The Spaghetti Incident

Before I begin today's post, I want to take a moment and remember Gina Rogers. This past weekend Rachel lost her Great-Grandma. In her memory, I want to repost a recent picture of her. She will be greatly missed.

We're all going to miss this lady very VERY much.

Recently I've been trying to give Rachel "people" food as often as I can. One night I was exhausted and just wanted to eat my dinner when it dawned on me that I could keep Rachel entertained while I ate by letting her eat. Since my "spaghetti" isn't really marinara sauce, but something MUCH more plain, I opted to let her try it. Here's what happened:

She looked a little apprehensive....

But was eager to put her little hands in whatever it was mommy had placed before her.

The final result? A happy and fithly baby! I think she ate a little bit of it...most of it I found below the tray on her tummy. Ah! So cute!

Rachel has become absolutely adorable. Yes, I'm biased....but I have MANY others who aren't biased and will come up to me and tell me so. For example....here she is as we waited for GramE a few weekends ago:

Her sleeping habits have also made me giggle. MANY mornings recently I'll check her out on the monitor and I can see that she's on her tummy with her butt in the air. I have no idea HOW that is comfortable, but that's how she sleeps! And she's starting to be able to fall asleep on her own a little bit better. Not always, but it is improving. However, I'll hear all this shuffling on the montior and turn it on to see her rolling around the crib. There are times it almost seems like she's circling the way a dog would before it lays down. She makes her rounds around the crib and never seems to wind up in the same spot twice. It's like she has to find that "comfortable" position before she can fall asleep.

Other little things she's doing....She has started to say "Mamamamama". And when she does, it can mean one of several things:
1. Mom (me)
2. Any toy in site
3. Pick me up
4. I'm unhappy
5. I'm happy
6. Babble

It's all in her tone and the direction she "speaks". One night we Skyped with Jason and she did say "Dadadada!!!"

Yesterday we were playing in her play area and I introduced her to a new toy. It's a drum by Leap Frog and when you bang on it, it'll say a letter of the alphabet and it also plays music. If you don't touch the toy for about a minute or two, it'll say "Bye bye!" and shut off. The drum did this and Rachel said "Bye...." Ahhhh!!! She's so close to talking! So I've tried really hard to talk slowly and repeat everything I say as many times as I can stand.

Rachel still loves jewelry and anything sparkly. She also loves to find the tiniest of lint or debris on the floor and explore it.

A new thing she's doing, and this is perfectly normal, is squinting. She'll think about something (or at least it looks like she is) and she'll squit a bit while she does it. Last night she kept putting her forehead to mine to see me really close up and she'd giggle as she did so.

She adores books. She'll sit in my lap and we'll read a short book, then she'll pick it up and try to turn the pages herself. We've received so many books that are full of colors and she loves to look at them.

With regularity, although not consistency, she'll wave "hi" and "bye". Sometimes she'll wave for no reason, and other times she'll "wave" by just holding up her hand out in front of her or above her head.

She's also FINALLY clapping her hands! I'm not sure why she wouldn't do that before. She would bang toys together, or hold her hands together, but she just wouldn't clap! Now she does, just for fun.

Another favorite thing for her to do is raspberries. She'll also mimic you if you cough, laugh, raspberry or go "fffffff".

I've noticed that if I just set her in her play area and walk away, she'll get upset. However, if I get into the play area with her, let her find a toy and start exploring and then get out, she doesn't seem to mind as much. And she'll be in there being busy as can be by herself for about 30 minutes before she starts to get lonely and will whine to see another person.

She is walking by holding on to things and absolutely LOVES the freedom to go where she pleases....to a point.

When she gets excited about something and I'm holding her, she'll kick her feet and inhale loudly. It's a noise she made as a newborn that used to freak me out as I thought she couldn't breathe. I'm still not fond of the noise, but I have learned it means "yay" not "I'm choking!"

I also snapped a picture of her recently wearing this awesome hat I found at a garage sale:

Anything on her head she thinks is a form of "Peek-A-Boo" and must be removed immediately. So I can't keep hats on her head. But I love this one and was so happy to get a picture of her wearing it. Ahhh! She's so cute!

Before I close, I have to share this picture of Rachel (I can't remember if I already have or not)....but her Day Care director sent me this of Rachel finger painting:

The picture turned out really well. But could this kid be less enthused about finger painting? They took two of her and in both of them she's scowling. Ha!!

Travels

This kid's been a travelin'. We'll go back to a few weekends ago when we met up with Rachel's Terry Grandparents in Louisville. Geri and I took her to the Kentucky State Fair while the guys went to see a movie. Here's some of the festivities....

I love this picture. I'm caught with a goofy look and Rachel's caught trying to eat my straw. This is worth to be submitted to "Awkward Family Photos"!

Check out the size of that goose. It's HUGE!!!

Doesn't it look like that goat is enjoying Rachel petting it?! Truthfully, this was just a candid and awesome shot that Geri captured. Truth is, the goat was less than happy about Rachel petting it.

Rachel's not in this photo, but I had to share. For obvious reasons.

Yup. We decided to allow Rachel to experience a "freak" show. Literally. Sadly, not as creepy as I thought it would be. But it was creepy!

Once we left the fair Rachel went on to spend the week with Grandma Terry. I think she had a good time....

Then last weekend after Jason left for the Middle East Rachel and I hopped in the car and headed to Evansville, just us girls. On Monday we headed to Holiday World!!

She helped me decide where we should start.

Perhaps it's more exhausting than one would think to be pushed around in a stroller....

We could not pull her away from Holidog for some reason...


It was a wonderful weekend! Now we're both home and doing great trying to keep ourselves entertained.

Some other milestones she's been working on....

Crawling is now second nature. She's pretty adept about getting around easily.
Walking is probably her next  big step. She can hang on to the furniture and move around very easily.
Talking is also fun for her. Right now her phrases consists of raspberries, Ma ma, Ba ba, Da da. I haven't quite decided when she says "Ma ma" if she actually is referring to me. Sometimes she'll say "Ma ma" then look at me, but I can't tell for certain if she's put a meaning to her babble yet. If not, she's darn close!

She's starting to give "kisses".....which are actually her opening her mouth really wide, sticking her lips on you, then she'll stick out her tongue and lick you. Sounds gross, but at this age it's actually cute. Whenever she sees herself in a mirror, she'll "kiss" herself. Sadly, it's adorable!!!