Saturday, September 29, 2012

5 Months- September

Harper is five months old!!  
What a big girl!
Reminiscent of Gavin's 5-month neck tie photo shoot, we thought we'd do a little pearls and tutu.
 
  Would anyone ever guess that these kids are siblings?!  Um.  Yes.

Harper is now taller, fatter, cuter, louder, grabbier, rollier, funner and all-together more Harpie-er. 

Harper loves to play in her exersaucer, listen to noises that she can make when she scratches things or  plays with noisy things, and she LOVES to make eye contact and smile- which her mommy and daddy  really love! She especially loves to smile at her big brother Gavin.  Harper is rockin' and rollin' in her fifth month of life...with an extra emphasis on the rollin'.  She's gotten so rolly that it's made diaper changing time quite a challenge.  It's become mandatory to have a distraction object to get her to try to stay on her back long enough to wrangle her into a clean diaper.  I picked her up from the nursery one day this month and one of her more senior nursery workers reported to me "Changing your daughter is like trying to change a maggot."
While I'm sure there are more endearing ways of describing my daughter than to compare her to a legless larva, I am in agreement that she's quite squirmy.  

In addition to rocking and rolling, as you can see she's sitting too!  
I must admit  that her sitting skills have really been honed this past week, which was technically into the start of her sixth month of life (since her 5 month birthday was on the 24th), but we are truthful in saying that she was sitting, albeit more wobbly before the 24th, which means we can include this milestone safely and in good conscience.  And just to prove it, I've added a sitting picture that was taken on the 22nd which can evidence her sitting tendencies within Month 5.  Whew.

Harper is also eating cereal like a champ..that is, when you can get the spoon in her mouth fast enough before she tries to grab it.  Harper is a grabby grabberson, there's not doubt about that.  She's got super  stealth ninja reflexes, which makes all glasses, earrings, hair or any other stray object no match for her.    It's really fun to feed her cereal with Gavin nearby.  He's such a good big brother- and really encouraging! He will sit there and cheer for saying "Go Harper!" her while I feed her with the spoon and when she takes a bite he'll say "Yayyy!"  Who knew eating was such a spectator sport?! 

Just in case you thought that Harper's tutu looked cute- which how could you not?!- a shout out to our family friends Miss Phyllis and Brother Danny who gave Harper this tutu at one of our baby showers.  I have been dying to put it on her for months.  And her bow is from her Arlington Cox fam: Uncle John, Aunt Alice, Autie Amy and Uncle Nathan. Thanks Texas Family for dressing our little gal so fancy! 

Whether she's dressed to the nines (or the twotwo's- no pun intended) or just bummin' around in a onesie- we think we're pretty blessed to have this little bundle of cuteness.  She's a good little girl and we're so happy that she's ours to get to love! 

Friday, September 21, 2012

Im Boyda

There's an episode of Friends where Phoebe tells Rachel that her dad just called and left her a message to call her back.  Rachel asks where she should call him back and Phoebe replies "Flimby's".  Rachel then says "what's Flimby's" and Phoebe responds "It's what I say when I can't remember the real thing."

Gavin has adopted a similar fall-back phrase to use, but instead of Flimby's it's "Im boyda".  That's right, Im boyda.  It goes a little something like this: 
Me: Hey, Gavin!  What's the name of the person in the picture that I'm pointing to. (Pointing to Elmo)
Gavin: Uh...Im boyda! 
OR
Matthew: Hey Gavin, can you tell me the name of one of your friends from church? 
Gavin: Im boyda! 

We're quite impressed with his new catch-all phrase and he uses it pretty consistently.  Don't get me wrong- he says LOTS of things.  The kids has really started talking especially over the last month!  He's got quite the budding vocabulary and doesn't just repeat things we ask him to, but volunteers information and can answer questions appropriately.  And most of the things that we're asking him, he has told us the right answer to before, but for some reason "Im boyda" seems to be the best answer at the time. And you know what?  

 It works!

Sunday, September 16, 2012

Then and Now: My little sack of sugar

Just a little Harper snippet: 
This is Harper- 4 days old- my little seven pound sack of sugar.
 And here is Harper now- 4 MONTHS old.  Still a sack of sugar, but a few more than 7 pounds.
Lovin' every minute of watching this little girl grow up! 

Saturday, September 1, 2012

4 Months- August

Four months!  

Why is it that time used to seem like it dragged by so slowly, but having babies seems to make time just fly.  Who said this could happen?  I don't remember getting this old!  Cue "Sunrise, Sunset" from Fiddler on the Roof...and while you're at it, throw in "If I Were a Rich man".  I can "biddy biddy bum" with the best of them.  

And speaking of biddy biddy- Miss Harper isn't so much any more.  Month four sees Harper weighing in at 13 lbs, 7 ounces and being 25.25 inches tall.  Thata girl!  She's eating great and sleeps like an angel.  We tried cereal for the first time on her 4 month bday...let's just say that we'll try again later.  

She is being as cute as ever.  She loves to grab for things, suck on her cheeks and I think she's doing some kind of "abs of steel" challenge, because the girl is always holding her head up like she's doing crunches.  And speaking of cute...who likes Harper's outfit in these pics?!  Her little flapper apparel was given to her by  her Aunt Katie...who I'm pretty sure only got it for her so that HER daughter can wear it in a few months.  Yes, that's right...Harper is going to have a GIRL cousin!!  I'm sure they'll love sharing clothes.  Let's just hope they don't fight over them as much as their mothers did back in the day...

Harper has made two very good friends this month.  The first is her new friend in the mirror.  Harper loves to smile and makes good eye contact, so it's really fun to put her in front of the mirror- she acts like she's just made a new friend.  She smiles and talks to the pretty girl in the mirror.  She's so friendly. 

Her other good friend is none other than big brother Gavin.  

I'm pretty sure Gavin can't get enough of his little sister.  And she's just as crazy about him.  He will get all up in her business and poke her and kiss all over her...and she loves it.  

I heard someone say one time that the greatest gift parents can give their children is siblings.  If that's the case then we gave Gavin and Harper one heck of a half birthday present for one another.

I love my little Harper girl.  She's the perfect fourth member of our family and I've loved getting to know her the past four months.