Linnea is 10 Months Old!

Linnea,
Time has not slowed down at all since you arrived.  I keep wishing I could bottle you up at different stages just so I never forget what you were like at each stage (hence the very detailed monthly blog posts).  You are at a really fun stage right now.  You are curious and love to explore new things.  You smile all. the. time.  You rarely cry and if you do it isn't very long or without reason.  You fuss when I put you in your car seat but you typically get over it quickly.  You are such a bright spot in our lives and we are so happy you are here.  This is what you've been up to this month.

Stats
There wasn't a well baby check up this month but when I took you in to get your ears looked at you weighed 16 lbs 3 oz with your clothes and diaper on.  I'm guessing you are a little longer this month since some of your pants look more like capris.

How you sometimes feel about the monthly box pictures . . .

Eating
We are still working on giving you more table foods.  I would say this is an area I struggle with.  You still don't have teeth and I just don't know what you can and can't eat.  Someone suggested canned veggies because they are softer than frozen veggies and those have been hit or miss.  You might eat some but then the rest you like to drop on the floor.  We've been working on trying to encourage you to keep it on the table (or tray) but that doesn't always work.

Your dad and I both thought it was gross when babies would put their food in their parents' mouths.  Guess what, it isn't as gross as we thought.

Eating wears a girl out.

Still working on your manners.

You have your own drawer in the kitchen which is one of the only ways I'm able to get any cooking done.  But really it is best when your dad gets home so I can really cook without any distractions.

I started putting you in food pants which are pants that you wear every meal that I don't have to worry about when they get dirty or stained.  You like to wipe your hands on your pants and I was tired of having food stuck to your pants all day.  So now you have your "dinner eating pants" like Joey had on Friends :).

You like avocado, peas, carrots, green beans, toast with butter or peanut butter, black beans, chicken, cheese, yogurt and pureed fruit.  Your favorite pureed fruit usually includes bananas.  You aren't so sure about real bananas yet but I think you'll warm up to them.  You prefer feeding yourself crackers, cheerios, toast, etc.  You don't like feeding yourself mushy or wet fruit (pears, apricot, bananas, peaches, etc).  Cottage cheese is growing on you but you were not a fan at first.  You are getting better at eating pureed food with chunks in it.  They don't always pop out as soon as they go in.  Your dad still feeds you lunch and dinner which is great.

You started blowing raspberries while you eat.  This is not one of our favorite things but you think it is awesome.

This is hard to type.  I'm pretty sure the frozen breast milk we have is now bad :(.  Apparently it is good for 3-6 months in a normal freezer and most of what I have I pumped right after we moved back so it is closer to the 6 month end of the range.  It smells sour and tastes awful (yep, we tried it after you refused to eat it and it almost made me lose my lunch).  Thankfully you don't have to take bottles daily so this isn't a huge deal but it just makes me so frustrated that I spent so much time pumping in October-December and now all of that is literally down the drain.  I haven't thrown it out yet but I'm guessing it will be thrown out eventually.  Ugh.

Sleeping
I would say sleeping this month was different and a little harder than normal.  You fussed and cried more when we laid you down for naps and bedtime.  You like to practice standing and sitting down in your crib for 15-45 minutes before finally falling asleep.  You would throw your pacifier out of your crib or it would fall when you were standing up and then bounce out and then you'd cry until we gave it back to you.  As soon as you heard our footsteps you would calm down (you little stinker).

For the first time since November you woke up in the middle of the night and we had to go into your room to help you calm down.  You've woken up other nights but you had always been able to go back to sleep on your own.

The first night you woke up screaming and you were standing up in your crib.  We tried going in to give you your paci back and lay you back down but you would pop right back up again and just scream.  I tried rocking you but you were really restless and wouldn't fall back to sleep.  We both tried laying you in your crib and rubbing your back or your forehead and you just wouldn't go to sleep.  You were fine lying in your crib if we were touching you or even if we were just in the room (at one point I sat in the chair across from your crib hoping you'd fall asleep) but as soon as we walked out of the room you screamed.  This went on from 1:30-3 am.  Around 3 we decided that your dad would hold you in the chair.  He fell asleep before you did but when he woke up at 5 he transferred you to your bed and you continued sleeping until 7:15.  That night we both felt like you were an infant and we didn't have a clue what to do.  Even as an infant you never really woke up in the middle of the night screaming for no reason.  If you woke up you were hungry and then you ate and went back to sleep quickly.  You ended up waking up 3 nights in a row but thankfully we were able to get you to go back to sleep the last two nights without having to sleep with you in the chair.

I'm thinking your teeth were bothering you (because I always think you are teething since you still don't have any teeth). Around 10 months you started going back to your normal sleeping habits which is great!

I took you in twice this month to get your ears looked at.  You were fussier than normal and pulling on your ears when we laid you down to change you but both times they were fine which is great but I felt silly taking you in after that.

Clothes
You wear mostly 9 month tops and 9-12 month bottoms.  You wear Huggies Little Movers diapers size 3 which we really like.  They seem to stay on better than the Snug and Dry Ultras now that you are crawling.

You've been able to wear more dresses which is really cute and fun to see.

I really liked this blue and yellow outfit but it was a little long and got in the way when you crawled 

:(.

This pink top is one of my favorites!  It turns out I do like pink on you but it just has to be the right color/design.

We've also figured out we like to dress you in things I could see myself wearing or at least we tend to shy away from things with lots of writing or characters on them.

Playtime
You LOVE to read to yourself.  You are constantly opening books, turning pages (occasionally bending pages) and holding books up to read.  You like being read to but you get frustrated when we want to read the whole book cover to cover instead of just the same few pages you keep flipping to.  You like to try to turn the pages on your own even if we aren't finished reading that page.  Your favorite books are touch and feel books or books with holes on the pages that you can put your fingers/hand through.

My favorite book . . .

You love touch and feel books!

You really love playing with balls.  I thought that was supposed to be a boy thing but you love banging two balls together or throwing balls (which can be a bit dangerous).

 

Your toys include:  board books, wooden blocks, balls, a pop up toy, a ball popper, stacking cups, and baby dolls.  Only recently have you been playing with the baby dolls.   It just makes me smile to see you play with a baby.  I spent HOURS (or more likely days/years) of my childhood playing with dolls.  Every Christmas and birthday I wanted a new baby.  You couldn't have enough babies.  I had a water baby, Betsy Wetsy (which my brother's high school girlfriend Betsy didn't appreciate when we brought that up), Heather (who talked and could act different ages), Corky, Baby Alive, Cabbage Patch, the list really goes on and on.  If there was a cool new baby I had/wanted it.  I hope you love playing with babies as much as I did but if you don't that is okay too.  I just hope you find something you love to play with.

I brought out two baby dolls for Avery and Leighton to play with when they came over for a play date and before I put them away you found them.  You like hugging the baby, sucking on the baby's head and slamming the baby on the ground.  We might need to work on being gentle with the baby :).

We met some new friends at Rhyme Time at the library and had them over for a play date.  It was really fun because all three babies are about the same age and all of the moms are first time moms so we can all relate really well to this stage of life and can ask each other questions.  Most of my friends have at least two kids and they are older so sometimes it is hard to have play dates when their kids can do so much more than you can.  Seeing you with your new friends was really cute.  You liked to hug them which was funny.  Sometimes it looks more like you were wrestling/attacking them when you were really just hugging them.  I'm not a hugger but maybe you are :).  I haven't seen you hug other friends but maybe that is because they are so much bigger than you.

Your dad made a rule while we made your Christmas list that you couldn't get toys that required batteries and if the toys had batteries they would either stay at the gift giver's house or would come to our house with the batteries removed.  We didn't want toys that made obnoxious noises in the house.  There are SO MANY toys that make noises and most of the time the noises aren't necessary and they are just annoying.  So all of your toys in our house are without batteries.  We don't mind if you play with toys that make noise (like a musical instrument) we just don't want the toy to make noise for no reason.  It feels like you don't have to be as creative if the toy makes noise for you.  Just our opinion :).  I have had a hard time finding toys at garage sales for you because almost all of them are battery operated and seem silly without batteries.

I've been thinking a lot about how screen focused kids and adults are nowadays and it makes me sad.  I have such fond memories of playing house, playing school, riding bikes, pedaling a car down my street, writing fake checks, etc and now I feel like most memories for kids will be playing on phones or tablets.  I hope we do a good job balancing creative and pretend play with screen time.  (Stepping off soap box . . .)

Our Days
I wrote a blog post about a normal day in our lives at this stage.  You can read about that here.

We've kept our selves pretty busy this month.  We've been going to MOPs every two weeks and you've been going to Moppets which is the daycare at MOPs.  It has been really good for both of us.  You cry every time I drop you off and once I had to go get you early because you were struggling a bit but I still think it is good for us to have some time apart.

We try to have play dates at Molly's house on the weeks we don't go to MOPs.  I LOVE hanging out with her.  She is so fun, such an encouragement and I love watching her parent her two boys.  I just hope I can remember all of her good ideas when I need them with you.

You take a nap in Miles's bed when we are at Molly's house which is great because then we can catch up a little bit while you sleep.

Rhyme time at the library ended this month which is sad.  I wish it would go longer in the year but there is one this summer we can go to in the park.

We run errands almost every day just to get out of the house and because there are always things we need to pick up or return.  You make friends everywhere we go.  People stop and talk to you.  They comment about your big blue eyes or your cute smile.  Most can't get over how cute and attentive you are.  Most of the time you smile, wave, clap or tilt your head at them and it just makes their day.  I hope you always make people smile and bring joy to other people by just being you.

You've had kind of a fussy period this month.  You've been pretty clingy with me.  You will cry when I leave the room or if I put you down to do something.  You cry when I leave you for MOPs and occasionally during naps and bedtime.  It isn't awful and other people might not even consider it fussy but for you it is not the norm.  I think a combination of stranger danger and teething might be the reason but I always like to blame your teeth.

Activities and Outings
We went to St. Louis this month with your grandparents and your Uncle Aaron, Aunt Lindsay and cousins Avery, Jocelyn and Connor.  We stayed about 40 minutes outside of St. Louis in a house through Airbnb.  We went to the Magic House which was a blast.

 We stopped for a picnic lunch and your dad got creative with your portable baby seat.  It is suppose to go on a chair with a back which we didn't have to so improvised.  Your bottom was hanging in mid air but you didn't seem to mind.

We also drove through Lone Elk Park to see bison and elk.  We had a campfire and made s'mores and after the kids went to bed we got in the hot tub.

Elk and Bison at the Lone Elk Park

The picture is blurry but there were lots of frogs around and one of them jumped on your dad which made me run and scream, obviously.

You and Connor are almost exactly 1 year apart.  It is fun seeing what he is up to and imagining what it will be like in one year when you are doing the same things!

We had a great time in St. Louis!

Your other set of grandparents came up to hangout.  Your Grandma Janet cleaned out one of our flower beds and planted new flowers which was great!

We went on our first family bike ride.  Your dad rigged up a platform in the bike trailer so we could secure your car seat in the bike trailer instead of having you wear a helmet.  It worked well but you were pretty indifferent about the ride.

We presented about Everyday Life in Stockholm at the Scandinavia Society in Wichita.  They were very excited to meet such a cute "Swedish" baby.

We went to pick strawberries with Jan, Avery, Leighton and your Grandma Debbie.  You were supposed to sleep in the car on the way there but you only ended up sleeping about 5 minutes.  I tried wearing you in the carrier but there were too many exciting things going on.

Firsts and New Skills
You are waving more regularly this month.  Sometimes you do it on your own but other times I'll try to encourage you to wave.  It is adorable!  I need to get a video of you waving.

You are crawling on your hands and knees.  You still drop to your forearms and belly if you want to get somewhere fast.

This video is long so if you make it through the whole thing (other than the grandparents) I'll be impressed!

The afternoon after your well baby 9 month check up you pulled up to your feet on the bathtub.  You are pulling up on the bathtub, the box of books by the chair and in your crib regularly.  You haven't done much other than that but it is only a matter of time.  When you are standing up you are holding on with two hands and then you carefully push your bottom backward and sit down.  Often times it is pretty hard when you hit your bottom on the ground but it doesn't seem to bother you.

Looks like you get your "planning ahead gene" from your dad.  Who needs a plan when you have luck?

This was a bit dangerous.

You climbed up the one step we have in our bedroom.  Once you figured it out it was a pretty fun game.

I don't think I've mentioned this before but you like to open and close drawers.  It took a few times of smashing your fingers in the drawer before you figured out you could open your hand up before the drawer was closed and then they wouldn't get pinched.  The first few times I saw you do it I thought it was a coincidence but it wasn't.  You knew exactly what you were doing.  You are one smart cookie.

Remember
I want to remember when you get really excited to see me you breath in and out of your nose and climb up me to get as close to my face as possible.  You often put your little hands around my neck or try to suck on my face.  It makes me giggle every time.

I want to remember the scrunchy face you make.  It is adorable.

I want to remember how much your dad and I talk about you before we fall asleep at night.  The three years before you were born we often spent time right before we fell asleep talking about our next doctor's appointment or another pregnancy announcement on Facebook that left me in tears, etc.  It was hard.  Now we lay in bed talking about how great you are, how cute you are and how lucky we are to be your parents.  It is THE best.  I am in awe of it every night.

Thanks for being so great and for just being you.
We love you SO much!

Love,
Your Mama