11 1/2 months we have a tooth

It has been a month since my last update and I feel so much has happened in the last two weeks. The most recent is we finally have a real tooth, and it isn't that nubby that I thought was a tooth. Don't know what that is but will check with the dentist in May when she goes for her first appointment. Her first real tooth is the top front tooth, which is funny because usually the bottom ones come in first. Ceilidh just keeps bucking trends. Sadly, I fear 3 other teeth are soon to follow. Sad for her because I am sure it cannot be pleasant. At least she has been on Advil for her ear infection so hopefully that helped ease the pain of the first tooth. Yes, Ceilidh has had her first ear infection. It started off as a cold (which we both had) and I thought she was getting better and then it moved to her chest. I was worried that it might be something more serious since we were going on day 10 so took her to the doctor. It turned out to be a ear infection. I hear they are the most common childhood illness, however, neither Matt nor I have ever had one. I hope these will not be common for her. It took a couple of days of antibiotics before I saw an improvement. The worst was when she would cough she would activate her gag reflex and everything would come up. Poor thing. But now the drugs are over and I think she is better, except now she has all those teeth coming in.  We did dodge a bullet though, we missed out on a play date because she was sick and it turns out all the babes and some mothers got hand foot and mouth disease. There was about 8 babes in the group. So I guess the ear infection was a blessing in disguise.

But moving on to her other progress. No she is not walking yet. She still grabs on to things and can walk with holding on to one of our fingers but doesn't want to let go. Her balance though has improved leaps and bounds. The exciting things are holding her own sippy cup and clapping. Okay exciting for us. Just remember this will be her baby book so I have to mention these things. While she has been able to drink from a sippy cup for a while she had not mastered the art of doing it well by herself. It perplexed her that the water wouldn't come out well because she couldn't tilt it back. Now she does it like a pro. She even knows how to drink from a small cup by herself. Although I don't put a lot of water in because she will drink from it and then dump the rest out. Better to give her just enough for one drink. The clapping of the hands is very cute. I kind of noticed it when I was at a play group and they were singing "If you are happy and you know it clap your hands" and she kind of did. But then didn't repeat it for another week. Now she knows if you say "clap your hands" she drops everything to clap. The other thing she has figured out is going down the stairs. The up was the easy part but teaching her to go down safely was harder. We kept putting her on her belly to go down and she kept turning around. Then about 3 weeks ago she finally got it. Now it is funny to see her do it for everything. Sometimes she starts to early and then turns around to figure out why she isn't at the drop of yet. Well at least she is safe.

Soon enough she will be one. Just over 2 weeks. Can't wait to see what she does in the mean time.

10 1/2 months and still furniture surfing

If you look closely you can see the tooth at the bottom that she has been working on since fall

Ceilidh is still furniture surfing. She will let go from time to time and just stand there but still shows no indication of wanting to walk on her won. At least not without the help of her walker or a chair or anything else that she can slide around the house or wherever she is. It's kind of interesting to see her being resourceful and using step stools, laundry baskets, and high chairs to help her walk. I feel she wants to walk but isn't ready to let go quite yet. She has also become a master at climbing the stairs, which of course means we now have to block the stairs going up as well as down. She can sure move up them very quickly, but still has no concept of how to go back down. Hence why we block them off, so she can climb them only under supervision. I have already had a heart attack where I turned around for a minute and then found her at the top of the stairs. Yikes child, I have enough grey hairs.

Helping her Dad set up the barrier for the stairs.

Skating with the kiddies on a local outdoor rink.

Play date at the Ontario Early Years Centre.

I thought winter might be the time where her social calendar slowed down since everyone would be in hibernation mode, but gladly this has not been the case. We have been blessed with milder weather, and a great group of friends who keep the activities up. We have been walking in the local forest trails, skating on outdoor rinks, keeping healthy with aerobics, being well read with our library's children programing, and just having fun with good old fashion play dates. Soon enough Ceilidh will be starting day care. It will be a big step for both of us. For now we are transitioning her off the milk and into the world of just solids. And while she has not been a big eater for a long time, something this past week has changed (growth spurt or maybe just a light bulb moment) and she is now taking to food with gusto. Some of her favourites include yogurt (good for facials and conditioning the hair according to Ceilidh), scrambled eggs, cheese, and just recently a new like for apple sauce and berries. And for her Hispanic roots she really likes creamed corn, add that to any other food especially the meats and she loves it. Grandma would be proud.

Walking in the Ferguson forest.

New Year almost 10 months

Touching the ocean

At 7am only the canucks, surfers, and fisherman are out and about

It has been a while since I have posted anything. The holidays were filled with lots of family get togethers which kept the family busy. It has been a good year thus far. Ceilidh is using her walker more frequently and just recently standing on her own. Still no walking but that looks like it will come soon enough. She still has no teeth but I feel that the one that is trying to come out is making more progress. I feel when other parents see Ceilidh they envy the amount of hair she has on her head, when I look at other kids I envy the amount of teeth they have in their mouths. I feel she would have an easier go at more foods. Oh well they will come when they come I guess. It's probably because I booked her first dentist appointment, Murphy's law. But she has her favourite foods, egg, cheerios, broccoli, cheese, and yogurt. She enjoys feeding her self the yogurt and hates it when you don't give her the spoon. Of course this independence leads to a lot of yogurt facials. Her hair is so long now that we have to put clips in her hair or head bands. Otherwise she also puts food in her hair since it gets in her eyes and she tries to move it out of her eyes.

Coral castle

Seaquarium watching the dolphins

Manatees at the Seaquarium

In other news we recently came back from vacationing in Miami. She traveled really well and was not bothered by the plane ride. She certainly knows how to smile at everyone and makes friends really quickly. She had a lot of first during our vacation. Went in the ocean for the first time (okay she didn't go in the whole way but touched the water), she crawled on grass for the first time, crawled on sand, and of course flew for the first time. She seemed to like seeing the dolphins, and whales but her attention quickly turned to the group of school kids while we where at a whale show. While we watched the whales she was mesmerized by the kids. We both loved  the heated pool at the Fountainblue resort. She had lots of fun in the water and the kids pool was amazing, slide and all.
Time has really passed by quickly and as I see some of my mom friends returning to work I know that the time will soon come for me to return to work and Ceilidh start daycare.  Soon I will finish this blog and print it out as her baby book.

At Fountainblue kids pool

Tuesday night Miami Food Truck Round up

Hiding in the trees

Genetics follow up

Her new friend

Last week Ceilidh had a follow up appointment with Genetics at CHEO. Basically Dr. G just wanted to follow up and see how she is progressing to rule out any syndrome that could not be diagnosed at birth, which is the last time she saw Ceilidh. I am happy to say that the Doctors think she does not have any syndromes which are often associated with Omphaloceles. She is meeting all important milestones thus far and is now 16 lbs.
Some of those milestones have only recently been displayed. Now that she can crawl fairly well she has moved on to lifting herself up using furniture or a my leg if available. However, she is not always sure how to get back down. She knows how to pivot from one piece of furniture to another if they are close but does not realize that she should be using her legs. If she sees me sitting by her she kind of throws herself in my arms I guess she knows I will catch her, so trusting.

Standing up and playing

The other cool things she is doing this week is waving goodbye and giving kisses. We have been trying to teach her how to wave good bye to Matt as he leaves for work every morning. We have not been certain that she understood. Matt was away last week so she hadn't practiced for a week. This morning Matt had put his jacket and shoes on to go to work and Ceilidh saw this as she was sitting in her highchair having breakfast, without any prompting Ceilidh started waving goodbye. So cool!

Enjoying blackberries

Lastly, she is really progressing in eating. She now has the capability of using her fingers and thumb in a pincer grasp to pick up food. This makes it so much easier for her to pick up small pieces of food such as cheerios. You can get a better sense of her enjoying food. But her mothers milk is still her favourite choice.

Visiting Santa

I wasn't sure if I was going to take Ceilidh to see Santa and take a picture but in the end I did. The result was a serious photo. She didn't laugh but didn't cry either. She didn't know what to think of the big guy and couldn't understand why we were all looking at her. Kind of like a deer caught in the head lights. But the Santa picture is captured. The people taking the picture were great and Santa had a real beard.

Deer outfit on she is at a salt lick (something to entice real deers)

Playing with my old cabbage patch Millie (they share brown hair blue eyes)

Almost 8 months

Bath time

Ceilidh will be 8 months next week. She is now weighing 15 lbs 10 ounces and is on the move. She started dragging herself along around Rememberance Day (Nov 11) and within a week she had got the hang of commando crawling. Now she is able to use her knees and does a combo of commando crawling and knee crawling. The cat is now weary of Ceilidh, I guess the cat (Trouble) knows Miss C is on the move. Ceilidh is a fan of the cat's water dish and the food dish (thankfully there is no food in said dish because Trouble is smart enough to finish all her food ASAP).  As I type she is after the water dish. Sneaky sneaky.

Going to the cat feeder

Well at least now when her crawling playmates come by and take her toys she can go after theirs. Basically when we have play group we bring out the toys and the kids just go around swapping toys. You just have to remember what you brought. The set of cups I picked up second hand seem to be a favourite for all the kiddies. In other accomplishment news, she has also learned to sit. She goes from crawling position to sitting position, and her balance has improved that face plants or falling back are rare. And as for sleeping she is currently down at 7 pm and wakes up once to feed and generally wakes up around 6 am. I look forward to seeing what the next month will bring.

The baby gate is up

7 months

Okay so technically Ceilidh is now 7 months and a week. But since I will be printing this into a baby book for her I thought better late then never. She is now weighing 15 lbs 5 oz and is on the verge of crawling. Lets see how long it actually takes her to actually crawl. She has bum scooted a few times but I do not think she realizes this is a form of transportation. We have also seen her dragging her self and pushing her self backwards. So hence why we feel she is on the verge. She is really good at turning around on her belly. We have started to baby proof the house in anticipation.
She has also started to sleep on her stomach during the night and naps. Even though I put her on her back she flips to her stomach but then when she wakes she is disoriented and wonders why she is on her stomach. She does not realize she put herself in that position. She gives me the accusing look, I explain to her that she did that to herself. She does not believe me, it is like explaining to my cat that she has already been fed.

Since she was such a cute pumpkin I have added a few more shots of her in her pumpkin patch.