6 Months and (gasp) Counting

In January, I said to Josh, "In April Meili will be 6 months old!" He said, "Yeah..." In my mind, April did not seem that far away, and having a 6 month old child was incomprehensible. But, here we are, with a 6 month-old, and we love her as much as ever. Although it makes me sad to think that we won't have a newborn in our house for AWHILE, and I miss lots of things about her being a newborn, I am so excited about every single little tiny new thing that she learns. This month, she can sit up on her own as long as she has something to focus on (like a friend her own size, or a cute little toddler boy.) She is getting better and better at eating, and started eating fruits. And Josh and I have bets going as to when she is going to start crawling. (I think that we have AT LEAST another month, and he thinks she is right on the brink.)

These next pictures are called, "Daddy's not allowed to go shopping alone anymore."

I sent Josh out to get a sun-hat before the Aggie football spring scrimmage...

Mission accomplished!

And this next video is called "Revenge." (This is the most boring video in the world for anyone besides Meili's parents, and I decided to switch the orientation halfway through, and don't know how to edit the video, so just bear with me.)

Josh LOVES to tease his nieces and nephews and the kids in our primary class. So now, he finally has someone who can dish it back. See, Josh tells Meili regularly that she is not allowed to date or get married until she's at least 27, and she, at 5 months, started practicing her kissing regularly so she can start blatantly disobeying her dad as soon as possible.

Plans

This post is for me. If no one else ever reads it, that would be okay. But since I have pretty much altogether given up on writing in a journal, and I'm years behind on scrapbooking, this will be all that I can look back on years from now. And I need a constant reminder of the things I've been thinking for the last five months or so.

Meili and I have had a rough day today. Nothing big. We just woke up with different plans in mind. My plan was to clean our entire house, run 6 miles, take a nap, shower, etc. and her plan was to be held all day, not want to eat, take 30 minute naps, then get so hungry that she is grumpy, but still not want to eat because she is too tired-and then we do it all over again. So I've had a lot of time to just kind of sit and think today. Unshowered, unexercised, staring at my messy house. But then I started crying when I was reading the story of the Three Trees to Meili. This is the last page...

"Sometimes, the dreams that we have for ourselves are much smaller than the dreams that God has for us. The three trees' dreams came true, just not in the way they imagined. And so it is with each of us. For if we follow God's path, we will travel far beyond even our greatest dreams."

So now we back up about 8 years... I've always liked kids, and always knew that I wanted to be a mother, but figured that it would happen after I had lived my life. My first semester of college, I called my mom and told her that I had my life figured out. I was going to graduate in 3 years with a bachelor's degree in Psychology-(because that's what I was interested in, but lead to no career path whatsoever), then I would serve a mission, come home and go to law school. After law school, I was going to get my PhD in Psychology. Somewhere in there, I was also going to go to cosmetology school, so that once I did get married and have kids, I could do hair in the basement of my house, teach guitar lessons, and tutor high school students in Calculus. Then getting married, and kids would just kind of find their way into my plan, and they would fit into MY life-not the other way around.

Then we fast forward to the summer of 2009. I had just run the Utah Valley Marathon and the Ragnar Relay, and Josh and I were getting ready to go on a cruise. I started thinking about the next marathon I wanted to run, and then the next and the next. I also started planning all the vacations that I wanted to go on for the next 5 or so years. All of a sudden it dawned on me... I was perfectly happy. And I felt like I could be happy running marathons and going on vacations for the rest of my life. The real reason that I started thinking that we should have a baby was because I was too comfortable just focusing on the two of us forever. I started wondering where it would stop. At what point would I be willing to sacrifice enough to start a family? So then came my next brilliant plan. I decided that if Josh and I got pregnant that fall, I could have a baby in the spring just in time to start training for another marathon. I originally told Josh that we would try for 3 or 4 months, and then if I didn't get pregnant, we would just wait until the following year-because there was no way I was going to give up a summer.

As the old saying goes, "Life is what happens when you start making plans."

My whole perspective changed when I realized a small portion of what it feels like to want to have a baby and not be able to.

And so, for the last 5 months, clean or dirty house, new or messy diaper, health or sickness, and no matter how much sleep I've gotten, I feel like I understand just a little bit the better plan that God had in store for me.

This is my better plan...

I chose this picture because, although it's not the best picture of Meili, this is when I remember how sweet she is and how lucky we are. Right before she goes to bed, when she's really tired, she just looks up and stares at me, and makes the cutest little noises. It helps me remember that even though she's my daughter, more importantly- she's a daughter of God, and I am so blessed that He let me borrow her for a little while.

And, of course, this is the other half of my better plan...

What would I do without this crazy nut?

5 Months

I must have blinked and missed something. I don't know how it happened, but within the last couple weeks, someone stole our tiny infant, and replaced her with a giant baby! This baby is totally different than we're used to. She is an Ambi-Roller. Yes, she rolls back to tummy, tummy to back, around in circles, on her head sometimes (J/K). The baby picks up toys, eats food, can stand in her saucer, and has hair! (Not tons, but enough that her little mohawk is looking even sillier these days.) These are some pictures from the last month of our ever-growing baby girl.We're actually sad that this trick was so short-lived. For a couple days, she made this face constantly. We call it Blue Steel (because of the movie Zoolander.) Like I said, it left as fast as it came.
Meili finally found something better than her hands-her toes! When we go to get her in the morning, all we can see is her little toes poking up over the side of the crib, and her toes are soaked! I figure her toes are probably more sanitary than her hands at this point.
She finally got pretty used to rice cereal, and then I switched it up again with peas. She has yet to be very excited about those-but who can blame her?
For my birthday, my grandma, mom, sister, two nieces, Josh and I went to lunch. Besides that I had a pretty low-key birthday because I had to work till 9. But it would have been hard to top my birthday last year-Josh and I heard Meili's heart beat for the first time. What a difference a year makes! (As a side note, Josh and I got engaged 5 years ago on my birthday! Can you believe it, 5 years!)

Our four-generation picture-with 3 of the most important girls in my life.

4 Month pictures

4 Months

Don't you hate it when people have a baby, and then that's all they talk about on their blog? I know, it's so annoying.

But, until Josh and I start doing things again, Meili is the only one in the house doing anything noteworthy. (And by that I mean that she ages by 1 month every month.)

Her new favorite trick is standing. You wouldn't know it by the picture, but she usually smiles when she's standing.

These pictures were taken on Valentine's Day. I was trying to take a cute picture to send Josh for Valentine's Day, and she honestly wasn't being very cooperative.

She's still loving sucking all over her hands.

This next picture is called, "Daddy Dressed Me Today." (Notice the pink polka dot socks) Someday I will recreate the other little ensemble he had her in the other day.

When I questioned him about it, he said that she picked out the socks herself. And the onesie and pants match, because the onesie has deer on it, and you shoot the deer when you're wearing camo pants.

This is her new toy. As you can tell, she's still a little small-hence, the pillow behind her back supporting her. She really just doesn't know what to think about it at this point, and definitely doesn't understand that she can stand up in it.

Look at that face!!!! How can you not love that?

And to quote Brian Regan, "How do I get that goodness in me?" (She gets pretty frustrated in the toy, because she can't figure out how to get any of it in her mouth. The first time we put her in she just started sucking on the seat.)

Whoa! Deer in Headlights!

At her doctor's appointment on Thursday, she weighed 12 lbs. 12 oz. (31st percentile) and was 25 inches long (90th percentile) which means that she is still gaining one pound and one inch every month. The doctor said that she must be putting forth all her energy into getting tall, and that's why she's still skinny. He said that she'll have the perfect build to be a track athlete. (And Daddy smiled from ear to ear.)

She had her first experience with rice cereal last night and she was not interested at all. (She's usually not interested in eating period, so a spoon just means that she has more control over not letting it in her mouth.) Other milestones... she is getting better at grabbing things, still hasn't figured out rolling from back to tummy, and yesterday, I heard her first fully legitimate laugh! This last week, we also survived our first (of many, I'm sure) ear infections.

...And the very best news about being 4 months old... Meili's blocked tear duct seems to have cleared up. (By the way, I am knocking on every piece of wood in our house right now.) We haven't wiped goobers out of her eye in over a WEEK (and anyone who has known Meili, knows why that is such an accomplishment in our house.) YEA!!!

3 Months

It's days like today that make me happy that I have something (or someone) to help me gain a little perspective, remind me what's important, and to make me smile.

When I see your face

There's not a thing that I would change

Cause you're amazing

Just the way you are

And when you smile,

The whole world stops and stares for awhile

Cause girl you're amazing

Just the way you are

Every time I hear that song it reminds me of my little baby girl-even though I know she is not what it was intended to be about.

At 3 months, she is still as smiley as ever, she is trying desperately to sit up on her own, and roll from back to tummy, and we finally figured out naps!!!! Every day, in every way this little girl is trying to teach me patience and someday she just might get me there. I struggled with naps for about a month straight, and one day I just put her in her crib after I rocked her for a little and she took a 45 minute nap. From then on, I just kept doing the same thing, and now she is awake for 1 1/2 hours, then she sleeps for 1 1/2 hours all day long. Meili also found her hands in the last month or so, and she thinks they are the tastiest treat ever!-much to Daddy's dismay. She also figured out how to drool, and is practicing to enter the world's first ever drooling contest-she is quite gifted I must say! And Daddy's favorite new trick is that she has started talking-the two of them have quite deep conversations nowadays.

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Josh said that all he wanted for his birthday this year was a beautiful baby girl. And since that was already taken care of, I at least put her in her Yankees onesie, and emailed him a card while he was at work. He said that it made his day! (Then I took back all of the other presents I got him.) Jk! :)
See, he's obviously super excited about all of his presents. I really just wanted to point out that I wrapped all of his presents in baby bags with pink tissue paper because we have an excess of them right now. For his birthday he worked, then we went to Ruby Tuesday to watch the National Championship game, and then we played with his birthday present-the beautiful baby girl to be exact. Happy Birthday old man!!!

And a random side note...
Even though this picture is so beautiful of me, I just had to add it, because this is my new favorite activity (that I have to give up, for the sake of better napping routines.) I used to like naps, but now I feel so lucky to be able to take one every morning with Meili-what could be better! But now it's time to say "So long good friend!"