10 months

it's pretty amazing that i will have a one year old in less than two months.

i just love seeing how she has changed over 10 months.

what a blessing these pictures will be 10, 15, 20 years from now!

eleanor has had a rough month to say the least.

from a double ear infection, the rash (which is still gone), her first tooth and an awful cold that she is just now getting over, she is finally back to her happy self and even more importantly back to sleeping 12 hours at night! thank the lord.

other Eleanor facts:

she weighs approx 16 1/2 pounds.

she naps at 9:30 and 2:30.

she nurses 4 times a day, around 7:30, 11:30, 3:00 and 7:00.

she eats three times a day and can put quite a bit down.

she loves turkey, green beans, hummus, cheese and pretty much anything i offer her.

she can say five words- mama, dada, buddy, lyla and jett (her cousins).

she loves music and clapping her hands.

she loves to point her finger.

her and lyla get super excited when they see eachother. it's pretty adorable.

coincidence?

thanks for all the sweet texts, comments and calls concerning eleanor.
things are much better now.

on my previous post i explained about an odd rash that showed up on her face.
yesterday it came back a tiny bit (still after i nurse her) but NOTHING like tuesday.
for the most part she was acting herself.
until yesterday evening.
we were outside with her and in the bright light, guess what we noticed...

white spots & purple on her gums!
i mean seriously, is my 10 month old FINALLY getting a tooth?
literally a couple hours ago it broke through and you can actually feel it now.
poor thing. i guess this explains all the drooling she has been doing lately.

so now my next question...could the rash have been related to teething?
i have never heard of that and ironically i asked the doctor tuesday if A. she was teething and B. if it was possible that she could get a rash from teething and she said no to both.
hmmmmm...

well maybe the rash isn't related but what a strange coincidence.
i guess i will know if if they are related if it happens with the next tooth.

i am trying to capture a good pic of the tooth but because of her obssession with the iphone, she moves all over the place trying to take it from me so they all turn out blurry.
maybe i need to bust out the big camera for this...

picture coming soon!

to all the momma's out there...

have you seen this before?

eleanor woke up this morning at 7:30 am like normal. she slept great.
i nursed her and once i was finished, i noticed a couple welts on her face.
they looked a lot like mosquito bites so i figured she got them during her sleep
(are there even mosquitos in january when it's 29 outside?!)

anyway, they faded within an hour or so and never seemed to even bother her.
we had breakfast, played and she went down at 10 am for her morning nap as usual.
she woke up at noon looking like this:

there were a bunch of the mosquito looking welts on her face.

her face was bright red.

they had spread to her head too.

again they didn't seem to bother. no itching although she was a bit fussy and clingy.

so i ended up taking her to the doctor.

by the time i got there the welts seemed to have merged together.

at that point it was just a couple GIANT welts on her face.

they pretty much said to keep an eye on it, that it was prob a food allergy or something normal and didn't seem too concerned.

they said i could give her benedryl if i felt necessary and that it should go away within a couple days. (exactly what i expected them to say...)

by the time i got home it was almost completely gone. so strange. i hadn't given her any meds yet.

so she went down for her second nap at 3:00 pm and woke up at 4:30 looking like this:

it had completely come back but was worse and in completely different spots on her face.

i also found it on her bottom, her shoulder and her foot...

i called the doc and they said to give her the benedryl, wash everything in her bed (since every time i got her out of the bed today, the rash appeared) and give her a cool bath.

check, check & check.

20 min after taking the benedryl, the welts were gone.

she was still fussy (she is never fussy and i literally mean that) and was so clingy.

all she wanted was to lay her head on my shoulders.

it actually was really sweet (i love it when she wants her momma) but seriously...what could this be?!

i really don't feel like it's a food allergy...she hasn't had anything different in that last few days.

there have been no changes in soaps, detergents, etc.

poor thing.

i hope she sleeps well and doesn't wake up with it in the morning but i would still love an explanation and right now i have no clue.

any ideas???

itty bitty baby

i stumbled upon this photo today.

it truly amazes me how much eleanor has changed.

i cannot believe she is two months away from her first birthday!

9 months

my how time flies!

i can't believe we have a 9 month old!

and it just keeps getting better and better...

eleanor facts:

she weighs 16 lb 4 oz. (20%)

she is 27 inches long. (45%)

she has been sleeping through the night for a little over a month now, 7:30pm to 7:30am... i truly thought this day would never come for us but oh how it did and it's AMAZING.

she is eating baby oatmeal, fruits and veggies for most meals but is transitioning to "big people" food.

she loves cheese, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, grilled chicken and green beans.

she is nursing 5 times a day.

she LOVES to babble and says dada to almost everyone and everything.

blake & i are convinced she has said Buuu Dee to buddy a couple times... ;o)

she still has no teeth & still isn't too interested in crawling which is completely ok with me considering we have done ZERO baby proofing.

she has a new face she makes...she squints her eyes and scrunches her nose with a giant smile...i really need to capture that in a picture because it is the cutest!

blake headed off to colorado with his brother and it was so sweet to see him say goodbye to eleanor. he even teared up (which he pretended was for me) but i know fully that it was because of our sweet girl. she definitely has him wrapped around her lil finger!

santa baby

here are some fun moments with eleanor over the last few weeks taken on my iphone.
so thankful to have a decent camera on my phone for times when i don't have my 'big' camera with me!


eleanor enjoying a mum mum in daddy's lap.

my sleeping beauty after waking up from a nap.

trying to escape from the highchair. i suppose it's time to start using the straps.

grandma's scarf wrapped around her head on a cold night out in c-town.

kickin back in the grocery cart while momma shops.

enjoying a morning walk with rett carreker, bentley long & lyla durrett.

a little skeptical of santa's furry face...i would be too!

E news

here is a run down on the latest & greatest with eleanor:

she is 8 months old now.

she sits up really well.

she is not interested in crawling yet.

she loves to sing along with the music on her exersaucer & toys.

her favorite word is "dadadada dadada".

she smiles every time she sees buddy enter the room, or move, or yawn, or scratch...apparently he is really funny.

she loves looking at family pictures. they make her laugh.

she still has zero teeth & i am definitely ok with that!

she is finally enjoying baby food much more these days and she shakes her head "no" when she doesn't want anymore.

she loves mum mums & also water especially from a glass or a water bottle.

she takes a morning nap & an afternoon nap.

she nurses 5 times during the day.

oh and MOST IMPORTANTLY...she started sleeping through the night 1 week ago, 7pm - 4:30am, nurses and goes back down until 7:30am. once my body adjusts, i will drop that last feeding. before that, she was waking up 2-3 times per night. to be honest, it was just easier to feed her & put her right back down so i never let her cry it out. somehow, it took me 8 months to come to that decision that i was ready to let her CIO. she did so for 1.5 hours, most of that in blake's arms and has slept 10 hours straight every since. i seriously thought this day would never come for me!

we are headed on a road trip next week to georgia for the holidays.

buddy & eleanor will be with us.

we are visiting my grandparents for a few days in woodville & cherry log & then will be in savannah for a few days.

we have so much to be thankful for this season! what a blessed year we have had!

happy thanksgiving to all!!

8 months

miss eleanor had her first big cold this week.

she was a tough one getting to smile in this pic.

blake & i danced around, made every noise possible, sang, etc & all we got was a half smile with the eyebrows raised.

oh well...still a cutie!

7 months

Viva Las Vegas

a couple weeks ago we took our first trip AWAY from eleanor for two nights & joined the longs in Vegas for Danielle's 28th birthday.
it was definitely hard to leave Eleanor but i knew she was in good hands between my parents & blake's parents.
what an AMAZING time we had with the Longs.
the boys certainly took us by surprise more than once.
we had a limo waiting for us at the airport where we met the boys.
we then headed to our room at the Palazzo (the new tower at the Venetian).
of course our regular room that we thought we had was actually a 2,000 square foot suite on the 45th floor overlooking the strip.
it even had an eliptical in it.
we also enjoyed shopping, dinner at Olives at the Bellagio & front row seats to the Cirque De'Soleil show "Mystere".

the trip was such a blast...one i will never forget.
danielle, i hope you had as much fun i did.
parents- thanks for watching our sweet eleanor. i am so thanksful & glad she didn't go on another bottle strike while i was gone. i am also glad she likes to sleep longer at night for you both!
and boys- thanks for all your planning and fun surprises!

love you!

view from out dinner table at Olives.