Real food and more

Not bad...I just updated not too long ago, and here I am again.

Yesterday was Lillian's 8-month birthday. Can you believe it? We started letting her eat "real" food now. The other day, I shared some of my bagel for breakfast, and if we have pasta for dinner, she gets little bits. We went to dinner for Nancy's birthday on Monday and she got to much on some of the bread the gave us before our meals came. We also bought some of those "puffs." They dissolve as the get wet, so we know she won't choke on them. She's pretty good about picking stuff up from the table and putting it in her mouth. I mentioned to Erik just today that it's weird how she meets some milestones right on and others she is late on. This is about the right time to start feeding herself, but she has yet to crawl or cut any teeth.

Yep...that's right. After all her grumpiness and runny nose I mentioned last time, there are still no teeth visible. I'm beginning to think she doesn't have any. But at least the grumpiness has stopped. She's actually slept all the way through the night (well, until 5 at least) the last three nights *knock on wood*, and it's been wonderful!!!

She thought about getting on her hands and knees today. One knee was prepped and ready to go, but she couldn't quite figure out what to do with the other leg. So she was kind of leaning there on her hands and one leg bent behind her since she couldn't seem to get all the way back up to sitting, either. Finally she just toppled forward and I had to sit her back up. I wouldn't be surprised if she's mobile here pretty soon.

Erik is still on overnights, at least for the time being. No one will give him a straight answer on his schedule. One day they tell him it's his last night and the next they say he's back on overnights. As a result, he's never really gotten on to a real overnight sleep schedule and ends up being exhausted all the time. In addition to work, he's running a part time thrift shop as he tries to sell various items to buy a new snowmobile. He sold the one he acquired last year, so he's trying very hard so he can get a new sled before the snow flies. In addition to the snowmobile, he's sold the blue scooter and some sound equipment. We recently got the Rodeo back from Lars and Lisa now that their car troubles are resolved, so he's working on getting that gone, too.

I'm just doing the usual...work is getting a little busier now that school staff, etc. are settled in and professional development trainings are starting. It's never dull, that's for sure. Lillian also keeps me busy. She'll play on her own for a little while now, but once she notices I'm doing something else, she'll demand some attention. Which is alright; I'd rather play with her than work any day. :) She interacts a lot more, so it's a lot of fun to play with her and see her reaction to new things.

That's all for now. Hope it was informative! :)

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Here I am, alone again, as Erik goes to work for the evening. But we found out last week that he'll be moving to days pretty soon. Another manager is transferring from Montana, but they've had some problems with paper work so he can't start yet. He actually wants overnights, so Erik get to move to days. Hurrah!!! I'll be glad when he's not trying to sleep while the three of us are going about our day. I've felt bad the couple times he's actually had to do it when Laddie runs around like a mad dog or Lillian gets tired and fussy. Have you ever noticed that if you're trying to be quiet, you seem to make so much more noise than you would have if you'd just been acting normal? You bump into things that have been there forever or drop more stuff. Anyway...I know he'll be happy to go back to a normal sleep schedule, too. With how things have worked out, he's never really gotten in an overnight schedule, so he's tired when he goes to work; but he's not quite on a normal schedule either, so it's been a little rough.

Lillian has been kind of grumpy the last couple days. She has a little bit of a runny nose. I don't know if she's sick or finally teething. It seem like she gets teething symptoms at least once a month and then no teeth come of it, so I don't even try to guess any more. She doesn't seem sick other than the runny nose, but she is grumpier than usual so something must be going on. It could just be she doesn't like that we've started feeding her meat. We tried turkey for the first go, and the face she made was priceless. Not to mention the involuntary gagging that resulted! The next time I went for the chicken, which didn't cause gagging, but she still doesn't seem too impressed with it. I try to sneak some in with the sweet potatoes or green beans so it's not so bad, but I think she's figured it out. She's a lot more reluctant to open her month, that's for sure.

I know it's early, but we bought Lillian a Halloween costume today. We saw a monkey one in a catalog we really liked and then Erik saw that they had an identical one at the Brigham Walmart for half the price. When we went to the Logan Walmart, they hadn't even put the costumes out yet, so we couldn't get it. But then while we were at Old Navy today looking for some new work pants (and spending more money than we should have--you'd think he'd learn not to take me in there), we found the cutest chicken costume. Yes...a chicken! It comes with orange pants with attached shoe covers and a what's basically a chicken coat with a hood for the comb. We were afraid it would drown her since the smallest size was 6-12, but I put it on her when we got home and it fits great. It is a little big, but in a month and half it should be fine...or at least it won't look four sizes too big. We'll make sure to get pictures.

Speaking of pictures, I realized I never posted the shots from her last studio session, so here are a few. And I'll leave you with that.

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