Evelyn's Recent Endeavors

Evelyn has been growing up so quickly these last few months.  She has started to become a regular sign language user, uses her little pointer finger to point at anything she wishes to have or touch, has started to walk, and listens well.  It is so fun to see more and more of her personality as she is slowly able to communicate and express herself more.

A few weeks ago I had gotten Evelyn ready to go, and then had to run and grab one more thing.  When I came back, she had successfully pulled off her hat, mittens, and socks.  I guess it's much more fun to play with those things than to wear them.

 

Just a few days ago, Evelyn was playing on our bed while I was doing something else.  I wasn't really watching her except to make sure she wasn't getting too close to the edge.  After a little bit she started playing with the window.  I wasn't surprised because she often pulls back the curtain and looks out our bedroom window.  This time though, she decided to try something new - licking the window.  I think there was a little bit of frost on the glass that she was licking off, but at any rate she was really enjoying it and I managed to catch it on video. Sorry it's sideways, I couldn't get it to rotate.

Then this morning, I decided to finally sort through a big pile of beads to make some necklaces for our niece for Christmas.  Just as I had almost the whole pile untangled, Evelyn decided that she was going to help me finish the job.  In the end, I had to untangle them a second time, but it was worth it watching the fun she had playing with them.

 

Overall, we are greatly enjoying each and every day with our darling girl.  She makes everything more interesting, and definitely more entertaining.  I'm looking forward to many more fun and funny things with her!

The Wean: Week 4

As of last Monday, Evelyn has been completely weaned.  The first couple of mornings were a little rough, but we made it through.  Now she gets very excited whenever she sees her cup of milk.  She drags it around in her teeth until she's done drinking it.  I was expecting more difficulty at the end, but I think finally cutting everything completely off helped to seal the deal.  I am looking forward to growing and bonding with Evelyn in different ways now, and watching her grow in her independence. 

The Wean: Week 3

This week I have dropped the night feeding.  The first two days were a little bit rough come bed time.  Starting at around 7pm, Evelyn starts getting whiny and clingy and insists on crawling up on my lap and laying her head down on me while she sucks her thumb.  I think that the main thing for her is that she's loosing her Mommy connection time and she doesn't like it.  Even though I hold her while she drinks her cup of milk, it's not the same.  I need to make an intentional effort to do fun things with her throughout the day to make up for this time she is missing.  Even simple things like reading stories, or chasing her and tickling her tummy, or going for a walk, or holding her in my lap for 5 mins are things that I know she loves and don't take much time out of my day.

I am anticipating next week to actually be easier than this week.  With all nursing times being supplemented, she's not left wondering, "I wonder if mom will nurse me THIS time?" Because she won't be nursed at all.  I'm sure we'll probably have a rough first couple of mornings, but after that and after a few weeks, it will all be but a fond memory (if even that).

Part of me is sad to be done nursing Evelyn already.  Initially I had hoped to continue for at least a year.  I guess making it almost to 11 months is pretty good.  The other part of me is looking forward to the freedom that will come with being done.  I can leave Evelyn with others (Kevin, family, etc.) and not worry about if she'll take the bottle for them okay.  The reality is that my break from nursing will be an all too short 5 months before #2 is here and we start again.  And my body could use a break to just focus on growing this little one.

The Wean: Week 2

Well, we made it through week one and are starting on week two of the weaning process.  The rest of week one went very smoothly.  With only one feeding being substituted, it wasn't that big of a shock for Evleyn.  We've only been through one day of two feedings from the cup and two feedings from mom.  By the end of the day yesterday, Evelyn was very clingy and a little bit irritable even though she took two awesome naps.  I think it might take her a few days to adjust to mornings and evenings from mom only.  The one good thing is that now when I do nurse her, she eats really well and doesn't mess around.  This makes those feedings go much quicker and easier.  I am still anticipating weeks three and four to be the most difficult in this process, but we're just taking one day at a time.

The Wean: Week 1

Yesterday marked day one of weaning Evelyn.  I decided to take 4 weeks and drop one of her feedings each week replacing nursing with milk I have stored in the freezer.  We're just skipping the whole bottle thing this time and going straight to the sippy cup.  She took the cup just fine both yesterday and today, but I discovered that she doesn't like it cold.  I have to warm up the milk for her or she won't drink it.  I think we'll work on one thing at a time.  When she is successfully weaned, then we'll work on drinking cold milk. 

She is, however, slowly figuring out how cups work.  Up until now, she would lean her face forward and down to try and get a drink.  I've been letting her play with a sippy cup of water to learn to tip it up to get the water out.  Today she was playing with it in the hallway and I found her with a wet shirt, so she was doing something right.

House Flies

A few days ago, we decided to paint our front door.  In order to do so, we had to take the door off of the hinges and lay it outside.  While the paint was drying and we had no front door, all the flies on our block appeared to have entered our house to get out of the cold.  I've been very annoyed with the flies constantly buzzing around and landing on me.  I've killed about 25 of them, but there are still a handful that appeared to have gone into hiding when the fly massacre took place because they survived the slaughter and  are back flying around. 

That said, the other day Evelyn woke up from her morning nap, and I could hear her playing in her crib.  She has this special giggle/laugh noise that she reserves for times when she finds something really fun to play with.  Curious as to what she had discovered in her crib that could draw out this laugh, I snuck into her bedroom.  Now normally as soon as she sees me in her room, she is instantly on her feet at the side of the crib with her arms in the air wanting to be picked up.  I found her this time sitting towards one end of the crib and looking at the blankets in front of her.  There was a fly sitting on her blanket.  She waved her arm at the fly, it moved out of the way, and then come crawling back.  This is what was eliciting those joyful giggles I had heard from the other room. She sat contentedly batting at this fly for several minutes. 

It started to make me think.  Oh to have the mindset of a child.  Where even pesky flies are fun playtime pals.  To not be bothered by a nuisance, but rather enjoy watching God's creation up close.  To see even the smallest creature as a means to be joyful.

I still try to kill the flies I see flying around our house, but it does bring a smile to my face when Evelyn is sitting in her high chair and a fly happens to land on her tray.  She proceeds to ignore me and smile real big at the fly and then watch it until she can't see where it has gone.

Morning Math

I always knew that there was a trick to converting square feet to square yards, and that it wasn't as simple as dividing by 3 or anything like that.  After a little bit of Google research I discovered a very helpful math forum with a smart man named Dr. Math who explains math problems.  The picture he showed made so much sense.

3 feet = 1 yard
    ___
   | 1 |  1 sq. ft.  
   |___|
    ___ ___ ___
   | 1 | 2 | 3 |   1 sq. yd. =
   |___|___|___|   9 sq. ft.
   | 4 | 5 | 6 |
   |___|___|___|
   | 7 | 8 | 9 |
   |___|___|___|

When you calculate it out, one square yard is equal to 9 square feet.  To go from square feet to square yards, all you have to do is divide by 9.

Excited that I finally figured out an easy way to convert between the two, I went outside to measure and calculate how many cubic yards of dirt we will need to fill our newly landscaped flower beds.  Wait?  CUBIC yards?  I thought we were talking square yards.  Well, landscape companies sell dirt and mulch and things by the cubic yard, so that's what we needed to know.

Well, here's how I did it.  I calculated out how many square feet of beds are out there.  I added up 166.5 sq ft.  Then I divided by 9 to get the square yards (18.5).  Then I measured that the beds are approximately 10" deep which, with a simple calculation equals .277777778 yds.  Multiply 18.5 by .2777777778 and voila!  We need 5.138 cubic yards of dirt to fill our beds.

Getting Paid to Landscape Our Own Home

As most of you know, Kevin does lawncare along with bits and pieces of landscaping for a living.  We have been looking forward to landscaping some flower beds around our home, but were waiting for the local landscape supply store to start their fall 40% off sale to buy our stones.  Kevin wanted to use limestone, which of course is one of the more expensive stones, so we were looking at about a $500-600 project just for the stones. 

Kevin called me about a week ago while he was out working and said, "What would you say if I told you that someone is going to pay us $200 for all of our landscaping stone?"  At first I didn't think I heard him right, but of course I had.  I immediately wanted to know how this would be possible.  I could tell he had a smirk on his face as he told me about one of the rental properties that he mows and how they have a limestone landscaped flower beds that are all overgrown and look terrible because no one maintains them.  He talked to the property owner and told him that he would take out all of the stones and plant grass seed for $200.  The man willingly agreed, much to Kevin's delight.

Now, not only do we have exactly what we wanted to put around our house, but we have an extra $200 to buy any extra stones that we may need, landscaping fabric, fill dirt, and plants to fill our beds.  My husband is such a business man, and it's wonderful! 

Evelyn's Eatings

Evelyn has reached six months of age.  I had decided that I wanted to wait until then to introduce her to solid foods.  Since reaching this age a couple of weeks ago, she has tried a few different things.  Her very first food was some rice cereal.  She didn't seem very impressed with it, and wouldn't open her mouth for more. 

The four days that I was giving her the rice cereal, she was extra irritable and fussy.  I don't know if it was giving her gas or what the problem was, but I decided to switch and start giving her an egg yolk.  I didn't get a picture of it, but she really liked it.  She actually opened her mouth and wanted to eat more.  Her fussiness stopped as soon as she stopped eating the rice cereal, so I think there was a connection.

After that, I switched to fruits in the morning for breakfast.  The first one was pears. She didn't know what was coming.  All she knew was that he had this fun thing around her neck and was sitting on the couch with mommy.

She didn't open her mouth because she wasn't really sure what was going on.

I think that pears must have a different texture, or else she just wasn't used to it.  But at any rate, this is the first face I got:

And this was the next:

She kept gagging on the food as I would spoon it into her mouth.  Needless to say, it took four mornings for her to finish that first jar of pears.  Next we switched over to apples.  She seemed to like those better and ate that jar in two days.  Because she was liking the apples, I decided to put a couple of chunks in her mesh feeder.

This feeder is such a neat idea for babies.  She can hold onto it herself, and chew on/suck on whatever I put inside.  The best part is though, that she can't get any chunks out because she's just gnawing on the mesh part and everything gets strained through it.

A few days later I was shelling a bunch of peas from my mother-in-law's garden and she started to get whiny.  I handed her a pea pod and she had lots of fun sucking on it. 

A few days later I was cutting up beans with my mom and decided to hand her a bean to suck on.  The only problem is that her top teeth are coming in and she managed to bite a chunk of the bean off.  She started choking on it and mom and I were on the verge of doing the heimlich on her when she swallowed it.  A couple of days later I found it in her diaper. :D 

We are continuing on our journey of introducing new fruits and vegetables every 4-5 days and enjoying her reactions to each one.  Sweet potatoes are on the menu for today with peas and beans to follow.

Bread Making

Until recently, I have never realized the fun of making bread.  This past winter, I experimented with sourdough.  Because we kept our house at an internal temperature of 62 degrees, there was not enough warmth for the starter to ferment properly, and my bread closer resembled a small brick than a loaf of bread.  Okay, so maybe it wasn't THAT bad.  I eventually baked up my starter and decided to wait awhile on the whole bread thing.

A few months ago, my dad got me a bread machine at a garage sale.  I didn't do anything with it for quite some time because I didn't have any recipes.  Well, I guess that's not an excuse with the internet now days, but I just didn't take the time.  Finally, I stopped over to my parents' house and got some recipes from mom.  I don't know why I waited so long to try it out.  I absolutely LOVE the smell of the bread as it bakes on the counter.  I think what I like the most about it is that it only takes me 10-15mins to dump all of the ingredients into the pan, and then all I have to do is push start, and voila!  3 hours later, we have a loaf of warm homemade bread.

The other amazing part is that it is so inexpensive.  I figure it maybe costs $1/loaf + electricity.  That is unreal!  I can make warm, fresh, homemade bread at a fraction of the cost, and it only takes me 15mins.  I'd say it's well worth it. I am looking forward to experimenting with different recipes and finding breads that Kevin likes too!  Although I think he'd eat anything I make and not complain, it's fun to find things that he truly loves.

Mmmmmm... that smell is starting to float through the house!

5 1/2 and 26.1

Today I had a few places I needed to go, and no time constraints, so I decided to ride my bike.  I got Evelyn's backpack, some blankets, a water bottle, and a Clif bar.  I tucked Evelyn into the Burley, propped her up with blankets, and gave her a few toys. I left home around 12:30pm.

I was about a half a mile from home when I realized that I hadn't grabbed our ipod.  I decided that since I wasn't too far from home, that I would ride back quick and grab it.  This added an extra mile to my trip.

Around 1:15 i reached my first stop. This was to drop off an estimate for lawn care at the house that Keith is working on.  I stayed for a few minutes to look at the house since it is almost done for the parade in two weeks.

I left there and headed out down Lake Rd. in Altoona to check out a thrift sale I had seen on craigslist.  I had to stop at 1:30 to feed Grunter, drank some water, and then we headed on.  I got to the garage sale and found a few things.  Among which were two books.  Of course I would find books.  So I added them to the cart.  I headed back through Altoona via Hwy KB. By this time, Evelyn was getting irritable.  She can't quite sit up by herself, and the bumps in the road were causing her to slowly slouch over to one side and be buried by a blanket.  Her toys were now out of reach, and the sun was shining in her eyes.  All legitimate reasons for a soon-to-be 5 month old to be upset.  Eventually she found her thumb, and the bumps bumped her to sleep.

My next destination was another thrift sale that I had seen on craigslist that was behind Kohls.  I headed down Clairemont to London Rd. and then over on Hamilton.  When I came to the sale, I was sorely disappointed.  I bought nothing. BUT, while en route to this sale, I saw a sign for another sale that appeared to be just a little further down this big hill.  I decided to check it out.  Much to my dismay, it was a LOT further, and was up another hill.  When I finally made it there, once again I was sorely disappointed.  The only thing I found was 2 Curious George books for Evelyn.  I should have saved my $1 and the 2 miles I biked up and down hills...

Next on my itinerary was to stop by one of our commercial customers
to pick up a fertilizer bill that had been left there.  So I headed back up the big hill behind Kohls and guess who woke up from her nap?  That's right.  And of course the sun was shining right into her eyes and no matter how hard she arched her back, she just couldn't get comfortable.  So I took her out of the cart and carried her as I lugged the bike with the cart up the hill.  After picking up the bill, I began to ascend another hill (the one behind Panera and BWW).  Grunter just was not having a good time at this point, so I decided it was time for a break.  We sat down in the shade of a retaining wall and laid down.  I ate my Clif bar, changed Evelyn's diaper, and called Kevin.  This was around 3:45pm.

After the short rest, I decided to press on.  I made it down to Golf Rd. and headed to the west.  Of course I went down the side of the road where the sidewalk ends 100 yards down, so I 'quickly' hopped down the curb, and up over the median, and back up to the sidewalk on the other side.  Evelyn was thinking about the rest we had taken where she got to lay in the grass and play with Mommy and was wishing we could do that again.  Unfortunately for her, we had to keep trucking so that we could get home.  She eventually fell asleep to the rhythm of the bumps in the sidewalk.

The last place I was planning to go was the Post Office to check if we had anything in our P.O. Box.  As I was heading down Golf Rd. towards State St. I turned right on a road that I assumed would connect to Hamilton so that I could stay out of the busy traffic.  Turns out the road I chose did not connect, and added an extra mile to my trip.

We were near to the top of State St. hill when it became time to feed Evelyn.  At 4:45pm we stopped in the little park by the fire station and sat in the shade.  I drank a little more water (which was very warm by this point) And tried to keep flies and spiders from crawling all over me.  As soon as Evelyn was done, we packed up again and headed down the hill.  The P.O., as we like to call it, held one letter for us, which is barely worth the trip over there.

Since I was plum out of water, I decided to swing by Daniel & Ellen's house, which is only a few blocks away, to refill my bottle.  This added an extra .75 miles to my trip, but was sooo worth the cool water that Ellen poured into my water bottle.

We left there around 5:30pm and were finally headed home.  As I headed up the Madison St. hill, it felt as if Evelyn had gained 20lbs.  How had the bike cart gotten so heavy?  I made it up and flew (more like crawled) past several thrift sale signs.  No way was I going to waste any more time stopping at more of those today.  I arrived back home around 6:10pm and fell onto the couch.  Never had it felt so good to sit down.

Out of curiosity I calculated out the miles I traveled and it came to a grand total of 26.1 miles.  I was out for 5 1/2 hours, got a fair amount of sunburn, and definitely broke in my new-to-me bike.  Needless to say I promised Grunter that I wouldn't make her go into the bike cart for a few days (not that my backside could take anymore time on a bike seat), and I will be staying home ALL day tomorrow!

Matching Outfits

Last summer I turned a pair of Kevin's pants into shorts for him.  I saved the pant legs knowing we were having a girl so that I could make a dress for her to match him.  Well, last Sunday I finally got around to making the dress for Evelyn.  It turned out even cuter than I expected.  It only took a couple of hours from start to finish, and was well worth missing my nap in order to make it. I also made a matching headband, but had trouble getting it the right size, so it kept slipping down on her face.

Here she is in her brand-new dress!

Evelyn and Daddy in their matching clothes.  Kevin absolutely loves it when outfits match.  He was hoping that there would be enough fabric left over to make something for me out of it, but unfortunately there was not.

A close up on Evelyn.  This was my first attempt at making button holes, and they didn't turn out the greatest.  Functional, yes, but good-looking? Not so much... Good thing the button covers it up!

The Misner Name Lives On

Late Sunday night (or early Monday morning) April 5th around 1:30am Gideon David Misner was born to my brother-in-law Keith and his wife Amanda.  He was 8lbs 4oz and 21in long. 

They wouldn't tell any of us his name until we went to the hospital to see him.  I have to admit that I was a little bit jealous that they named him Gideon, because it was one of the names that I really like for a boy.  Oh, well - you can't use them all, and who knows how many boys we'll end up having if we would even get around to using it...

His face was a little swollen and bruised from being born, but he is still a little cutie!

Because there are only two brothers (Keith and Kevin) in the Misner family, it was up to one of them to have a boy to carry on the Misner name.  So far they've only had girls.  So, needless to say when PapPap (David Misner) found out that not only did he have a grandson who would carry on the family name, but he was also named after him, a few tears were shed. 

We are all so very happy and excited about this new little bundle.  I can't wait to watch him grow and develop, and to see Norah as a big sister :D Congrats Keith & Amanda & Norah!

RSV?

A couple of days ago Evelyn started coming down with what seems to be a nasty cold.  It all started with a cute little cough and a snotty nose.  She has some of the symptoms of RSV, but it hasn't gotten to the point where we have to take her in to find out for sure.  She has been okay the past couple of days, but this morning as we were sucking snot out of her nose, she started having a coughing fit and began choking.  She scared us very badly, but thankfully that's all it was.  We got a humidifier going and that seemed to help some.  She doesn't have a fever, but she does have a stuffy nose and cough.  Her appetite has drastically decreased, but she is still having around 4-5 wet diapers/day so at least I know she's not dehydrated.  She has also been very sleepy during the day, hardly staying awake for more than an hour at a time.

She was just starting to eat well at 5:00pm, and then when I sat her up to burp her, she spewed milk all over me.  This wasn't just a little spit up either. It just kept coming and coming.  I think she threw up everything she had just eaten.  The first round went up her sleeve with the rest falling all over me as I tried to catch it with my hand.  So into the shower the two of us went.  I think the warm steamy air helped loosen things up in her nose and throat because she's been breathing a lot easier and not coughing as much.  

Because we are trying to take a more natural approach to health and wellness, both her and I are taking a natural supplement.  We brought her bed back into our bedroom so that we can hear her easier if she has trouble breathing during the night.  We also have the head of her cradle built up with blankets so that her head is elevated.

We have no idea where she caught this bug.  If it is indeed a mild case of RSV, it can be spread through touching or kissing, and can take anywhere from 2-8 days for symptoms to show up.  In adults, RSV is simply a mild cold, so anyone who has held her in the past week could have given it to her.  It can take up to one to two weeks to fully recover from it, so we're looking at a potentially long haul with this. 

Please pray for little Evelyn.  It is so hard to watch her cough and then grimace because it hurts her throat.  It is also a very scary thing when she starts coughing and can't breathe.  Pray also for Kevin and I that we would have wisdom in knowing how to help her, and when to seek additional care for her. Any advice is welcome too!

Evelyn Rolled Over!

Yesterday I laid Evelyn down on her stomach on a blanket in the living room. I went into the kitchen to put away the dishes and when I turned to check on her, she was off the blanket and laying on her back. I thought it was just a fluke thing, so I put her back on her stomach and sat and watched her. Much to my surprise (and delight), she rolled over again. I quickly grabbed the camera to videotape her, and she rolled over again while I caught it on camera. When I went to watch the video, much to my dismay I discovered that the camera had been in time-lapse mode. I tried to get her to do it again so that I could get a regular video of her, but I think she was a bit tired out.

So today after her morning feeding, I thought I would try it again. I laid her on her stomach on her blanket and went to grab the camera. When I came back to her room she was already on her back. I reset her and got the camera rolling... Enjoy! Evelyn rolling over at 5 weeks and 6 days old!