Month: July 2017

Teething still sucks…but today, was a good day! Kens ended up in bed with us at some point throughout the night. The zombie version of me doesn’t remember when, but I do remember being up for 90 minutes after the fact while she tossed, turned and fussed because she couldn’t get comfortable/breathe through her snot nose. Poor KB. 

 I didn’t get a great picture of Kensie’s outfit today because my phone is (still) the worst. The only normal one is dark and fuzzy. 

The flash on the focused photo made her blink, but it’s a great display of how much snot was running out of this poor babe’s nose all morning. 

I’m ready (as I’m sure she is too!) for this dang tooth to come all the way up so she can feel normal again. During swim Mrs. Heidi said the one next to it is coming up too. 

Speaking of swim – I am on cloud nine after watching K’s lesson today!!!  The whole point of her lessons is to teach her to roll onto her back and float if she fell in water. Week one she learned float, 2 was holding her breath under water and this week, rolling over to her back! I didn’t expect her to do it all on her own until the last week or 2 of lessons so I was caught (pleasantly) off guard when she did it today! 

​​One of the other moms there asked me if Kensie was my only child and once I said yes, she asked if watching her lessons bothered me. My answer? Absolutely NOT. 

I will admit a few times at her lessons my motherly instinct wanted to reach out and grab her as a reflex, but I’ve never once been worried. Heidi has been teaching infants to swim for YEARS and she knows what she’s doing. She explains it all to me as she does it and asks questions about Kensie’s eating/sleeping/bathroom habits to make sure everything is as she expects it. 

Today only confirmed how amazing of a teacher Mrs. Heidi is and I was fascinated at how much Kensie has learned in 3 short weeks. In general, a baby’s ability to respond to positive reinforcement at such a young age and how smart they are blows my mind. 

Of course I have no intention of Kensie ever having to use these skills, but if we could predict accidents, they wouldn’t happen. We have a pool about 6 feet from our back door. We go to pool parties, friends have pools, my parents live on a retention pond, we boat. We live in Florida. The girl needs to know how to float and breathe! 

Chris and I are going on a cruise for a friend’s birthday this weekend so our next post won’t be until Monday! (I’m not just being a slacker 😜)

 I’m dropping K off super early tomorrow with Gramma and she is already MVP for having to deal with these teeth over the weekend. 😳 Luckily, Kens is still happy during the day (knock on wood). It’s when we take off her necklace and she has to sleep that it gets ugly. I expect to come back to a full tooth and a happy baby that likes to sleep. K? Thanks mom! 

I will definitely miss my Kensie so freaking much this weekend. Shoot, I already miss her and she’s in the room next to me not even dropped off yet! But, I also know it’s important to have “us” time and with all the craziness and nonstop that our lives have been lately, I’m looking forward to a weekend with Chris to relax and enjoy uninterrupted (well, except when I have to pump…still gotta mom) time with friends! 

Last night went a little better than expected after Kensie’s 9p wake up and scream session. She slept normal the rest of the night but woke up with the RUNNIEST NOSE EVER this morning. 😪 

KB was pretty cranky today, BUT SHE NAPPED! I can’t blame her, if I had snot running out of my nose nonstop all day I’d be pretty cranky, too. 

 Just before this little one crawled up for some snuggles, I got a great video of her morning obstacle course. 

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Kensie hasn’t quite grasped the “work smarter not harder” concept. 

I had to run open gym today and I knew Kens wouldn’t make it through a 3 hour gym sesh, so I was that mom and used the tv to babysit her for 30 minutes so I could get my workout in before I coached. 

Bedtime started out promising tonight because KB PUT HERSELF TO SLEEP! I wasn’t allowed to leave the room, but as long as I stood there she slept. Haha! I walked out the first time and made it 2 steps and the tears came. I walked back in, she laid down and went back to sleep. 🤷🏼‍♀️

However, it was a false alarm. About 45 minutes later, K was screaming. Daddy tried to soothe her but it wasn’t happening. She’s definitely all in on a “mama Clinger” phase. We’re talking stage 7. Skipped straight over stage 5. 

The only thing I like about Teething? All. These. Sweet. Snuggles!!!! I’m thankful the “needs her mama” days aren’t quite done yet. While I hate that she’s in pain, I’m glad she won’t remember it and I am soaking it all in while I can. Even on the not-so-great days, time is going by way too quickly! 

Fact: God made Teething painful for population control. 

Brief overview of the first (almost) year from yours truly:

Pre-baby – We want a baby…or 2, or 3!

0-3 months – Adjusting to new life. Tougher than you thought it would be. Question everything. Labor is still all too close in the front of your memory so you decide “nope. Only child”. 

4-7 months – Ah, this is the best! Got the parent thing down and they’ve got the baby thing down. They smile, sit up, resemble an actual human and don’t cry as much. We got this. Let’s have another!

7-9 months – Okay, the little human is on the move. I mean I could still go for another but what do I do with this one if I have a smaller one to take care of? Still awesome so I’ll figure it out. 

9 months – Teething. Enough said. Back to baby being an only child. 

I’m being slightly dramatic. (But only slightly.) WHYYY does it have to screw everything up? 

K was doing so great on her nap schedule, starting to eat better and go down for bed on her own. Today? HAHAHA! Y’all, God literally looked down and was like “that’s what you get for thinkin!”

Kensie was up from 1-2:30am last night. She was happy (unless I left her alone in her crib), just wide awake. 

K got up around 7…and never took a morning nap. She just kept pulling on her gums and crying when she’d start to doze off. 

She made it through swimming and actually did really well! On the way home, she was out before we even got out of the neighborhood. However, that nap lasted maybe 20 minutes. 

Other than the not napping and pulling on her gums all day, she was actually really happy. Emily watched her for me so I could workout, because she’s amazing, and Kensie had no tears and climbed all over her face. 

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 It’s bedtime where she really loses it. The last 2 nights aren’t even a fuss/cry. It’s a top of the lungs SCREAM into a cry. Over and over and over. This is the ONLY thing that gets her to stop. 

Kensie’s ideal day would have been for me to carry her around non-stop. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE her snuggles. I just don’t want this little girl to be screaming in pain! 😪 (And for the record, I did breakdown and give her medicine before bed to see if it would help. Judging by her 9pm wake up, with screaming, I think it was a fail.)

I thought I was going to win the mom game last night. But I didn’t. 🤦🏼‍♀️ 

I tried to give Kensie solids AND milk for dinner thinking she’d sleep better. She ate about 3oz of food and chugged milk after (amount unknown, because my boob doesn’t offer that feature). Still woke up 3 times and got up before 6:30am. 

We are going on a cruise next weekend for a friend’s birthday (without K) and I’m pretty sure I’m most excited just to sleep. 🤷🏼‍♀️😂

I’m hosting a baby shower today so last night was full on prep mode!! I am thankful K consistently goes down at 7 and I know I have some time to myself. 

Kensie’s been doing some weird pulling on her gums and playing with her tongue but she was a happy girl all day! 

She got some fun playtime with Riley and Harper and then helped me run baby shower errands! 

We had to make an outfit change as we were leaving for the gym…see blowout above. But, I have the absolute BEST friends, and this is why. 

Like really? I say it all the time, but our village is the best and Kensie is one lucky little girl (and I’m a lucky momma).

There are some awesome photos of Kensie climbing a box and doing pull-ups but they’re on daddy’s phone and he’s fishing right now…so I’ll post them after the weekend since I know you’re all dying to see them. 😉

She was also so excited to see Aunt Ashley since she’s been out of town the last 2 weeks. K gave her the sweetest hug when she got there!

And to close out her FriYay – Party girl got to officially graduate out of her baby tub last night and took a bath in the big tub!!! 

Now, back to the important things while Kensie’s napping….like baby shower prepping!!

Guys. Today marks 9 months since I’ve gone without sleeping more than 5 consecutive hours. 😂 Oh, I meant to say KB IS 9 MONTHS OLD! Same thing. 

Kensie is so much fun and her personality is showing more and more each day. She’s extremely smart (a little too smart), sassy, funny, hyper and snuggly all in one. 

She’s taken a liking to yanking my hair (not a fan), thinks it’s hilarious when I tell her “no” and give her a straight face 🙄, and LOVES to CLIMB!

KB is crawling EVERYWHERE and can destroy her playroom in under 5 minutes. 

In the last week she’s started pulling up on everything and anything and loves to stand! She has impressively good balance and coordination and still zero depth perception. 🤦🏼‍♀️ Our days involve a lot of chasing her around making sure she isn’t going to climb onto something and divebomb off of it. 

She sits on her knees and we can tell she’s determined to walk before she’s one. 

Kensie is going 9 months strong on breastfeeding!! She can put a spoon in her mouth by herself but still doesn’t care for purees. She’s all about some finger food that she can feed herself! Our options are limited since homegirl still has ZERO teeth. 

Kensie recently started belly laughing at a lot of things, especially the dogs. She’s given big smiles and a little squeal here and there for months but now she’s really laughing and I love it!!

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Her favorite book is “Where is baby’s belly button?” and she brings it to me to read every day.  

She still loves Baby Einstein and she likes the songs in Moana! When she watches baby Einstein and they sing “if you’re happy and you know it” she claps when the other kids clap. She cracks up at the puppets and any time they say “yay” she stops what she’s doing and claps. 

Kensie loves shopping with mama, smiling at everyone and has started SCREAMING when she “talks”. She does constant vocal chord checks…like girl, we can hear you. 

KB can sign “more”, wave, claps about 20 times a day and says “yeay”!

She can also say “hi”, “dada” and “baba”…whatever that is. Let’s replace those “b”s with “m”s this month – thanks Kens! 

She’s still a momma’s girl but she definitely knows who daddy is and loves grabbing his face and giving him huge smiles when he walks in the door or picks her up. 

Kens is 18.2lb according to my super accurate “weigh myself then weigh myself holding her” method. She’s still in 6 month clothing and 9 month PJs. My little long legged lady! She’s finally starting to fill them out so maybe she’ll fit into her new clothes soon. 😉 

OH! And as of today my little fishy can officially float on her back all by herself!!!

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After we host a baby shower this weekend it’s full on first birthday party planning mode! I’m. Not. Ready! 😭 

Happy 9 months, KB!!! To say “I love you” isn’t nearly enough! 

Well we definitely didn’t stick to our 2-3-4 nap schedule today because someone decided to wake up at 5:15am. (That someone wasn’t me). Sticking to Kensie’s nap schedule would have meant a 7am nap and a 10am nap. The thought of her naps being done before lunch is a joke. 

Kensie was extra sleepy last night so she went to bed at 6:30. I was wondering if she’d wake up earlier because of it. Got my answer! Lol 

The early wake up call wasn’t the worst of it though. It was the fact that she woke up…wait for it… FIVE times last night. Really KB? Get it together. 

Kensie had no interest in sleeping but at least she was a happy girl all morning…

We also had breakfast together again today! She had some yogurt bites, quinoa puffs and oatmeal! K ate about half of the oatmeal. It’s very clear she likes food that she can feed to herself. 

Kensie worked on her rollover at swim today! It is amazing to watch her progress and how well babies respond to reinforcement training. Before and after Kensie’s lessons are babies a little older than her and it’s so cool to see how smart and skilled they all are. 

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We went straight from swim to run some errands and the only nap I got out of Kensie the rest of the day was on the way to the store. When we got home Kensie ate her lunch and I attempted her nap. She laid down for a while but zero sleeping occurred. 

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Oh wait. I just realized she took a nap on the way to the gym. And I don’t feel like going back to edit what I already said, so, yeah. There’s that. Makes more sense now why she wasn’t a complete wreck while I coached 6. 

On another note, I was super thankful for these two for hanging with KB while I lifted! 

Anyway we got stuck at the gym later than usual so Kensie didn’t get to bed until almost 8 tonight. That’s all I’ll say about that before I jinx myself. 

She may not sleep through the night, but Kensie is officially a PRO at our bedtime routine. Bath, eat, and when I walk to her crib and shut the door she immediately lays her head on me. We sing and say prayers and she lays down. It’s the sweetest thing and one of my favorite parts of every day. 

Along with mom brain affecting my memory capacity (like forgetting she took another nap 🤦🏼‍♀️), it also kicked in some ADD. I’m getting ready for a baby shower this weekend and in the middle of it I started looking up a few things for Kensie’s  birthday… I started crying guys. I can’t. 😂😂 

You better believe her party will be exactly the party I told myself I would never throw when I had a baby because, “she won’t remember it”. 🤷🏼‍♀️ Not even remotely ashamed. 

This early bird made me start my day way sooner than I wanted to!

Kens woke up in a great mood and since we had extra time to kill before naptime this morning, KB ate breakfast with me! 

After nap it was swim time! Today Heidi worked on Kensie’s float and had complete success, she did it all on her own!! K had a great back float Day One then started throwing her head back the next few days because she was mad. 😂

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​Kensie was a trooper and let me get a ton of work done today. We had some time to run a quick errand before the gym…and we had our first pacifier casualty. If you are walking around Hobby Lobby and find a giraffe wubanub – please return Jeffy to KB. I caught it the first time she chucked it but I must have missed her redo. I think I’m a real mom now! 

We had to get up to the gym early today so I attempted to sit in Kensie’s baby jail with her and work from my phone. She spent the entire hour climbing me and would only play with her toys if she was touching me. 

She wasn’t really having it tonight so we left the gym early and finished up some errands. My real accomplishment today? Finding her a new favorite Teething toy. 

Foam. Go figure. I had these in the closet to save until she was older but as we all know, she puts everything in her mouth. She always wants to eat the foam mats at the gym so I figured she’d like these. I was right. Longest bath ever. 

I got a pretty exciting gift today!!! (Okay it’s a photo. But it feels like a gift!) An awesome photographer snapped a photo of me and Kensie at the competition we were watching on Saturday. Remember when I said I didn’t get a photo of her Orange bow? Mike Kokoszka for the save!!!

He sent me this photo and since I don’t get a ton of photos of the 2 of us together, I love it even more. Mike takes awesome action shots as well. Go like his Facebook page, FitrStudios and follow him on Instagram! 

Since K woke up early, she was in bed by 6:30 tonight. She couldn’t hang on any longer. I just hope it doesn’t mean she’ll wake up earlier tomorrow…😳

Kensington was a much happier camper today! 

At swim, Mrs. Heidi immediately noticed a change in the color of Kensie’s gums and thinks she’s going to cut a few teeth in the next couple weeks. But hey, I’ve thought that for months and homegirl is still allllll gums. 😂 So we shall see!

I had to cover a class this morning so KB practiced her jail break skills. 

KB had a great start to week 2 of swim lessons!! Less crying and she is starting to learn how to turn onto her back! 

When we got home from swim, Kensie ate lunch and took a solid nap and played on her own when she woke up! I was thrilled because I had a ton of work to get done. Of course she eventually got bored and I attempted turning on Baby Einstein to save the day…but she just wanted mama. 

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Now if only I could get her to actually SAY “mama”. 🙄

Kens was the BEST nurser today!! Every time she ate she actually ATE. Like laid there and chugged like a normal baby instead of sitting up/switching sides/clapping and playing every 10 seconds. I tried to get a video of her sign language when she ate her puréed food and cereal today at lunch but the second I turned on the camera she wouldn’t cooperate…

There have been a few days of naps off the 2-3-4 schedule, and on Sunday when she was extra cranky I put her down for a later afternoon nap at 4:30 (we’ve been stopping the post 4p naps) …but even with the flukes are over a week in of Kens going straight to sleep on her own at 7pm! Hopefully this post doesn’t jinx it…but for now I’ll put that tally under official parenting wins.