Monday, November 19, 2012

Handedness, Standing/Walking, and More!

I think Annelise is a lefty. She tried eating her pasta today with a spoon, and got 3 spoonfuls in with her left, and none with the right. And she seemed far more frustrated with her right hand, and kept wanting to just pick the pasta pieces up with her left hand. Also, she's always favored her left hand for everything. 

Annelise has stood up on her own and stayed standing several times in the last week. She still plops down anywhere from immediately to about 15 seconds from when she got up, but it's progress! She likes to use her walker, but is so good at crawling now, she'd much rather just crawl places. I think the main reasons she likes the walker is because it makes cool sounds and I get really excited when she uses it. 

For the past week or so, I think one of her molars has been trying to come through. I can kind of see the front and back of a top left tooth in the back, but not the middle part yet. She's been really cranky, waking up at all hours of the night whining and whimpering. It's so sad, and also so grating on Mark and my nerves, because it's almost nonstop for hours when it starts. We try just about everything to make her feel better, food, cold foods, stuff to chew on, Orajel, Tylenol when a slight fever hits, distractions with games or toys... I think molars are just the worst. 

She has become attached to her toothbrush lately. I don't exactly know if it's related to the teething, but I'm pretty sure she loves the toothbrush because it's got both the bristled part the feels fun on her gums, and the soft rubbery part on the other end and that also feels nice to massage her gums with! She grips that thing like a mad woman, though. It's intense!

Annelise loves the rocking chair she got to use at her grandparent's house a couple weekends back. I think it was her Uncle Scott's? She was so funny getting in and then rocking for a bit, sticking her legs straight out as usual, of course, for any chair she sits in. Then she'll hop back out of it, play with something else for a second, and then get back in the chair and rock again! Repeat about 10-15 times. She was having such a good time!

It's been unusually warm for this time of year in Iowa. But it's great because the best way to cheer up Annelise when she's grumpy is to head outside and let her crawl in the grass! She likes to look at the rocks in the rock garden at her grandparent's house! She's so funny, because she knows she's not supposed to eat them, since we've told her as much, but she thinks she's being sneaky. She'll grab a rock, kinda lick it really fast, and then throw it over the edge. It's like she's rebelling against us telling her not to put the rock in her mouth! What a little stinker!! At her other grandparent's, she likes to crawl around in the grass, pick up leaves, and try to put those in her mouth when I'm not looking. But I'm always looking! Joke's on her!

At our place, Annelise and I like hang out on our patio, and she pulls herself up on the railing bars, and looks down to the driveway below. In our tiny little lawn, she likes to crawl back and forth, then test me on whether or not she can climb down the curb to the parking lot area, but that's a no-no! She also likes to look at the weather beacon towers. They blink red and white bright lights! I can't wait until next weekend when we put up Christmas lights to see what Annelise thinks of them this year!

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Crawling and sickness...

[Okay, so I wrote this waaaay back on July 9, 2012 and now it's Nov 1, 2012 and I realize I totally forgot to post it. I've been slacking on writing blog posts. So here's that post from way back then...]

First of all, Annelise had her 9 month doctor's visit! She weighed 18 pounds, 6 ounces, was 29.3 inches tall, and had a head circumference of 44.5 cm. That puts her in the 43 percentile for weight, 95 percentile for height, and 65 percentile for head circumference. Basically that means she's gonna be tall like her daddy.

Next up, sickness. Annelise first started getting sick the evening of the 4th of July, might have even begun earlier that day since she wasn't letting herself take her usual naps. Regardless, by the morning of the 5th, at 5am, she was miserable. I got up and changed her diaper, prepared her usual bottle, and she drank it up mostly as usual. But.. she had a stuffy nose, coughing, sweating like she had a fever. I checked her axillary temp right after the bottle, and it was right around 97.2, which was fine. We played for a bit, then it was time for her nap. She would not go at all. The nose clogged up, and I think her throat must have been hurting... I took her temperature again and it was 99.2. Just barely below what it would be to take her to the doctor. So because she wouldn't go to sleep, I ended up just letting her fall asleep on me, which was nice because she's never done that before and I enjoyed the snuggles, but I really wish she had been feeling good. She woke up after about half an hour sounding worse than before. By that time, Daddy came and was helping out, and he eventually got her to actually nap in her crib while I went back to work. The rest of the day was spent trying to make her feel better, but even today she's still got a runny nose. :( The rest of us around here ended up getting sick throughout the weekend. First starting as a sore throat, the next day being extremely tired and feverish, and a continuing stuffy nose after that. So Annelise must have had a sore throat on the 4th, and then the full symptoms started the 5th. Basically, sad girl for the holiday.. no wonder she didn't want to stay up for the fireworks!

Even though she's been sick, she's been amazingly resilient. With the exception of that first morning, she's tried so hard to be happy. It's amazing! If she felt anything like Mark and I felt while we were sick, it was an amazing feat that she was so chipper most of the time. And to top it off, she's figuring out how to crawl on her hands and knees more! She now takes up to 4 little steps. She's also a pro at sitting up all by herself, which she's been perfecting over the last week and a half or so. And, she also pulls herself up to standing on the couch now, pretty consistently. Last night, we put the crib down to the lowest position since she's getting so strong now!