Four Months

The Latest Developments

Julia turned 4 months old last Friday! We can't believe how much she has changed in the past month. She now rolls over easily, smiles and laughs, and "talks" a lot. She also wants to grab and put just about everything into her mouth, so nothing is safe. Her new favorite sound to make, as of two days ago, is motorboat sounds. Unfortunately, that sound is also accompanied by a lot of spittle being sprayed, so even though it's pretty darn cute, we're not loving this phase.

Her favorite thing to stick in her mouth is her FEET! It looks like she is doing a lot of complicated yoga or Pilates moves the way she extends her legs up into the air and then puts the feet into her mouth. Good thing she has clean feet! Here she is with one foot in the mouth and other foot off to the side. It's really amazing how flexible babies are and how they seem to think that an appendage is as much fun to play with as a toy.

Baptism

A few weeks ago, we went to Michigan to have Julia baptized. I drove with Julia and Tom flew because he had to be back for work on Monday, so it was Julia's first car ride of more than an hour. The trip to Michigan went pretty well, with a pitstop in Milwaukee to visit some of my former co-workers, but the road back was not as smooth. She was fine most of the way but the last 1/2 hour, she screamed bloody murder. Then the dog, who was with me for the return journey from Michigan, having ridden out with Tom's parents, started whimpering and whining because we were close to home. So I had been driving for 12 hours and I had a screaming baby and a crying dog and I had to laugh because if I didn't, I probably would have started crying myself.

After the baptism, my mom threw a big brunch at her house and invited a lot of folks over to meet Julia. My mom had not seen Julia since she was three days old, and my dad had never seen her. It was a lot of fun, despite the hot and rainy weather. For the baptism, we had to decorate a candle with small pieces of wax that you can shape into words or symbols to personalize it. I decided to make a dove, which sounds a lot easier than it was. It was so warm out (and my mom doesn't have central A/C) that I couldn't work with the wax very well, and despite putting it into the freezer every few minutes to firm it up so I could cut it, I ended up with a dove that looks more like a marshmallow Peep than anything else.

For the service, Julia wore her great-grandfather's baptismal gown, which was worn by Tom's grandpa when he was christened in 1915! It is a beautiful cotton gown and I was just hoping we would get through the service with no diaper-filling. We paired with some very cute satin and lace booties that we received at a baby shower in April. Of course, the baptism was about much more important things that what she wore and we were thrilled to have so many members of both families there to participate in the service. It was also special to have such an old gown with meaning that other family members have used for the same occasion.

Sleep (Most of the Time)

Julia has begun sleeping more, although there is nothing approaching what we could call a pattern. It is still very unpredictable, and she may sleep well one night, getting up only once, only to wake three times the next night. I have learned that I must go to bed as soon as I can after she goes down. We tried cloth diapers exclusively last weekend, but that seemed to trigger much more frequent waking, so we had to revert to disposables at night for now. Regardless of her sleeping patterns, she is definitely a morning person, and there is no better way to start your day than a smiling, laughing, squealing baby who is just happy to see you.

Summer Outings

We went to the farmer's market here last Saturday, which proved to be a big outing for our little girl. She was pretty tired after rolling to and from. We bought fresh blueberries and used them to make blueberry pancakes the next morning--YUM!! There is nothing better than in-season produce, and since our garden doesn't produce too many fruit items, it's nice to buy berries and herbs from the market. Of course, the way things are going with our tomatoes this year, we may not see many vegetables, either. For some reason, they are spindly and pretty pathetic looking. Normally our tomatoes are big, bushy, and quite abundant. This year, I don't know if we'll get enough to can salsa and pasta sauce like we did last year. Our green beans are going like gangbusters and our peppers are coming in pretty nicely. The Brussels sprouts are also finally showing signs of the little green buggers, so we'll have to see how those taste straight out of the garden.

Healthy and Happy Baby

We just had Julia's 4 month well baby doctor visit, and she is, as we suspected, tending toward the larger end of the baby size spectrum. At this rate, we are going to be solidly in 9-month-sized clothes by the time she is 6 months old. She fits into most 6-month clothes as of a few weeks ago, so we have no idea what to expect moving forward.

She is obsessed with Murhpy, our dog, who is mostly black and white. We went to Ikea to buy a high chair last weekend, and while going through the kids' section, I was showing her various stuffed animals. There was a bulldog and a few other animals, but when I held a black and white stuffed dog in front of her, she immediately screamed with delight and pulled it toward herself. After a paw went into her mouth, I figured we pretty much had to buy it.

It's hard to believe how when she was a little tiny baby, she couldn't control many movements at all and now she is thinking about crawling. I'm sure that's still a few months off, but she's definitely on the right track!

Just in case you were wondering, Tom and I took most of the pictures in the blog. The one on this entry that looks like she is wearing a cloth diaper on her head is because she is wearing a cloth diaper on her head. We went out for a walk, and I thought it was cloudy enough to not need a hat. After getting outside, however, it seemed brighter, so I grabbed the burp cloth I brought along and it became a temporary hat. It's also awesome to be able to put her in the Baby Bjorn, which makes taking walks a lot more fun. Now that she is strong enough to face forward, she can take in all of the sights on our walks, which she loves.

Otherwise, there is not too much to report from this end. She is happy most of the time, and we wonder what we did to deserve such a good baby. I'm sure we'll have more rocky times ahead with teething, etc., but for now, we're enjoying the ride.