Author: magrilless

Our mission to plump up Tessa is succeeding! According to our bathroom scale, at least, she is up to almost fourteen and a half pounds. Her follow-up appointment is next Friday, so we can be accurate about things then. And while we’re there I intend to ask about the fact that she poops at least 3 times a day. Seriously. She’s filling out and bulking up; but three dirty diapers?! A few days ago she broke a record with five. Yikes. She continues to like food and want to eat, so we continue to feed her. No allergies or reactions or real dislikes yet, either. She’s so agreeable!

Tess is going through a time of frustration though. It may be exacerbated by the two teeth coming in, but she’s becoming increasingly frustrated by not being able to be independent, I think. She wants to stand all the time. She does not want to just sit around anymore, and certainly doesn’t want to be carried around very much either. Working on crawling is ok, still by throwing a toy out of reach and then walking her arms in front of her until her bottom is barely off the ground. But cruising along using the couch or her crib rail or a bookshelf is much more her cup of tea lately. Yesterday she started a new game which involves taking a toy up to the couch while standing at it; throwing the toy on the ground; trying to sit down to get the toy; screaming about either the hard landing or having assistance with a softer approach; standing up with the toy at the couch again. Repeat. A lot. Maybe she’ll skip the crawling part for awhile and just move right on to walking. But she’ll have to toughen up a little first; there are going to be a lot of bumps before she can do it perfectly. How do you explain that to a ten-month-old?

What I didn’t expect to do today:

I know I skipped a week. Well, there was a reason. It involved a baby with a cold and three (possibly four) (or possibly none) new teeth making their way down. And then everyone else getting the cold and a fender bender and garden emergencies (hail storms and a hard freeze already!) and just daily life, like birthday parties at the fire station (how many babies get to drive a fire engine?). So, we are all on the mend (except the garden which is dead) and back to normal hecticness.

Tessa is eating like a champ. Of course. Since everything she does is of champion quality. She’ll eat yogurt with fruit in it, can chew apple pieces softened in the microwave for a few seconds, loves egg yolks, bread, cheese, peas, avocados, cous cous, berries, and bananas. And anything else she’s tried. In the past two weeks she has gained about 1.5 pounds, which I think is good progress. She is also consequently pooping two or three times a day.

She loves to stand up on her own at her crib, and will take steps all the way from the living room to her room. She gets so proud of herself when she does these things. It’s very sweet. She’s starting to get her bottom off the ground when she walks her hands out in front of her, so crawling is a coming attraction. And she kind of has a first word: dog. When she sees a canine, she’ll point and say “dah”. She met a chihuahua for the first time tonight and it took her about an hour to be convinced, but by the end of the evening, that animal too was a “dah”. And high-fiving is pretty funny to her.

If all goes according to plan, you will soon see a slight change in our blog. To earn a little extra pocket money, we have added advertisements to our posts. I know, I know. Yuck. Hopefully they won’t be distracting or too garish or nauseating to handle. If they are, we can always go back to the good old days of pure blog content. In the meantime, we’re going to try this experiment. Just so you know, the way these ads make us any mad money is when people click on them. Soooooo, if you want to donate a penny or two to us, read an entry, then click on an ad. You don’t have to buy anything or sign up for anything or sell your soul to anyone; just a click’ll do it. If you want. Otherwise, just ignore it and carry on. We’ll see how this goes!

This is Tessa’s most favorite noise to make. It’s very conversational, I think. And surprisingly difficult! We’ve all been practicing for awhile now and can talk back to her in her own language. She seems to enjoy hearing the grown-ups make such a nonsense noise, and then she can carry on the serious conversation she began.

And as promised, here’s a doctor visit update. Tess is hitting all her developmental milestones right on. For instance today, since she is now 9 months old, she pulled herself up to standing while holding on to an immovable object (her crib)! Those two top teeth have come down now and so she’s a four-toothed baby, exactly 3 months after the first two came in. She’s still working on the crawling thing, but she’s doing all the right stuff for her age. She is, however, tiny! She’s off the charts on the small end (except her head which is in the 45th percentile for girth). While we know petiteness runs in the families for ladies, we’ve also discovered that she will eat a lot more than what we were feeding her previously. Tessa, the silly child, is so complacent and easy-going, she apparently won’t tell us when she’s hungry. “I could eat more. Oh, but there’s nothing else on my plate. Okay, that’s fine. I don’t have to eat more. How about a hug?” Commence operation Bulk Up Tessa. This week I’ve been giving her extra servings at breakfast, lunch, and dinner; and she’s also getting two new snacks in between meals and naps. Plus nursing four times a day still. That seems to me like a lot of extra food all of a sudden, and shouldn’t this be affecting her (tummy size, bowels, spitting-up, etc.)? But no. She just keeps opening her mouth for each extra bite and goes along the same way she’s always gone along. A wonder. We’ll go back in a month and measure her again to see if we can declare Mission Accomplished. In any case, she’s enjoying the experiment!