummingbird, E-I-E-I-O."

This is where I had to interject.

"What did you say? A hummingbird? I can't wait to hear what sound a hummingbird makes." His response, "They're silent." So it continued like this:

"...And on his farm he had a hummingbird, E-I-E-I-O.
With a (long pause) here and a (long pause) there,
Here a (long pause) there a (long pause) everywhere a (long pause).
Old McDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O."

She ate this up, laughing her way through it and singing along. I can't wait until she starts talking and really singing this song. Will she have cows and pigs on her farm, or will she have silent hummingbirds and spider problems (my personal favorite)? Her preschool teacher is going to love her if it's the latter.

Bonding time.

Spring Break! No babysitting this week, so Brooke and I are officially on spring break. And we're loving every minute of it. She and I have been having a blast the last 2 days. Serious Mommy-Baby bonding time up in here. We've been playing HARD - so much so that she just crashes when it's nap time. We've taken walks, napped together, cleaned together. This has been some of the most fun I've had with her since she's been born. I think it's partly because we've had no obligations whatsoever; nothing on the calendar, nowhere to be, no one waiting for us. Just Brooke and Mommy hanging out at home.

Speaking of fun, Grandpa V introduced Brooke to one of his favorite games last week. It has no name, but it involves a baby hand & foot in one of Grandpa's hands and the other hand & foot in his other hand. And then there is major swinging through the legs and up in the air. This is something he's done with all of his kids and each of his granddaughters so far. He waits to introduce this to the little ones until they're physically strong enough to be able to handle it - I guess our big girl is big enough! These pictures crack me up, her face is priceless.

Here we go!

Grandpa, what exactly just happened here?

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter everyone! The Easter Bunny was so good to me :)

Growth spurt.

Holy growth spurt, Batman!

Oh, Miss Brooke. When are we going to go back to sleeping all night? You spoiled your Mama! We've had a rough week in the sleeping department. Couple that with a ravenous hunger and it appears we've got one heck of a growth spurt going on. Brooke's been waking up at least once every night this week, going no more than 5 hours at a time. And when I pick her up when she cries out, she's inconsolable until I feed her. She literally slurps when she finally gets to start eating. It's exhausting for all of us!

Fingers crossed for a good night tonight. If not, it's Daddy's turn - it's the weekend, after all!