peek-a-Gracie

I have been playing peek-a-boo with Gracelyn for awhile now and she thinks it hilarious, which makes me think it's hilarious too!

Up until now, she would always pull the blanket (or shorts while changing her diaper) off her face after I covered it. As of today she will raise the blanket up to cover her own head and take it off, all on her own. (In the video she only does it once because we had been playing for quite some time before it finally dawned on me to video her.) It's a lot of fun because she will play and interact more and more each day. She still isn't a fan of patty-cake so we partake in a lot of peek-a-boo and singing.

What's even funnier about this video is that she is playing with Britton's beloved "bay." She loves how soft it is, or maybe that she knows she isn't allowed to touch it. Either way, it was handy and he was off playing with Blaine so he had no idea that his "bay" was be touched by someone other than himself. He watched the video after I uploaded it to YouTube and he was none too pleased to see it in the arms of his sister.

G's 9 month, um, I mean 10 month stats

Gracelyn had her 9 month well-check Friday. It was a month and 1 week late, partly due to my tardiness in scheduling it and the pediatrician being on vacation. It's kind of what happens when you have 4 kids, at least in our world, and according to my dear mom friend who also has 4 kiddos!

Miss G weighed in at 20 pounds, 10 ounces and is 27.5 inches long! That puts her in the 50th percentile for weight and 50th for length.


Doc thought she looked great!


I mentioned to her that Gracie wasn't sleeping and hadn't really since we got home from the hospital in March. She said it was perfectly understandable. Just as I was having difficulty letting her out of my sight (and hold,) so was G with me. She called it a form of separation anxiety. It made total sense as we are pretty much a package deal. It's not like Gracelyn wants to be held all day. she gets down and plays a lot, but pretty much always knows where I am in the house.


Gracie also received her 6 month shots. I opted out of them at 6 months. For me it was too soon after she was discharged, even though the Botulism Treatment Center in San Fransisco that supplied the Baby BIG immune-globulin to treat her botulism said that vaccines were fine, as long as they were not live virus vaccines. I was still and still am leery of them knowing that the serum is still in her system, helping to protect her from any further botulism sickness for the next few months. There is no way to be absolutely certain that nothing will counteract but this is where I have to trust God, turn my anxiety to Him. For He is the ONLY one who knows and can comfort and protect her.

Can you tell that she is adored???

crawling cutie

better known as a "Rockstar!!"

So I wrote the other day that Gracelyn was getting up on all fours and crawling one movement, meaning moving one hand forward and one knee and then belly flopping. I promised that I would catch it on video but was honestly having difficulty because with only one quick stride, she was done before I captured it.

Today Miss G proved yet again, how she is my miracle baby. She army crawled herself to the kitchen where I was preparing lunch and as the boys were making their way to the table she went from a sit to all fours and crawled the ENTIRE WAY TO THE TABLE! I'm talking like 6 feet! I just stood there with my mouth touching the floor. Even the boys commented. Britton pointed and said, "Mom, Dadie (his version of Gracie) crawling." The first time she goes from one crawl to that!! She had sat herself right at her brothers' feet so I ran and got my phone and knelt down and called her over to me. She started to come to me but opted for a detour and made a sharp left turn to go to the living room.

Gracelyn is truly our rockstar. She has scaled the hurdles and is making such progress! It's awesome and something that I can really only thank God for. It's with Him that she has done the things she has.

Even though she is capable of crawling now, her preferred mode of transportation is still the army crawl. She is quite speedy so who can blame her? I have also noticed that, so far, she only will crawl on our kitchen tile. Of course she has only crawled long distances three times now but as soon as she gets to the carpet, she drops.

The next milestone I would LOVE to blog about would be Gracelyn sleeping! The girl does NOT sleep. ever. even in the day I'm lucky if she takes a 30 minute nap. She wasn't sleeping through the night before she was diagnosed with botulism but she was only up once in the night. Now it's every 2 hours, if not every hour and it takes a good 20 minutes to get her to go back to sleep, at least.

Just Cruisin'

another new milestone, as of last night!!! this video cracks.me.up because it shows how my little Gracelyn can go from happy, to sad, back to happy, in just seconds! She really doesn't let anything get her down for long before she is happy and on the go again. Her incredible recovery in such a short amount of time speaks volumes to that! Gracie is definitely a determined little princess!

10 months down....2 to go

Gracelyn is 10 months old, as of Monday, the 16th. It's more of a countdown now to the big first celebration, seeing as I am in party planning mode. I'll go ahead and confess that I have been since she was born, maybe not physically purchasing items for her party back in October but mentally preparing. Her cake is ordered, has been for months and her "party wear" is too. What can I say, she is my princess and that is exactly the kind of party Miss G will get!

Current stats on Gracelyn Paige...

she is all over the place now. She scoots, one arm over the other, and really can go go go! Since Monday, she has gotten up 3 times on all fours and crawled one movement!!! I'm trying to catch it on video but once she starts, she immediately realizes how much quicker her army crawling is, so she belly-flops and is gone! Gracie is pulling up to a stand to pretty much anything and does it very quickly! She just sits right up from her belly now too. It's hard to believe that it was such an issue for her before.

I have been standing her up, unsupported, for about a week and she would last a couple of seconds and then fall either to the front or back. (I catch her of course!) Monday night, she stood balanced for 32 seconds! She was so excited (or possibly distracted because we were all cheering wildly) that after that she immediately fell over and over again!!

G said "MAMA" and reached for me Sunday! Talk about heart-melting!

I'm working with her on kissing but when I say "kiss" to her she won't, BUT will pucker and smack randomly throughout the day, when I am not mentioning it.

She is fussy fussy lately, my little "Grumpy Gracie." I think it's teeth related so I give her Tylenol and teething tablets. It's sad/funny how her face lights up when she sees the teething tablet bottle. As a result of her gum pain, she isn't eating much, which doesn't help her sleeping issue, or better yet NON-sleeping issue. I can only get her to eat a tiny bit of food but she will eat cheerios and puffs by the handfuls. G is a pro at her two hand

teeth!!

Her HUGE smiles that she gives us often are absolutely beautiful! Among her fussiness in a day, she can just light up a room with her grins, just because of something as simple as saying her name or seeing her brothers and them talking to her. precious precious.

she has really grown in length. I couldn't tell you exactly how much. she goes for her NINE month well check on Friday, yes at 10 months and 1 week of age.

Where's G's Teeth?

I spent the day trying to come up with a witty title similar to "Where's Waldo" since Gracie's little stubby teeth are among so much slobber. Unfortunately I failed.

she is squinting at me.
not sure why.
she is all about funny faces these days
and will do just about anything for a laugh or applause from (us) her adoring fans!

Gracelyn's first tooth cut 4 weeks and 1 day ago and the second 2.5 weeks ago. They are coming in very slowly. She spends much of her day biting/chewing on cold teething rings and frozen pacifiers!!