… because you keep cracking me up!

I’ve become so enamored with all the different RSS feeds I’ve signed up for.  There are so many of them that only a few minutes will go by before my reader has something new for me to read.  I love them so much, I figured I would share some of the sites I’m most fond of here:

• http://thepioneerwoman.com/
• http://www.onesentence.org/
• http://failblog.org/
• http://www.freepatterns.com/
• http://www.parenthacks.com/
• http://thehappyhousewife.com/
• http://notalwaysright.com/
• http://filthwizardry.blogspot.com/
• http://blog.craftzine.com/
• http://icanhascheezburger.com/

I could go on and on, I won’t bore you, but you should consider checking out your favorite sites (this one?) to see if they have an RSS feed option (we do )

We had an outing with some good friends on Sunday, the L ladies took Celeste and I to a lovely little park near their house.  Celeste had her first ride in a bucket swing (she really seemed to enjoy it) and sat at the bottom of a slide (I don’t think she’s quite ready to slide down yet)!  She also watched the girls feed the ducks and saw two huge iguanas.

This video speaks for itself!

Labeling these as tricks makes me feel like I’m talking about my new puppy, but only some of them are truly developmental stages…  Take a look at these two new videos..  Celly’s Daddy has only been away for five days and in that short time period, she’s picked up a few new habits/learned a few new things.

1.  Its the tongue that makes all these great sounds, watch as she moves her tongue around to make different noises.

2.  The crazy 90 degree angle head tilt, she’s doing this all. the. time.

3.  “Show me your tongue.”  She mimics me sticking my tongue out, she did this very rudimentarily at around 5 weeks but now its obvious on her face as she watches me, processes it and repeats it.

4.  She’s making raspberry noises on purpose (very briefly in the second video).

Its really hard to get her doing these new things on film since as soon as I break the camera out she focuses on it and tries to grab it, stopping whatever cute thing she was doing to begin with!

Enjoy!

Did you know that we have a mutant kitty cat?  You’ve heard of Hemmingway cats, I’m sure, that have six toes?  Well Isabella has only the normal five toes, but six nails!

Kitty nails are retractable so in this shot, where Izzy is resting her paw on me you don’t see them, but that arrow is pointing to her mutant sixth nail that grows UP out of her toe pad and therefore does not retract.

The vet says its not big deal and we should just cut it like the others (as you can tell from its length, she’s not the easiest cat to give a pedicure to).

All three of our pets have something odd (and kinda cute) about them, how about yours?

This is what happens when Celeste misses her 3:00 pm nap and I try to feed her dinner. 

First, she is too interested on gnawing on her bib to eat dinner, at first I try to be patient but she’s getting sleepier so I know she needs to get her dinner in soon before its too late.  That being the case, I just took the bib off, I knew she’d be out of her day clothes and into PJs any minute any way.

I could tell I was fighting a losing battle, however, when I started to get this face:

The seven mile stare, she’s not seeing anything, just kinda zoned.  That face leads to this:

No expression, no reaction to the spoon (her usual responses are either to open up or purse her lips and turn away).

Tonight, this didn’t progress, but it has before, to this:

Not twenty minutes after the first two of these pictures were taken, Celeste was down for the night!

Our nightly routine is a fine balancing act and the smallest deviations from the norm can lead to big consequences.  Heaven forbid I don’t get Celly into her bed by 7:45 at the LATEST… its not pretty…

So forgive me, all my grown up friends out there, but I have a strict curfew, if you need me after 7:30, it’ll have to be on the phone!

Dear Celeste,

You turn six months old today.  Wow.  I can’t believe you’ve been in our lives (outside of my tummy) for half a year already.  At the same time, I can’t believe that its only been six months!  I can barely remember what life was like before you were in it.

You amaze me every single day.  Watching you learn and grow has been a wonderful journey and I can’t wait to see where it leads us.  You wake up every morning with a big smile on your face and go to sleep the same way.  Even during your crankiest tantrums, you would rather smile than cry and as such sometimes they go something like this: “Wahhh, *sniffle* *smile* *laugh,* wahhh.”  No matter what we’re doing or where we go, we are stopped by well wishers and strangers who want to meet you and melt when you smile at them.

Waiting for you was a painful journey but having you in our life has made that pain fade away.  You’ve removed the pain so much  that I can barely remember telling your father in the ER after our second miscarriage that I wanted to give up trying to have a baby.  I am so glad he didn’t listen to me that night.

Being your mom has been the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done and I can’t wait to continue.  Just the other night you woke up shortly after going to sleep for the night, you didn’t need much, just a snuggle from Mommy to go back down again.  While I cuddled you to sleep, you smiled up at me as you were drifting off.  You woke up once, jerking awake and looked around.  As soon as you saw me you settled back down to sleep and I sat with you like that for a few minutes, just savoring the feeling before putting you gently into your crib where you slept through the rest of the night.

Its only been six months, Celeste, but already my arms feel empty when you’re not in them and my day less bright when I’m away from your radiant smile.

I love you.

Mom.