Chloe is Ten Months Old!

"Hello everybody!"

Our little Chloe Bug has been quite busy this month! She has taken up to five steps and is cruising all over the place. She is trying very hard to keep up with her big brother. Most of the time she acts like she's going to walk and then decides to quickly crawl instead. I'm guessing that once she realizes walking is faster she will leave crawling far behind.

Thanks for the outfit Aunt Jackie! It's keeping me really warm!

It's so much fun to watch our kids inspecting the world around them.

"Why sit when you can stand?"

Chloe loves her Sing-Along Stage! Thanks Miss Anise! (That's Miss Denise for those who haven't been around Sawyer lately.)

Sawyer didn't want to take a picture with Chloe so I got a shot of him playing with his Play-Doh instead.

She is waving bye-bye and signing for milk. She is also clapping although I think she thinks she is signing for more. She always watches Sawyer to see what kind of signs he is making while I'm making them. I keep telling him that he is helping her learn to sign. She is trying to play peek-a-boo and that's really cute. I need to try and get a shot of that sometime soon. She also raises her arms when we ask her, "How big is Chloe?"

"So big!"

Chloe is a typical kid; she'd rather play with the cardboard than the toys!

She stopped eating baby food this month. I have been trying to prepare as many of her fruits, vegetables, and meats on Sunday. That seems to make it easier during the week. She eats everything cold so all I have to do is chop it up and away we go. She tried ground turkey, chicken, and hamburger this month and loves all three. She is still eating oatmeal cereal mixed with yogurt for breakfast each morning. I think that I will continue to feed her the cereal until she is one year. She seems to tolerate me spoon-feeding her the cereal as long as yogurt is involved. She is also very excited when Mommy shares her pudding.

I'd already forgotten how messy self-feeding can be!

She loves chewing on her fingers.

All I Want For Christmas is a Virus

Hello everyone. It has taken me forever to blog because we have been sick. We were planning on staying in Van Vleck until the 2nd, but we came home on the 29th because Sawyer got sick. We were initially coming home Saturday because Sawyer wasn't sleeping well at all. We got to Van Vleck on the 23rd, and he was falling asleep later and later as the week progressed. We realize looking back that his poor sleep habits were probably a result of him not feeling well. He started running a fever on Friday and started coughing on Saturday. I think that he was finally feeling better yesterday, but the cough is lingering. A nurse at the pediatrician's office said that a cough can hang around for as long as two weeks!

Chloe's nose started running on Wednesday and she is coughing some, but it doesn't seem to be as bad as Sawyer's and hasn't affected her sleep. I had a sore throat and that turned into a cold, but I'm feeling better too. Lorne usually suffers in silence, so if he has felt poorly he hasn't really let us know. He was off this whole week. I was so proud of him for toughing it out with me when he could have easily gone to work to escape. I kept asking if I could go to work for him! He is the best husband and father ever!

We had a great drive down again this time. We left at 4 AM again so the kids slept for quite a while. We only made one stop in Navasota so we only had two hours left after that. I sat in the back and entertained Chloe while Sawyer watched his Caillou Holiday Movie DVD. Man, he loves that cartoon! We're in the process of weaning him from good 'ol Caillou, though, because he is such a brat!

We pulled into Wharton about 9:00 and Lorne dropped me off at Nanny's so that I could help with the strudel. I have been helping her for quite a few years now and I look forward to that time we get to spend together. It's kind of like the calm before the storm that is Christmas Eve.

Christmas Eve was crazy as usual. I think Nanny and Poppo's house gets smaller each year. There are so many of us in such a small place. I volunteered to make the Martha Washington balls this year. I also did candy for my cousins again. I think that they all enjoy it and I love making it for them.

I don't think that the greatgrandkids were too excited about taking this picture, but I'm glad we got it.

The main thing that I will remember from this Christmas is how much Chloe was attached to me. She wouldn't let anyone else hold her so that made for a fun time for me. It was frustrating because she was around so many family members who were looking forward to holding her, but she wasn't having it. She didn't even want anything to do with Lorne. I was thinking about the other grandkids like Sawyer, Kayla, and Aiden. They were all six months old at Christmas so they were too young to know any differently. Landon wasn't even two months old last Christmas. Chloe is much more aware of what is going on at nine months of age.

I wanted to try out some Christmas traditions this year. One of them was to bake a birthday cake for Jesus. I want Sawyer and Chloe to know that Christmas is more than presents and Santa Claus. I thought it would be a great idea because Sawyer loves helping me bake and loves to sing happy birthday so it was a win-win.

Sawyer enjoyed singing Happy Birthday to Jesus and blowing out the candles.



Another thing I did this year was buy the kids matching jammies. I let them open one gift on Christmas Eve and that one just happened to be their jammies! I know that they're too young to know what's going on now, but in a few years I think it will be fun for them to open their jammies together. It also made for cute Christmas morning pictures since they were dressed the same.

Santa didn't leave too much for the kids in Van Vleck because he brought the big toys to Wylie. He must have known that their parents didn't want to rent a U-Haul again this year!

Chloe looked so cute in her jammies!

Santa must know how much she loves her suck suck because he gave her a cute pacifier keeper.

This was a train Christmas for Sawyer. He got lots of GeoTrax and Thomas toys.

We went to Matthew and Jackie's house for Christmas lunch again this year. I didn't get many pictures, because Chloe was once again stuck to my hip. We had a great time, but I sure was missing Mark. I can't wait until we get to see him again! I was glad that Dad was able to be there, though.

Sawyer wasn't too sure what to think about Uncle Matthew's bow.

We went back to Larry and Velma's for supper with Ty, Jamie, Brittany, Tyler, and Jordan. We had Mexican food for supper and it was really good. Lorne and I made seven dozen tamales the weekend before. Lorne realized two hours down the road that we had left them in the freezer. We did leave at four in the morning, so I was happy that was all that we forgot! I don't know why I didn't take any pictures that night. It's probably because I am a big dork!

Jackie and Kayla came to Larry and Velma's house for a visit on Wednesday. Lorne helped Jackie with her online course while the kids played in Sawyer's pop-up Thomas play tent that he got from Mimi. Chloe just did her best to keep up with the older ones. They stayed for snack time, supper time, and even bath time.

Snack time!

This is one of those pictures I will drag out on their graduation days!

Chloe is Nine Months Old!

I know, I know, Chloe turned nine months old on December 23rd, but we were on our way to Van Vleck that day so I didn't have time to blog. I really enjoyed taking these pictures in front of the tree. We had a time keeping Sawyer out of the tree this year. I've already decided that next year we're going to have a smaller tree with non-breakable ornaments in the game room so that the kids can play with it and put the ornaments where they want them. I feel like I spent the whole month yelling at Sawyer to put down the ornaments and stop taking the ribbon off the tree.

Okay, back to Chloe Bug. She is still crawling everywhere and getting into everything. She thinks that she is at least one year old I think. She had her nine month well check on the 2oth and she weighs 19 pounds, six ounces, and is 19 3/4 inches long. She is still the 95th percentile for her length and the 75th for her weight. I think that she is tired of being spoon-fed because she has started throwing up her hands when I try to feed her, but put something on her tray and she goes to town! I'm skipping third foods with her and just going to table foods.

We're still nursing! I'm so excited! She is only nursing four times a day so she goes for a minimum of four hour stretches which is great! I think that we may actually make it to one year! My plan is still to nurse until eleven months. I plan to drop one nursing per week and have her weaned to whole milk in a cup by one year. She is getting better and better at drinking her water from the cup. She is throwing it on the floor less and less.

She is a HUGE Momma's girl as I mentioned in the Christmas post. I cannot walk through the room without picking her up unless I want to hear her cry. I pretty much spend the entire day with her on my hip. Luckily for her it's a big hip so at least she's pretty comfy.

She is still taking two naps and is sleeping through the night until anywhere from 5-7. Sometimes she goes back to sleep after nursing and sometimes she doesn't. She seems to go back to sleep on the weekend morning when I sleep in and Lorne gets up with the kids...go figure!

What a girl!

Sawyer took the bear away from Chloe, but luckily she didn't seem to care.

I like this one because it shows how well Chloe is standing these days.

I thought I could take a cute picture if they each held a present. Chloe wanted to eat hers and Sawyer wanted to open his...what was I thinking?

Presea's Baptism

I was honored to be chosen as Presea's Godmother. Her Baptism was held Saturday, December 22, at St. Anthony's in Wylie. Jeremy's brother Tim was the Godfather. Jeremy's parents and sister Veronica were also in town for the event. Denise's parents were in Wylie the previous weekend so that they could help out after Denise's gall bladder surgery so they weren't able to be there. It was a really nice ceremony and I am looking forward to being a Godmother!

We went to Jeremy and Denise's afterwards and had Dickey's barbecue and cake. We didn't get to stay too long since we were leaving for Van Vleck at 4:00 the next morning.

Presea, Denise, Jeremy, Sophia, Luann, David, Tim, and Veronica.

Kelly, Denise, Presea, Jeremy, and Tim.

I think that there's a baby under all that dress!

I can't get over how much she looks like Jeremy!

Cookies for Santa

Sawyer and I had a blast baking sugar cookies. Aunt Net gave me Christmas cookie cutters and sprinkles last year for Christmas. Velma embroidered him a cute personalized apron. I couldn't believe that he stayed with me in the kitchen for the entire process. I baked one batch a little longer than the others so I gave him those to decorate for Santa. He had four plastic bowls with icing and plastic knives. We've learned the hard way that plastic is the way to go with a two-year-old! He put so many sprinkles on each cookie that I could take the extras and decorate three or four of my own. He had about four cookies that he had taken one bite out of so I set those aside for him to have for snacks. I packaged up the others for him to choose to leave out for Santa.

"Roll 'em up..."

Notice Sawyer's little helper in the bottom right corner.

Such focus!

I think that he ate just as much icing as he spread.

You wouldn't believe how many sprinkles ended up on the floor!

Daddy enjoyed the cookie baking because it gave him some one-on-one time with Chloe.