Mondays with McKenna {2}

As I sit here anxiously waiting to watch 2 new ABC TV shows {and potentially get hooked} I thought it would be a good idea to talk about all things McKenna! AND THERE IS SO MUCH!

Most exciting.  She is walking!  And walking fairly well.  She still stumbles around like a little drunk sorority girl and every now and then she still scoots around on her bottom. But for the most part, walking is her #1 movement of choice! =D  ….sadly I cannot seem to insert the video because I am just not smart enough. But. She is walking!

She can officially point to 4 body parts.  She can put her hands on her head, show us where her nose is, touch her feet, and find her bellybutton.  I think the bellybutton is the most fun because she pulls up her shirt and smiles so big!  Bellybuttons are funny things. S

She is also a HUGE fan of the shape sorter my parents got her for Christmas. And she is getting really good at sorting the shapes into the bucket.  She does better when no one is watching her, but she loves the cheers and claps she gets when the square falls into the bucket because she put it in the right hole.  She also simply loves books.  Sometimes when it is just too quiet, we find her sitting there flipping though a book and it melts my heart.

McKenna is starting to voice her opinions on what she is wearing. It all started a few weekends ago with her game day dress.  She lost her mind when she saw her pants.  And I gave in and put her jeans and tee-shirt back on.  Then after nap, I tried the outfit again and she lost her mind again.  Welp. I made her cry for about 10 minutes and then she realized she just had to deal with it. Hours later, she still hated those pants.  The other day I put her in a romper and she cried and cried over that too.  And lastly, I bought her the cutest pair of brown faux suede fringe booties for her outfit for picture day.  She cries looking at them.  Just cries.  Well, I told Kyle to put her in the dress, cardigan, and booties and just let her cry on Wednesday.  I will be on a work trip so I won’t be there, but I have a feeling she will go to school in her pink and purple running shoes and the outfit will be ruined.  Can’t wait to see how she reacts to her riding boots for family photos in November.

Oh. Another example. McKenna’s day care did a charity event where all the little babes had to dress up like a superhero. Well. You can tell she was not the biggest fan of her superhero costume.  She pretty much looked distressed and/or angry all day about her get up.  Honestly, I am surprised daycare never changed her into one of her spare outfits.  And… Notice how she is wearing her pink and purple running shoes.  Not the shoe cover thing the outfit came with.  Truthfully, I was not going to fight that battle the tears were so intense that morning. I have a feeling the costume may have been itchy.  But I also wonder how Halloween will go and if we will be able to get her dressed in a costume… We shall see.

She is 14 months - almost 15 months - and I cannot believe how much she is growing up.  We picked her up from daycare on Friday and she just looked older.  Both Kyle and I commented on how she just looked different and older.  It is just crazy how fast she is growing up and how quickly she is learning to do things on her own.  Soon we are going to be sending her to Bama Bound and then moving her into her dorm in Tuscaloosa.   

Mondays with McKenna {1}

I have a goal. Every Monday I am going to write about the little lady. OR if not every Monday I will write each Monday when there is some tidbit of exciting news to share. Or goofy story. Or fun video.

McKenna. Ya’ll. She makes my heart smile.

Milestones: well. she is finally crawling (and has been for a few months). She pulls up on pretty much anything and everything. She loves loves loves to walk with assistance – holding her Dad’s hand or pushing one of her many toys around.  She is not walking on her own yet, but we are ready for when she does.  She has mastered the stairs (going up, not down) and how to slide down the slide. She no longer sits in her high chair; she has joined the family at the dinner table. Basically, she is a big girl or something like that. I don’t think she has a favorite toy right now, but she loves all things Little People and she is obsessed with anything that she can stand up and push.  She has a mouthful of teeth and loves to get her teeth brushed.  I think she just loves the apple banana toothpaste, but whatever.

Other Happenings: We recently had a birthday party to attend. It was at Chuck-E-Cheeses. She was pretty much overwhelmed at first and just wanted to be held, but then she warmed up to the whole place and had a ball.  She LOVED the Barney ride and would try to put tokens in on her own to make the ride start over again once it stopped. I am pretty sure she rode that ride about 15 times, many times back to back.  And she learned to climb and slide and had the time of her life. Of course, the Barney ride was at the foot of the slide so she would power crawl over to the ride, pull herself up, and pretty much say, “come on guys, time to ride Barney” …  She chowed down on 2 pieces of pizza and 1 cupcake and got bright blue icing all over Kyle’s polo. This girl can eat. Best part: she napped HARD that day.

Because of Chuck-E-Cheeses we are pretty much living at the park on weekends.  Well, “living at” is a bit of an exaggeration. But, we do spend some time there every Saturday and Sunday. She seriously LOVES to slide and we have thought about buying her a backyard play thing for our deck, but it is more fun to take her to the park and watch her climb and slide around.  And she loves her wagon rides down to the park. …well, she actually loves everything about her wagon. She has a cup holder for her sippy and she loves to “read” her books on the ride. That thing was the best hand me down EVER. 

She is a wild thing. When we keep her indoors at our house she likes to “fall off” our bed. Fall off = slide off the side with Dad ready to catch her.  She loves to climb all over her pink chair and climb over the back of it onto the couch and then fall back down onto the pink chair.  And she loves to slide off the couch onto the ground.  Needless to say, I have the worry gene from my Mom’s side of the family so I think she will gray my hair sooner than later.

This little one constantly keeps us on our toes.  But she seriously brings us an insane amount of joy and it has been so so so fun watching her become more and more mobile over the last few weeks. 

McKenna’s First Easter

McKenna had a great first Easter.  The Easter Bunny spoiled her with bubbles and books clothes and food and some super fun toys {she LOVES her camera} and then we got to do dinner with my parents, so she got a little extra loving that day!

She tore right into her Easter Basket and wouldn’t let me put things back into the basket – everything had to stay on the floor where she could touch it and feel it.

Luckily she was too young for the neighborhood Easter Egg Hunt, because I thought it was on Sunday when it was actually on Saturday {that would have been a huge mommy fail} but we’re looking forward to possibly doing that next year.  But, if you cannot tell from the basket pictures – it may take her a few years to grow into her basket so she can hold it… ….not drag it.

BUT! We had a great first Easter. Watching her dive right into the basket makes me excited for her 1st birthday and then Christmas!

McKenna is 8 Months

Well. It happened. McKenna got another month older this week. Yesterday, she turned 8 months old {I was calling it 8 month years old}.  I have no idea how tall she is or how much she weighs, but she gets heavy and kind of reminds me of a sack of potatoes.  she still only has 2 teeth, but I know a 3rd is making its debut and a 4th may be coming along quickly. But she is still as adorable as ever.

Her new accomplishment is clapping. She used to clap with her feet and she still does, but now she knows she can clap her hands too and she loves to do it. She still is not crawling, but she has perfected her ability to roll around.  At some point this month she has started saying “da da da da da” over and over and over again and that pains me. So now I pretty much stare at her and say “ma ma ma ma ma”.  She also has decided that she is a pacifier kid… …now when she sees one she must have it.

Other fun things that happened to her this past month include: she met The Cat and the Hat at daycare.  She went to a restaurant for the first time.

We are loving that the weather is getting warmer {sometimes} and have started pushing her in the stroller at night and on the weekends we take her down to the park to swing. I cannot wait to take her to the pool. Time is seriously flying by – it just needs to slow down.

Little Miss is 4 Months {and some}!

This is a smidge overdue. Sorry!!  Full Time. Working Mom here. Took the pictures had to move them to the right computer. forgot. sue me. =D

Percentiles: >97%
Height: 27.5 inches
Weight: 19 pounds
Clothes Size:  9 months

Little Miss really is just the portrait of perfection. We are loving watching her grow up and develop and learn new things. Her Smile. It just brightens our day. And she is starting to giggle. So when we get a giggle. You have no idea how much that warms our heart.  She loves all the same things – stroller rides, her birdies, and her rainforest toy. But she also LOVES when Daddy lifts her in the air over his head. Everyone at daycare adores her & daycare has been amazing for her.  Hard on us – we sometimes feel like we are watching her grow up from the sidelines – but we know she is thriving and learning and developing and just so loved and taken care of. She has started sitting in a high chair and we got the green light to start solids and plan to once she kicks this RSV. We bought her an exersaucer and there are not enough words to describe how much she loves it. EVERYTHING goes in her mouth currently and due to lots of drool she is forever sporting a bib & we are realizing we didn’t buy enough burp clothes to sop it all up.

I LOVE Saturday mornings and the 9:30 AM feeding. Kyle and McKenna play beauty parlor (hair brushing and manicure) after chow time is over and they watch College Gameday together. McKenna loves football. It is probably one of the cutest things ever.

We are excited for her 1st Thanksgiving and then her 1st Christmas. We have already decided to fill her stocking with necessities we need like baby spoons and socks and baby food. She won’t know and nor will she care.

But. It has been an amazing 4 months so far.  While I want to freeze time and constantly tell her to slow down the growing, I am excited for the next developments and the new tricks she will learn!!

<< Insert Title Here >>

I HAVE NO ENERGY TO THINK OF A WITTY FUN TITLE. NOR AM I CREATIVE. PLUS I AM EXHAUSTED AND ITCHING FOR THE WEEKEND.

McKenna’s 1st Family 5k:
We “ran” the Big Pumpkin 5k in Roswell.  I think this was my 3rd  time running this race and I have always liked it.  Good mix of hills and flat road. The kids who were part of a running “team” were ADORABLE and while I want M to stay little forever, it made me so excited for her Elementary School days.  Moving on: we rocked the race if I do say so myself. We finished in 40:59 … which isn’t my best 5k time … but it is really good for the fact that I really have not been running anything hilly with McKenna in the stroller or really running at all. Little Miss slept the whole time and Kyle (who finished in 28:52 & beat his last 5K time) cam back to meet us.  I still think that we would have finished faster had the finish line not been littered with speed bumps!!!

Health Update:
monday was my eye appointment. and honestly, I was terrified for bad news. my eyes have always been wonky, feeling heavy and randomly blurry. I was terrified I would get bad news since I honestly have no idea how long I had melanoma on back.  However, after to say “my doctor found melanoma” out loud to a medical professional {which makes it feel so much more real} and crying a bit I got a comprehensive eye exam and my eyes were given a clean bill of health.

tuesday was the appointment with the skin cancer specialist. terrified doesn’t even begin to cover how scared I was. full disclosure: over the weekend I had my 1st emotional breakdown since I was told that I had melanoma. I was scared for Kyle and McKenna and if they would be ok if anything happened to me and I didn’t want to miss anything – I had an ugly cry to kyle. And I cried at the doctor Tuesday. Truthfully, I was scared that my laziness in going to the dermatologist was legit going to kill me. WELL. We got some good news. Yes, I have (had?) melanoma, but it looks like it was caught early. So it was stage 1A and .33 millimeters deep. Which means the probability of it spreading to my organs etc is like 5%.  And they cut that bad boy out and I will have like a 6” scar on my back and now we wait to see to make sure the margins are clear and it hadn’t spread to any other parts of the skin.  I have one more mole that is going to be removed in December, and I will find out hopefully sooner than later that they 100% cleared all the melanoma out this week.

I do still have my physical on Monday to ensure that nothing has spread and to just get an overall assessment of my health.  Fingers crossed that all goes well.

I would be lying if I wasn’t bummed about my working out instructions or better yet, my instructions to not work out for what seems like an eternity. AN ETERNITY I TELL YOU. Because of where my excision took place this week I cannot work out (other than walking and running and bis and tris) for 2 months. That means no Blast900 and no Flywheel and no Pure Barre till December.  Well… let me add salt to the wound. I have the 2nd mole being removed in December and it is in the same general area on my back, which means I cannot work out for 2 months after that. Giving me a total of 4 months of non of my amazing studio workouts.  I.AM.NOT.HAPPY.

I was just starting to fall back in love with Pure Barre and got the 3 months unlimited Baby Bounce Back & luckily the owner in Dunwoody is amazing & she is allowing me to hold off on starting the 3 months till February. Flywheel opened their 3rd location practically in my backyard and I was booked for 2 rides this weekend – had to cancel – and I cannot start my #dawnpatrol 5:30 AM rides with them until 2015.  People. I was counting.down.the.days. till they opened and now I have to wait.  And… Blast well you know the drill.  And they are being superb also because my package expires before when I can use all the classes.  Well, they are going to credit me my classes once I am back in action.  I know in the grand scheme of things I shouldn’t be so worried and worked up over my studios being out of my life for 4 months, but I need those extra hard workouts sometimes and I still have like 20 pounds to lose post McKenna.

In Other News:

Stay tuned for Halloween costume pictures and how the Santa visit goes this weekend!!

2 months & Still BIG!

This is a little late, simply because McKenna turned 2 months old on Saturday (WHAT?!) and she did not have her 2 week appointment until today. But the past 2 months has just flown by – I really cannot believe that my “little” baby is already 2 months old and we have her daycare orientation next week, and I am getting ready to head back to work in a few short weeks.

Over the last month we have loved watching her smile more and more everyday at things like us, her birdies, lights, and the curtains in our bedroom.  Often times asking her to stop smiling  & chow down.  It has been adorable to watch her try and find her hands and try to put her hands in her mouth.  Often times getting her mouth and eyes confused.  We love asking her about her “popsicle” when she clenches her fists and brings them to her mouth. She is so cute when she rubs her eyes and ears.  Well… if we are being honest, she is cute in general.

We always smile when she is gulping her chow and it goes down the wrong hole and she starts coughing and then Mulligan comes running to check on her and then he stands guard of her.  Mulligan is for sure going to protect her as she gets older.

Kyle loves his nighttime routine with her – bath time, chow time, and story time. Then he used to rock her to sleep at night, but now she falls asleep on her own. As jealous as I am of his nighttime routine with her, I adore their special time together and hate to break it up when I go back to work, but momma needs time with her too once I am working again. I am loving how most nights she is sleeping from bedtime (9:00 ish to 5 or 6 AM).

The doctor was impressed with her eye contact, smiling, and all her baby babble and sounds she makes.  She got a good report card from the doctor. And she got her shots. I think I cried more than she did. And now she is literally passed out {a side effect of the shots}. I know I have already said it, but I CANNOT believe I have a 2 month old. Where is the time going?!

Current Stats:
Weight – 15 pounds, 1 ounce
Length -  25.5 inches
Percentile – Greater Than The 97th Percentile
Wearing 6 months clothes.

Her Favorite Things: Stroller Rides, The curtains in our room, her birdies, her swing, and running errands with her mom.

Her next checkup is 4 months, I seriously wonder how big she will be then and what sort of milestones she will hit!! This little bird of mine makes me love her more and more everyday. 

McKenna is 1 month old!

I cannot believe how the time has flown – McKenna is officially 1 month old – and getting bigger by the day.  She loves stroller rides through the neighborhood & on the greenway.  She loves making us walk her in circles around the house so she can see all the sights.  She loves her swing and her gym mat – but is not the biggest fan of tummy time (unless she is on mom’s chest) but it is getting better by the day. She met the neighbors and their big dog (and I think they were more scared/worried than we were).  She has learned to accept her nightly bath time, but I think Kyle has more fun than she does.  I have been pooped on, peed on, and puked on so I think I have been 100% welcomed into motherhood.  but – it has been a wonderful, amazing first month.  She is such a beauty.

Current Stats:
Weight – 11 pounds, 14 ounces
Length -  24 inches
Percentile – 97th Percentile

Long story short: she is still a BIG baby!  but she is healthy and happy and that is all we care about!

I don’t want to say it was a hard 1st month, but it also wasn’t 100% easy.  There were meltdowns (on my part mainly) about her meltdowns and not understanding her cries, breastfeeding issues, fears of being with her alone all day long, her stomach issues, my c-section got infected and of course the lack of sleep. 

Kyle is amazing and has been since day one.  I am so thankful to have such an amazing partner in life, marriage, and parenthood.  I didn’t know it was possible, but the love and respect I have for him today is more than I had for him before McKenna. He amazes me more and more everyday and McKenna is so lucky to have him as a dad. 

Now. I wonder what is in store for us for the next month and what developments & milestones McKenna will hit! 

McKenna’s Nursery Reveal

 McKenna’s room is pretty much DONE!  And that is a big sigh of relief to me because I wanted the nursery done by the end of May and our May is a little hectic and overwhelming.  I love how it all just came together so easily and how simple and clean it looks.  I do have to brag on my husband a little bit – he was such a trooper.  it was a long day of crib assembly {with Kennesaw in the way 98% of the time} and hanging things on the wall.  But he never once complained and I think he is proud of the work he did. And it all seriousness, I think she has one of the better rooms in the house.  Already a spoiled little princess! Now, I just cannot wait to get her home and in her room.

I absolutely love our crib.  I am so glad the debacle around the crib {and nursery} set was resolved …. even if it did take me writing a scathing review on Yelp.  Oh well.  The cream color looks good with the gray and pink and I love love love the engraved detailing of the little flowers.  I do hate mesh bumpers and think they are total distraction, but Land of Nod doesn’t make the big pretty bumpers and evidently non-breathable bumpers = bad.  But.  I still think they are a total eye sore.  We wanted to put McKenna’s name of the crib, but with the letters being white and the crib being cream we now are hunting for what to put over the crib.  Ideas are welcome!

Crib & Nightstand : Koo Koo Bear Kids, Dolce Babi Bambino // Bedding: Land of Nod, Hop to It

I just LOVE this wall.  And I have to pass the credit onto Kyle for the idea of putting M’s name of this wall.  I love these curtains and how they look on the pink wall.  When we hung them last week Kyle and I both immediately thought that they looked so good against the pink wall.  And we all know that K and I are pretty much obsessed with the glider.  And then the addition of her name on the wall just works.

Curtains: Land of Nod // Glider: Babies r Us // Letters: Babies ‘r Us.

I LOVE our dresser / changing table.  Again.  I am so glad the debacle around the nursery furniture was resolved and I am slightly obsessed with the mirror.  We like how the pink wall is reflected in the mirror and adds a little more pink to the room.  Another project will be to wash, organize, and put away little baby clothes and socks and mittens.  I need to order the drawer organizers from IKEA that I really like and we need to decide if we are going to do a diaper caddy or use one of the top drawers for supply and diaper storage to keep it all out of the way.  I am leaning towards using a drawer.  After all, I don’t think she will need ALL that drawer space yet.  Right?! FYI: babies are so small.

Dresser: Koo Koo Bear Kids, Dolce Babi Bambino // Mirror: Pottery Barn Kids // Changing Pad Cover: Land of Nod // Lamp: Target circa 2008

I saw this idea on Pinterest and we needed a place for books and extra storage and I really liked this idea.  And it looks clean and put away and is just what we needed – great storage for swaddling blankets and extra sheets and her books and toys anything else we need to store. I do need to get one more pink bin.

Cubbies: Target

We also have an apothecary jar on her night stand to store pacifiers {and need to stock up on some pacifiers to fill it!} and need to figure out what to put over the crib.  But, I love that the room is basically done and that it looks so very very good.  I cannot wait to show it off to Kyle’s parents when they come in town in a few weeks and then to my bestie Heather when she is in town and then my parents and brother as they visit!

And… now we have to go onto our next project.  Which Kyle thinks is laying down grass seed or sod from all the juniper he pulled.  I believe it is a laundry room make over.  Flip a coin – heads: yard work … tails: laundry room!?  We also need to get new furniture for our living room to move the old couch to Kyle’s man cave so we can have our big “family space” and the love seat into the random sitting room we have.  I feel like we need to play the lotta and hit the jackpot!