the great pumpkin

happy halloween! maddie dressed up in her pumpkin costume and posed on our front porch for this holiday portrait over the weekend. but she didn't wear a costume today though. in fact, she spent most of the day in her pjs! she slept and ate until 3:30 this afternoon! i don't think that she slept this much even as a newborn. she would wake up all smiles, eat a lot and then fall back to sleep for at least an hour. i guess that her 4-month growth spurt must have been in full swing today...

unfortunately, we didn't get very many trick-or-treaters tonight. our neighborhood doesn't have many of the elementary age group. but in two to three years we will need three sam's sized bags of candy (that is if we still live here).

when maddie did finally decide to stay awake around 3:30, i put on her "peek-a-pooh" shirt so that she was a little festive.

on an unrelated note, our volleyball team is in first place and i have to miss the last of the playoffs for a business trip next week. i am so bummed! i was finally starting to hit like i know what i am doing at last night's game and now the season is over. but it looks like i am going to play on a girl's 4 team over the holidays...

i hope that you all had a great halloween! love.

costume party

every week the moms in the neighborhood get together at someone's house or the park to chat and have a giant playgroup for our kids. this week our neighbor, jill, hosted and had a costume party for moms and kids (to get some extra use out of the costumes). maddie wore her pumpkin outfit and i was her farmer (i know - its lame - but i wasn't going to dress up at all and i had drawn freckles on my cheeks and wore a straw hat).

all the kids were so cute! ava (1 year) was dressed as a lady bug and she got down to maddie's level to say "hi".

after some punch and some fun, maddie was very ready for a nap. i put her in her crib, she talked to the room for about 30 seconds and then rolled over and went to sleep. i think that she had fun. she really likes seeing little kids and babies. the only thing that she didn't like was her limited perspective from the floor, so i held her in a sittig or standing position most of the time. here are some more costume pictures from the party...

before going to the costume party, maddie had some more fun singing to herself and her new trick of the day - sticking out her tounge! she just kept sticking it out and singing or just sticking it out for fun. here is a picture of her in her "Dots" outfit with her tounge (and her belly) hanging out. love.

singing a new song

madelyn was in a singing mood today so i taped a little of it for you to see and hear. (i like how she sticks out her tongue to 'sing'.) she had been doing much more of the high pitched squealing/singing sound which did not help my splitting headache today...



and since the chargers played yesterday, maddie is all ready to cheer on the packers tonight for monday night football (and can wear her packers shirt)! love.

sunday swinging

today matt went to the park with maddie and me to enjoy a sunny sunday afternoon. luckily, we have dvr so matt could pause the chargers game while maddie was ready to play at the park (she is wearing one of her chargers outfits in the pictures) madelyn really had fun swinging and daddy took her down the slide twice (it took two tries to get her to enjoy it) before we were all too cold to stay any longer.

matt got some cute pictures of her on the swing and i thought that i would share. we tried to get video of her laughing, but she stopped when we turned the camera on. if you look closely at the first/top picture, you can see her two bottom teeth (you can click on the picture to see it larger).

we also took some halloween pictures over the weekend, but you will have to wait until wednesday to see them... love.

spoon fed

so after much debate, research, advice, and paying attention to maddie, we decided to go ahead and see if she was interested in "solid" food yet. i mean, she had almost all of the signs for food readiness out of a 15 or 20 point list, so i figured it was at least worth a try. we had already started to put her in her highchair while matt and i ate dinner after the bumbo recall (we had just been putting her in the bumbo on top of the table) so that she could see us while we ate and we could sit at the table as a family.

friday i went spoon shopping and since i had done so much research on the subject it was very difficult to decide which spoon was best, but after about 15 or 20 minutes i finally had my selections. (the picture to the right is maddie after our exhausting selection process - which, yes, did include me asking her for her opinion on more than one occasion - yes, out loud.) and don't even get me started on selecting a cup...

so after her mid-day meal today, we mixed up a little rice cereal (which we had no idea just dissolves in the milk and is nothing even remotely resembling a solid) and dipped her spoon in. she wasn't too sure about the taste, but after a few "spoonfuls" she jumped on board and even grabbed the spoon handle and helped me get it to her mouth! after "eating" she breastfed again and then took a three hour nap! (i know that the little bit of cereal had nothing to do with it, but it was still really nice.)

i am planning to do "super baby foods" with her, so i spent her nap time reading up on how to give her healthy food and a healthy relationship with food. really, i am not "crazy, obsessive mommy", i just like to make informed decisions on how to do something based on the research available. and i totally accept that no one and nothing is perfect! really!

i also have a couple of videos for you all tonight. they are mainly for the grandparents and that is why there are so many, so don't feel like you have to watch them all (or any of them). i keep forgetting that the camera orientation matters for the video! but the one in the swing is mainly for the audio of maddie happily swinging, so maybe just close your eyes so that you don't get motion sick.

in the first couple of seconds of this video she smiles when she hears the camera turn on now and this day she laughed each time i tried to film her or take her picture. if you keep watching, you can see her attention to the toy and frustration when i interrupt her...

now here is a third take of her playing on friday - my voice over is a little repetitive...

i also got the proofs from jcp on friday, and here are my two favorites.let's see, what else... oh she can sit up by herself for a few seconds now (5-10 or so)! here are a few pictures of her supported by her bobpy so that i could use the camera. she was having too much fun and that is why she threw her feet up in the air - she isn't falling - i just thought it was cute (and, yes, her feet really are that big.)
and i think that is enough madelyn for you all today! love.

oh what a night...

last night was a rough one. maddie went to sleep as usual at 7:30/8:00 but then she got up at 11:45pm, 4:00am, and then at 7:00am. while i know many of you are like, "yea, and..." this is highly unusual for madelyn. i sent matt to check on her at 11:45, but the poor thing was screaming bloody murder so i got up to see if she was hungry. she had eaten around 8 oz. before going to sleep for the night, but she ate like she was starving! and it was the same thing at 4. when we met with her doctor on monday, she said that we should introduce solids when maddie stops sleeping through the night since she has been such a good sleeper, has teeth and is so big - if she stops sleeping through the night she needs more calories than she is getting during the day. but we didn't expect it to happen so soon! we really want to wait until she is 6 months, but after last night we are thinking that we might have to start sooner rather than later.

however, after today i think that last night's restlessness is more likely caused by her top teeth coming in. she has had a difficult time eating today and keeps pulling away and screaming after just a few sucks - a classic teething sign. we'll just have to wait and see how tonight goes...

since she was having a tough day and it was sunny out, i took her down to the park for some fresh air. she laughed at me while riding in the swing! i was sort of laying on the ground under the swing and she thought it was so funny that she could be over me like that. i think that the fresh air did her some good because she didn't fuss at all the whole time we were out and came home to take a nap. at least her napping has been normal today. i can't imagine if she hadn't gotten her naps either.

she is starting to be more consistent about what makes her laugh, so i can get her going more often. she really likes for me to kiss on her chin and neck after changing her diaper. it is so fun to make her laugh. i think that i enjoy it as much as she does.

apparently, i am obsessed with taking pictures of her while she is asleep, but this time the flash woke her up. (now how did her socks get all the way over there...)
love.

our little sleeping pretzel

it just amazes me the positions that madelyn finds comfortable. today she napped for over an hour holding her toes and sucking her thumb (well her thumb was in her mouth anyway). she is like a little pretzel! maybe that is how she managed to get one leg out of her pjs and her legs out of the crib so often.

she was still a little off from her shots today so she had some trouble getting down for her naps. that is why her elephant joined her for nap time. just a little cuddling and she was asleep.

tummy time has become her favorite way to play. she spends most of her awake time on her belly. and she has gotten good at reaching for her toys and pulling them up to her. she even manages to get her big stuffed blocks over to her mouth for some attempts at chewing them. this week maddie has a new noise and it is not a cute one! (well it's a little cute in the way that everything babies do are cute.) she sort of grunts from the back of her throat, but there is no expression in her face. it sounds like she is screaming in anger or is frustrated, but she isn't at all. i am hoping that she will move past this sound and return to her cute 'cooing' sounds. we'll see... love.

giant baby

today is madelyn's 4 month birthday! and she celebrated with a trip to the doctor for another round of shots - yea! matt and i jokingly (and lovingly) call madelyn our "giant baby" and today we had that verified by the doctor. she was 28" tall (99.99 percentile), weighed 15 lbs. 12 oz. (88.55 percentile), and her head was 41.2 cm (57/58 percentile). please tell me that you caught that she was in the 99.99 percentile for height! i mean we knew that she was tall, but wow! no wonder she has started to wear her 9 month clothes - even though she swims in them because she is so lean.

other than that, the doctor's appointment wasn't too exciting. all's well and we will go back at 6 months. she did better with the shots than last time, a little more crying when she got them, but she wasn't as cranky throughout the rest of the day. she pretty much stopped crying as soon as we got her in her car seat and was asleep before i got back on the interstate to head home.

the shots take a lot out of her so she took two more naps than normal and ate a few more times. not to say that there weren't lots of smiles and laughs today - she just didn't spend as much time awake. plus, she went to bed an hour earlier.

tomorrow should be a better day for all of us. love.

farewell warm weather

we had a nice late-morning walk through the nature center down the street on saturday. most of the fall leaves were blown off because of recent rain and high winds, but we did get some great pictures and maddie got to touch some leaves of different colors. she was enjoying being outside so much that she went to sleep - maybe she will enjoy it more next year...

we had a beautiful fall weekend! it was breezy, sunny and in the 70s - probably for the last time this year. so we spent as much time as possible outside. they are saying that the highs are going to be in the 50s for the rest of the week.

as a last goodbye to warm weather, we went down to the neighborhood park today to let maddie swing for a while. well, it wasn't so much letting her swing, as showing daddy how she can sit in the swing while we push her. while she laughed and smiled a few times, she was mainly focused on chewing and sucking on her fingers and feeling her teeth and the inside of her cheek.

madelyn has also learned that she can pull matt's glasses off his face. and like everything else that she can get her hands on, they went straight into her mouth. she is particularly fond of cloth. i was reaching over her for a clean diaper while wearing a long sleeved t-shirt and she wouldn't let go of my wrist. she was determined to find a way to get it into her mouth. i just let her hold a burp cloth all day for her chewing pleasure.

love.

the challenges of warm clothes

fall is here in wisconsin. we are going to a nature preserve today to view the fall colors before they all fall from the trees - hopefully we will get some good pictures of the leaves. i had my first glimpse at what the challenges of warm clothes are going to be with a very young child yesterday. it was around 55 and very windy so i thought that i should bundle maddie up a little bit before we went out to the mall. can i just say that baby jeans are very difficult to get on busy little legs! whoever thought that elastic just in the back and a little snap in the front would give you enough room to pull them over a diaper underestimated things a bit - and maddie isn't even that big around! and after that i got to wrestle her into a cotton cardigan. she did look really cute though! but i think having to get her into layers everyday is definitely going to present its own challenges. especially when you think about how long our winters are up here. people had told me that i wouldn't need a coat for her until she out grew her carrier, but her feet are already at the very end of it, if not hanging over, so i feel the need to carry her in it as little as possible. plus, she really likes being able to sit upright in her stroller and look around when we are out and about.

maddie and i went to the mall so that we could go back to jcp for another attempt at pictures. and it was like night and day from our first experience! there were so many great shots and they really posed her cute with her toys. i was really happy and will post some of the proofs once i get them in about a week or so. i was just so relieved to have a better experience - it gives me optimism about future photo sessions.

sids risks are so stressed on every single baby bedding product and in every book that you can't help but be paranoid about it. however, i finally decided to put her bumper back on her crib after walking in on her straddling a crib bar while laying on her stomach. i am still not really sure how she managed to get herself into that position...

now that the bumper is on, she came up with a new trick...getting one leg of her pjs unsnapped so that she can suck on her toes. now, i really can't figure out how she does that one!

love to you all.

florida vacation

i haven't been able to post in a while because of all the pre-trip preparations and then the trip itself, but i do have a lot of pictures and video now to share. we went down to florida for my 10 year reunion and there is a picture of matt and i all dressed-up. but then we got down to showing off maddie and meeting her cousin annabell! when maddie and annabell were first meeting face to face, annabell started crying and maddie laughed at her (at least until she realized that annabell really was sad). then grandma and aunt abby really got her laughing, but i only got video of the tail end of it for your viewing enjoyment.



maddie also got to meet uncle josh and aunt adrienne and their dogs, reeses and maya. the dogs had lots of kisses for maddie and she laughed at them a little. we were joking that she couldn't figure out how these stuffed animals moved around so much...

maddie did so good on the flights there and back! on her first official flight, they gave her wings and a certificate for her baby book. she pretty much slept for take-off on the way down and then stayed awake and played with her monkey rattle (and when i say 'played' i mean that she chewed on it like a pharana). and then flying back yesterday she slept for 2-1/2 hours, ate, and then slept for another half hour before she woke up and starting talking and laughing at the tray table (we couldn't figure out what was so funny about it - the sun or the color - but at least she was happy).

and what would a trip to florida be without sunglasses. love.

she found her toes

maddie got her toes to her mouth tonight while matt was changing her for bed! i was so excited, i had to post pics! love.

p.s. if you look closely at the second one, you can see where she has worn away the skin on her pinky toe scooting herself around. i think that it hurts me way more than it hurts her - in fact, she shows no signs of even noticing the injury.

put your legs in the air

maddie has a new favorite pose and its both legs up in the air. she spends a lot of her playtime this way. yesterday she started grabbing and holding her feet with her hands, but i haven't gotten a picture of that yet. maybe i will have some luck after she gets up from her nap today. i love when babies grab their feet! and i can't wait until she puts her feet in her mouth. she is just so cute (but maybe i am a little biased).

i thought that this was pretty cute too. matt and i went to the mall this morning to run some errands and had bagels for breakfast at panera. while we were eating, maddie took this pose with 'prayer' hands and the butterfly's antenna in her mouth and i thought that it was pretty cute. she was going to fall asleep this way, but we were laughing at her and she started to smile and the antenna fell out of her mouth.

her giggles are getting more and more frequent and will come on demand, but the camera is still too distracting to get a video of it. at least i was able to get her to giggle for matt this afternoon. it was making me sad that he wasn't able to hear her cute, new little giggle. love.

swing girl

maddie tried out the swing at the neighborhood park today when we got together with our playgroup this afternoon. unfortunately, she seemed to be indifferent to the whole experience. i think that she was still waking up from her nap and meal. we will have to try again this weekend when she is more awake and daddy can see her too.

she was pretty out of it until the very end of our time at the park. then she got all sort of animated and vocal. maybe next week she will be social while people are around to see it...

this next picture is of her afternoon nap. she fell asleep with her right leg up in the air resting on one of the crib bars and her thumb in her mouth. she looked so cute passed out like that so i ran and grabbed the camera. luckily the flash didn't wake her up.

maddie was in an extremely vocal mood today and i got a couple of videos where you can hear her 'talking'. the lighting wasn't very good and i didn't realize that i couldn't rotate the video to be vertical later. luckily, i was more interested in the audio than the visual. i have posted two videos but they are pretty much the same kind of sounds from her. she went on like this for at least 30 minutes. it is the most she has 'talked' at one time. i think that she is going to be a little chatterbox.