We've had a busy week without much time to post, but we've had a lot of Halloween fun! Here is a link to an album of the events we've done so far- Vivi and Amira, the Zoo Boo, and carving our pumpkin. We'll add more to it after all the trick or treat fun tonight!
To get to the link, click the picture below.
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| Jenavieve's First Halloween |
We got Vivi and Amira together for a Halloween photo shoot. Amira wasn't too fond of her legs being trapped in a bunting but they had fun for a few minutes.
Adam and Amy gave Jenavieve some of their old baby toys. It is fun to see them again, I remember playing with most of them when they were babies. We're bringing them out slowly as part of our rotation, but yesterday we pulled out the little piano, and she LOVED it! She went nuts banging on it for 5 minutes straight, then she started banging on it a few times, then throwing her hands in the air.
We started getting questions about what Jenavieve might like for the holidays, and my first thought was "you're thinking about that already?? It isn't even Halloween yet!" But, there are only 65 days until Christmas, and Hanukkah is early this year, so some of you are just good planners!
PLEASE don't think we're asking anyone to get her any gifts! We are so blessed to have everything we need, and feel a little tacky asking for more. We have just had questions about what she might like, especially since we're doing things a little differently from most parents, so here are some suggestions:
We are incorporating a lot of Montessori's theories into raising Jenavieve, which includes trying to stay away from plastic as much as we can, opting for more beautiful wood options when possible, and avoiding anything that uses batteries. We are also not using plastic dishes or cups for her. I'll do another post about our thoughts on that later.
She is still in 0-3 month clothes...and has been in this size for so long that we have quite a collection of 3-6 month clothes waiting for her. We don't have much in any bigger sizes though if you enjoy buying cute little girl clothes. She can't wear pajamas with footies because her feet are so long. Footless ones can be found at BabyGap, Old Navy, and Babies R Us that we've found so far. She wears size 2 shoes.
I'm definitely still learning, I haven't perfected any of the styles yet, but I'm enjoying trying new things. It would help if she stopped rubbing all the hair off the back of her head so I could do more with it! Just when I thought it was going to start growing back now that she is sitting unassisted for long periods of time, she figured out how to dig her heels into the floor and push herself backwards when she's lying on her back.
We wanted to wait until Jenavieve was 6 months old to start her on solid foods, especially since she was getting breastmilk exclusively. She started showing an interest in eating our food, but we tried to hold off. Then we lost our donors because there is a sick baby in the area who can't have formula at all, so we're back to formula, and Vivi has been hungry non-stop and pulling food off of our plates. So, we decided 5 months and a week was long enough.
I made applesauce from the apples we picked at Long's, put some in the fridge and put the rest in ice cube trays to freeze it, then in labeled bags in the freezer so I can just reach in and grab a cube or 2 for the day.
After the initial shock of finding that there was actually flavor on the spoon, she enjoyed the apples. She looks suspicious in both of these pictures, and much more excited in the next 2 :)
She enjoyed it even more when she got to hold the spoon herself.
I also baked and froze some squash, and she tried that for the first time today. She really liked it! She kept getting mad when her spoon was empty and banging it on the tray, it was very cute.
She's really enjoying eating, and is still hungry all the time, so tonight I put some uncooked brown rice in the Magic Bullet and in the morning we'll cook it and see if getting some whole grains into her fills her up.
Miss independent has also started holding her own bottle. She gets very excited when we make it for her, and reaches her hands out to grab it and bring it to her mouth.
I've been having trouble getting the layout right lately, so instead of throwing my computer out the window, I'm just putting all the captions on the top and all the pictures at the bottom :)
We went to the mall with my mom to do a little shopping. We met Geoffrey the Giraffe outside of the Toys R Us store, and Vivi couldn't take her eyes off him. Between the red shirt and the giant giraffe inside the mall, he was quite interesting.
Vivi has been trying to tell us that she's ready for solids, and on this day, she told us she was ready by grabbing a handful of fries and trying to shove them in her mouth.
Then, she decided she needed a purse, as all ladies do. She shopped until she dropped (while still holding her purse).
We were on vacation on Vivi's 5 month birthday, so we're a couple of days late. Here is our little 5 month old...wearing a newborn onesie and 0-3 month jeans. The jeans are getting short on her though!
My friend Michelle sent me the link to the youtube channel she used to learn how to do things to her daughter's hair, and still uses for inspiration. I watched a few videos, and started experimenting. Vivi's hair is getting too long and unruly to be just left out, and I wanted to do more than just pigtails. In this picture, she has pigtails with 3 twists in each one. I don't have all the tools I need quite yet, but I'm enjoying working with what I have.
