The Girls - July 2013

Harlie insisted on wearing her new princess jammies for this month's photo. I conceded because if anything is representative of who Harlie is right now, it's her wear-by-day-and-night princess jammies.

Harlie: Guess who's napping at daycare FINALLY!!! Woot Woot, this makes Scott and I so excited! Our evenings have been pretty delightful with a well rested Harlikins and it means we get to spend more time with her in the evenings which we all benefit from. Harlie has always been a great sleeper, but it's just not quite time to stop naps yet. She needs 'em.

Even though Harlie quit going to dance class last month, she's still a dancing queen, shakin' her stuff to Just Dance Kids on the Wii or teaching her sissy to "Dance! Now Freeze!" The profound impact that siblings can have on each other is so interesting. The fact that Ashlynne is already mimicking her sister is so cool as well as a little terrifying! ha!

Another passion of Harlie's has just emerged this month. We have on our hands a little wildlife enthusiast/explorer. :-) Come to find out, Harlie loves to watch survivalist shows and is obsessed with everything Shark! on Netflix. So yeah, not much My Little Pony this month. :-) Just this evening before bed she requested "the scariest one (shark show) Daddy."  She definitely doesn't get that from her sissy mama.

Some other relatively new things about Harlie:  Everything is "Awesome!"-- she only wants to wear seamless socks, if she wears them at all but usually she just wants to wear the same (sweaty, smelly) brown mary jane shoes to daycare everyday no matter what her outfit-- and she loves to randomly bust out singing "Every Rose Has It's Thorn" by Poison. The last time she did it, she and I were in Target. :-)


Ashlynne:
This has been a big month for little Ash. At the beginning of July, she started sitting up at the baby table at daycare and we got her a Bumbo for home. At first she would slouch over most of the time, but now she’s able to sit up in it with no problem. I think in the next couple of weeks she may be able to sit up unassisted. Her back is getting stronger everyday! At dinnertime, she’ll sit in her Bumbo on the table with us and tries to play skee ball with her toys as she launches them towards our plates. J
When she’s not causing a ruckus at the table, she’s actually eating with us now! Ash started solids on the 28th, just one day shy of her half birthday! We decided to have a picnic at the park across the street and thought it would be fun to let Ashlynne get her first bite there. She liked it, but was definitely a little skeptical about the mush on her tongue. It takes her a while to get it down, so we make it pretty thin for her. I think she likes being included though at dinnertime! I’m getting impatient because I want her to try ALL THE THINGS! . But for now we’re waiting several days between new foods, which is probably best anyway until she starts gaining confidence and gobbling it all down.
Ashlynne’s sleep schedule is RIDICULOUS right now. Swizzles goes down around 7:30, might wake up an hour or two later, and then definitely is up 3 more times (about every 2 hours) after that. Growth Spurt? Boredom? Separation Anxiety? Reflux? Gas? Got me!!!!!! J We recently switched back to the swaddle from first a sleepsack and then only her sleeper and it does seem to be helping her sleep longer the first stretch, and she’ll sleep about 4 hours before her first wake-up. Knock on wood, this becomes the trend. It is hard for me, especially since I should be pumping at 2:00am, and so most of the time she wakes and wants to eat, or she’s eaten an hour before and I don’t have much to pump! One thing that has been helping me save milk is nursing her at daycare when I drop her off. She consistently wakes up for the day around 5:30!, so the timing works out that I can feed her at drop off which often leaves me with an unused bottle of milk to take home. They are probably so sick of me at daycare because the last few days I’ve been feeding her 3 times a day there. At drop off, at lunch and at pick up. It’s SO much easier to feed her after work there, instead of at home, because there is a quiet corner I can sit with her in and then when we get home she’s not fussing and hungry while I unpack all of her stuff! Anyway, it’s working for us, so I’m going with it! J
I’d like to say Ashlynne is great at tummy time now and she would be if she wasn’t rolling onto her back all the time! Our little roly poly prefers to play on her side or back and has started rolling off her playmat, or getting blocked by the bendy poles that the toys hang from. It’s probably time to take those poles off, but since she likes to end up on her back anyway, they still give her something to look at and play with. Dilemma! J It’s so fun seeing her become much more active. She loves to kick her feet with the music, play the dancy freeze game with Harlie and dance with Daddy. Ah, it’s the best ever. She has also started doing this growl when she’s excited and it’s so cute. I wish I could get it on video but she never wants to perform when I have the camera ready.
This little girl puts a big smile on all of our faces. It’s amazing to see how much she has changed in six months. Time is flying way too fast for me.