This afternoon Molly's babysitter Stephanie e-mailed me with the subject line: "Notice anything new in each picture?" And here are the pictures she attached...







Gee, I guess Molly was really into her tongue today! So cute. Stephanie is so much more than a babysitter, of course... She really goes above and beyond to take exceptional care of Molly, and they even do fun art projects (like the ladybug I shared a picture of not too long ago). This week, they made 2 new art projects! One involved Molly's footprints in paint - now that's ambitious!

Here's a video:



Stephanie also made us a super cute photo scrapbook of Molly's first few weeks with them. How thoughtful!

In a couple of weeks Molly will be 6 months old. I can hardly believe it! It's hard to believe she was a little newborn who woke me up every hour of the night not very long ago... Now she's a babbling, playful little baby, learning and growing daily! Here's a bit about Molly at 5 1/2 months old:

- She has a tooth coming in! A couple of weeks ago I felt a little tooth bud on her bottom, front gums, and sure enough...now we have a tooth! It's still pushing it's way all the way through.. but we can see it! Way to go, Molly!

- She can sit up! Not for very long...but we did get about 3 or 4 minutes of solid sitting up a couple of days ago! Then, she toppled over. :)

- She loves to hold onto her feet!

- She can put her pacifier into her mouth! Sometimes her coordination is lacking, and it's upside down or sideways...but more often than not, if we place it into her hand the right way, she'll place it into her mouth perfectly.

- She loves her big sister! She is all smiles when Lydia is around.

- She likes the glow seahorse that plays soft music for sleeping. Lydia liked him, too. I've been using it every night when she goes to bed, and I think it really soothes her. I've decided she really likes it, but maybe she's just really tired and ready to sleep and it actually has nothing to do with the seahorse...!

- She naps in her bouncy chair, rather than in her bed. I'm not sure when we'll transition to naps in her bed. It just feels more convenient to bounce her to sleep downstairs where we're usually hanging out and doing chores or whatever...

- Believe it or not, she is still swaddled for bedtime. Not for naps, but for her overnight sleep in her crib. We have one of those velcro swaddle vests, and it's very secure. I'd like to test her out again on sleeping "free style" as I call it, but you know how it is... When they're sleeping through the night without a peep, you don't mess with it! But it sure would be nice to just lay her in bed without the swaddle vest.

- She likes her baths.

- She likes the swimming pool. She has been in 3 times now. Didn't like it so much the first or second times, but the third time she enjoyed it.

- She falls asleep for the night sometime between 8:00 - 9:00 pm, and wakes between 5:45 - 6:30 AM (usually closer to 6:30! Too bad I have to be up earlier than that for work!)

- She started eating solids recently, and seems to really like the cereal, apples, pears, and sweet potatoes, but not so much the green peas!

- She hasn't rolled over, yet, and doesn't show any interest in doing so either! Oliver jokes that she's lazy, because she doesn't really like tummy time, either. ;)

- She has the most amazing smile! It's so big and happy, and it's like she's just so happy to see you, and so happy in general that she just can't help but beam with joy! I love it!

- She is without a doubt the sweetest, cutest, most precious baby on the planet, and I am madly in love with her! (And to my baby nephews Benjamin and Miles...you guys are precious and cute, too, of course!)

Stay tuned... Next time I'll share about Lydia's latest and greatest interests/activities!

Sisters…    

Oliver played a game with Molly where he would surprise her from around the corner of the doorway, and here’s the cute faces the game produced!  I think she liked it.  (If you’re not a parent or a grandparent of this child, these pictures may all look exactly the same to you… But I couldn’t help but post all of them!)

 

Yesterday we went over to Grammy and Poppy’s place to go swimming.  Molly was all decked out, thanks to Grammy! 

Lydia had her cute suit on, too, and showed a great deal of interest in her little sister at one point.  Aren’t they cute?

 

We had a lot of fun swimming.  Molly stayed in the water for maybe 10 minutes or so, but she was only happy off and on… She’s not so sure about this, yet.  Lydia, however, had a blast.  Lydia’s Omi loves to swim, too, but she’s out of town right now.  Lydia is hoping Omi will take her swimming with her when she gets back from her trips to New  York and Canada! 

Lydia has been practicing holding her baby sister.  I don’t think this looks very comfortable for Molly, but she didn’t complain.

She also helps Molly with her tummy time.  

I’m not sure how helpful this was, however.

Molly really likes her big sister.  Despite the occasional roughness Lydia brings upon her, whenever Molly sees her big sister come around, she instantly smiles SO big.  And it takes next to nothing for Lydia to make Molly giggle.  All Lydia has to do is pretty much be herself and play near Molly, and Molly is very happy. 

Yesterday Molly ate rice cereal for the first time. Go Molly! I think she was intrigued by this new experience... She started opening her mouth for the spoon by the 3rd or 4th bite. I added a little applesauce so that it would have some flavor...

Video:


Mmmmmmmm Yummy! (Or as Lydia says..."Num-Num-Num")

Loooooong weekends are the greatest, aren’t they?  Our Memorial Day weekend has been fun.  On Saturday night we met up with Grammy and Poppy for dinner at TGI Fridays.  Grammy brought Lydia a helium balloon – which she LOVES.  Simple pleasures.  She’s been carrying it around the house ever since then.  On Sunday we went to church, and then after naps we headed out to Keller for a barbeque and swimming with Aunt Katie, Uncle Mike, Warner and Miles. 

We had a great time!  There was one very unfortunate incident when Lydia may have pushed Warner into the rose bush…probably because she didn’t want to share something, I would imagine.  Un-Oh.  Poor Warner got rose thorn scratches on his face!  Naughty, naughty Lydia! I guess this is what kids do when they’re learning how to express themselves, but that certainly doesn’t make it okay.  We’re sorry Warner!  After a great barbeque dinner on the patio, we went to their community swimming pool.  It was Miles’ and Molly’s first time to go swimming!  Neither of them liked it very much… The water wasn’t quite warm enough for their little bodies, but Warner and Lydia had a terrific time!

 

The pool has a rule that little kids wear special swim pants over their swim diapers, and thankfully we didn’t have to buy one for Molly…she got to borrow Warner’s old one.  Only once did someone say…”Aw, he’s so cute.”  (To which I was only mildly offended…)

Chilaxin’ by the pool….

Warner had a such a great time that he didn’t mind being cold… But once he got out of the water…brrrrr!  Although it was warm outside, it was also pretty breezy. Happy Memorial Day!

Lydia goes to preschool 5 days a week from 7:50 AM – 10:50 AM.  Either Oliver, me or Lydia’s Omi picks her up from school and then usually she gets to go to either the playground or to the mall or to McDonalds or occasionally to Grammy’s house… Always something fun.  Today I picked her up and she and Molly and I went to the park and had a picnic!  It was fun!  The grass was wet and muddy from thunderstorms the night before, so we had a concrete picnic…but it was still fun. 

      

Molly enjoyed lying in the shade…  She liked to watch the trees above her.  It was about 82 degrees outside, so the temp was just perfect in the shade.

  

After our picnic, we went to play on the playground.  Lydia recently learned how to sign “Swings”, so when she pointed to the swings, gave me her sign and said “Ssssss”, off we went to the swings!  (Her vocabulary is increasing each day… We’re so proud of her.)

 

I’m sure Molly would have loved to have tried out the swings for the first time, but they were too hot from the sun, plus I was busy pushing Lydia…so she just watched.  Maybe next time, Molly!