The Cat

So this is the cat that always causes us trouble. Her name's Grace and at one point, she actually cost me my favorite camera. $1200 and she peed on it.

But a week ago she was missing for 2 days. Last time that happened I found her on the porch of some other house around the block. She was lost and I had to go pick er up and take her home.

This time a fellow apartment resident found her in a tree. I put up a flier saying she was missing and within a few hours the apartment manager called and said that I think we found your cat.

So I got our ladder and climbed the tree and got her down. She was thankful but a little freaked out and of course hungry. I'm just glad we found her. I did miss her even though she's a pain.

I named her well though because she teaches me to live with Grace even if every thing's going to he**.

Our Thanksgiving

So Grandma Kay came out for Thanksgiving. IT was fun. She arrived on wednesday and we went to IKEA to get stuff for Mary's room. Then we got home and I started baking pies and getting stuff ready for thursday. Then of course Mary got sick. All over the kitchen.

I was like Oh no! But then she seemed to be doing better and I was thinking maybe she just ate something she didn't like or something. But then she threw up a few more times. And she ended up going to bed really late, at like 11.

The next day was Thanksgiving and we all had a great meal. Mary didn't eat with us. She was sick til noonish time and she took 2 naps. We were all wasted that evening but we thought, oh what a big meal. But then...

We all got sick. Rich started not feeling well that night. And then threw up the next morning. Mom felt ok til the afternoon and then whammo! I was feeling good til about 5pm and then

 Bingo! By then Mary was feeling right as rain and was being a good girl. While all the grownups were sprawled out on the couch Mary played quietly in her room.

Did I mention the fever too. And the aching and the headache.

By the next day on saturday we were all

 recovering. We were still a little weak but feeling much better. Mom was doing good and we started puting together all the stuff we got at IKEA. Here's basically what we got. You can check out more pics on the photos page. There's a dresser, storage system, tv stand, flower light, picture frames and (not pictured) side table, floor rugs, small chair. Did I mention that I love IKEA?

Then on Sunday we cleaned her room and mom left at about noon. It took her 11 hours to get home. Can you believe that!? Holiday traffic, what a bummer! But now Mary's room looks great. I can actually clean it and I actually love spending time in there. Mary also likes her room a lot. She was running around in circles squealing the first day we put it together.

The Screaming

Mary has reverted to screaming all night again. I'm going to buy another sleep book and see what happens.

We were doing good for a little while. But everytime she starts to sleep well she gets teeth or gets sick. I think I'm going to have to wean her soon too. She always wants to be nursed! She gets to be such a cranky pants.

I nurse her a lot when she gets sick because usually it's stomach problems and nursing keeps her hydrated n stuff. But then even when she gets well she expects it all the time and won't really eat food. Except if she sees other children eating. Then she'll eat. Of course.

I check on her like the sleep books say but then they say to not pick them up but she always has a dirty diaper. I can't leave her in a dirty diaper all night. So I have to pick her up and change her and then more screaming.

Anyway, she screams last night at bedtime, and this morning and right now at naptime. It's killin' me smalls.

I'm going to Barnes n Noble after her nap and we're buying some more sleep books.

HI again

Photos taken in November

Guess we should check in and say HI

Pictures taken 9/18/2008

Halloween Soon

A few days ago we went to the pumpkin patch, actually Bates Nuts Farm about a half hour away. But they have pumpkins there. We saw some animals and we bought some nuts. Mary picked out a pumpkin for us. It's a little lopsided but cute. We asked her if that's what she wanted and she said "Ya," so we got it. She had a good time tromping through the pumpkins and riding the pumpkins. I think she's going to have even more fun next year.

I was hoping that they would have cinnamon rolls there but they didn't. I've been craving cinnamon rolls for like 2 weeks now. I can't wait to make them myself.

I think we'll carve the pumpkin tomorrow on Halloween. I guess we'll have to though since we haven't carved it yet. The house is still a mess but at least it's coming along.

IKEA

So last Sunday we went to IKEA. By the way don't go there unless you have like 3 hours to spare. It's basically Costco for home furniture. It was crazy. But I found out I actually love Ikea. I wish I had discovered it years ago. I love the look and the prices. I wish I had pictures for you. But I can put up a random picture of Mary though. 

We had a good time and bought some bookshelves for our living room. There is absolutely hardly any storage at our new apartment and we have tons of books and computer stuff and we have no where to stick it. We're figuring it out, but it's been a challenge. Grandma said she might be able to help out with getting some more stuff there. That's pretty exciting but she's not coming down til Thanksgiving. So I guess we'll have to live with boxes til then.

Ikea will be our friend for the next couple of months.

We moved, we're unpacking, it's maddness

Wow, it's been a while since we've made a post about Mary. (Here she is in her Tinkerbell Halloween costume.) We went to a couple Halloween parties with a bunch of other kids. It was pretty fun. Mary had lots of treats and fun running around. It was pretty warm though, like 80 degrees, but not too bad.

Then a couple of weeks ago mom had a big Mom had a big test to try and get into grad school in Mathematics. I think the test went pretty well but we'll find out when I send in my application. Now the next step is to get letters of recommendation. 

A few weeks ago Mary finished her ISR swimming lessons. She did quite well and rolled over on her back just as she was supposed to. There were even some slips while she was playing and her training kicked in and she did just like she was supposed to do.

And in the middle of all of that we moved. Can you believe that. What a month we've had. Well, we now live in Vista, a couple miles away from where we lived but it's much cheaper! We'll try and get out our new address ASAP. The new place is a little smaller so it's sort of been hard trying to find a place for everything, but we're managing. At least they put in new floors at this place and new counter tops and cabinets. 

Now that we're getting settled into our new place, I'll be able to post more often. Talk to you again soon.

Pied Piper

Our Beloved Bunny Piper passed away last week on Sunday September 7th. 

She had been sick with an abscess due to malocclusion of her upper an lower teeth. The vet said that she probably had this malocclusion her whole life but that she had enough stuff to eat and chew on that her teeth still wore down properly.

She was getting older, being 7 1/2 years old. Piper was a mini lop and they usually live 7-10 years. She was a good bun. Piper was pretty relaxed and super lazy. She loved sugary treats and never bit anyone. She never minded a nice pet and got along w

ith the cats pretty well. 

We don't think that we'll get another bunny anytime soon. Toofu will

 just have to enjoy all of our company now. She's the same age as Piper was, just a few months younger. Toofu doesn't seem to have any health issues though, just long nails. She seems to be doing pretty good since Piper's gone. 

We buried Piper in a nearby field. Hope she has fun in Bunny heaven. She is survived by her buddy Toofu and the rest of the Curras Family.

Born January 9, 2001.

Died September 7, 2008.

Update #2

She likes to play in baskets. Here she's got in the basket all by herself. We also got her a lot of Pjs with feet in them. She seems to sleep better with them on.

I'll continue with the update. Friday we ended up not doing much because we were so wasted. Mary didn't get to bed til about 10pm the night before because we had visited Lara's house in San Diego. So we got up late Friday morning and we just chilled all day.

Then on Saturday morning Diane and Carol Ann came over. Lara dropped them off. We went to Chipotle and to the toy store. I bought Mary her first doll and we bought Carol Ann a Pooh Bear. She loves Pooh that's for sure. We've been watching the Winnie the Pooh video like 4 times a 

day. 

We've been pretty busy. But things are settling down now. Talk to  you again soon. 

P.S. Here's the doll we got Mary. She has lots of toys and stuffed animals but no dolls. She always likes to look at them in the store so I thought we'd get her one.

Teefers Update

She's got a full 5 teeth now. She just got her fifth one last Sunday on the 7th. It usually takes a few days to come in and she gets cranky and won't eat anything. But she's eating a lot now, using those teefers!

Nap Graduation

I found this post from July 4. But that was when Mary got her ear infection so I guess that I sort of forgot about it. Wow! Since then she's never gone back to 2 naps. And she goes down quite well now too. Not a lot of fussing except if she's teething.

7/4/08...

I think she's finally graduation from two naps to one nap. It seems lately she's been wanting to take a nap at about 11 and then she'll sleep for a couple of hours. Then she won't want to nap the rest of the day and does fine.

Update #1

No pics to show you right now. Although I think I have a lot on my camera. It's been crazy madness this week. 

On Sunday one of my bunnies dies, Piper. She was about 7 and half and had been battling an abscess in her mouth. She had problems since march but she hung in there. She was a good bun. We'll miss her. So we buried her in a field near our apartment.

On Monday me and rich got to go see a movie. Mary had been teething over the weekend (her fifth tooth!) and she was cranky. But we left her with our neighbor (also a mom) and we saw a movie. The movie was OK. But it was a bummer because when we got home Mary had been asking for us for like an hour. That was a bummer.

But then on Tuesday she was back to her normal self. Then I went on a playdate Tuesday morning and I was going to go on another one in the afternoon, but I got into a little fender bender. Mary and I were fine but I did some damage to the tire and needed a new tire. I waited for AAA for like an hour and they finally came. It sucked beause I was just around the corner from our apartment. I was looking at where we had buried the bunny and I hit the burb. How about that! But we still got Mary to swimming on time.

Wednesday, they had to keep the car in the shop so I was using a rental truck. I think it was a dodge ram. Whahoo! It occurred to me that I totally spaced on my friends birthday earlier this week. So I sent him his present. His birthday was Monday but better late than never. Then my friend lets me know that last minute she's going to fly out with a free ticket and she'll be here tomorrow.

Thursday I visit my neighbor for a quick playdate and then I clean the house like a mad woman for like 4 hours. The cat had peed in the bathroom and every dish was dirty and I had to clean the carpet. Then I got Mary to swim lessons and we drove to San Diego afterward to meet Diane and Carol Ann at Lara's house. They're going to stay there til Saturday and then they'll stay with us. We were out til late 9:45pm. But Mary did good when we got home. 

And I'll write more later because it's late. I'll let you know about Friday and Saturday. It's been crazy this week!

New apartment hunting

Mom and Grandma went apartment hunting this weekend. Luckily we think we found a place that will be hundreds of dollars cheaper than where we're living now. Currently we're going to make sure that we get a remodeled unit and then we'll set a date to move in.

It's quite a bit smaller than the apartment we have now by 300 sq ft but it'll be nice to pay less, considering where we're living wants to raise our rent by like $300! And in the new place we'll be able to use our washer and dryer. That'll be nice. We'll be having a garage sale too within the next few weeks. So stay posted to find out when and come by and pic up some cool stuff!

Changed the Look

So I've been working hard to change the look of the blog. I didn't even know you could do that until I saw my friends pages all cool and colorful. So I looked at the html source and changed Mary's Blog. I like it.

She's walking better now. Mary mostly walks instead of crawls. But, for a week she as walking and crawling about the same amount. She also likes to carry stuff around with her. Grandma came by for a visit this past weekend. That was pretty fun. Grandma Kay showed Mary how to wrap up her Penguino in a blanket and carry him around. So she does that now when she sees Penguino. She likes giving big hugs a lot too. And she'll pat you on the back when she gives you one.

She's also getting a fifth tooth. Pretty exciting. Swimming lessons are going well and yesterday she started learning to float on her back in addition to kicking and swimming towards the wall of the pool. Pretty soon she'll be like a fish.

I'll be back to post some pics and a video soon.

Walkin' Fool

We went to a BBQ last saturday and Mary decided that walking was a good idea after all. She was taking steps and walking a few feet at a time, but I think when she saw other kids her age walking all around she thought she would too. So now she's walking like a pro. She's a little wobbley but gets right back up when she falls down.

We started our swimming lessons and when we get a chance we'll record a lesson and post it. She's doing reall well and the teacher said that she's gonna be a little star. Of course mommy's so proud of her. And even though she whines and cries most of the time, she does her best and is learning fast. I' try and take pictures too and post those as well. She's only been going for a few days. But so far so good.

Mary's been doing better with sleeping. I used to feed her all the time at night and now we're working on not eating at all at night. I went to just feeding her once in the morning but now we're going to try and cut that out too. It'll be easier when she gets more teeth, but right now she's only working on her fourth tooth. But last night she woke up at 4 am. She was quiet off and on for an hour. Then she slept til 7am. Yaaa! So I didn't feed her at all last night. Maybe soon, she'll sleep all the way through the night without waking up!

She's 1!

Mary Pie is officially 1 now. Her birthday was of course August 3rd. We haven't posted in a while so oh where to begin. We actually spent her birthday recovering from the stomach flu. Me and Rich were feeling better but Mary wasn't quite yet. It lasted a week. Ugh, that's the worst when your whole family is sick at once. Over the next couple of days though she got back to normal. We're glad we went and had the pictures at Sears done the weekend before her birthday!

Then right after that we had to fly up and see the family in Nor Cal. We had a little cake for Mary and we had the yearly Curras Family BBQ at Grandpa Al's house in the Bay Area. Mary got some presents and we had a great time. Auntie Tina came out to visit from Wisconsin and we got to see Auntie Jen too. Lots of people were there and we got to meet a lot of them even though Mary slept through half the BBQ. We had a great time even though Mary's scedule was thrown off and she screamed a lot at night. By the last night we had her sleeping ok but then it was time to leave.

So since we've been home, we have done some major sleep training. She actually got some pajama with feet from Grandma Kay and that seemed to help sleeping through the night. Who would have thought that she wanted pajamas with feet in them. We went out and baught a few more and now that's what she wears to bed. Also we have discovered another tooth coming in! It's her other top front tooth. The teething probably hasn't been helping the sleeping but we give her some IB before bed at night to help. Pretty soon she'll have 4 whole teeth! Wow, time to start working on corn on the cob.

This is a long post!

We had our one year checkup at the doctor's. Mary is 21 lbs and 28.5 inches. She's 50th percentile in weight, but only 25 in height. So she's a litle short. She just fits into 12 month clothing so of course we buy everything in like 18 mo to 2T so it'll last.

Mary Pie is almost walking around on her own. She can take multiple steps at a time and can stand up by herself. Pretty soon she'll be running around like a pro.

We've been to a few more Mommy's group playdates and we're having a good time. With the playdates and swim lessons beginning, our schedule's going to be pretty full. Next week Rich goes on a business trip for a few days, but at least we have other moms and kids we can go see and play with.

PS We just got word today too that our car needed to be worked on. That's twice in like 2 months or something. What a bummer. Hopefully it works OK now.

Birthday Time

This past weekend we went to Disneyland and the San Diego Zoo and the San Diego Air and Space Museum where they have a Star Trek exhibit. Derrick and Marina and Grandma Kay came with us and we all had a great time. The weekend was a little hectic but I think all went well.

Look for pictures up soon of our trip in the Photo page of her website. We rode on the Carosel and on the new Toy Story ride. It turns out too that Mary doesn't like the Tikki Room or the Jungle Cruise but we'll check again when we go back to Disneyland. (How can you not like the Tikki Room?!)

Mary sat in the Captain's chair from the original series at the Star Trek exhibit. We have a picture of that, but we haven't scanned it into the computer yet. It'll be up soon. Her favorite part of the zoo was the kitties. They were all asleep this time but kitties usually are. She was pretty wasted at the zoo. She did good though. She was a trooper and took a nap in her stoller and we only had to carry her half the time instead of the whole time.

Lara and Christean met us at the zoo. Mary was excited to see them and squealed in delight.

On Mary's actual birthday we plan to go to the Wild Animal Park. See you then.

Walking and other stuff

On Sunday Mary took her first step from the coffee table to the couch. Then yesterday she took another step trying to get to someones hands to help her walk. I don't think she realized that she wasn't holding on to anything. But she is so close to walking. She can definitely stand up by herself. Sometimes she gets nervous though and just sits down when you stop holding onto her. She walks when she can hold onto you. Her 1st birthday is in 3 weeks. Maybe she'll be walking by then.

She points to things now though and says, "mmmm" when she likes something. She defintely says, "KKKKK" for kitty. (It comes out as a gutteral clearing of the throat sound.) She loves bananas in the morning and yogurt. We're doing better with sleeping through the night too.

We've been sleep training this week and I've stopped nursing her at night and stopped rocking her to sleep. She's sleeping better and eating more during the day now. Which in turn helps her sleep through the night when she eats her breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I've also stopped nursing her on command. I only nurse her in the early morning, at naptime, and after her bath. That's actually helped her eat more too.

And on a side note. She still wears some size 2 shoes and she's actually growing into size 3 now. She has little feet for sure. She's also 19 lbs 10 oz incase you were wondering and I'll get a measurement on her height soon.

Fireworks update

We did actually get to see the fireworks. Turns out you could see them from our apartment. Legoland is right next door so those are the ones we got to see. Mary wasn't too excited but she wasn't scared either. I think she was just wasted from being up all night the night before with her ear infection. But I'm glad she got to see them.

Fireworks Time, or not

Mary got her first ear infection last night. Apparently, both me and Rich got them as children a lot. Hopefully Mary won't get them quite as often. She had been running a low temperature starting Wednesday afternoon and I gave her some Tylonol. Then she seemed so sleep fine wednesday night and thursday we went on a playdate and she did well there too. Her appetite has been curbed but she's been nursing well, so I wasn't sure if there was anything really wrong other than her teething. (More to come on that later.)

But last night at 10:30pm she had a fever of 102 under the arm. I gave her Tylonol and by 11:30 her fever hadn't gone down. We called an advice nurse and I sent Rich out to get an ear thermometer. We took her temperature with the ear thermometer and it was 104. So we called the advice nurse again and they said to take her to the hospital, which I totally agreed with. She also threw up on me once. Probably because she was feeling so lousy.

We got seen pretty fast. Her temp was 103 at the hospital and they gave her some Motrin. The doc took a look in her ear and said, "Yup." I guess ear infections are pretty common, but she gave us a little scare. So we finally got home at 5am. Mary woke up at like 6 and 7 and 8. So we've had a little sleep and Rich went out just now to get her antibiotics from the pharmacy. They're only one dose a day for 5 days. Pretty cool drugs. And they're a yummy fruity bubble gummy flavor.

Mary had her first dose at the hospital and I gave her some more Tylonol so she's feeling a little better and sleeping better. Hopefully she'll be a new baby by tomorrow. We were going to go see fireworks tonight, but looks like that's out, so we'll just stay home and watch a movie instead. There's always next 4th of July. Hopefully she'll be right as rain by her birthday at Disneyland in two weeks. (Celebrating a little early.)

Naps Updated

She's napping again regularly. Recently we went to the Animal Park and Legoland and Mary went a couple of days without any naps. She was a trouper and slept pretty good at night. However, I found that I was again up at night feeding her 3 times a night. So last night I just held her when she woke up and stopped feeding her at night. It actually went pretty well. I did feed her when it got light out and then she slept until 9am. Then she took 2 naps both over an hour and a half long today! The day before yesterday she went to bed at 7pm and woke up a few times in the night but then didn't wake up for the day until 9:15am! She's been a sleeper baby. But she's also getting in her two top front teeth. So teething may be a reason why she's so sleepy. Hopefully she feels a little better soon and starts eating more solid food and less milk. We'll try and get a picture of her teeth when they come in.

Legoland and Fun

Grandma Kay just came out for about a week and our friends Terilynn and family too. We went to Legoland and the San Diego Wild Animal Park. We live right next to Legoland and we had a lot of fun so maybe we'll get a season pass for it. Mary had a great time playing in the Lego Duplo room and the cool air helped since it was really hot that day. Mary also liked the different flavors of ice cream. She got a taste of everyones. Tristyn and Logan (Terilynn's kids) loved Legoland and even went for two days instead of just one. There's lots of kids rides and pretty good food there.

It was pretty hot when we went to the Wild Animal Park too but we had a good time looking at all the animals. Mary's favorite part was the Carosel. We missed the petting zoo. (It was closed by the time we got to it.) So we'll have to go again soon. Personally, I prefer the Zoo as opposed to the Wild Animal Park, but they both have animals so they're pretty similar. We did get to go on the African Safari Tour, which takes you on a bus through the habitats of the animals. They used to have you drive through in your car, but I think animals got hurt and people so they stopped doing that.

We had a great time. And soon, we're going to go to Disneyland in July for Mary's birthday. We'll keep you posted.

Home from Nor Cal

So we're back home from northern california. We visited Patty and her new baby Emily, Master Rick and Jenny, Grandma Spring, Auntie Sherilyn and Jessica and cousin Kailee (not sure of how she spells it though), Aunite Jen, Grandma Deb and Grandpa Al, Brian and friends and for the most fun we got to see cousin Carol Ann. Carol Ann is exactly 7 months older but her and Mary play together pretty well. They give hugs and kisses and are good at being gentle with each other.

We had quite a week last week. We kept a pretty hectic pace and Mom is pretty warn out. But Mary was a party animal and kept up pretty well. We went to yosemite one day and played in the grass. We also went out to dinner on a couple of nights. Grandma Kay was nice enough to take care of the little munchkins to while me and Diane went to Derrick's graduation in Davis. He recieved his PhD last week and now works at UC Merced. It was also Diane's brother Brian's 24th birthday. We celebrated with Sishi and Italian food, and some beers.

We're hoping that we can go to Salem, OR (where Carol Ann lives) in October to celebrate Halloween with her. The girls will both be walking by then (Carol Ann has been for a few months) and they'd love going out and meeting new people I'm sure. They both love other kids and maybe Mary will have more teeth so she could eat some of the candy. We live in apartments right now so it'd be hard to trick or treat here anyways. But we've got a lot planned this year so we'll see how we feel when it comes time to buy the tickets. We miss them a lot though.

This week Grandma Kay comes out to visit and we're going to go to the Wild Animal Park and Legoland. That's going to be fun. Hopefully we'll get some sleep in there somewhere.
Talk to ya'll later.

Nap Schedule

I did put her on a nap schedule and it worked like a charm. On a normal day she takes a nap at 10:30am and 2:30pm. Usually one nap is for an hour and the other for an hour and a half to two hours. Then she goes to bed at 8pm and is up by 8am. (She does wake up at like 6am for a feeding and then at like 7:15am or so for another one. But then goes quickly back to sleep.) If I let her stay up in the morning instead of putting her back to bed til 8am she's cranky. Now she's doing much better with sleeping. She's a happy baby when she's on a schedule. Otherwise she's like this all day. (See below.)

Then no one's happy. It'll be interesting to see what happens when we go on vacation. I'm hoping she'll just be excited to get out of the house that she won't notice her schedule's all messed up. We will see. Wish me luck!

10 months old and off to see Grandma

Mary turned 10 months old on June 3rd. And now we're off to Northern California on Sunday to see family and friends. Peas and Diane will meet us up there. It'll be so good for the girls to see each other again. The main reason for us traveling to nor cal is Derrick's graduation. He's getting his PhD in Physics and now we have to call him Dr. Kiley. :)

We'll be gone about a week and returning next saturday before Father's Day. (Gotta be home for that.) Then after we get back we're going to go to Legoland and the Wild Animal Park with grandma Kay and some friends. Then in July we're celebrating Mary's birthday a little early at Disneyland. Lots of fun.

We'll let you know if she starts walking or talking or anything. So far she's walking with her walker a lot and standing with support a lot. I'll post another blog when we get back from vacation.

Love, Mom

P.S. She did actually get a full tooth in and she's teething right now for her second tooth. So now she has 1.1 teeth instead of just half a tooth. But she you'd be surprised at what she can eat with only 1.1 teeth!

Still Half Tooth and Walking with the Walker

She still only has half a tooth. But we think that the tooth next to it is coming in. She's walking pretty well with the walker. Check out the video at her home movie page (walking video). She also stood on her own the other day. She let go of the coffee table and I don't think she realized it though. She sort of looked around and then sat on the ground. She also learned to clap last weekend. We've been trying to get her to clap and then she just did it one day. We were playing upstairs and she just clapped on her own. It's pretty cute. She also knows how to do the all done sign. (As seen here.) So when she's all done playing or eating she throws her arms in the air and we say "All Done." Now she can tell us when she's full.
She also says dada and mama and baba. That's pretty cool. And one of her favorite pasttimes now is opening drawers and taking everything out. So we clean a lot. She still loves to eat bunny pellets. We're still trying to get her off that. We thought of taking her to Poo Eaters Anonymous or PEA. Well hope you like the website and all the new stuff on it. Take care and we'll talk to you again soon.
Mel

New Blog Site

Here's Mary's New blog site. I'm going to see if I can transfer her other entries to this site. So Stay tuned. I'll try and transfer the comments too. But that will take a little longer.

Still Half Tooth

Mary's tooth still hasn't come in all the way. She's a baby with half a tooth. She's graduated from just crawling to cruising. She' holds onto things and stands up all the time. She loves to climb the stairs and she loves bath time.

With only half a tooth she can't eat real food yet. But she has tasted some. She likes salt and vinegar potato chips, lemons, limes, saurkraut, and mustard. She'd much rather eat real food than baby food, but she mostly still nurses anyway. So we have time before her teeth come in. But she'd like them in now, so she can have that german pub dinner!

Another one of her favorite pastimes is watching the bunnies. She likes to go over and pet them through the cage. Unfortunately she also likes to munch on bunny droppings. So we have to keep an eye on her.

She's sleeping through most of the night right now, but we haven't slept through the whole night yet. Naptime is still hit an miss also. If she doesn't want to take a nap, even if she's tired. She'll complain and moan and wail until I get her. But sometimes naptime is a breeze. I thought I'd try putting her on a nap schedule, so she takes a nap at the same time everyday. Wish us luck!

Mom

She's Crawling and New Teeth

We just got back from traveling back east for a couple of weeks. First we visited Mom's Aunt Karen in Tennessee with Grandma Kay for a week. Aunt Karen has lots of dogs and a nice house in the country. It was pretty cold and it even snowed one day.

Then we traveled to North Carolina where we saw Dad's family. We met up with Grandma Deb and Grandpa Al at the airport and we drove to Maria and Ray's place. Dave and Lori and Dan and Sue and Vivian were there also. Mary was so close to crawling.

But she waited until we got home, so Dad could see her first "steps" on April 3rd. Now she's zooming all over the place and one of her favorite places to go is over by the bunny cage to watch them. Unfortunately, when we got home, we all got a cold. Mary had a little fever for a day but then she was feeling better. It took Mom a little longer to recover, but I'm feeling better now. Mary also had a set of vaccinations right after she was feeling better but then that put her out of it for another day or so.

But we were feeling better, just in time for Diane and Carol Ann's visit. They came out for a couple of weeks stay and the two little ones are getting along splendidly. They laugh together and play well. Carol Ann is 7 months older than Mary so she's still learning how to play. Right now she thinks of Mary as one of her Teddy Bears; she hugs and squeezes her.

So that's what's been happening recently. Sorry it's been so long for the update. But boy have we been busy, traveling back east and going out to the zoo with Diane and Carol Ann and everyone getting a cold on top of that. But we're back at home and things are winding down. Just in time for Mary to get her first tooth! Just the other day I've felt the sharp teeth under the gums. So very soon we'll see little teeth! Then she can start eating real food.

Hope to see everyone again soon. We've had a great time the last few months and now we're going to wind it down and take a rest. Talk to everyone again soon.

Love, Mom

The Big Move

Hey everybody,

It's been one crazy month down here. Mary's doing well and she's almost crawling now. She's pretty active and looks in her toybox to pick out toys and holds them up so you can see them. She likes Elmo and she likes music. We play an album called Free to be You and Me. That seems to be her favorite song. She's also taking her naps better now. She only cries for a few minutes and then she goes to sleep and sleeps for about an hour. Night time is still a bummer for mommy though. She still wakes up every couple of hours right now.

And to let everyone know, we've moved. The house in Hemet got caught up in the whole mortgages devaluing. Our mortgage devalued about $150,000 in one year. So, we were planning on selling it this year, but that would be very difficult considering the value and there's another house on our block that's the exact same house that's been on the market for 2 years and hasn't sold.

Now we live in a 2 bedroom 2 and a half bath in Carlsbad. It's about 3 miles from Rich's work and so his commute time is down considerably. It's nice having him home a lot more and the apartment comes with a garage to store all of our stuff. Unfortunately the garage was soaking wet and leaking when the neighbors hot water heater above burst a pipe. Some stuff got damaged, but the apartment complexes claims office is currently reviewing a list of the stuff that was damaged to consider compensation.

Mary did great through the whole move though. The move is also why there haven't been any recent pictures of Mary up yet. We haven't stopped taking pictures of her. We just haven't had the time to put them on the internet. But that's one of my goals this week.

Also, Mary and Mom plan on traveling out east to visit the relatives. that will be in late March. We'll be visiting Auntie Karen on mom's side and a bunch of daddy's relatives in Raliegh Durham.

Well take care and see you later.

Mom

Nearing 6 months old!

Hello

It's been crazy with the holidays and my 30th birthday this month. I'm in northern california for a couple of days. Just a quick trip for a friends surprise baby shower. It's a surprise for her and a surpsrise for us, since we just found out about it.

Mary's doing well. She's becoming more aware of her surroundings and gets separation anxiety now. Whenever I leave the room she cries. She can sit up well on her own now, but she's still figuring out how to crawl. She can use a high chair now and we've started feeding her rice cereal everyday. She can reach for and grab things pretty good now. And she doesn't like to go down for naps anymore.

We plan to visit back east and see Abuela and everyone in March around Eastertime. We even have an Easter dress for her and everything. Soon it will be Valentine's Day and I'd like to get some Valentine's pictures done for her 6 month birthday too.

Well it's been a while since my last post but I'll try and keep it up more often. Thanks for reading.

Mom and Mary Michelle

The New Year

Christmas and New Years have come and gone and now M&M is 5 months old. She laughs and giggles and responds to her name when you call her. Right now we just call her Mary because I think Mary Michelle might be a little long for her to respond to right now.

We saw the family for Chrsitmas and just stayed home for New Year's. Rich is back to work today too after getting 2 weeks off for family leave to spend time with M&M. I also turn 30 this month on the 22nd and we plan to go to Disneyland. A lot of friends are coming out including my mom and Peas. Diane and Peas will be flying in from Oregon and we're all going to go. Peas just turned 1 year old on the 3rd too so that'll be an extra present for her.

I bet before we know it we'll be celebrating Mary's 1st birthday. We plan to go to Disneyland again for that. (We got season passes so we hope to get use out of them.)

Keeping you updated, Mom