6 Months-Hard to believe!

Where has the time gone? It seems like just yesterday Jared and I were discussing whether we should have children and then even more recently that we wondered if we would be able to have children. I cannot believe it has been 1.5 years since we decided to do IVF to make our dreams of a family come true.

milestones:


sitting up & well


reaching for everything

everything in the mouth


squeels and has yelling competitions with Dad

looks for a toy when she drops it (sometimes)


started goign to bed earlier and sleeping 8 hours!


loves the bouncey which has a foot pad that animates when she kicks


stopped rice cereal after ~1.5week trial period so exclusively breastmilk until 6months which was our goal


loves to smile


start saying dadadadadadad mostly and a few variations whie moving mouth in various ways


had first bout with stomach, throwing up etc

This parenting journey has been more rewarding and complex than I had ever imagined. Sometimes Jared and I just look at each other and wonder how we got here, how did this perfect little person come from us, how can we enjoy her so much, how can we have imagined not having her, how did we get so lucky to be blessed with such an easy going baby, and how can it get any better?



Jared and Nicole--loving being parents



6 month pictures 4th July theme


I fell and bonked my head and now I am VERY sad



My first 4th July, like the bathing suit?


I love taking baths!

Mother's Day

Well I ended up having to work on my first mother's day which was a drag but it ended up being a very nice mother's day weekend overall.

Saturday after I got out of work we had my mom and sibling's over for a bbq. We had all conspired to take a professional photo for my mom and she was none the wiser to our scheme though she almost caught us in the act when she came home early from work and starting calling all of us to see what we were doing! The bbq went great and mom was overjoyed to see the photos of her children and grandchildren since she didnt have any photos with all of us. I knew if she cried my mission had succeeded and, well -- it was a raging success!

Saturday night of course Jared broke down and gave me the gift he had gotten me, he can never wait until the day to give me a gift. I was so overjoyed to see that he had printed up a nice poem and it is about hcildren's handprints being on the wall and he had the daycare dip Lillian's hands in paint and put handpritns on the poem, he then matted and framed it. I love it so much, I will cherish it forever. He also bought me a mothers heart pendant with mother and child in the center and it is beautiful and classic. I am so fortunate, I still can't even believe I am a mother sometimes. It is hard to believe at this time last year I was just a bit pregnant and hoping to start feeling kicks soon!






All 5 kids and 3 grandkids

5 Months Old

Wow how things can change. Lillian is getting so big these days and really beginning to be a little person. She is so sweet and good natured. She is starting to stick her tongue out when she smiles which is cute. She is loving her baths and has learned to kick to get water all over.


She still loves to yell. The daycare still uses her as bait to get the other babies attention which is cute, now one of the otehr little boys has learned to yell back to her, much to the dismay of his mother! She is meeting all of her 4 month and some of ther 5 month milestones. She can now roll from back to the belly pretty easily and loves spending time on her tummy.



She is getting very interested in the dogs and likes to watch them pace around however she gets tempermental if they dont pay attention to her. A typical scene goes like this: Lillian standing in the exersaucer and watching the dogs walking around then starts squeeling in their direction, they take notice and come over to her and proceed to lick her face, now she reaches out her hands and holds their face while they continue to lick her while opening her mouth and sticking out her tongue! Oh I wish I were kidding but I can't make up something that disgusting. If you are picturing a dog french kissing a 5 month old you are right on. I am documenting this so that I never forget it and we can tease her for the rest of her life with the image. I have tried getting it on video but havent been successful yet.





For whatever reason she slept great up until her 4 month shots and now she can get up between 3-4 times a night no specific pattern. I thought perhaps I woudl try cereal and the first night she was not a fan at all, she seemed to enjoy it but woudl scream if the spoon wasnt in her mouth. The next time I tried when she was a bit full already and it went better but she shoved it all back out of her mouth which indicates she still has the tongue thrust reflex and is not ready for solids so we will wait a while before trying again. So for now I am stuck getting up alot more at night, Jared to as he still gets her and brings her to me. Breastfeeding is still going well so I am happy for that. She is gaining weight well so for now there is no real need for additional food.



So much has happened it seems impossible to remember and detail it all. I will have to start keeping track of thigns throughout the months as they happen instead of trying to remember the past month since my memory is not so good since becoming a mom!

Lillian 5 months old--she really enjoyed trying to eat all of the flowers.

Job Front #2

Well now I have my own bit of good news. I too have landed a new job. I applied to two different positions within the Pfizer site and really had my hopes set on one in particular that I did not think I could get, I honestly didnt think I would get either of them. SUrprise! I got the one I really wanted.

I will now be an Associate Chemist working for the cleaning validation group. I will be working to develop methods to ensure the tanks/reactors are clean in between batches of different medications. The job is very diverse in the different groups that you get to work with and should stay challengig and interesting for a long time.