One more word!

New words are coming fast and furious now.  This is an amazing time for toddlers!  Yesterday, I had to leave work early to take Tessa to the doctor for a bad cough.  Turns out both of her ears are infected as well, poor baby.  But she made me feel better when we trekked to the store to pick up her med.  We wandered around for a bit until she said OOOHHH-COOOWWW!  I turned around and there was a poster of a cow in the dairy aisle.  So cute.  I think she's said OOOOHHH-COOWWW rougly 29,000 times since then.

DOGGY!!!

Sorry Tessa, no time to post lately even though you've been making leaps and bounds in progress.  A few weekends ago Jason, Mom and I were at my house doing some work to get the house ready for Ken and Nissi to come (Yay, roommates!).  We were all in the kitchen with you looking at your big board book of 100 words.  Now, you haven't spoken too much yet not that you're not verbal, because you are...you just don't usually use words we can understand other than MumMum or BaBa or KAAAAA! (cat).

We turned to the page with animals and we showed you the ducky, cat (Kaaaa), doggy, etc.  Suddenly, you said, "DOGGY!" clear as day.  We were all so surprised.  If you had recited the Gettysburg Address -4score and 7 years ago-I don't think we would have been more shocked.  Wow, things just change so fast.  Now you can also say RUFRUFRUFRUF in a high pitch after Violet does the same thing.

Nine whole months!

Today was Tessa's nine month checkup.  She is right on track developmentally.

Weight: 19lb 2 oz / 50th %ile
Height:  29 in / 90th %ile
Head circumference: 17.5 in / 60th %ile

Beach

Last weekend saw Tessa's first ever beach experience.  Everyone who knows me knows that I love to make short visits to the beach.  Uncle Jason went along for the ride, to help us at the beach, and to see Brent.  Tessa loved the beach, the sand, and the water.  In fact, she loved the sand so much she tried to eat it several times.  Uncle Jason put her down to feel the waves and she was a tiny bit frightened of that but she got over her fear pretty fast.  We also had a tent that was ridiculously hard to assemble and are forever grateful to Uncle Jay for putting it up.

Tessa also sneaked a piece of lord-only-knows-how-old-bacon from the floor of the hotel room and chewed it like a piece of bubblegum for about ten minutes until I discovered it.  Gross!  She tried cinnamon apples from Chili's while Momma had a delicioso margarita but Tessa's not a fan of cinnamon. She made the worst faces.

Uncle Jay had his first pooh-plosion experience trying to change Tessa in IHOP's bathroom after she was a bit fussy while Momma was finishing breakfast.  I'm sure it was an unforgettable moment for him.  Yay for IHOP having a changing table in the gent's restroom though.

Six Months!!!

Wow, Tessa is six months old as of yesterday.  We went to the doctor this morning for a well-baby checkup and these are her stats:

Height: 27 in / 90th %ile
Weght: 17.3 lbs/ 75th %ile

Samantha

I took you outside to play with Samantha yesterday evening.  The weather was beautifully perfect but of course Samantha was coughing and choking horribly because of her allergies.  It's probably the mold that affects her so but my heart goes out to the poor little doggie.  She rolled on her back in the grass which probably doesn't help but at least it reminds me that she can still get a little normal doggie joy out of her life.  You laughed everytime she turned her face toward you.  She licked your hand and you laughed.  I suspect Samantha will be gone before you remember her but maybe this will help.

(That's Anthony beside Samantha)

Four Month Well Baby Check-up

Well, you most certainly are a well baby, Tessa.  You thoroughly enjoyed hamming it up for your audience of nurse and pediatrician until the needles came out.  Your stats are as follows:

Weight: 14 lbs 6 oz / 70th %ile
Height: 25 in / 75th %ile
Head circumference: 16.25 in / 50th %ile

You rock, Lady!

Nobody told me about baby getting sick

You've been so sick over the last couple of weeks and I am exhausted.  I thought parenthood was a giant piece of cake up until this point but watching terrified as your child turns a bit blue in the mouth because she can't breathe slams you back down to ole Planet Earth from Cloud Nine pretty fast. 

On Thursday, January 27th I picked you up from Gramma's after work and I noticed you had a little "wet" cough.  On Friday, Gramma reported that it was obvious you were a little sick since you didn't eat very well.  Saturday seemed a bit better.  Then by Saturday night, we were in the ER.  Sunday, urgent care.  Monday, pediatrician's office.  Those were the longest three days of my life.  It was awful beyond words to see you so ill and not know what to do.  It's clear by the way you look at me that you trust me to fix things.  I'm the Mom.  That's my job.  But I couldn't fix this.  All I could do was wait it out and help you along as much as possible.

Thank God.  Thank God.  Thank God.  You are getting stronger and feeling better every day.  I've been appalled by the amount of weight you lost while sick.  I can see your little ribs and feel your little shoulder bones.  I'm so happy you want to eat like a starving lion cub now.  Hopefully you'll catch up to where you were soon.

Tessa has a fan base

I've noticed that small children are especially fascinated by babies.  Picking up the girls from school one day over maternity leave, I happened upon a class of kindergartners and they all wanted to see Tessa.  One little boy said, "I like your baby."  They were very curious about the stork bite mark on the back of her head.  And one little boy even reached up and patted her on the back in passing.

Another time, I took the girls (my nieces) for a walk around the little lake near my house.  We were passing the park and this little girl came running up to the stroller and grabbed ahold for dear life.  She was barely tall enough to see Tessa.  I let her look for awhile but after a few minutes of her clinging to the stroller, I was at a loss about how to get her off.  Luckily, I think her sister noticed and came to retrieve her.

Well, today beat all.  We were both having a bad morning.  I tripped and fell at the post office and the bottom of Tessa's carseat clunked on the floor which scared her really bad.  We met Valerie at IHOP for breakfast where the morning started to get more fun.  Out of nowhere, this toddler comes running up to Tessa's carseat to look at the baby with her Dad in tow.  He had to keep telling her not to touch the baby.  It was so adorable.  Tessa gave her a great big smile.  Then the tiny little girl made oinking sounds at my daughter.  She was talking, not to Tessa, but to the pink piggy toy on her carseat.  As we were leaving, she tried to follow us out...still oinking.  SO CUTE!!!

What a difference a day makes!

Sorry for changing the person of reference here but I'll probably easily go back and forth between creating new posts for Tessa, using 'you' and new posts about Tessa.  Not an English major. lol. 

So between Tuesday and Wednesday afternoon, I noticed that Tessa is babbling differently.  I can't even determine what is different about it.  Maybe her babbling is clearer or more purposeful--or just louder.  And, get ready for this one, she's reaching out for objects that pique her interest.  I fed her a couple of bites of cereal last night (it doesn't help her sleep longer but she kind of likes chewing on the spoon) and she reached out and tried to grab the spoon!  So I gave Tessa the spoon and watched to make sure she didn't bonk herself in the eye with it.

We will be playing with spoons more tonight.