5 Months Old

Chloe is five months old today. This past weekend I was able to sit her up and for the first time she was holding her self up by her arms. From what I have read this is how they will start to sit up on their own. She can only do it for a short period of time then she falls over. This little step is so exciting; I can not wait for her to be sitting up on her own.

At 5 months she does not have any teeth yet but she is working on it. Everything goes right in her mouth and she chomps down on it. She is doing well with her solid foods. I have increased it to 2 feedings a day of the solids. I give her a mixture of rice cereal & applesauce in the morning and I give her a fruit & a veggie in the afternoon. Sweet Potatoes are still her favorite and she can not stand peas or carrots.

Diapers 101
When I was pregnant I decided I did not want a changing table. So what I use is the Sara Bear diaper Caddy. It is a basket with little compartments for all your diaper changing stuff. This made it easy to carry the basket around where ever you do a diaper change. We have found the best way to buy diapers is buying them in bulk. Cost wise you save a lot of money that way. At the moment she is in between size of the brand I usually by so we bought a cheep brand to get us through this size. They work fine except that they do leak more and you end up with more clothing changes during the day. You can also buy the wipes in bulk too. I do not care for the cheaper brand for the wipes. The cheap brand I picked up when I was out of stock, the darn things did not link together so they would not pull up through those wipe containers, very frustrating when you only have one hand. I will not buy the cheap brand again on wipes. When I first started changing Chloe’s diaper I had never done it before. I was slow and nervous and it was worse when people were trying to talk to me when I was trying to concentrate on the task at hand, especially if Chloe was crying at the time. Now that I have changed about 1200 diapers, the changing part is pretty easy.

Note from Chloe
Psst…Hey word on the street, not Sesame Street, my neighborhood is that my Mom was bald as a baby. I can not believe I am just now hearing this. I turned 5 months old today and look at me, just some measly peach fuzz. I have all this stuff I am dealing with like trying to figure out how to crawl, how to get the rice cereal up my nose, & how to avoid naps at all cost. Maybe if I try to make my own hair tonic, I can get my hands on some sweet potatoes and maybe mix it with some applesauce and smear it all over my head. I love sweet potatoes, this might work.

Wordless Wednesday

Solid Foods

Once Chloe hit 4 months at the end of July the doctor gave the go ahead to start her on rice cereal and pureed foods. I started her on rice cereal and she did pretty well. Then I have been trying a different food every 3 to 4 days. So far she likes Butternut Squash, Sweet Potatoes, apple sauce, & bananas. She could give or take pears, and she hates carrots. Solid foods are a whole new realm of messy. Mushy gush gets every where and she will often take a bite of food then stick her thumb in her mouth to finish it, getting food all over her hands and her face. She will also grab the spoon and help me feed her. So far it has been a fun experience and yes I have made the airplane noises while moving the spoon through the air and yes it results in a baby opening her mouth wide for the bite of food. LOL

Chloe has been rolling onto her stomach every time we lay her on her back. She started to hit her head on the ground while in this position. Even though she was on a play mat, blanket and rug, underneath is hard tile so she would start to cry. We found these interlocking foam mats at Sam’s club and we set them up under her floor playing area and they did the trick. She is doing great with the tummy time and I think she will be crawling soon. She just needs to figure out how to get her tummy up and her knees underneath to start the motion.

Chloe has found her feet. Lately she has been holding her legs up for me while I change her diaper. It is pretty funny, like she is helping me. It is only a matter of time before the tootsies end up in her mouth.

Note from ChloePsst…. I have discovered something the adults call a remote. I am not sure what it does but it is very important. At all times the remote is in one or the others possession. When one adult leaves the room the other one will quickly take it into their grasp. I am thinking it controls the universe or something even more important like the mobile on my crib. Every time I try to get a good look at it they quickly take it out of my reach. My advice is if you get your hands on one of these remotes, hide it and don’t let anyone else use it. Catch up with you later.

Wordless Wednesday

Our Disneyland Trip

The packing was crazy knowing we would be bringing a stroller and a car seat. We also planned to bring a suitcase for Chloe with her clothes and enough diapers, wipes, formula, & stuff to get her through the week. These were all things we were not use to traveling with. I think I was most worried about the airport and the flight then anything else.

Airport & plane ride with a 4 month old
How it worked at the airport going through security was you needed to put the bottles with formula in one of the baskets along with any liquids you might have in a quart size baggie. Going to CA they just left the bottle in the basket, but coming back they had me step a side with the bottles and open them each individually as they put a litmus paper over them checking for vapors or whatever. This would not have been so bad except for the fact I had Chloe in my arms and no shoes on. Chloe had a death grip on my hair and was laughing at me, and soon the security guard was laughing also. Now with the stroller and car seat, you fold up the stroller and put that and the car seat on the conveyer belt for them to scan. The baby you carry through. On the way from CA they had a separate line for families. This helped out tremendously and also kept regular travelers from having to get in line behind us with all our stuff.

We purchased a seat for Chloe on the plane. The tickets for babies are discounted and some times half the price of a regular seat. So she was in her car seat in her own seat against the window. On both flights there were at least 3 babies, and not once were they all crying at the same time. Chloe did not like sitting waiting for everyone to get on and the take off. So Chris and I tried our best to entertain her and to keep her busy. Eventually she fell asleep and all was well.

Disneyland Hotel
We stayed at the Disneyland Hotel. They had a pack and play thing for Chloe to sleep in. They said if we needed a regular crib we could call housekeeping to get one. The pack and play worked just fine. The mattress was a little wimpy and you could feel the bar in the center. I had brought a heavy blanket that I put down on the bottom and it worked nicely. Chloe had no problem falling a sleep in it and staying a sleep all night. The room was just a regular hotel room so I had to be creative and set up little stations. The night stand near my side of the bed had an opening on the bottom that I put all Chloe’s diaper changing stuff. I would just lay a changing pad on the bed and change her when needed. Inside the TV cabinet to the right was a small fridge and a shelf up above. Here is where I set up my bottle making area. In the bathroom I just put a small towel to the side where I would dry bottles that had been cleaned. Once I had a system down it worked out great.

The great thing about the hotel was that it connected to Disneyland and their other park California Adventure. So we just had to load up the stroller and walk from the hotel to the parks. This was great for when we would come back to the hotel for naps each day.

The Rides
We took Chloe on all the kiddy rides. We used a front harness and either one of us had her strapped to us. She liked the dark scary rides the best; she even liked Pirates of the Caribbean. Chris went on a few of the rides himself while I fed Chloe, like the Indian Jones ride & the Grizzly River Run. They have a line for single riders that you can get right on.

The Food
I had been craving a Mickey ice-cream bar for weeks before our trip. So of course I had one of those. We also made reservations for lunch one of the days at the Blue Bayou restaurant. This is the one were the restaurant over looks the Pirates of Caribbean ride. So it is in the dark with lanterns up above. We both ordered the Monte Cristo sandwich. Chloe is not old enough to sit in a high chair so we just wheeled the stroller in wherever we ate.

We also ate at the Carnation Café on Main Street for breakfast one of the days. I ordered the Cinnamon Roll French Toast and a Café Mocha. The seating is outside and it was a wonderful breakfast. We will definitely eat there again if we go back.

They had a Vineyard Wine Bar at the California Adventure park to the left of the wine bar was a restaurant called Wine Country Trattoria. Both had out door seating. 2 of the evenings Chris and I went to the wine bar and I enjoyed a raspberry sparkling wine. It has a nice seating area with little tables under the trees. It makes it nice to relax and watch the people walking by. One evening we ate at the restaurant and for desert we had this wonderful Orange Sorbet, very tasty.

Good Times
Mostly Chris and I took it easy and enjoyed the moments sitting around. We took the parks at leisure and went back to the hotel in the afternoon for a nap or time at the pool, then went back into the parks in the evening.

We took the time to just enjoy being a family and the newness of us.

Chris and I took this trip for us. We really needed to get away and have some fun. I especially needed to get away after a less then pleasurable pregnancy and giving birth & 3 months of a newborn, it was definitely time to go out and celebrate. We know Chloe will not remember a thing on this trip. We will and we enjoyed sharing this trip with her. The bonus is that she had a great time. If you have any specific questions about traveling with a 4 month old send me an email, I can let you know what I did or what I learned from this whole experience.

Chloe With Disney Characters

We are back from our trip to Disneyland. I am up to my elbows in dirty laundry. I thought I would post a few pictures of Chloe with some of the characters. As soon as I get my house back in order I will tell you all about our trip and traveling with a 4 month old.Here is Chloe with Minnie Mouse. The photographer made some funny noises that made Chloe laugh for the photo.

Here she is with Ariel. Chloe was never afraid of the characters. She just kind of starred at them in awe of all the glitz and glamour.

This is Silvermist one of Tinkerbelle’s fairy friends. Silvermist is a water fairy and Chloe was blowing spit bubbles at her, so she asked Chloe if she was a water fairy too.

Here is Chloe with Belle

Here she is with Winnie the Pooh. Chloe is fascinated by his big furry paw.