Karly Stats and Pics

At 9 months, Karly is:

16 lbs, 6 oz (10%)

27 3/4 in (56%)

17.4 in. head (56%)

So, she's skinny. And she's anemic. Is anyone in my family surprised by that? (we're pretty much all anemic - thanks mom! :) ). Otherwise, she's a healthy and happy baby.

Oh, I have to brag for a sec (I'm a mom so I get to do that, right?). At her dr. appt., when the doctor was checking her, she didn't get upset. She just kind of looked at him and only kind of whined when he put the stethoscope on her chest. He was pretty surprised at how calm she was and said most babies just cry the whole time because of stranger anxiety. She really doesn't have that (is that good or bad?).

And since you probably don't care about all that, here are the pictures:

She's a little climber. Wonderful.

She also sometimes pushes her laundry basket around and walks with it (like a walker). She figured out she could push it up to the TV stand and climb on it, as well as the table and be able to see over the top.

She's not allowed to play with her laundry basket anymore.

(I'm not going to apologize for my baby talk voice. It's sound stupid, but who doesn't talk like that to babies?)

She picked up on this game pretty fast and does it all the time now.

She claps every time Nate walks in the door after work. It's hilarious.

Do you ever...

have one of those nights, right before you go grocery shopping that your house is practically devoid of food?

I did.

I had ingredients for several different things, but there was always a crucial element missing: tomato sauce, bread, etc.

So, I got on the wonderful allrecipes.com and went to the ingredient search. All I put in was "ground beef."

This is what came out of that:

Yeah, I know what it looks like. You don't have to tell me. And yes, that is hashed browns underneath. No pasta.

It actually didn't taste as bad as it looks. A little salty, actually. Nate ate almost all of it, though I can tell how much (or little) he likes something based on how much he drinks while eating.

We did have an interesting conversation though:

Nate: (picking up the place) This is heavy.

Alisa: (no response. I just laughed.)

A few bites in

Alisa: How is it?

Nate: It's not the worst thing you've ever made, but I wouldn't request it again.

I love it. He's so tactful.

Well, I'm off to get a Tums.

9 Months - way too close to a year!

As always, here are the monkey pictures:

I love the one below because this is how she looks at me when she's on the floor looking up (especially when she's tired). Love the slouchy look.

My little Buddha baby.
And look at the hair! It's getting long and thick and, when I put lotion in it, CURLY!
And some other random pictures and tidbits about the girl:

This girl LOVES anything electronic (don't all babies?); cords, cell phones, computers, etc. If I don't keep her away, she loves to play under here (I finally put a box in the way, so she can't - see my ER post for more details of why...)

Socks. I think that will be her first word, because I am always saying it. Because she is ALWAYS pulling her socks off and eating them. I don't get it. She's ruined several with those little teeth of hers (she has 3 now!).
She loves playing by the door. One day, when she was quite tired, she was yelling at the door hinge. Yeah. Strange kid. :)
This is her Valentine's Day outfit from Grandma Frakes, so we wanted to show it off.

And her cute face. I love this face, with those little cheeks sticking out. SO CUTE!
Man, I love that girl!

Other updates:

-She is getting better at sleeping through the night. She has started to go to bed sometimes as early as 8:30 (Wa-hoo!) and sleeps until usually 7:30, waking up at 6 to eat and sometimes once earlier in the night. But definitely longer lengths of sleep. Wonderful.

-This girl has attitude. When she's eating, she likes to throw things off her high chair. She'll hold it over the edge and look at me like "I'm gonna drop it - what are ya gonna do about it?" And she does drop it.

-She loves the bathroom, I think because she knows it's off limits. We have to ALWAYS keep the door closed and if we forget, she makes a bee-line for the room. (Again, see ER post - BAH).

-For awhile she stopped giving kisses, but she's baa-aaack. She will just give kisses over and over and over!

-She is chatty! Almost always babbling, which is so cute!

-She has perfected the arch-the-back-and-lift-the-arms-so-they-can't-pick-me-up technique. We hate it.

Wow, there are so many more things I could post about! She's so fun to have around and always coming up with new things to make us laugh.

Not the way I wanted to spend my Tuesday

I'm not a bad mom.

I try really hard to take care of my daughter.

But sometimes when I only get 4 hours of sleep at night, I am really tired in the morning, even if she's wide awake.

So sometimes, I fall asleep on the couch while she plays. Our house is mostly baby proofed, so there's really not much she can get into that can cause major problems.

Except the bathroom. So I try to keep the door closed. However, sometimes it gets left open and Karly loves to play in there. This particular morning, the door was open and I was exhausted. I usually only fall asleep for a few minutes, then wake myself back up or Karly wakes me. When I did finally wake up, I saw that she had gotten into some drawers we have on the floor.

She had pulled out my nail buffer as well as some Tylenol we had in a baggie. She has something in her mouth too. Any guess what?

So I got the dang Tylenol out of her mouth and picked all the other ones up. I called her doctor's office to ask if I needed to do anything (I didn't know what to do if your child sucks on Tylenol). They said to call Poison Control (POISON CONTROL?! It's that bad?!). So I called PC and they made me feel like an idiot.

"Did she only eat the one? Are you sure? How long did you leave her alone?"

Yes, I'm an idiot. Yes, I actually put them on the floor for her to suck on. Hello!? Anyway... he said if she ate more than 5, I'd need to take her to the ER, they would draw some blood and check to see if they needed to either pump her stomach or give her the "antidote" for Tylenol. He said it was up to me: if I didn't think she ate more than 5, then not to worry. BUT if she ate more than that, it's toxic, it would kill her liver and eventually her. Oh great.

So we decided I should take her to the ER. I don't think she ate more than that one (and she only sucked on it), but I'd rather be safe than sorry, you know? So off to the ER we went.

It was loads of fun sitting in the ER for over 2 hours with a 9 month old who won't hold still for anything. And even more fun to watch them stick a needle in her arm and miss her vein and wiggle it around and still not get much blood, so they just squeezed it out of the hole they made. Awesome.

Anyway, results came back and she was only at a 3 (toxic levels are 12, so she wasn't even close).

The doctor was really nice about the whole thing. He said it happens to lots of people - his son climbed on the changing table and ate Desitin, so that made me feel better. He said to go home and get down on my hands and knees and just make sure it's all baby proofed. No cords accessible, no chemicals or medicines, etc. I did. There is now almost nothing in our bathroom. :)

Overall, not the best day, but it definitely taught me to be more careful and keep doors closed and stay awake while she is up.

...That's probably a given.

Best Birthday Gift Ever

Fitting into my skinny jeans (the ones I almost threw away in despair because I thought they would never fit again)!

They fit.

Oh, they fit.

This is in no way offence to those wonderful birthday gifts I got from my parents, my in-laws and my husband (all of which I have already opened...it's not even my birthday yet.... But seriously. I. love. these. jeans.