Beebop-a-Lula

Lulu : 18 months

At a year and a half, Lulu is showing signs of the typical toddler. One minute she is beaming with a smile from ear to ear, the next she is screaming/whining over the smallest things. While her vocabulary is ever growing and her comprehension of what we’re saying to her is amazing, she gets frustrated very easily when she can’t communicate what she wants to us.

apples to apples

She’s still a picky eater but we’ve noticed that she does at least have a willingness to at least try what we’re eating. She won’t eat pizza, but likes spicy pepperoni. She won’t eat a banana but likes banana bread. Picky eater or not, she is definitely growing and getting very heavy.

Still a great sleeper, loving Sesame Street (Elmo especially) & Blues Clues, taunts Spooky daily yelling “ME-OW!” as she chases him, loves watching videos on YouTube on the big computer with Mom, despite the cold weather enjoys being outdoors, loves Peek-a-Boo & Patty Cake and still enjoys her little sister. Occasionally a total menace, particularly when it comes to getting ready for bed (she’d rather run around nekkid then to put on a diaper and pajamas!).

Rose: 8 weeks old

Rosie is changing all the time these days! She is the chubby baby that Lulu never was, with meaty little legs and full, pinch-able cheeks! She’s a hefty little package to hold and will definitely wear your arm out if you hold her for a while. Her eyelashes are nice & long and she has a pale, pinkish complexion with dark hair.

chubby!

Lots of big smiles for mom & dad, coos and gurgles and even some occasional squeals. At night she’s still fluctuating between 3-6 hours of sleep at a time.

devilish gleam in her eye

We have been making the best of being stuck in the house for the winter, but we did manage to get some fresh air last week when it warmed up a little. Rose is slightly more demanding then Lulu ever was, but those big eyes and sweet smiles make up for it!

weight: 12.3 lbs
height: 23 1/2″

Rose’s appointment revealed that she is in the 97th percentile for height and weight! The doctor was impressed by the growth spurt she had. She is a BIG, healthy girl!

While she still isn’t quite sleeping through the night she is getting there, going for 4-5 hour stretches at a time. I think one reason Lulu turned out to be such a great sleeper from the start is because she’s a summer baby and we had her out and about all of the time in the fresh air and sunshine, where poor Rose is housebound since it’s cold and snowy outside right now.

While she’s awake, she is a bit of a curmudgeon. She rarely seems content and is often fussy. A lot of it I contribute to tummy troubles, she is always doubling over with gas problems and may even be a touch colicky. Gas drops are our friend!  The doctor did say that this will get better as she gets older. She’s so sweet. We hate to see her so uncomfortable.

And in the past week or so she has started to lose her hair, although not as severe as when Lulu lost hers! I predict Rosie is going to have dark hair, like her mother. It’ll be fun to find out!

weight: 21.13 lbs
height: 33″

Lulu’s stats haven’t changed much since her weight check back in early October. She gained a pound. That’s it. But the good thing about checking her progression is now the doctor realizes that her skinniness is genetic, not because she’s not eating enough. Luckily Forrest was with us this time around and explained to the doctor that he had a similar physique when he was a kid. So, basically that means no more weight checks.

peek

-a-

boo

The days are getting shorter, the temperature is getting much cooler and my belly is growing to massive proportions waiting the arrival of 2.0…

Summer may be gone, but we have some great pictures to show for it. Since getting a single photo of Lulu with both of her parents is as rare as a Sasquatch footprint, here’s what I’ve managed to scare up!

in the park

the photo Forrest has been dying for: his lil girl with him on his motorcycle

I know...she's my Mini-Me!

I like the candidness of this pic. It's so cute.

all three of us!

On the ferry from Boston to Salem

“Little wonder
You little wonder, you”

Lulu is now full-on walking! She is doing great on her own, although sometimes appears wobbly like a drunken sailor. We were always so worried about her walking around on our brick floors while she was learning, but no major head trauma has happened thankfully. She’s had a few head bumps and face plants that resulted in a bruised cheek. Luckily that is all.

There is one member of the household that doesn’t quite know what to make of her new-found mobility. That would be Spooky. He is used to simply relocating whenever she got close to him, but now she downright chases him! Its so funny to watch, like something you’d see in a commercial or a movie. He tries to seek refuge from her by jumping up on the back of the couch, but she’s so tall now that even when he does she can still touch his feet.

Pretty soon he’ll learn to make himself scarce while she’s running around. Otherwise one day he’ll find himself sitting at a tea party wearing a baby doll dress.

Lately, she has been exhibiting a streak of independence and quite a little temper. It typically coincides with nap or bed time when she is tired, but when she gets mad she either hits or pinches me. I know I should be deterring her from doing so, but I think it’s really adorable. I know that will wear out it’s welcome soon.

Another new skill: when she doesn’t want you to pick her up she straightens her body out and goes limp! Heh, what a bratty little skill to master, right? I know, hard to believe from a little girl with such an angelic little face!

I really like this photo despite the unibrow! Her eyelashes, cheeks and lips make up for it.

And while she still isn’t saying a whole lot of words, when she wants something or wants you to look at something, she has learned to point at it. So…she now points at EVERYTHING, which helps with communication, even though occasionally convoluted.

lil pointer

Baby Frazier version 2.0 update

We’re coming into home stretch waiting for the arrival of baby 2.0. Thankfully this pregnancy has been incident free. Six weeks (or less) to go and we are heinously (mentally) unprepared for the new arrival, although physically I am ready! The waiting and wondering is the hardest part.

Since Lulu was deemed underweight by her doctor at her 1 yr. check up, we had to go back for a weight check today.

Today:
weight: 20 lbs. 12 ozs.
height: 33″

That’s an increase of about 2 lbs. and 2 inches. So, she’s doing great!

“She’s a sunflower, she’s my one flower, She’s the flower of my heart.”

It’s been a while since the last update so there’s a bunch of Lulu news to catch up on.

Lulu has grown unbelievably fast recently. She is currently wearing a size 18 months in clothes (pants especially because she is so tall). We’re still working on her pickiness with eating, but in the meantime I’m still supplementing her meals with mushy food.

She almost has all four of her molars grown in (the top two are still lagging behind a little) and I’ve noticed over the past week that she’s got four more teeth toward the front coming in. She has learned where everyone’s eyes, nose & mouth are (we’re working on ears). She likes the nose especially because it goes *honk honk* when she squeezes it. She even knows where her bellybutton is.

We think she’s been going through a crazy growth spurt because she has been sleeping so much lately. She goes to bed around 7:30-8pm and gets up somewhere in the 9-10:30am range (yes, yes…I know I am *extremely* lucky to have a baby that likes to sleep!) and then takes a long nap (1 1/2-2hr) during the day.

Her vocabulary has tripled recently. Before she could only say “hi”. Now she has added “light” (yiiiight), “hi da da” “cracker” and “noooo.”  She also waves to everyone (and anyone) that will potentially pay attention to her. I think half of Salem and the visiting tourists have said hello to her in their travels. She waves to us from her crib in the morning and I even caught her waving to the television this morning.

Even though I don’t have the best singing voice in the world, I sing to Lulu all of the time. The repetition of songs is paying off because we hear her humming “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” to herself. And the amazing thing is that her pitch is perfect. She absolutely loves music and dances whenever she hears a song she likes. I’m thinking of enrolling her in a toddler singing/music class this fall just for fun.

She’s also making big strides with walking! We’ve been practicing a lot and her balance is getting better everyday. She even took 5-6 steps on her own yesterday, so it won’t be long now before she’s tottering around (a blessing and a curse!). The other day, out of the blue, it occurred to her to climb the stairs. I thought she might climb up to the first landing and sort of get overwhelmed with the whole idea of it. But she climbed the entire flight like a pro without any hesitation. Needless to say, we promptly put up a gate at the bottom of the stairs. Unfortunately the downside of the gate is that Spooky doesn’t understand that he’s a cat and can’t figure out how to jump over the gate…sigh…

Her mischievous side is beginning to emerge as well. She loves to go after Spooky whenever he’s around. She only chases him if he actually bolts, it becomes a game. Most of the time he’ll sit there and tolerate grubby baby hands on him until she loses interest and moves on to the next thing.

Over all she is just so much fun. I really hope her good nature sticks around when her sibling shows up (2 months from now!). I know there will be a lot some adjustment for all of us, but especially for her having to share the attention.

We had some bloggy-type issues, but now they are all fixed.

Stay on the lookout for a big update this weekend.