1/2 a year old!

(eating yo-baby yogurt)

Oh my goodness! Where has time gone?! I have a 6 month old today. WOW! A year ago today I was just just finishing up my first trimester, sighing in relief that I had made it that far. A year ago today, I was still sick as a dog all day long, tired, and looking at the next 20 some odd weeks thinking my baby would never get here. A year go, I could not picture my life today. And yet, here it is, and Logan is now a healthy 6 month old little girl who brings SUCH joy to our lives, we could not picture living them without her. What a blessing God has given us!

So, Logan, you are a WHOLE 1/2 year old today! What are you up to?!

- You're favorite position to be in is sitting up, on your own, playing with your toys (or flapping your arms wildly like you're doing right at this second).

- You love to make noises, right now you sound a bit like a pterodactyl (daddy's description) with your giddy screeches but they are so cute. We're working on teaching you to keep your screeches down low instead of loud and high pitched. You also love to talk to yourself in your crib, I know that when you wake up from your nap I usually have an extra 10 minutes of you just talking away before you're ready to be up.

-We introduced some solid food to you a couple of weeks ago because of how interested you were getting in our food. Right now you eat about half of a jar of babyfood while we eat dinner and just today mommy fed you some yo-baby yogurt to celebrate you're 6 month milestone and you LOVED it!

- Foods you love: yo baby yogurt, BANANAS, sweet potatoes and applesauce. Foods you like: squash, prunes, and carrots. Foods you hate: avocados.

- You are trying so desperately to crawl. When we put you on your tummy, you no longer flip over. Instead you grunt and hum and haw trying to move forward. So far, you can scoot yourself forward just a bit when you're trying really hard. We've now started to babyproof the house in anticipation of you getting mobile.

- You have learned how to hug. You put your arms around mommy and daddy's neck and rest your sweet little head on our shoulders when you're feeling tired and affectionate. I do believe you're starting to use this to your advantage, as you do it when you see us nearing your crib. :) It melts our hearts.

- Your favorite toy right now is a plastic camera that talks to you about what pictures it is taking. You could literally spend an hour in front of that toy and not fuss a bit.

- Your comfort item this month is your pink minky blanket that mommy and daddy got before you were born. When we put you in your crib for a nap with it you pull it to your cheek and let it stroke your cheek over and over before you fall asleep.

- You are still taking two good naps a day. We tried just one long nap in the middle of the day yesterday and won't do that again anytime soon. You were a wreck after about 5pm and ended up down for the night at 6:30.

- You are sleeping two long stretches at night. You go down at about 7:45pm and wake up at 1:45am and then sleep until about 8am after that. You've also moved into your own room to sleep at night (yaaaay!) and are doing pretty well with that.

- You are absolutely fascinated with your hands. When we get you in the morning after you've woken up, 99% of the time you're just staring at your hands in the air.

- When you are in your crib and you can hear me at the door, you stick your foot in the air and wiggle it around until I come and you can see me. I thought this was just you playing with your feet until I realized that any time you're awake and I come to the door, your foot shoots up in the air and begins to wiggle around. It is HILARIOUS.

- You hum when you eat. This is something you definitely got from your mommy. As soon as something goes into your mouth you hum and hum until you swallow it. I've been told that I did this exact thing when I was your age.

-This month you've taken a liking to the Little Einsteins. Not to be confused with Baby Einstein. This is the Playhouse Disney show. We watch it together about every other day and you sing and talk along with the characters.

You are such a sweet addition to our little family and we are so blessed to have you with us. We thank God for you every day and look forward to MANY MANY more months with you.

Here are your comparison pictures:

1 month

2 months

3 months

4 months

5 months

6 months: 1/2 year!

And here are a few more pictures from our six month shoot:

No Nap

Well...no Logan standard nap anyway. She usually goes down for a 2-3 hour morning nap and at least an hour in the afternoon. We got a couple 20 minute car naps today. This is what I caught my little munchkin doing when she was SUPPOSED to be taking her afternoon nap.

That's right...she's learned to play with her pacifier in the crib. Notice that she does indeed have other toys around her (that I take out when she goes to sleep at night) but chooses to play with the pacifier. Oh, to be so easily amused.

There's her "you caught me" grin. She knows she's cute and uses it to her advantage.
And the classic, "I'm smiling for you, does this mean you'll come take me out so we can play?"

In other news, we went to try out our first church in NC today. It was going really well, we dropped Logan off in the nursery, she was excited when she saw the toys and the playmates she was going to have. We left and all was fine (though, I had a bit of separation anxiety) and just as I was starting to feel better and enjoy the service, Logan's numbers popped up on the screen (that's how they page you if you need to attend to your child). As I walked down the hall to the nursery to find out what was up I could hear an incredibly loud, piercing cry that I thought certainly could not be coming from my mild mannered baby...

I was wrong.

It definitely was Logan. She was not having any of that nursery junk. We're hoping for a better result next week.

A Few Captions

While on our incredibly long car trip (everything seems longer while in the car with a baby), Logan has been keeping entertained with the Little Einsteins. It is amazing to watch her while it's on because she is so intensely focused and entertained (she laughs at them and talks to them). If you look really closely at the picture, you'll notice that she likes to hold onto the DVD player with her little toes. Those definitely come from her daddy!

At dinner tonight, Logan grabbed my water glass and went to town! When Mike grabbed the camera to capture the moment, Lo gave him this "I know what I'm doing, you can put that camera away." look.

She's such a sweetie!

Great Food, Great Friends

When we lived in Tallahassee, Mike and I had the daunting task of finding a couple to take us through pre-marital counseling. We knew so many wonderful men and women who would have done the job more than justice. We talked and prayed over the decision and in the end went with the couple we felt most connected to together. Lori and Jodie did SUCH a great job, we definitely felt God's blessing over our choice. We had such an open line of communication with them and felt like we came out of our 8 weeks of meeting with a much stronger understanding of the marriage relationship. Our time with them has definitely shown up in our marriage (especially lately, with the addition of our little one) and we feel healthier as a couple for it. I also babysat for them throughout the four years I lived there. I had a really fun connection with their three kids and was so sad to leave them.

We were so excited when we realized that we'd be passing through Tallahassee and would get the chance to meet up with them! The two can cook up quite a storm, so when they invited us over for dinner, we knew we were in for a treat. We got there and it was like we picked up right where we left off (only their kids were a bit older and we had one of our own). Their girls, Katherine and Gracie helped us out by entertaining Lo while we were there.

I remember when Gracie (right) was Logan's age!

They were such great helpers, it gave us all a chance to catch up while Logan was having fun with the big girls.

The girls were so gentle and it was so neat to see them loving on our baby.

Aren't they cute?!

While Lori and I hung out and caught up, Mike, Jodie and their little boy, Austin played Rock Band. Needless to say, the food was incredible and the company was even better. We can't wait to see them again!

Mommy's Alma Mater

Our mini family vacation is about to come to an end. We're on our way up to Wake Forest, NC, and decided that we'd go ahead and take advantage of the trip up and stop and visit a few places. We started with my grandparents and moved on to Disney and finished up in Tallahassee.

Tallahassee holds a special place in our hearts. We loved spending our first year as a married couple there. We got to know some very special people and really made some wonderful memories while there. It was such a treat to be able to bring our sweet girl and show her around such a fun place. And of course, we had to make a stop at Florida State to show her where mommy went to school and to get her some little 'nole gear.

No kidding, it feels like just yesterday I was a senior in high school and standing in this same spot in front of the stadium trying to decide if I could see myself going to football games in the fall.

F-L-O-R-I-D-A S-T-A-T-E

Florida State, Florida State, Florida State, WOOO!

(I LOVE this picture!)

Logan Meets The Mouse

Today we took Logan to meet Mickey at Disney's Hollywood Studios. I was a little apprehensive because:

A. We've never taken Logan on an all day outing where she has no chance of a long morning/afternoon nap.

B. It was a mostly outdoor outing, which we also have not done.

C. I was a little nervous that the characters might scare her.

However, she was a champ! We totally killed her schedule today but she didn't have any major meltdowns and she just talked and giggled the day away. Now, many of you may not know this, but this was not Lo's first trip to Disney. This was:

Yes, her first trip to disney was while she was still cooking. This WAS her first trip that she could really enjoy. She had such a great time. I'll stop writing and let you see what I'm talking about.

I'm going to meet the mouse today!

I'm all ready to go!

We're finally here and ready for fun.

Meeting Mickey for the first time.

Meeting the Incredibles.

Disney does it right for nursing mamas. They have a really nice station where you can go and sit and nurse in private with rocking chairs and dim lights and a tv for the little ones to watch. Here she is hanging out in the nursing station.

Getting ready to for the playhouse Disney show.

Logan loves the Little Einstein kids.

She was completely enthralled with the show.

She danced and played along with them.

Tigger and Pooh were there too!

She met Handy Manny.

Not quite sure what to think about this guy holding her hand.

But after a while, she didn't want to let go.

Then she met June, a Little Einstein character.

June had fun with Logan, too. Logan was absolutely fascinated with her.

After meeting the Playhouse characters we headed off to lunch.

Where Logan passed out.

Until I put the first bite of food into my mouth. Then she was wide awake.

Later in the afternoon we went to ride the new Toy Story attraction. Logan loved looking at all of the different decorations on the way in. We felt like we were inside of a giant toy box. Here she is with Rachael, my college roommate.

And with daddy, the birthday boy!

We had dinner at Hollywood and Vine, our favorite restaurant at the park and were shocked at how empty it was. Usually we have to wait to be seated (even with reservations) but we showed up early and got right in and were probably one of only 6 tables with people at them. Logan sat in a high chair for the very first time and loved it!

These are our Disney friends, Rachael and her husband, Drew. Mike and I have been going to Disney with them at least once a year for the last 3 years and we have such a great time. It's going to be so strange living outside of Florida and not just being a hop, skip and jump away from them.

I love Disney mommy and daddy, let's come back when I can remember what I saw.

Passed out at the end of the day.

We wanted to get Logan a nice keepsake to have in the future. I know, now that I have one of these I'm going to have to get one for each subsequent child that we have. This is why we picked something relatively inexpensive and useful. I'm sure we'll get years of use from it and will enjoy adding to the collection as we add to our family.

I can't end this post without giving some credit to a few creative geniuses. The adorable pillowcase dress with the Minnie and Mickey heads was made by Marci, she does incredible things with a sewing machine. I got so many comments on Logan's dress, I can't wait to put her in it again. The big Minnie bow was made by my sweet friend Shannon, she also does some crazy wonderful things and we love her work! She has definitely been my inspiration with the bow making. Thank you, ladies, for making Logan's Disney wardrobe so cute and special!