4 months!

Today Rhia is 4 months old! Wow. Time really flies.

Yesterday Rhia had her 4 month appointment and shots--she did really well. She cried when she got her shots, and she was a bit grouchy/sore last night (although the grouchiness might be because she didn't get a real nap from 1:30 or so until 7:30), but otherwise she did great! She's up to 14lb, 9oz, so almost double her birthweight (getting close) and she's 23/5" long. Still in the 70th percentile for weight and about the 30th for height--the poor girl doesn't stand a chance--she's just going to be short! She gets to try cereal, which we might do today, so that's pretty exciting. We found out that the thing on her eye is a little bacterial infection, but the doctor gave us a prescription for some stuff to put on it, and it should clear up in a week or so. No big deal--just a little patch of excema that got irritated by her rubbing it/having tears on it. It was our last appointment with our Ellensburg doctor, which was really sad for me, as he was my doctor the entire time I was pregnant and whatnot. So my new task is getting her a new pediatrician over here for her 6 month appointment. It was really great to go over to Ellensburg, though. We went and visited all sorts of people. We stopped at Thorp to say hi to them, then we went to CWU to see Al's advisors, then we went out and visited my student teaching teacher, went to the doctor's appointment, and finally we visited Maggie, Dustin, and Elke, and Michelle came over to say hi, too. Rhia got to hang out with Elke, but Elke's a bit older and just kept trying to take Rhia's burp rag. :-) It was great to see everyone--I was pretty sad on the way out of town, since I really have no idea when I'll be back through there.

No pictures today....we haven't taken any since the last post!

September Adventures

So we've kept ourselves pretty busy all month--Al went back to school last week, and so far he's pretty excited about it. He's taking a couple of seminars and teaching a couple of classes, so he's got his hands full.

Rhia is growing like crazy and doing really well. She "talks" to us all of the time now--including high-pitched Mariah Carey-esque screetches, and can sort of balance herself sitting up (so long as we're holding onto her arms--she's nowhere near sitting up on her own yet), and can support her own weight if we stand her on her feet. Her eyes are still blue and getting lighter--and I'm starting to think they'll stay that way--if they do, she'll have defied genetic odds, since Al and I are both brown (but his dad and my mom both have blue, as do our siblings). She has her 4 month appointment on Monday, so she'll get her second round of shots, we'll be able to see what to do to make her stop itching her eye(the eye with the birthmark got really dry and she started to itch it, and now it's all flaky...hopefully we can get something to fix it. It doesn't seem to bother her much, aside from the itching, but I'd rather her not look like we scrub her eye with steel wool.), and we find out about solid foods! I can't believe my baby is getting big enough to eat from a spoon--wasn't she just born?!?! For a quick comparison--a picture of her taken yesterday at almost 4 months, and a picture taken when she was about 3 days old--wearing the same onesie.

She's getting so big! She's at least double her birthweight, by my bathroom scale calculations. She's to the point now where I'm about to start putting her 3 month stuff in a box--as you can see in that first picture, it's getting pretty snug.

She's still sleeping all night, except for the occasional morning where she wakes me up at 5:00 or so to eat, but for the most part she sleeps until 6:30-ish, which is nice. It's weird for me to not be the one getting up and leaving at 6 a.m., but I'm getting used to it. Although every time I see a school bus I get a bit mopey and miss it. I still plan on going back next year and being more proactive about finding a job next summer. Plus, by then we might actually be able to get her into a daycare--even if I'd gotten a job this year, there are 1year+ long waiting lists everywhere, so it might not have panned out, anyways.

Rhia and I have been exploring Lynnwood/Edmonds and checking out what we can do to keep ourselves busy. We go on a mini-adventure every day (aside from grocery shopping and whatnot), which usually means that we go find somewhere we haven't been before and go for a walk. So far we're explored a few parks, a couple of different routes to Barnes and Noble, and spent a fair bit of time at the waterfront. Today we took Al down to the Edmonds Marina and played in the sand, which was nice. It's a gorgeous weekend (after a week of sogginess), so that helps. We took some pictures, plus a few from playing around the house (and for those of you who don't know--if you click on the pictures, then it takes you to an album that you can look at all of the pictures bigger/at your own pace).

Miller Look-alike Meter

This is pretty spiffy! We did it with a few different pictures, and it always turned out exactly 50/50. Maybe that's why we can't figure out who she looks like....

MyHeritage: Look-alike Meter - Black and white photographs - Free family tree template

Chatty, chatty

A quick update, since I haven't done one in awhile, and because I have some new pictures/a video to post!

Rhia is still learning all sorts of stuff--she's gotten incredibly chatty and loves to tell us stories, like this one (make sure sound is on!):



She'll chatter away all day--apparently she's found her voice! She's also started to roll over from her belly to her back, but not often. She gets to her side from her back, but hasn't turned over onto her belly yet. She hates tummy time and flails around miserably when we put her down on her belly, so I'm guessing the drive isn't there yet. Lots of smiles and giggles--have yet to get her laughing on video, but it's pretty cool. Otherwise we're getting along--Al starts up stuff at UW on Monday with orientations and such all week, then classes start the following week, so he'll be pretty busy with all of that. In the last couple of weeks we've stuck pretty close to home, sans a trip to Portland to visit Uncle JJ and Powell's.

So, since it's late and I'm on my way to bed, a few pictures for your viewing enjoyment! **Note: She spit up all over her Seahawks outfit last Sunday--I don't blame her, they were pretty awful.