It feels like it has been f o r e v e r since my last post, but I guess it's because I have been so busy with the baby. We have been having so much fun with her lately. She has got to be the happiest baby I have ever seen. She loves to laugh and smile, she entertains herself by "talking" and making noises, she has become semi-mobile, and she is still fascinated with Gunner. He of course, still wants nothing to do with her, UNLESS...... she has spit up on her face. Then he will sit next to her and stare at her like she is a hamburger with arms until he gets an opportunity to lick her face, which can be difficult these days since she is constantly flailing her arms like a little baby ninja. (She probably gets that from me, Kolt calls me the Sleeping Ninja.)
Now that Kolt is healed from his surgery and has returned to work, he received orders for the two C-schools that he needs to attend in North Carolina. He originally was going to a four week school starting in Feb and then another starting in March. Now he is just starting with the March school first and then will go to the next C-school that starts in April. Basically he is going to them in the opposite order than he was originally going to. Each school is four weeks long, with a week long break in between. Kolt is also taking a week of leave after the second school is over, but will only stay in NC for a few days. He will be coming back to Sitka to fish in a tournament or something. Brinleigh and I will be leaving for NC three days before Kolt and we will either all fly back together (which is the plan) or he will return home and then Brinleigh and I will fly home after him. This is due to plane ticket prices. My travel schedule is based on when I can fly for the lowest price, rather than a specific time. Kolt's tickets are paid for (or will be reimbursed in full) so we don't have to worry about how much his tickets cost. I realized this weekend that I only have two and a half weeks until I am supposed to leave and thought I should probably buy my plane ticket to NC ASAP. Brinleigh will fly for free, but I will have to hold her the whole time. Because this is such a long distance, I had to choose our flights carefully. We will be taking a couple long flights (about four hours) and so I wanted longer layovers, especially since I will be taking care of Brinleigh alone. I ended up getting an overnight flight which I think will work best due to the length of the layovers and the number of times we have to switch planes. The majority of our flight time will be during Brinleigh's bedtime hours so hopefully she will sleep during those flights, especially with me holding her. Then momma can sleep a little bit too. We only switch flights twice, in Seattle and again in Atlanta. The downside, our layover in Seattle is six hours :/ But that will give us plenty of time to do everything we need to do, including feeding Brinleigh since she is now on solid foods. We might look for the USO for the remaining time to see if we can hang out in there. The layover in Atlanta is two and a half hours, I think. So wish us luck!
Brinleigh is doing amazing with her night time sleep and nap schedules. She is getting so big and is almost ready to move on to her nine month size clothes. She rolls over like a champ and can spin herself around on her belly like a pro. She also now lifts herself up onto all fours and rocks herself back and forth. She pushes herself backwards and then brings her arms in to scoot herself back again. I've attempted to record multiple videos of this cuteness but she gets mesmerized by the camera/phone/camcorder and ends up just staring at it. She also moves all over her crib throughout the night. Every time I check the baby monitor she is in a different angle, position, or side of the crib. Now that she is getting bigger and stronger and can raise herself up on to all fours, Kolt lowered her crib mattress this past week. I was scared that she would learn to pull herself up in the middle of the night and fall out of the crib :o She still loves to play in the exersaucer and will jump and bounce all day long. Kolt moves her next to the sliding glass door so she can watch Gunner when he is tied up outside...... she loves it. She also keeps herself entertained in her playpen for longer periods now, giving me time to clean, vacuum, make dinner, etc.
It's hard to believe that February is already half way over. This year is flying by and I am NOT happy about it at all. Every month that goes by brings us another month closer to my little baby girl's first birthday. Even though I get sad about how quickly she is growing, I am already planning her 1st Birthday Party, Thanks to Pinterest. This party is going to be one of the most important to me and I want everything to be perfect. Therefore, I am taking my time planning everything out. And for those of you who do follow me on Pinterest, Brinleigh's 1st Birthday board is private so nobody can see any of it :o It will be a surprise for everyone. For Brinleigh's first Valentine's Day we didn't really do anything special. She wore her Valentine's Day outfit and we did a little shopping for craft supplies while Kolt was at work. This past week, Brinleigh and I secretly worked on a couple homemade gifts for Kolt when he went to work and we got to give them to him this morning. I think he liked them and he took them to work to hang in his locker.
Brinleigh is growing and learning so much these days and she is getting stronger and has more control over her movements now. I got out of the shower a couple days ago only to see her sitting up in her bouncer. Hmmmm..... Good thing she can't escape since she is buckled in but she probably tried with all she could. This little girl does not like to sit still, unless she is sleeping. She has figured out how to jump and likes to do it when we hold her on our laps. She goes crazy playing in her exersaucer and when we lay her down in the play yard she is all over the place. She isn't crawling yet, but she can roll, turn herself around, and somehow scoots herself but I haven't really figured out how yet. I watch her but apparently she only likes to move when nobody is looking.
We are still experimenting with baby food which Brinleigh absolutely loves. We have to feed her one kind of food for several days or once and then wait a few days before introducing her to another to make sure she isn't allergic to anything. So far she has had sweet potatoes and sweet potatoes and corn. Tomorrow we will be trying some green beans. As of right now she still gets oatmeal for breakfast and we are working on introducing the vegetables for dinner. Once she has gone through all the different kinds of vegetables and we make sure there are no food allergies, then we will start introducing the fruits for breakfast.
We have set up and established a daily routine which she took to almost immediately. We started the routine to help with sleep training which didn't really consist of much training. The first night I decided to leave her in her own bedroom for the entire night. Usually she would sleep next to our bed in her bassinet, then I slowly worked up to letting her sleep in her room until she woke up in the middle of the night, then I would get up to nurse her and bring her in our room. So the first night it took her about 15 minutes to fall asleep in her bassinet and she stayed in her room the entire night. The second night she knew what was going on and she did pretty well with the bedtime routine. She was waking up a few times throughout the night and so I decided that she was ready to start sleeping in her crib. I think she was waking up because she wasn't comfortable and needed more room to stretch out. She did great sleeping in her crib, she still woke up a few times for the first few nights, but then is slowly decreased to a couple times, and then only once.
So....... we have a sleep trained, solid food eating baby with a daily routine. YaY!
Our 6 month old baby girl.....
