Isabel at 6 months

It has been so much fun to watch Isabel grow and develop these past few months. She is learning more each day, and it is amazing to watch. We have watched her learn to sleep unswaddled - which admittedly we did a little late (just after 4 months), and it was challenging, but the minute she learned to be OK with having her arms out, she put the middle two fingers of her left hand in her mouth and ditched the pacifier altogether (which she had never really taken to that well). Now she puts those fingers in her mouth when she is tired or needs comfort. Our doctor suspects that she must have done that in utero. We have watched her develop stranger anxiety (which is not always so much fun, but it gives Mommy and Daddy warm fuzzies to know that we are her favorites!). We have watched her learn how to roll from her tummy to her back (no back to tummy yet because she still doesn't like being on her tummy, so she has no incentive to roll that way! Once she is on her back, she is content and doesn't want to go any further!) We have watched her get big enough to use the "standing" toys, like her doorway jumper and her Exersaucer (which I would deem her favorite toy right now. The only thing she gets frustrated with is that she can't get the toys detached to put them in her mouth! She has this funny way of opening her mouth WAY WIDE and pointing her chin toward the Exersaucer toy she wants to put in there, and she gets it as close to in her mouth as she can, sometimes partway in). We have watched her learn to eat solid foods from a spoon. She has liked everything we have given her: rice cereal, pears, peas, green beans, sweet potatoes (too starchy to agree with her system, but we will try them again in another month), oatmeal, carrots, peaches, applesauce, and squash. She is definitely using more energy now, so I am glad to be getting these extra calories in her body in addition to the breast milk and formula she is getting daily. We are still nursing (yay for making it to six months!), and she is getting about 80% breast milk and 20% formula (since I don't get enough while pumping to leave enough for our child care providers to get her through a full day). We have also watched her become an excellent sleeper through the night! Since she was four months old, I can count on one hand the number of nights we have had to get up with her (and two of those were due to the sweet potatoes). She has blessed us in this way, because she is still our "intense" baby during the daytime hours. She will tell us what kind of mood she is in, whether it is happy or sad, in a very loud and demanding way! But we love her just the way she is! She is a little bit of a spitfire like her mommy, and also thrives on routine and consistency, like her daddy. The other thing we love about her is her eyelashes. EVERYONE that we come into contact with comments on how long and beautiful they are. She DEFINITELY gets those from her daddy! Lucky girl! Enjoy the new photos and the video clip...it is pretty hilarious (just taken this past Sunday before church).

Isabel's first Twins game

Today, we took Isabel to her first Twins game! As many of you know, her daddy is a HUGE Minnesota Twins fan (and Mommy is a fan too), so we are starting her young! She already has two Twins pink-and-white outfits, and even though the shorts and skirt are too big for her yet, we put her in the onesie with the Twins logo on it, and pink pants to match. So, she was well-dressed for the occasion!

Isabel's godparents (who are Kristy's godparents too) called us this morning and invited us to go to the Twins/Yankees game because they had a couple of extra tickets. We hadn't been planning to take Isabel to a game for another couple of months because we were not sure how she would do, but since we wanted to see Jayne and Pete and they so graciously offered us the tickets, we thought we would give it a shot! Isabel surprised us by doing amazingly well! We woke her up from her morning nap to go up to the dome, and she didn't cry the whole way there until we got to downtown Minneapolis, and then it was only a few minutes until we parked. When we got her out of the car, she was fine because Daddy put her in the front carrier and she was just fascinated by watching ALL the people walking to and around the metrodome. I took a photo of her and her daddy in front of the dome (with the Twins Territory sign in the background) to commemorate the occasion. Once we were inside in our seats, we gave her a bottle and then she just watched all the activity, people, colors, and lights for the whole game (well, 8 innings, and then we decided to go because we knew she was getting pretty tired!) Usually when she is that tired she cries pretty hard, but it was so interesting for her that she just sat in our laps and cuddled into us (which she rarely does), and watched everything that was going on. She was pretty cute to watch, lots of expressions on her face. A lot of people around us were flirting with her too which helped! At one point in the game a foul ball came flying pretty close to us, and Luke was laughing because I was putting my arms up and trying to shield Isabel from the ball even though he could tell it was going to land one section to our left. All in all, it was a really fun day and we are glad we braved it, because we came away from it with a fun memory of taking our 5 1/2 month old to a Twins game! We look forward to taking her to her next game when Grandma and Grandpa C are here in the beginning of July!

Isabel's dedication

We had Isabel's dedication at our church, Hosanna!, this past Sunday. She did really well considering that by the end of the service, she had been awake for four hours! She had started to fuss toward the beginning of the service but with the Daddy magic hold, she calmed down and made it through with very little noise. Daddy's arm was about to fall off by the end, though! The service was really nice and our pastor, Derek Rust, had a very meaningful message. We are committing to, in his words, build a spiritual greenhouse over our daughter, introducing her to the Lord Jesus Christ and teaching her to know, love, and serve Him. This is a huge responsibility and one that we feel so honored by (and also a bit overwhelmed by sometimes!) I was much more emotional during the service than I had anticipated, and coming unprepared with no tissue, I was dabbing at my tears with Isabel's burp cloth! We had our family and close friends over for a celebration at our house afterward and it was so nice to be able to spend time with everyone and to entertain which is something I love to do. The guest of honor slept during the first two hours of her party but then got up to meet everyone. She was so tired from all the stimulation that she took an evening nap, got up to eat one more time, and went right back to bed!

My last day of maternity leave

Today is my last day staying at home full-time with Isabel, and I am already starting to miss her! We go to Florida on vacation next week, so I still have a week and a half before I have to go back to work, but even being in Florida will not be the same as the precious time I have been able to spend bonding with her these past 12 weeks. I will miss the smell of her as she sometimes sleeps on my chest, with her head on my shoulder (when we sometimes "cheat" and don't lay her down for a nap in her crib!) I will be thinking about her constantly as I drive to work that first day, and often while I am in the office, even though she will be in the best of care. I will be away from her for 10 hours on the days I go to my office, which seems like an eternity to me after never having been parted from her for more than 4 hours at a time so far. Having said this, though, I do have to express my gratitude to God that He has made a way for me to only have to go back to work part time. Others do not always have that option, and Luke and I are working diligently to make sure that we can have this option for as long as I want to stay at home part time with Isabel and any other children that come along in the future! As bittersweet as it is, I look forward to this next chapter in our lives, as I now begin to balance the responsibility of raising our daughter with the responsibilities of my career. It will allow Daddy more time with Isabel too, as he will be the one getting home earlier on the days that both of us work. So they will have some special Daddy-daughter bonding time on those evenings until I get home!

Isabel's two month appointment

We had Isabel's two month doctor's appointment today and her first set of vaccinations. Four shots in the leg (two in each thigh) and one oral vaccination. It was so sad and heartbreaking for me to hear a cry come out of her that was sheer terror and pain, unlike I have ever heard before. But, as I was standing there watching her, waiting to be able to pick her up and console her, something occurred to me. This is the first of many times as a mother that I will make a decision for her that will be painful at the time, but will protect her later on. God has placed the responsibility on me and Luke to make these decisions for her, always having her best interest at heart. She will often not understand at the time why we are choosing to have her go through something painful, but we can hope and pray that as she grows, and especially someday when she has children of her own, she will understand why parents have to allow their children to sometimes suffer pain. It is a tiny bit of what God the father experienced when he watched his Son Jesus suffer and die on the cross. I grow closer to the Lord each day that I am a mother, and I could not do it without Him.

Smiling at Mommy and Daddy

Isabel has been smiling at us now for a couple of weeks! Her first smile at yours truly (Mommy) was on January 30th, and of course melted my heart! Every day since then, she has smiled at one or the other of us, or both of us. A good time to get her to smile is when waking her up from a nap, when she does not wake up on her own. We pick her up and start talking to her, and as she starts to wake up she will often look right at our faces and grin. How adorable! She is also really trying hard to coo, and a few cooing noises have come out but she is not doing it consistently yet. When she gets excited she will move her mouth in all sorts of shapes and breathe really fast, kicking her legs and arms as she is trying to figure out how to "say" what she wants to say! It should be anytime now that she is cooing all the time!

Sweet sleepy smile

For the past couple of weeks, Isabel has been doing exceptionally well at night, going to bed in her Moses basket in her cradle between 10 pm and midnight, sleeping for 4-6 hours, then up for one nursing and back to sleep for another 3-4 hours. Last night, she was having some trouble going to sleep the first time, crying when I put her in her Moses basket to carry her upstairs, when usually she just goes right down with no trouble. So, I ended up placing her on my chest and sitting with her for over an hour to calm her down, and as she began to calm down and fall asleep, she briefly opened her eyes right as she was about to fuss, looked into my eyes, and gave me the sweetest sleepy smile I have ever seen. I am still not counting it as her first smile because I don't think she was fully awake, but it was so sweet, and I am glad now that she was a little fussy last night, because it gave me the opportunity to experience that precious moment with her!