Snotty Daughty

Those of you following me on facebook already know that Aurora has been sick this weekend. She hasn't quite been herself ever since we returned from AZ. At first, she refused to nurse before bed, and I figured she was just off schedule. Then Thursday she awoke with an extremely runny nose, and both Thursday and Friday she didn't finish her afternoon bottle at daycare. Friday Carole told me she didn't think Aurora was feeling very well, and that was how our weekend began...

Yesterday Aurora woke up with the runniest nose EVER - seriously gross and dried up all over her nostrils so she could hardly breath - along with goopy eyes, a red blotchy face, and extreme sadness. Turns out she had a 101.7 fever too. I started her on fairly regular doses of Tylenol, which really improved both her temp and mood.

She still tried her hardest to be happy and partake in her regular activities of crawling and standing up. Here are a couple pics I took yesterday, trying capture how much of a mess she was - but as usual, she saw the camera and just had to smile!

I have a busy week ahead, so I'm really hoping she isn't so sick that they make her stay home from daycare. I'm trying to secure all of our spring interns before the holiday break, and Chuck & I are preparing for company this coming weekend. Curt & Brooke will be visiting from LA!!! Oh, and I've been spending ALL of my free time reading the Twilight series. It's so addicting. Hey, who needs sleep anyway? It's overrated...

Pictures!!!

It was so fun to take the babies to a photoshoot during our time together. Zeland was so good, and totally conked out by the end, but I think Aurora was pretty overwhelmed the whole time. Here are a few of our favorites so far...

Phew

I’d like to start off by saying that traveling with a baby is not easy. Planning a day with 6 adults, an 8-year old and two babies who are on different schedules is a little challenging as well. Add in the logistics of Thanksgiving and Christmas (we celebrated early as it was the only time we’d all be together), and you have one hectic weekend. Actually, we had a nice time. Nancy fixed a traditional Thanksgiving meal on Thursday (no, Aurora did not eat turkey!), then we all opened presents. Rora's a lot like a kitty - she liked the ribbon best.

On Friday we hauled the babies off to Julia’s friend Nicki’s house for a photo shoot (I can’t wait to get the pictures!). Saturday was very low key – we just took a nice walk and rented a movie. Sunday we brought the babies to the park to play on the swings.



Sunday afternoon we took a quick trip up to Jerome for lunch, then on Monday we drove down to Phoenix for an afternoon at the zoo and a really lovely dinner in Tempe (thanks Andrew & Julia!).

We really had a good time getting to know little Zeland. He’s one month younger than Aurora and is such a little sweetie. He’s just sitting up and is the cutest little guy when he flails around on the ground, but Aurora started crawling a couple weeks ago and her main goal during this trip was to pull herself to standing and balance well enough to let go of whatever she was holding. I'm not sure what she's saying to Zeland here, but I can tell you that standing up was serious business. Now that we're home she's started standing up in her crib too...

I'll post more pics as I continue to go through them. I know that between Nancy, Julia, and Nicki, tons of great family photos were taken. Of course, I also need to catch up on all my food shopping, dishes, laundry, unpacking, sleeping, and reading (I just started reading Twilight)... better get to it!

We're home!

What a weekend. We just got in after midnight, and I don't have much time to blog this morning, but thought I'd post a quick update to let you all know that we had a great holiday weekend.

Lots of pictures and stories to come - for now, I have to head to work so I'll leave you with one cute early morning photo of Aurora and Zeland with Grandma Nancy. Thanks for having us over for Thanksgiving!!!

Thankful

Tomorrow I'm bringing Aurora to work for a few hours, then heading home to pack and prepare for our early morning flight to Arizona, where we'll be spending Thanksgiving with the Wadey/Imus clan. We'll bring the video camera and a laptop, but I'm not expecting to blog again for the next week, so I wanted to wish you ALL a very happy Thanksgiving.

Happy Thanksgiving to all my friends at the LAF. I truly am thankful to work for such an amazing organization with such great people. I'm thankful to be in the "mom club," and feel fortunate to have friends in Jennifer, Sue, Brooke, and all the other LAF mommies. And Kim Barnett, Teresa, Kelsey, Bianca... I could go on and on.

Happy Thanksgiving to the Ostergards and Slanes up in Seattle. I have so many great memories of Thanksgivings with you guys as a teenager, and I'm sure family gatherings have only gotten more fun with the addition of so many new family members!

Happy Thanksgiving to Katie and her parents, who have always been like a second family to me. And to Amelia, who I'm thinking of so much this week and wishing peace and love.

Happy Thanksgiving to my Mom & Dad, who will be celebrating more than just the holiday this week in Miama. It's also Grandpa's 85th birthday!!! Grandpa Sandler has always been so generous and supportive of our family. I wanted to post a few photos to honor his big day...

This is me and my grandpa in 1979. Oh yeah, and Julian :)

Here we are in 1986, dancing at his wedding.

And this silly picture is from just two short months ago, September 2008. I hope Aurora and I get to visit you many many more times!

We love you Grandpa Sandler!

What a weekend...

Last night Aurora was up just about every hour, crying and drooling and chomping her gums together. I couldn't feel any teeth today, but it's pretty obvious she's working on them. At one point I filled a sippy cup with ice water, and she liked that, but it didn't help for long. Tonight I'm prepared with soothing drops and Tylenol.

The most amazing thing was that this morning she woke up happy! I was sure she'd be overtired and cranky. Nope. We had a full day of breakfast at Le Madeleine, coffee with friends at the Borders bookstore in the Domain, yoga with Jennifer and Larkin, and a little afternoon shopping.

I'm afraid this may have been our last postnatal yoga class. Aurora is a little too mobile, and she's not shy about crawling over to other babies and grabbing them. Last week she reached over and grabbed Larkin's MOUTH! Today she kept crawling across the room to Lyric, who's in our class at daycare, and Doris Ann, who's 9 months old and pretty content to stay in one place. Larkin and Lyric are a couple months younger than Aurora and are not even sitting up yet, so they can't exactly play with her (or defend themselves against her!).

Rora has a great time at yoga and we'll both miss it, but once the babies can crawl they sort of 'graduate' into the crawlers and toddlers class - which is only offered on weekday mornings. Oh well. Here are a couple pictures from today. Larkin was keeping her eye on Aurora!

Today I took Aurora shopping dressed like this...

Hair!

No, this post is not about Aurora's hair (though it is certainly getting thicker)... it's about my haircut. More than the cut, this blog is about my new hair color, which I like to call NOT GRAY!

When I was pregnant, my hair got really thick, and the gray began to multiply. A few months ago it started thinning out, but those silver hairs are tough - they do not fall out. The color makes me feel like I look about 5 years younger, which is pretty nice.

A crawler, a stander, and a sleeper...

Tonight Aurora started crawling on her hands and knees then pulling herself up to standing! She'd already done it perfectly and without any help before I grabbed the camera (of course), but I think this video gives you the gist of it...

I can't believe she'll be crawling around Grandma Nancy's house a week from today. I'm sad that Julia will be working and won't be able to spend much time with Aurora, but I'm pretty excited that we get Zeland all weekend! I have a feeling that A & Z will be best buds.

And speaking of baby Z, I wanted to post a couple sweet pics of Rora in her favorite sleeping position. Julia posted a completely adorable picture of Zeland sleeping earlier in the week on her blog, which inspired me to take these. Sleeping babies are the best.

7-month old sweetie

Yesterday I got a call from daycare and it was Carole saying that she didn’t think Aurora was feeling very well. Rora didn’t want to play and seemed tired but didn’t want to sleep. After picking her up a little early, I decided she must’ve just been worn out from the weekend, or possibly even a little sad that she couldn’t spend the day with us after having such a fun weekend. Rest assured she’s doing fine now – as happy as ever and definitely not sick.

Today Aurora’s 7-months old and she’s growing up too fast! I truly expected that the baby phase would be so hard and seem never ending, but lately I wish I could just freeze her at this age forever. She’s the best and most beautiful little baby I could’ve asked for.

Julian once said that the days go by slow, but the years fly by. I just can’t get enough Aurora time and frankly it seems to me that the days are going by a little too fast…

Not to distract from Santa, but...

Pictures with Santa!

Today we went to the mall with Kim to get pedicures, and Santa was there! The truth is, we weren't planning on a picture with Santa – at least not this early in the season – but I couldn’t resist, and here’s why:

1) Aurora was happy and active, so the timing was right

2) Santa looked really nice – he and the staff seemed happy to be there, which may not be the case a month from now

3) The line was short

4) Aurora was wearing the cutest hoodie! All the other babies in line had frilly dresses and tights and patent leather shoes, but Aurora was just so sweet and comfy. The dad in front of us, who had 2 little girls in fancy outfits, kept calling Aurora a “cute little guy." She IS wearing a pink onesie under the hoodie, plus there's pink on her socks and flowers are embroidered on the jeans. Even the hoodie has a few feminine details, but you can't see any of it in the photo... oh well.

I am starting to rethink the outfits we bought for her Thanksgiving photo shoot with Zeland. I’ve been searching for a nice outfit for her, and figured that if we’re having a special sitting, she should wear a special holiday dress. But I’m wondering if a cute little top and pants won’t be good enough – I mean, we do want her to be comfortable and look like herself, and I’m not sure if that'll be the case if she's wearing fancy clothes. Maybe we’ll just have to do one or two outfit changes to get a good variety... we'll see!