Highlights of Month 8

We had a busy month 8. Abigail continues growing by leaps and bounds and is really becoming her own little person. She is now an expertly fast crawler and is pulling to stand, letting go of what she's holding on to, and staying steady for awhile before falling down. She is also babbling a lot more, saying ma, ba, ga, la sounds. She also really likes to look at herself in the mirror, though I don't think she's figured out that it's her!

Saying mama

Talking to baba

Standing up

We traveled to Illinois and Wisconsin over Thanksgiving. My beloved great aunt Vonnie passed away, so we traveled to IL for the funeral and to spend time with family. We then spent Thanksgiving with Dave and Alice in Madison. Abigail was a trooper in the car, and even slept most of the way home! We were also grateful to get to spend time with our friends Christy and Sergei and Dave and Libby and their kids while we were in town.

Fun playing with cousins

Abigail's first Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade!

Sesame Street!

Mmm, Abigail's First Thanksgiving Dinner!

Playing with Uncle Sergei

Dancing with Daddy as Sergei plays the accordian

Nice to see Libby and Dave and their family (their little girl Ana was off playing in the big kids' section)

Unfortunately, just before leaving for IL, Abigail came down with a cough that she's had a hard time getting rid of. We ended up in the ER for the first time with her after she spiked a 105 degree fever. We got the fever down and she was in pretty good spirits considering that she didn't feel well. They took a chest X-ray to find out if it was pneumonia. However you imagined them getting a chest X-ray of her, I can pretty much guarantee that you would not have imagined this. The picture below (from the internet) shows the device they put her in to get the X-ray. It seriously looked like a Medieval torture device. The tech, seeing we were clearly a little leery about it, reassured us that if she cries, it actually helps them get a better film. This however, was before he tried to put her in this thing. Now, my daughter is not typically a fan of being restrained from movement. As in, she hates getting her diaper changed and flails all over until you (miraculously) finish. So when he put her in this thing, she didn't just whimper in discontent. She full out screamed her head off until they let us take her out. As we left the department, all the staff was poking their heads out of the other exam rooms to see who caused all the raucous, and then smiled apologetically to us.

Turns out, she had pneumonia, so we got her on antibiotics, the fever came down, and she was a happy kid again. Except when we had to actually give her her medications (antibiotics twice a day, rotating Tylenol and ibuprofen every 3 hours to control the fever until it broke after 5 days). It would have been helpful actually to have one of those torture devices at home, because without it, we were stuck wrestling her with one arm and trying to give her the meds with the other arm. When asked for tips on getting her to take her meds, the pharmacist suggested among other things that if you just put the syringe by their mouth, some kids will just suck the medication out. Ha. Ha. Ha. Yeah right.

Then to top off the illness train, she came down with a 48-hour stomach bug and was barely able to keep anything down. I stayed home from work to take care of her, so I ended up home again the next day with the same thing. The one positive is that by the end of the stomach bug, she had incredibly resigned herself to the process of getting medication, and actually did just suck it out of the syringe!

In other news, Abigail became quite the eater in month 8. She has become very adept at the pincher grasp of her thumb and forefinger, so she can pick up tiny things on her tray (or the floor - she is an expert at reminding me that it has been more than a few hours since I swept the floor!) and feed herself. She loves Cheerios and baby puffs (a lot like Cheerios) and pretty much anything she can feed herself. She started eating pretty much everything we eat. The recommendations change often, but the latest recommendations from the AAP are that she can eat anything except honey before age 1. We haven't tried anything with peanuts yet (I don't think!) but more because it's not a regular part of our diet.

All in all, when she's not roaming around the house or sleeping, you can usually find Abigail hanging out in her highchair these days! She's usually eating, but we also found that it's a great place for her when we Skype with Grandma and Grandpa, as you can see in the video below.

With Christmas approaching, I got out the boxes of Christmas decorations to make the house look festive, only to have to stop and think about which ones I could actually put up this year! We decided not to get a tree, and go for a wreath, hung high above grasping hands. I put out some decorations that were on the walls, but the real fun was getting out all the bright-colored cookie tins. Abigail immediately turned them into things to bang on, roll across the floor, throw down on the floor from the table, etc. All very fun and very loud!

And here are a few more gems from this month!

Oops, dad! I think you might need some more sleep!

Our makeshift playpen next to our bed where she can play in the morning before we're fully awake!

Mom, what are those shiny things on top of your cake?

Wait, wait! What happened to those shiny lights!

I was recently reading a blog and the person had a section as follows, which I thought was a great summary!

Random facts about 8 months:
Weight: 17 lbs  Height: No idea
Wears: size 3 diapers, 6-9 month pants (and some 9-12 month ones – especially jammies with feet), 6-9 month shirts and onesies, size 3 shoes
Teeth:  2 on bottom
Loves: playing with Daddy, eating Cheerios, crawling, watching the blinking Christmas lights, snuggling with Mommy when she comes home from work, looking at herself in the mirror, pulling off her socks, iPhones

Hates: taking medicine, having her nose wiped, being restrained (as in getting strapped in her car seat, getting dressed or getting her diaper changed), getting out of the bathtub, sleeping

Brags: She is pulling to stand and even staying up on her own for a few seconds! She is also helping to get her arms out of the straps of her car seat!

Foods she loves: Cheerios, puffs, spaghetti, kefir yogurt smoothies, anything she can feed herself

Foods she hates: while she reportedly eats purees and rice cereal at daycare, she hates anything we try to feed her on a spoon - she is do it yourself kind of kid!

Favorite toys: paper bags, anything plastic and crinkly, cookie tins from Christmas decorations