First Foods

Adley began the adventure of experimenting with solid foods this month. We started her with just basic rice cereal since Jaden and Cody had been successful with that. Adley opened her mouth happily and, although she was quite messy, seemed to enjoy this first food experience.

On food trial day #1, just Mommy and Daddy did the feeding, but Jaden and Cody were amazing encouragers. They loved witnessing the process for Adley and enjoyed hearing stories about their own first solid food days.

 On Adley's second day of trying solid foods, we let her big brothers join in the process. It was quite amusing watching the boys try to get the spoon in Adley's mouth.

I also got a kick out of watching Cody and Jaden's own mouths open and close along with Adley's.

These two big brothers were SO proud to feed their little sister! They offered many words of praise to Adley as she successfully ate again on Day 2.

After the initial few days of rice cereal, we branched out into other varieties of fruit and vegetable purees-- butternut and acorn squash, banana, apple, sweet potato, avocado, and peas. Adley's typical pattern has been to grimace at the first few bites of any food, push the food around with her tongue, but then eventually settles into eating. She still spits out more than she swallows on any given bite, but she's slowly making progress. 

I've taken quite a few pictures of Adley eating so that I can show the boys Adley's reaction to new foods that she tries while they are at school. Jaden and Cody love guessing whether or not Adley will like a certain food and than determining her overall taste based on the photos.

Squash (butternut) -- so-so

(acorn) -- yum!

Sweet Potato -- so-so

Avocado-- no, thank you!

Oatmeal -- double YUM (Look how wide she opens her mouth!)

Adley's favorite so far!

Other top food choices include banana and apple, while pumpkin and peas are only so-so. Avocado has been the only food to be completely rejected. We're enjoying this new phase and are happy that Adley is a decent little eater so far.

6 months old

Every time our friends see Adley, we hear a similar remark-- "Look how big she's getting!" Perhaps that's just what everyone says when they see a baby, but we think it's true as well. Our little six-month old is growing up so much! We love how she interacts with others, smiles easily, and seems very interested in the world around her. We thank God for our happy, pleasant baby!

Here are some current stats about Adley Grace:

PHYSICAL

• 19 lbs, 15 oz
• Very confident sitter; rarely tumbles over
• Likes to practice standing (with help)
• Enjoys trying to drink water from Mommy or Daddy's cup but spills quite a bit
• Often grabs onto her foot while nursing
• Enjoys bouncing in her jumper

• So close to crawling!
• Leans far forward to reach for toys until she's in the crawling position
• Can scoot herself backwards or sideways to different places around the room

SLEEPING HABITS

• Rough naptimes at the start of this month (took a LONG time to rock/bounce to sleep and then would only catnap for 25-30 minutes)
• Still had 3-4 awakenings at nighttime
• Finally did some sleep training and made a LOT of progress! (Naps more regularly generally twice a day and knows how to self-soothe before bedtime and naptime)
• We transitioned Adley to her own bedroom crib rather than the pack n play in Mommy and Daddy's bedroom. (This meant that Mommy and Daddy finally had to finish putting up the decor in Adley's bedroom too!)

 

PLAYTIME/OTHER

• Loves playing peek-a-boo, especially with her brothers
• Enjoys standing by the activity table (with help)
• Loves any musical toy and chewing on her indestructible baby books
• Takes baths in the big tub
• People often comment on her "pretty blue eyes" and her alertness
• Spitting up much less-- hooray!
• Likes riding in the front of shopping carts at stores

Next month, we predict that we'll have a baby on the move! It's a joy watching this little girl grow. We love you, dear Adley Grace!

Kindergarten!

Well, here we go. Our clan has officially entered the world of full-time school, and there's no turning back! It's hard to believe that my "little" boys are at this stage already. Cody and Jaden started kindergarten in mid-August. Two nights before school began, we attended an orientation night. The boys got to meet their teacher (who we actually already knew from church) and take a tour of their classroom. Their teacher, Mrs. Snow, had a classroom scavenger hunt activity for each child to complete. Both boys found their new desks and eagerly began!

After finding all of the items around the room (such as their backpack hooks and the classroom library) Cody and Jaden each got a prize from the classroom treasure box-- a bag of Goldfish with a medal that read, "I am o-FISH-ally in kindergarten!"

When the first day arrived, neither boy seemed nervous. Cody proudly announced the night before, "I'm not even going to cry!" (like he did at the start of pre-K last year).

Cody was true to his word. In fact, he was quite the goofball during our "first day" pictures. All of these photos make me smile, so I couldn't just pick one!

Now that Jaden and Cody have entered kindergarten, they are required to wear a uniform. On chapel days, they have to wear these specific colors (otherwise they don't prefer to match). The boys were thrilled about their new light-up shoes-- Ninja Turtles for Jaden and Spiderman for Cody.

We know that Mrs. Snow is a loving, easy-going teacher, and we are thankful for the godly role model that she will be for our boys. Jaden and Cody were both VERY excited to learn that she was their teacher this year.

At the end of Day 1, Cody said that he most enjoyed center time while Jaden was excited about recess. Here are two of their work samples from the first week of school:

The class read the book, Mrs. Bindergarten Gets Ready for Kindergarten, and then made their own class book pages. When asked how he got ready for school, Cody said, "I drove to school."

Jaden's page says, "I drove here."

The three kindergarten classrooms all have a Pete the Cat theme, so the kids decorated thematic hats.

Jaden's hat

Cody's hat

Our whole family is still adjusting to the early mornings and long days of kindergarten, but overall Cody and Jaden have been enjoying school. We are grateful for a school with caring staff members who teach about Jesus every day! We look forward to seeing how Cody and Jaden will learn and grow throughout the year.

Bike Riding

Cody and Jaden reached a significant milestone the weekend before school started. They learned to ride their bikes without training wheels! Both boys asked about trying this quite a few months ago (well before Adley was born) but it seemed too complicated to attempt while Mommy was pregnant. Finally, in mid-August, we scheduled an evening for Grammy and Papa to come over and hold Adley so that Mommy and Daddy could be free to help both boys ride.

We found a perfect bike riding practice zone-- the parking lot of a nearby elementary school. It had a long, straight path free of cars or other obstacles. Both Cody and Jaden seemed to get the hang of balancing on their bike fairly quickly.  They loved realizing how fast they could go without training wheels. Mommy and Daddy each ran behind one of the boys, and we sure got our exercise! We were so busy running after our boys, in fact, that I forgot to get any pictures of Bike Riding Day 1. The boys made great progress and only had one minor fall (Cody). It was a successful start!

A few days later, we went over to the school again. This time, Mommy and Daddy stood on opposite ends of the parking lot and let Jaden and Cody ride back and forth. This plan freed Mommy up to take some good pictures of our bike-riding boys.

On our second day, Jaden experienced his first minor fall but thankfully got back up and tried again. This evening, Cody and Jaden practiced making turns and learned how to start on their own. 

We were so proud of the boys' fast progress. They were definitely ready for those training wheels to come off!