CHRISTMAS WEEK TWO

Christmas morning Finley could not contain her excitement, although I'm pretty sure she had no idea that this day was unlike any other except that a whole lot more people were around. This didn't last too long, however, because after 30 minutes she was ready to eat again and have a nap. Her first Christmas morning was a lot to handle so we went upstairs and she napped for a good ten minutes and was awake and ready for action.

This was the Christmas morning gang. My in-laws, Brad's older sister and husband and their six kids, and Brad, Finn, and me!

Finley tried on her new ruffle pants just before she broke down begging for food and a nap. PS - Christmas morning is all about lazying about and not wearing makeup so don't judge me!

Finners and her cousin Ella (who simultaneously dressed for Christmas morning and a 1987 prom. It was hilarious).


To quote my brother-in-law Ken, "What did families do before youtube?" I believe in this picture they are watching Double Rainbow on Ken's Ipad. What does this MEAN?

After the entire gang (all 35 of us!) arrived in Naperville "plans" kind of went out the window so we ended up doing a lot of varied fun stuff. One night everyone went to our local church building and played some games in the gym (after we did a service project of cleaning). Most of the moms sat around with the babies and talked while the dads and kids ran around.





Finners loved this walker of my sister-in-laws. My pediatrician scared me with stories of imminent death if I ever put her in one these but she survived to tell the tale. I might consider getting one for my next kid, it was fun to see her having some independent fun at the pre-crawling stage.

Lauren was doing some major trash talk during kickball.


WICKED! Brad surprised me with tickets to see Wicked in Chicago for Christmas, which just happened to be in town at the same time. We even got to go with Brad's brother and wife and their daughter Lauren. I LOVED it and would go again in a heartbeat. Glinda and Elphaba were both fantastic. Glinda was very Amy Poehler funny. It was also nice to have a night out without the Finners. Although when we got home she had apparently cried for about an hour. I'm sad that she cried, but it's also nice to know she missed us. Is that a horrible thought?



Naperville got quite a bit of snow right before Christmas so one day the kids went sledding. Brad went to take some pictures but couldn't resist taking a few turns down the hill even though he was not at all dressed for the snow. Crazy husband.






It was fun to see everyone for Christmas and get in a nice loooong vacation. It might not always be so easy for us to see family depending on where we move next so we are spoiling ourselves with as much family time as possible. The next time the entire Carn clan will be together is this July for Family Reunion 2011 in Utah.

TRUE STORY

Today while Finley and I were watching the Pats get their trashed kicked, Brad was getting ready to take a bath. That's right. The girls were watching football and the man was taking a bath.



Dear Jets,

Thanks for taking out the Pats. Go Bears!

Love,
Brad. Bridget. & Fin

SEVEN MONTHS

Our little chub-chub is seven months! Her list of accomplishments this month include:

. Belly surfing on our hard wood floor. I don't think she'll ever learn to crawl because she's getting pretty efficient at pushing herself around on her belly. Oh well.


. Screeching. No this isn't a Saved By The Bell reference. More along the lines of a screeching that sounds like a whistle or possibly Mariah Carey doing vocal practices in her upper range. Not fun.

. When she's not screeching she has started to do more baby talk. She has mastered the "gahb" sound. It's only a matter of minutes until she's reading Shakespeare I can feel it!

. Eating solids. And by "solids" I mean all manner of pureed food and some puffs that dissolve in her mouth. BUT she has learned to chew the puffs as they dissolve before swallowing them whole. We had a few scary almost choking instances that got my heart racing. But all is good, everyone is still alive. (sidenote - whenever she takes the first bite of something she makes this face as if she's stunned/angry that something has entered her mouth.)
. She's starting to get more hair!


. When she gets excited she flaps her arms like a seal. This most often happens when she encounters new people, when dad comes home, and when I'm too slow to feed her the next bite of food. It's adorable.
. The most common comment she gets is about her "big blue eyes" and the fact that she is such a good happy baby. No complaints there!
. She has been wiggly but generally quiet through church the past few weeks. In fact this past Sunday I got to sit through the first hour without having to get up.
. She's started tilting her head to the side when she smiles, much like an adorable puppy. It makes me melt every time! (Yes I just compared my child to a dog, get over it.)

. She loves all these electronic - cell phone, mouse, remote... If one comes in to her view she becomes unhinged until she can touch it. So now we have to keep these items out of her line of sight. Just add it to the list of ways a baby changes EVERYTHING in ways you'd never imagine.
. She has two bottom teeth. Hopefully she doesn't have any more coming soon I need a break from teething.
. Balancing. She can sit by herself now unassisted. Her balance still needs some improvement because as soon as she reaches for something she usually topples over which startles her and makes her cry.

. And I've saved the best for last. She is finally sleeping through the night! We had to wait for the perfect storm where she wasn't teething or sick and for a time where we could be consistent. That day ended up being when we got back from Christmas vacation. Her old bedtime was about 11:30 on a normal night so we are working on moving that back. The new schedule is I nurse her and put her down between 10:00 and 11:00 and let her cry it out and she has never cried more than 8 minutes! I was all geared up for hours of crying for Finley and hours of emotional torment for me. But it was really anticlimactic. Oh well, I'm not complaining! She sleeps solid until 8:30 or 9am and it is fantastic! My friend at church asked if I love Finley a little more when I have a full nights rest and the answer is, honestly, yes. Sleep problem? Solved. For now.

A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE

Our first week in Naperville was very relaxing and calm. We slept in, went shopping, and ate way too much. In fact I spent so much time being lazy that I realized two days before Christmas that I still hadn't picked up Brad's present ("oops"). So I went to the mall by myself which turned out to be a big mistake. Traffic was insane and the mall was even more insane. While I was hurling myself from store to store (the specific Bears hat I was trying to find Brad was sold out EVERYWHERE) I noticed the crazy line of parents waiting with their crying children to get a picture taken with Santa. I thought, "oh those poor parents I'm glad I don't have to do that. Oh wait! I'm a parent. I do have to do that!" From there I started getting guilty that I hadn't done more to make this first Christmas special for Finley.

So I went home and declared to Brad (remember this is TWO days before Christmas) that I wanted Finley to get her picture taken with Santa. Brad is a lovely sort of husband and could tell this was one of those occasions to humor me. So we got up Christmas Eve morning and got to the mall when Santa was scheduled to arrive at 10am. It turned out that pictures with Santa would cost at least $25 dollars. Apparently you CAN put a price on memories and that cost is $25... too steep for us. So we went to the center of the mall and took some pictures by the giant indoor tree. I was disappointed but satisfied with our effort.



Fast forward a few hours later. We are back at Brad's parents house and I hear a knock at the front door. And who could it be? SANTA! Or rather Brad's wonderful neighbor dressed as Santa on his way back from another neighbor's house making a Christmas delivery. They knew nothing of our bad luck with Santa earlier in the day but just randomly thought to stop by and say hello. We called it our Christmas miracle because not only did Finley get a picture with Santa but she got about 400, they were free, and she didn't have to sit on some strangers lap that smelled like beef and cheese!


Plus they brought Finley a present! She got to open her very first Christmas present with them... a beautiful ornament. The Simnick's are truly awesome people - their kindness goes on and on.


Other than our Christmas miracle here are a few other pictorial highlights from our first week in Naperville.



Every year Brad's siblings would fight over who got to put the star on the top of the advent tree on December 24th. This year Brad was the only sibling there on the morning of the 24th and he allowed Finley to be the first grandchild to put the star on the tree. The siblings were none too pleased.


Evidence of our sleeping in. Also evidence that Finley was not a good sleeper while were on vacation.

This was me showing Finley snow. I thought it was fun. Finley thought it was cold. Put a hat on that noggin!

HAPPY TWENTY ELEVEN

We had a fantastic Christmas and New Years. Lots of family and lots of presents. We are happy to be home even if our house is a disaster and Brad had to start school again this morning. A thorough review of the past two weeks will be up sometime this week. I'm just happy our Christmas stockings were done by the 24th. After I'm done with mountains of laundry and taking down Christmas decor I'll get back to the blogging. If I had been on the ball enough to send a Christmas or New Years card this would have been the picture but what can you do?

NEW CHRISTMAS SONGS

I'm usually a traditionalist when it comes to Christmas tunage but these newcomers are fantastic. If you are looking for a way to spruce up your current playlist here are some to add:

A VIDEO YEAR IN REVIEW

I posted this on Facebook a while back but since I know a few of you don't have an account I thought I'd put it up here too. It's a nice summary of 2010... since it was mostly about preparing for, having, and then loving our little chicken.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

This is a picture of Fanta (fake Santa). Have I ever told his story on this blog? He's an almost exact replica of a decoration Brad grew up with in his home every Christmas. I won him this past summer at the Carn family reunion through a series of tournaments that tested my very soul (or maybe it was just one lucky game of Bingo? I can't remember). Anyway, Fanta's story is pretty funny I'll get around to telling it sometime.

(EDIT - Get Charlie and Brook's perspective of Fanta's story here. Thanks guys!)


Today we are heading to Brad's parents house for Christmas and New Years. It will be nice to have a lengthy vacation where I don't have to worry about Brad studying for a 1:00 quiz or whether patients are pulling guns on each other in the clinic parking lot (true story). We have lots of fun stuff planned but we are most excited to spend our first Christmas with Finley. If I don't get around to posting I wish you all a happy Christmas and hope that you are able to spend it with those you love.

SIX MONTHS

Our chubby bunny is six months old. It's hard to imagine a time before she was a part of our family and I've recently found myself thinking, "what did I do with all that free time I had before?" But I honestly don't think it in a negative way because I wouldn't trade being a mom for anything. Yes it's a huge lifestyle change, but the good far out weighs the bad. We went in for her six months checkup and here are her current stats:

50th percentile for weight: 15 lbs., 12 oz. (more than doubled her weight since birth)
75th percentile for height: 26 1/4 inches (grown 6 1/4 inches since birth)


Our pediatrician said she is "perfect" and is growing at a great pace, very proportionately. She did move from the 50th to the 75th percentile in head size! We knew it was just a matter of time before that big noggin kicked in, luckily her hair is starting to come in a bit more!


As for her new tricks - she's rolling all over the place and doing this crazy back bend thing. I can no longer leave the room and expect her to be in the same place when I come back. Which is a sad stage to leave behind. She's even started pushing up on her hands and flailing her feet which propels her a few inches here and there, we are really not ready for a crawling baby! She also found her feet. In fact the other day in the car I looked back at her in the car seat and she was holding both feet straight in the air and just smiling out the window. Happy as a clam.


She sleeps slightly better at night then she did a month ago. Her (own) bedtime for a while there was about 12:30 and I've pushed it back to about 11. Which still entails a few waking episodes throughout the night but fortunately it's easy to get her back to sleep again. Our pediatrician told us to cut out night feedings which turned out to be harder on me than Finley. I assumed she was waking up because she was hungry, but I think I was just using it as a crutch to get her back to sleep. We went cold turkey about three nights ago and haven't looked back. Turns out Finley hasn't died of starvation as I feared. None of her sleeplessness has been helped by the fact that she got her first tooth right before Thanksgiving. And her next tooth is just below the surface - hopefully on it's way to full eruption in the next few days.

The trade off for hard nights is that she is one happy baby during the day. Most often she still smiles at everyone she sees but now she laughs a lot more. In fact now she is more ticklish. Even if you just make the sound and gesture that you are going to tickle her she starts to giggle. Brad is also enjoying the fact that he can toss her in the air now that she is getting tougher. And boy does she enjoy playing with dad. Sometimes she'll even cry when he leaves the room (never happens when I leave the by the way). I think we have a daddy's girl on our hands - Brad melts every time.


And the last big milestone she hit this month is starting on baby food. She has done well with butternut squash but peas and green beans have been a little less appealing (I don't blame her). So far she hasn't outright rejected anything but she was literally grabbing the spoon herself to get the squash into her mouth faster.

Finley also met snow for the first time today - we only went outside for a few minutes because we are all getting over some nasty colds. And below freezing is no place for a little burrito. Her "bear suit" is a size too big so it makes her arms and legs look extra long and extra adorable. But she didn't seem to mind the cold. Pretty good coming from our June baby.

WITCHCRAFT

So Brad's parents gave us their old Christmas tree when we left after Thanksgiving. I'm not sure how three people, a ginormous tree, and all our luggage made it back to Alton in our Civic but somehow we lived to tell the tale. Diane warned us that some of the pre-lit lights were out but I was thrilled to move on from our two footer to a big girl tree. Plus free is my favorite price. Anyway, once I set it up only three branches lit up. My mom told me about this thing that fixes your lights by plugging them into this gun-like device. I wasn't buying it at all - it just seemed like one of those "too good to be true" things. Or one of those things that works for everyone else but me. I went to Home Depot the next day anyway to buy one and made sure that they would let me return it if it wasn't all it was cracked up to be. Well I don't want to over sell this but it was all it was cracked up to be and MORE. It seriously felt like I was performing magic. Every strand was fixed but one and it was ridiculously easy. Just plug and click and they magically start working again. Witchcraft, I tell you! Since then I have considered trying to break the lights again so that I can use the gun again. But maybe not. If you have lights that aren't working give me a call - I'll bring my gun over.

THANKSGIVING 2010 [PART 2]

Brad came up a few days later by way of bus and train and we met in Naperville. We had a relaxing week with family and we even got to spend an evening with all of Brad's high school friends where Finley was a hit. One of the best things we got to do was volunteer at the Bishop's storehouse on Thanksgiving packing up food orders for those in need.


Diane was in charge of cooking, so of course it was delicious. The mountains of rolls didn't last 24 hours! We had about 20 people for dinner and believe me we stuffed ourselves.



Brad's go-to expression. I'm not sure why... I think it has something to do with highlighting the eyebrows.

Remember this dog last Christmas? He used to be so tiny! He's still a little guy but definitely bigger. He's used to six kids running around but I guess 15 wore him out.


Jonah is the baby whisperer. I swear! Brad's family (it was a team effort) watched Finley while we went to see Harry Potter and she took a nap while Jonah held her for more than an hour. Jonah, do you want to come stay with us for a few weeks?




We had lot of fun and can't wait until Christmas. Since I'm no longer working we'll be able to take a nice long vacation to Naperville for two weeks during Brad's winter break. We are excited for lots of Portillos! Oh and EVERY member of the Carn's will be in town - all 35 of us! Mayhem. It's the most wonderful time of the year.

THANKSGIVING 2010 [PART 1]

Okay. Bad blogger alert! I'm hopelessly behind so for now I'll just post a few highlights from Thanksgiving. Finley and I went up early to go visit Ashley in Evanston which is a just a short drive from Naperville. This was the first time Ashley met Finley and I hadn't seen Lincoln since he was three weeks old - and now he's crawling! And Parker is so grown up - he talks up a storm. He really wanted Finley to "play" but I think he was a little disappointed that she wasn't much fun. When we first arrived I think he brought her every single toy he owns, he was such a good sharer. And Finley loves Ashley's husband Sam - she could not stop staring and smiling at him. Every time he came into the room she would follow his every move, it was hilarious.

We realized on the last day that we hadn't taken any pictures, and now I know why. Trying to photograph three children at once was quite the challenge.




This isn't a perfect picture but it's my absolute favorite of all the ones we took. I can't believe that between me and Ashley we have three kids! It really feels like yesterday we were going to our high school prom. I can't even imagine what our lives will be like in another ten years.