Welcome to my Dojo: 6 Months and Road Trippin

[cousin Chelsea.... you asked for details, you get details :)]

06/21/11 we had your 6 month appointment.
You are not a fan of needles. You cried so hard you did that broken breathing-in-gasping-for-breath thing and had big crocodile tears and it made us so sad. You would stop crying for a second and then it was like you would suddenly realize you were still upset and scream out, and that kind of made us laugh (we both felt bad for laughing at you and were trying to hold it in).

15lb 7 1/2oz (30%)
27 1/2inch (90%)

You will sit for brief periods of time on your own before toppling over. You always fall over as if you know we are going to be there to catch you. Oh, and you have some flexibility that could rival any gymnast.
You usually immediately roll from your tummy to your back, but are content to chill there only occassionally rolling from back to tummy and never more then one roll at a time.

In your fifth to sixth month we will have spent 3 solo weeks together because McDaddy was traveling for work.

You got a sweet baby cousin, Teagan, birthed by an incredibly strong momma.

You still haven't tried any baby food, but you have noshed on lots of foods (steamed carrots and brocolli, avocado, chicken, watermelon, apple, baked squash, banana, black beans, turkey, tilapia, zucchini, papaya, mango, raw milk goat cheese ) and are getting better and better at bringing things to your mouth, biting off a piece and smooshing it with your gums....and you are swallowing more and more, as evidenced by your diaper contents. You seem to enjoy experimenting and as long as you aren't relying on food to fill your tummy or provide you nutrients I will continue to let you "learn" how to eat real whole foods.

I had such a wacked out view of food growing up. Food was so powerful. My mom tried so hard to give me the most healthy foods, so hard that I spent a large amount of my time and energy trying to get all the foods I wasn't allowed to have. I stole snacks (from other kids lunches in kindergarten) and milk from the lunch line. I tried to invite myself over to friends houses for meals all the time. I bought candy whenever I could and hid it in my closet. I missed countless birthday parties because I refused to eat my shaklee soup. When I was finally able to make my own choices about food they were terrible, and I would gorge myself on junk like I was never going to have access to it again. Food was a never ending battle in my home. I want so badly to not allow food to gain that power in CB's life. I want to try to avoid using it as a bribe, incentive, or reward. I want her to have good foods and make healthy choices and I want her to enjoy eating, but I don't want to deprive her or make certain foods so powerful that she seeks them out. I don't want her to have the mentality I do..."it's ok if I have to study all day because I am going to reward myself with a frappuccino." I don't want food to numb pain or provide comfort. I'm only praying I can be successful in doing this.

Looking back.....

I was thinking about how Charlie Belle has been a travel-baby extraordinaire.
Her first road trip she was a mere 4 weeks old. Aunty Audrey had flown in from Washington DC to meet CB. We decided to adventure to Jacksonville to see some of Audrey's family (which for all intents and purposes, is really our family too). The flower girls in my wedding (Anna and Sarah) were awesome snugglers and we spent our first night away from McDaddy (Audrey was a good daddy stand-in). CB attended her first pot-luck and had her first walk on the beach. Looking back at pictures I can remember what an awesome anywhere, anynoise, anytime sleeper she was, since she is no longer. There are pictures of her in the middle of all the action curled up on the boppy lounger snoring away. I think her sleep setting neediness changed around 3 months (when she started sleeping through the night) and she started to prefer (or demand) a more quite and darker place to take a nice siesta. That night in Jacksonville was a little rough, seeing as I had kicked the grunting baby into her own room at 3 weeks old and we had to share a room for the night, it was a less then restful nights sleep (and for a blissful week I had only been waking up once between 11pm and 7am for her to eat).

Anyhow, the adventure of the story resides in the ride home. Since I birthed CB I think of everything in "windows." A window of time to get from here to there, to run errands or what not, basically the time between eating and sleeping or sleeping and eating again. Charlotte was a good car sleeper at that point and I fed her and we jumped in the car knowing that if we went straight home she would be right at the 3 hour point and ready to eat again. She was sleeping peacefully and then we hit dead stop traffic within eyesight of Lee Road off I4 because of an overturned semi. It was pouring the rain and people were getting all kinds of cranky trying to pull over onto the muddy grass to crawl up to the exit (which doesn't work when a million people are doing it). At this point we know the gas light has been on for a while and we are a little concerned we won't have enough gas to make it to the next exit when traffic starts moving again. CB started letting us know she was getting hungry, and we started to think we were going to have to pull over so I could crawl in the backseat and feed her. Making our way over was not easy, Audrey got all kinds of Papa Bearish on people and was pointing to the back seat yelling "hungry baby," trying to get people to let us over (it was awesome). Fast forward baby is fed and all buckled back in and Audrey goes to start the car and nothing. Still it's pouring the rain, still dead stopped on I4. I called McDaddy and he had me get out of the car to wiggle some battery thing-a-ma-jigs, I was thinking maybe we ran out of gas but the car was making a funny noise. It was pouring and I was standing in water talking on the phone and Steve tells me to touch plastic not battery so I don't electrocute myself or something and then I say "ok, I'm scared but I'm going to do it" and then I scream bloody murder and drop the phone. McDaddy presumed he just got me electrocuted but I realized I had ants crawling all over my pants and shoes. I danced all around, pulled my shoes off, patted my pants down and jumped in the car. Still squashing rogue ants, I told McDaddy I was fine. We then decided to call for a more expert opinion (sorry, McDaddy) and got some advice to get the car jumped by Audrey's brother (an almost Mechanic). People were trying so hard not to make eye contact (which is hard to do when traffic isnt moving) with Audrey as she was obviously vying for some help. Finally a man in a truck pulled over and jumped the car and much to our relief it started. Somehow the situation sounds stressful, but we really laughed through most of it. I guess every adventure seems a little dull, and a little less worthy of tears, after the crazy way CB came into the world. The sad part is my brown converses were left as a sacrifice to the ants.

Since then Charlie Belle has been to...

Melbourne Beach with Bello (6 weeks old), where she proved she could sleep on her belly on the sand.