Baby Led Weaning

I had never even heard of this term a week ago. But for the last two weeks Alyssa has hated eating baby food. So after doing some research on line I found this idea. That babies really don't need baby food. So starting two nights ago we started giving Alyssa regular food. She has eaten, apples, broccoli, banana, and watermelon. She really like apples and broccoli.
I give her the food and I get to sit and eat while she eats so I don't have to keep stopping my meal to feed her, she loves it!
I will keep you updated on how it goes over the next few weeks.

A few Things

1. I had to cut Alyssa's clothes off of her the other day! She had such a big pooh that it came out the front and back of her diaper and there was no way I was going to get the outfit over her head without getting things EVERYWHERE!

2. She is getting so big, she is sitting up by herself for up to about 15 seconds. I'm so proud but can't believe she is getting so big.

3. We went for family pictures yesterday. We had a few good family pictures but when it came time to take pictures of just her she did not like it and after about 20 minutes of trying everything we had to just give up. I guess we will just stick to taking pictures ourselves.

4. I have to go back to work in 2 weeks. :-( I am so sad. I can not believe how fast summer has gone it feels like each week goes faster and faster. I hope this school year flies by as fast as summer did.

Okay off to fold laundry before she wakes up from her nap.

California

So I have been in California for the last week. I had to travel by myself since Chris had no more vacation days.
I was as nervous about this as I was giving birth. I have traveled enough to know that sitting next to a screaming baby for a flight is not fun at all.
We had to take two planes each way because we had a lay over in Dallas Texas. Alyssa did AMAZING. She never once cried louder than what just my row could hear. She slept at least a few minutes of each flight. She had more fun looking at the string that held her pacifier and the straps on my shirt.
Once in California she also did a fantastic job every day she missed at least a nap or two. She got to met a lot of new people including her great-grandparents, great-aunt and uncle and second cousins.
Her love for dogs also came through. She LOVED the dogs everywhere we went. In fact we got video of her laughing at one of the dogs on the trip.
I can't believe how well she did on the trip. She is amazing baby I am so lucky to have her.
And on that note I hear her awake through the baby monitor so I must go get her.

Heart Break

Yesterday I had to get my car worked on. I called my mother in law to watch Alyssa for me so that I did not have to take her to the car dealership. I dropped her off and I went to the dealership.
I was gone about two hours. As I pulled up back to my mother in laws house Alyssa and her were sitting outside. I could see Alyssa and I thought "ohh she looks so tired" as I got out of the car and closer to her I realized that she might be tired but the eyes I was looking at were eyes that had been crying. She had cried for almost 2 hours. And not just cried, SCREAMED. My heart broke. I picked up my little girl and almost started crying myself. I sat in the chair and just kissed her and held her tight.
It makes me not want to go back to work. I am already getting sad about the thought of returning to work, and when I see that it makes it even worse. Alyssa is over at the babysitters today so that I could pack and clean the house before our trip tomorrow and I called to check on her about an hour ago. The babysitter said that she was asleep and had been fine all morning.
I'm glad that she is happy, and I will know if she has been crying when I go to pick her up in a half hour.
As I have sat here for the last half hour, catching up on blogs and e-mails I ran across one about a man who lost his daughter. I sat here in tears thinking I want to go pick up my daughter right now!
Going back to work in August I think will be harder than when I went back to work in March. It will be harder because I have gotten to bond with her more, and because it isn't just 10 weeks, it is 10 months!
It will be a long ten months and I can tell you I will look forward to every weekend. Hopefully sometime in the near future I will not have to return to work and will be able to work with my daughter and future kids by my side!
I love that girl more than I ever thought I could!!!

Okay now that I have rambled and not really said anything I'm going to go call the airlines to make sure all is good for tomorrow and then count down the minutes until I can go pick Alyssa up.

Life with a 5 month old

Today started at 5:20 am. Alyssa figured it was time to get up and play she laid in her crib and talked to her self and dozed off until 7:20. Most of that time I was awake in my bed listening to her talk and dozing when she dozed.
She has still been very crabby today because she isn't caught up on her sleep yet. So being the wonderful mom that I am I decided that today would be a good day to try the Benadryl that I'm taking just in case the flight to California gets to long for her. I gave her the medicine and then held her. In about ten minutes she could no longer hold her eyes open and though she was still fighting staying awake by moving her hands it was getting slower and slower. Watching her reminded me of watching a toy run out of batteries. Then once she was asleep I got worried. What if she stops breathing, what if she has an allergic reaction. So Since she went down an hour and a half ago I have been running upstairs every 15 minutes to check on her. Each time she has been perfectly fine, but I still have to do it.
But I have been productive in the other 14 minutes of that time, I have family pictures scheduled, I have a appointment for my car tomorrow, I have called chase about our property tax, I have ordered 95 pictures from Walgreen's to work on my scrap book, eaten lunch, and I have taken a shower.
I'm hoping she will wake up happy because we need to run to target, Walgreen's and the DMV to renew my car.
Well off to check on Alyssa again and then do 14 minutes of cleaning the kitchen!

4th of July

Yesterday was Alyssa's first fourth of July. She was not thrilled to say the least. She went over to her grandma's for dinner. She took a nap and slept through the b-que. Then we went over to Sharon's as soon as we got there Alyssa had a major melt down and we thought we were going to have to leave. We finally fell asleep and slept for about an hour. She was then able to make it through the fire works. But since it was raining it was really hard to see the fireworks and so we left before there was another melt down.
She has now been extra crabby today but that is to be expected since she didn't go to bed until almost 11 last night and was still up at her normal time this morning.
Her next big holiday will be Halloween!

Baptism

Alyssa was Baptized at Atonement Lutheran Church on Saturday. It was a big event with my brother, his girlfriend, my mom and her husband all coming in for it. We had almost 30 people at the church service and would of had more if my grandma hadn't had a stroke a week before.
For the two days before I kept telling Alyssa that they would pour water on her head and that she didn't need to cry it was like taking a bath.
The talks must of worked because she didn't even whine while up in front of the church. She did spit up on my arm some, and she did try to eat the blanket that was presented to her, but no crying.
Now me on the other hand; I almost did cry. As I was standing up there I was looking out at all the people that had shown up to support Chris, Alyssa and me. It is amazing and wonderful to see and feel how much Alyssa is loved. And the best part about it? Is there are even more people that love her that weren't able to make it for one reason or another!
We had a party to celebrate afterwards. There was good food, lots of fun conversation and good cake. Alyssa was exhausted by this point and fell fast asleep on my shoulder.
She had a wonderful day and I am so thankful for the love that we have of our family and friends.

Getting So Big

Alyssa is almost 5 months old. I can't believe how fast time goes. This morning we were playing on the floor with her toys. She was sitting in her green bumbo seat. She would put the toys on the floor on the right side of her and one by one pick them up put them in front of her play with it, then put it back down on the floor. She did this for about 5 minutes while I just sat there watching her. I then picked her up and sat with her on the couch were we sang songs. She was all smiles. I then put a spit rag on her face and said "Where's Alyssa?" she pulled the rag off her head and smiled. Before today she would always just turn her head side to side trying to figure out what had happened.
She is now eating cereal, can almost sit up by herself, can roll over and loves to "talk". These were all things that I said I couldn't wait for to happen. Now I'm missing my tiny baby.
Yesterday Chris and I talked about having another one. If the world was perfect we would try again right away. We love Alyssa so much that we can't wait to have another one. However the world isn't perfect and so we will wait. Plus I would like to breastfeed for a year and if I get pregnant again I probably would not be able to breastfeed her.