Our little Pumpkin

Monroe is a little pumpkin. Well...she is round. :) Jonathan and I stuck Monroe out with the pumpkins at Mom and Dad's house to take a few pictures.  It didn't go very well at all. She did a face dive into the dirt. She can sit up by herself now, but she got really excited about playing in the grass and tumbled over. Luckily, she didn't have any ouchies, but it did scare her. :(  I'm looking forward to dressing her up for Halloween.

Sydney's Wedding

My good friend Sydney got married last weekend. Jonathan, Monroe, and I went to the wedding. It was really sweet. They wrote their own vows and it was precious. She was such a pretty bride, and her new husband is wonderful. I am proud to say that Monroe was the only baby to not cry during the wedding. Jonathan and I were literally sweating by the end of the ceremony. It was tough work to keep her paci in her mouth and her occupied for over an hour. I'm not sure if she has ever been quiet that long...well at least not in the last few months.
 Here are a few pictures:

Sydney & Ryan...She is so beautiful!

We never have pictures of all 3 of us. We need to start asking someone else to snap the picture.

5 Months Old

I know I am 2 1/2 weeks late on this post, but we have been so busy. Monroe is growing quickly, and she has so much personality. I'm really liking the 5 month age. She has started playing by herself, which gives me a chance to get a few things done at home. She likes anything that makes noise or that spins. She loves the dogs...particularly Bentley. He snuggles up beside her, and she pulls his hair and then cackles. She also thinks it is so funny when he licks her. Sometimes in the middle of a melt down, he is the only thing that helps her to stop crying. Ziva is a little too big and excited to play with Monroe. Monroe pets her, with super vision of course, and at night Ziva will sit beside her exersaucer and eat a bone while Monroe plays. She is a really good eater. I haven't found anything that she won't eat, which is great. We spent a week with my parents this month, and Mom taught Monroe to drink from a straw. It is so cute, but now she screams if you take a drink and don't share with her.  She usually only gets water, but Jonathan gave her sweet tea recently and she seems to love it. Don't worry she doesn't get very much or very often. She is starting to sit up on her own. She can't do it for long periods of time, but she can play with a toy for a few minutes. Her bedtime has become more stable also. She is ready for bed around 7:30 every night. Basketball season starts in two weeks, and I'm starting to wonder how we are going to make it through the games. All of his games start at 7. If anyone has any tips, I would love to hear them.

Solids...

3 weeks ago at Monroe's 4 month check-up the doctor gave us the okay to start solids. I was excited to introduce something new, and she was eager to start chewing. She had started giving me signs that she was ready.. We always sit her in her bumbo on the table, while we eat. She had started leaning over trying to grab things off our plate, and move her head side to side with an open mouth...think baby bird.  We started with veggies first, and stayed with one food for a few days before moving to a new one....She is currently eating squash, carrots, green beans, sweet peas, and next week we will start sweet potatoes. She's nursing and eating cereal for breakfast, and then nurses again at bed time. She is a messy eater!  She typically requires a bath after each meal.... Here are a few pictures of her covered in food.

Covered in Carrots 

Bath after the Mess!

A New Family Member

    I'm excited to say that we have a new family member. No, not another baby...well at least not the human kind. We got a puppy. She is a Rottweiler and her name is Ziva. She is so mellow/laid back, which is nice. I'm staying at home, and she follows me around the house. I love that she has puppy breath. I know some people think that is gross, but it is so sweet. She is named after a character from the television series NCIS. It is my favoritie show. On the show, Ziva was an assassin for the israeli mossad that has come to work for the Navy. She's a beautiful and tough "killer", so our rotti is named after her.

Ziva from NCIS

Bentley, our pomeranian, doesn't know what to think of her. He is dog aggressive, but Ziva is so much larger than him and not scared of him at all. The 1st day we had her home Bentley nipped Ziva on the nose. I think he thought she would run off and leave him alone, but she let out one loud bark and he ran under the bed. However, in the last few days they have begun playing together. Ziva also currently has a fractured ankle. She is in a cast for the next 6 weeks, so we have to monitor her activity. Monitoring a puppy's activity is very difficult. She gets so excited when we let her outside and takes off around the yard. She was supposed to start her training next week, but it will have to be put off a few weeks. We are sending her off to be trained by the people that train the state police dogs in AR. She is going to be too large to take any chances on bad behavior. After watching videos of dogs they have trained previously, I'm really excited to see all the things she will learn!

The Baby

Her Cast

1st Trip to the Fair for Monroe and Mommy...

   Monroe and I had our first trip to the fair last week. The Huskey's, Jonathan's head coaches' family, were headed to the fair and invited us to tag along. They are so good to us, and are always inviting us to eat and go do things. They have two young girls, and wanted Jonathan to ride the rides with them. He was excited to "help" them out. I swear he is like a kid. :) Monroe rode in the carrier that attaches to me. She loves that thing. It is the only way I can get anything done around the house. Anyway, she loved the lights. She stared at them until she feel asleep. She was so good, and so cute! I was pretty excited to go to the fair also. Mom and Dad didn't really "believe" in taking Laura or I, when we were little. Dad would sing a song about carnie's having green teeth and Mom would have needed to spray everything down with Lysol, before we could have climbed on a ride...On Dad's behalf, they played the "green teeth" song on the radio, and he typically sang it just to be funny. Mom assured us that we had been to Disney world enough times and we weren't missing out on anything. After going to the fair, I agree with her. I was a little disappointed and disturbed by how dirty things were. There are not a lot of options for entertainment in Mountain Home, so I'm sure we will go again...If were are still living here.

                                                                

2nd round of shots

Sweet baby girl had her 2nd round of shots today. She did so good! She has a new pediatrician now that we have moved to Mountain Home. Today was the first time we met with the doctor. Her name is Dr. Makwinja and she was so nice. She really talked with me, played with Monroe, and answered all my questions. I feel so much better knowing that we have a good doctor to see, in case she gets sick. She weighs 15.3 lbs and is 26 inches long. The doctor said it was time to start cereal and solids. I'm excited to slowly start introducing the new foods to her. We also found out that she has eczema. I was pretty certain of this before the appointment, but now it's confirmed. She has a Rx cortisone cream to use for the next 5 days, and the doctor suggested that we use aveeno baby eczema relief body wash and lotion on her. I started using everything this afternoon, and I can already tell a difference in her rash. It's no longer red. I hope it completely clears up soon. I'll have to post a video of her trying new food, and the funny faces that she makes.