now arriving......

tooth #2 should be in any day now!......the floodgates of drool are open once again along with another round of sniffles/runny nose.......stay tuned!......

solo stander......

this morning casey was playing at her musical table thingy when she bent down (while holding onto the table with one hand), grabbed a toy off the floor, stood back up, and played with the toy with both hands for like 10 seconds at least......no holding on or leaning onto anything.......yay!......

loving christmas......

casey had a great 1st christmas......breakfast over my grandparents' house and dinner at steve's brother's house.......lots of family, lots of food, good gifts.....all of us were exhausted by the end of the day, but that just means it was a good day, right?......

casey didn't quite get the unwrapping of the gifts part, but she was content playing with the wrapped boxes until someone opened them for her......then she had a blast playing with all her new stuff......among the highlights were a fun musical caterpillar (in picture), nesting cups, a play table thingy that flashes, talks, and sings in english and spanish, and a cute pair of sneakers.......

so a couple updates on all-things-casey.......first, she's not so excited about baby jar veggies anymore......she's all about eating her little baby puffs and cereal with fruit, but she's snubbing sweet potatoes and her favorite, carrots!......i'm surprised by this turn of events......hopefully she'll go back to loving all food soon!......secondly, casey's super close to standing unassisted.......she's a pro at pulling herself up and standing while holding on with one hand to something.......but lately she's been able to balance herself unassisted for about 5 seconds or so before she plops down.......she's almost there!.......and thirdly, casey's been a champ at napping lately......in her crib for two 90-min+ naps a day.......she's actually sleeping a lot these days!......

i caved......

so i didn't want to do it.......i didn't want to wait in line for hours and shell out $25 for two lame-ass 5x7 pictures of casey with some guy dressed as santa at the mall.......but i caved........my mother really wanted it......steve didn't really care either way.......and i guess there was some tiny iota of me that bought into the whole tradition in our society of doing it......i mean, if i changed my mind years from now to thinking it's the greatest tradition ever would i regret not doing it?.......she's only going to have one 1st christmas, so i bit the bullet and decided to do it.......

there wasn't ANYONE in line when we showed up so no time for me to change my mind......"santa" was less than psyched to see us though even having had a little break.......he was really not jolly at all - just seemed like a tired old guy counting the minutes till he got off work.......which i can on one hand understand because it was 7:30 at night and i'm sure he had had a full day of screaming, whining kids........but on the other hand, clearly this is casey's first christmas and her first christmas picture experience for us - we're shelling out $25 to have her picture taken with you so try to be a little more cheerful will you??........but casey was oblivious to his unenthusiastic personality and was totally in awe of him and grinned from ear to ear (what else is new!) for her picture.......at least she didn't freak out like you hear some babies do........

so i caved......and i'm ok with it........

xmas eve ruminations.......

i really like getting gifts for people.......remembering those little times during the year that they mentioned in passing things they'd like, but forget they told you and are surprised you remembered when they open their gifts on xmas......i sometimes think those people who have a hard time finding gifts for people just aren't listening hard enough.......because it's harder to buy something for someone you don't talk to as regularly as those you are closer to.......it's because you know what's important in their life......you just need to listen......that's my opinion anyway......

while i do enjoy the gift giving, every year somewhere along the line you get caught up in the franticness of it all........the "only X number of shopping days left till xmas" ness.......when you lose sight of what's important and start considering buying those stupid gadgets on endcaps at cvs.......like a flashing toenail clipper with a red sox emblem on it that's a bottle opener too.......

but let's try not to forget that it's not about the gifts........at all really........i mean you can't realistically show up on xmas morning without anything for your family and friends to open, but you get so wrapped up in buying buying buying that you forget what the day's really about.......it's a celebration of jesus' birthday......and about his teachings of love one another and be nice to one another and take care of one another........you don't need to have a religious bone in your body to follow that advice........it's hard to do.......much harder than just picking up a gift certificate at the mall........but that's what the day's about........next year i'll try to remember all that before i'm reminded of it at xmas eve mass.......because as with every year i got sucked into the marketing side of xmas and i don't think i took enough time to love one another, be nice to one another, and take care of one another this holiday season........

ahhh.....

as a follow up to my last post, she's asleep.......finally.......ahhh.......

screeching......

ug, how i hate that screeching........those sounds that are definitely well beyond screams that sound like she's deathly frightened of something and i don't know what it is but i can't calm her down.......she's clearly wicked tired but literally is so scared of something she is no where near close to falling asleep.......the farbers method is totally worth crap at this point......she goes ballistic every time she even goes into her room.......she's in her crib and literally been screaming her head off to the point that she's hacking stuff up for the last 8 minutes......she's not even close to calming down.......ug.......i can't wait till tonight's over......

sitting, part two......

so casey finally has learned how to sit, again.......for the past two weeks or so she's been pulling herself up on everything but once she's up she realizes she doesn't know how to get down, and freaks out.......which has wreaked havoc on our neat, structured little naptime schedule in her crib.......she'd be tired, but not tired enough not to climb up her crib sides and get stuck, over and over again......and the "i'm scared" cry takes way longer to calm her down after than a normal "i'm tired" cry......so naptimes lately have been in my lap......which is good for catching up on tv time, but not good for the household errands that have been building up.......luckily it hadn't carried over to bedtime which has still been going ok - well up until last night, but i'm hoping that was a fluke.......but anyway, today she climbed up our dining room chair and after a while, stuck out her butt and very hesitantly dropped to her butt........she did it a couple more times after that.......it was awesome.......i was so excited that i actually cheered for her.......clapping and all.......this is definitely something she needs to learn soon because she really does get scared up there......and i hadn't wanted to keep helping her down - figured she'd never learn to do it herself that way.......so yay!......

ridin' like a big girl......

yesterday casey rode in the kid seat part of shopping cart at the grocery store (without her carseat) for the first time.......and like a dorky mom, i took a picture!......

multiple bms???

ok so i'm sure this is way too much info for the non-moms reading this, but all of a sudden casey's doing like 2 or 3 poops a day.......wtf????......is this normal??.......

mamamama......

yay!......i heard 'mama' for the first time today!.......ok, so it was in a stream of 'mamamama' but still.......neat!......