Crib Life

This week my baby will turn 8 months old and I can honestly say that she has not spent a single night in her crib.  As most know, we have co-slept with Catie since she was an infant and that has been the best way for ALL Rexroats to sleep at night.

During nap times, she usually sleeps in her big cradle swing.  She has logged over a hundred hours in her swing, but she is sadly getting to be too big for her swing.

So today while I was working, my mom kept Catie.  Catie Grace was having a rough and fussy day so mom tried to put her down to sleep.  It took several minutes of casually hanging out in the room with Catie but she eventually fell asleep.  HER FIRST TIME EVER IN A CRIB!! 

It only lasted for 20 minutes but I guess it's a first. 

Now, we have no plans of quitting co-sleeping at night just yet.  I plan to wean night-time feedings around her first birthday and at that time then we will work towards getting her into her own bed at night, but for now we are enjoying this stage of life. 

Park Time

 Who seriously would have thought that my firs two blog posts in March would be of a snow day and a 80 degree park day? Kentucky.....

Well yesterday was another first for our Catie Grace.  We took Catie to Shilto Park and she was finially big enough to swing in the swing sets there. 

While there, we met up with a dear friend of mine, Erica.  It was such a great time of catching up while our babies enjoyed the beautiful spring day. 

Also- Now entered into the 'Lessons Learned the Hard Way' file, I have learned to always remember to put sunscreen on both myself and my child.  I made a huge effort to make sure that Catie was protected from the sun, but I completely forgot about myself and today I am paying for it.  Oh well, lesson learned. :)

Here are just a few of the highlights from the outing. 

First Snow Day

Today was Catie's first snow day, but it wasn't exactly expected.

Now for my friends and family who live outside of Kentucky, let me give you a little bit of background on why today was such an unexpected day.  Last week, Kentucky experienced higher than normal temperatures and spring-like weather.   Most of last week we spent the days in the 60's and nights in the 40's.  We also experienced severe thunderstorms and deadly tornadoes.  Twice last week, we found ourselves under a tornado warning and we tunneled our way into the safe room in my parent's basement.  On Friday, we experience a beautiful morning and afternoon with temperatures in the low 70's and by evening we dealt with a long line of severe thunderstorms which left us rotating to the basement and glued to LEX18 and Bill Meck's commentating. 

With the storm front came some cooler tempatures and we found ourself needing to pull back out our coat for church on Sunday morning, but it warmed back up into the 40's during the day.  ANNNNND then this morning we find 5 inches of snow on our car.  So in 72 hours we went from 70's and tornadoes to 30's and 5 inches of snow.  Oh, and to top it off, it's going to be 58 tomorrow.  If you have lived for more than one season here in the bluegrass state, then you have probably heard the saying, "If you don't like the weather here in Kentucky, stay a day and it'll change" and boy is that the truth!

So we figured this was going to be our last chance to get some snow pictures with Catie so we wrapped up our bug and made the trip outside. 

Catie was already not feeling the best and was a little cranky because of teething pain and a rough night sleeping but she was such a great sport despite not feeling at her prime.

Rexroat's 3/5/12

Getting ready to nail me with a snow ball

Building Catie's Snowman

Feet in the snow

Catie and her snowman

Starting to get 'over' it

Nahna showing Catie the snow

Kisses from Nahna

Moving up: Car Seat

 

Now that our little bug is getting so big, we had to go ahead and move up in the car seat world.  We have been using the infant car seat since she was born and we have enjoyed it. It has allowed us to take the car seat with us into the house or into church.  This has been super handy if she has fallen asleep or if it is terribly hot (like it was in August) because the car seat would already be inside and we wouldn't have to worry about putting our little girl in a black, hot car seat. 


But recently, we realized that Catie has started to out grow her infant car seat.  We have had it on the highest shoulder level for several months and when we tighten the straps, it pushed her shoulders down and crunched her into the car seat.  So the car seat search began.

We did some research, looked at crash safety reports, and decided that Britax Boulevard CS was going to be the best investment.  We also learned that BuyBuyBaby was having a 25% off sale going on in February and it would be a considerable saving to buy the seat during that sale. 

So my sweet, sweet brother, Jacob Melton, seeing the need to move his niece up into a bigger car seat for her safety decided to buy the car seat for us.   So it only seemed fitting that since Jake bought the car seat, that the seat would be in a pattern that would match both of our personalities.  The print of the seat is called Cowmooflauge- I think it's a nice blend of Jake's hunting and redneck side and my animal print obsession. 

This past weekend was our first weekend using the new seat.  It took some getting used to because we can't reach our hand back and pick up toys that might have fallen out of her seat or stick her paci back in if she is tired and fussing, but the seat is very user friendly and easy to get her in and out of.  It gives us such a peace of mind knowing that if we were to get into any kind of accident, then she would be safe and is now in the right seat for her height.

So, thank you JAKE for your sweet gift and investment in Catie :)  

***Also, I should probably note that Kelly really wasn't as mad as he looks in the photos while putting in the car seat.  He was just hamming it up for the camera but the results made it look like we were in the middle of a HUGE fight while installing the car seat. lol

Taking out the infant carseat base.  (This is one of those face's I was referring to)

CowMOOOOflauge :)

Just getting it in the back seat was difficult because of how BIG it was

Reading instructions

Catie's new seat for the next 4-5 years :)

Watch me grow-27 weeks

2/17/12
27 weeks
17 lbs
27 inches long

I'm terribly embarrassed to log in and see how many 'uncompleted' blog posts there are right now.  I have become a great starter but then Catie will get hungry or blow out a diaper and all stops.  I have always been one who boasted of finishing STRONG and I think I still will, it's just on a different time table then it was B. C. (before Catie) :)

Well our little Catie Grace sure didn't wait for me to update my blog because she has grown and progressed leaps and bounds since I last updated.

At her 6 months appointment, our pediatrician did all of Catie's measurement's and told us that Catie is in the 50th percentile for her weight and 88th percentile for her height.  He confirmed that she is still growing at a perfect curve and is on a fast track to be one of the tallest girls in her class.  I have just resigned myself to the fact that my little girl will probably pass up my 5 foot frame by the time she is around 11 or 12.  Kelly is of course still thrilled that she is taking on the Rexroat height and will hopefully inherit his ball skills.  :)

With all this growing, our little Bug is outgrowing ALL her clothes.  She is currently wearing 6-9 months shirts and pants.  She has a very long torso (unlike her momma) and super long legs, so the clothes that 'fit' the best are the 6-9 months but everything is short.  According to her height, she should be in 12 months, but the pants literally fall off her.  So in order to cover up her high waters, we always put boots on her feet to cover up the inch or so of exposed skin between the top of her socks and the hem of her 9 month pants.  We will be making a trip to Gatlinburg with our church family next month and we hope to take advantage of the outlets there to stock up on her summer wardrobe.


We hit another milestone around week 22 or 23.  Catie is now sitting up all on her own.  She now loves to sit on the floor and play with her blocks and watch them fall down.

Also around the same time as Catie Grace learning to sit up on her own, she also popped in her bottom two teeth.  We went through several days of intense teething symptoms and then the pain paid off.  We have had to work on our nursing technique and Catie has learned that she can not use Momma as a pacifier anymore. 

We are still exclusively breast feeding and have not started solids yet.  We are in no rush to start solids.  our pediatrician really encouraged us to continue exclusively breast feeding till we get through the cold season.  We have been able to keep Catie healthy this winter and we credit that 100% to the exclusive breast feeding.  Catie is continuing to grow and has not hit the plateau yet that usually signals the need for the extra calories that the infants get from solids so we will keep going strong with what is currently working.  We have another appointment with our pediatrician when Catie turns 9 months in April and he said we will reevaluate the solids topic then.  

Nahna and Catie with Catie's tree

 We started a new tradition with my parents this past Christmas.  This year and every year from here on out, each grandchild will get their own living Christmas tree that we decorate and enjoy during the holiday,  After the holiday's were over we planted the tree down in Campbellsville at the farm that has been in our family for generations.   Hopefully, it will be a living timeline of the children and holiday's from Christmas past :)

 

Visiting Nana

Kisses from Great Aunt Maria