Could Mary be any cuter?!?!?

Mary Achieves an Eating Milestone

Getting Mary to successfully swallow her solid foods was not as easy as I expected it to be. Last Friday, after 3 weeks of trying, I spoke with Mary's speech therapist and she gave us a Nuk Brush.We place it on the tip of her tongue and then roll it back. This forces her tongue into the motion necessary for swallowing food. I've used it only a couple of times a day since then (the goal was 4x a day), but finally today, it worked!

Mary ate an entire jar of carrots! She barely spit any out. I am so proud of her for learning so quickly how to move the food to the back of her mouth. It makes meal time much less stressful!

For those of you who care... here is some video of her not only eating the carrots, but actually opening her mouth and leaning into the spoon to get some more. This is the first time she has done that. In the past, I had to trick her into opening her mouth so I could get the food in. :)

The "Bee" Happy Sisters

If we've talked little girl clothes recently, you know that I have more clothes for both girls than I know what to do with. It makes laundry both easy and hard. Easy because I don't have to do it but once every three weeks or so. Hard because then I have three weeks worth of laundry to fold and put away! Ugh!

Despite this, I really love dressing the girls in matching or coordinating outfits. Recently, I wanted to get some pictures of them wearing new "Bee Happy" shirts I found at Target. It went well, but then it didn't. Judge for yourself.

 Charlotte trying to get Mary to smile..

 

Giveaway: Yoplait Smoothie Prize Pack

In what seems like a long time ago, I used to drink a smoothie for breakfast every morning. I found it was an easy way to get in extra fruits and protein. And it was quick, all the ingredients could be arranged the night before and I just had to blend and drink. I fell out of that habit when I began staying home with Charlotte, but really miss it. I was thinking about busting out my old Magic Bullet again and I was recently given a chance to try a new frozen product called Yoplait Smoothie. I used the coupon I received to buy the strawberry-banana flavor and it blended up super yummy! (They also sent me a free personal beverage blender, so goodbye Magic Bullet!)

According to MyBlogSpark (the giveaway sponsor), Yoplait Smoothies are " a healthy way to fit essential nutrients into your diet. The antioxidant-rich fruit in Yoplait smoothies can be a great way to help you get all the important vitamins and minerals your body needs."

They also told me that "seven out of 10 Americans do not consume the daily recommended amount of fruit. Every Yoplait Smoothie contains a full serving of fruit as well as real Yoplait yogurt pieces with live and active cultures. Yoplait Smoothies are a good source of calcium when prepared with milk according to directions, and an excellent source of antioxidant vitamin C."

All I had to do to make my smoothie was add it, plus some milk (skim for me please!), into the blender. It took me about two minutes to get the consistency I wanted. If you want to try it, here is a link to a $1.25 off  Yoilait Smoothie coupon that you should be able to print twice.

How to Enter: There are four ways to enter and you can do any of them you like, for up to four entries:

1. Leave a comment telling me what flavor of smoothie you like best.
2. Subscribe to my RSS feed, and leave a 2nd comment telling me you did so, or already are subscribed,
3. Link to my giveaway on your own blog, leaving another comment with the permalink to you post, or
4. Share this giveaway on Twitter and leave a 4th comment letting me know you did (copy & paste this suggested text: Win a Yoplait Smoothie Gift Pack from @FamilyMusings http://bit.ly/bcGBLv)
   

That's it. 4 ways to win and 1 lucky winner. This giveaway will end Wednesday, March 17th at midnight. Read all contest rules here.

This giveaway was sponsored by MyBlogSpark and Yoplait.

"We Got Annie!"

For many months now, Charlotte's favorite movie has been Annie. More days than not, she will wake up from her nap and ask to watch Annie and eat microwave popcorn. I am happy to oblige her because well, the movie isn't annoying at all, and I really like kettle corn flavored popcorn!

This past week, the local community theater put on a production of Annie and even though the show didn't start until 7:30 pm, I decided Charlotte and I would go. I did tell her about it a couple of days ahead of time so the excitement would build and it worked. As we were getting dressed, she started singing, "You're never fully dressed without a smile." This is now my favorite Annie song!

A friend from MOPs, Bethany, joined us along with her two oldest children. Charlotte goes to dance class with the daughter and was excited that she would be watching the stage with us.

Throughout the show, Charlotte didn't do a good job of sitting still. Part of that was the view. Part was that she doesn't way enough to keep the theater seat from folding her in. Part was that she was past her bed time. Part was that she was excited and wanted to dance along with the "Annie's friends," the other orphans.

At one point, as the intermission was ending, Charlotte stepped into the aisle to enjoy orchestra medley of Annie songs and she was totally immersed in what she was doing. I think she did notice the surrounding attention a little, but she just really seemed to enjoy swaying and raising her arms to the music.

The true highlight of the night for Charlotte though, was getting to meet Annie and Sandy after the show was over. You can see in this picture that she appears a little star struck - so unusual for her!

Really, Really Tired

Charlotte has not been feeling well lately. Two weeks ago she came down with a cold (we all did) and none of us have quite shaken it. Then sometime last week, she got a sore in her mouth. I assumed she had bit her tongue and it just was having a hard time healing, as mouth sores often do. It only seemed to bother her when she ate.

To add to that, on Tuesday, when I picked her up from MOPs, they told me she was complaining her ear hurt. I noted it and decided to watch it for a couple of days because she has only ever had one ear infection. Ever. However, she had other plans. By the time we got to the car, she had stopped twice and made a yelpy, crying noise and held her hand over the ear. I decided in that instant to take her to the doctor. We went straight there and the doctor saw us right away. (Side note: I LOVE our pediatrician, Dr. Cynthia Enlow!!!)

While Dr. Enlow checked her out, she saw 5-6 sores in her mouth (which I didn't know about) and then looked at her hands and legs and saw a few sores there too. Turns out, Miss Moon has hand, foot, and mouth disease! The worst part is that it hurts for her to eat and drink. So far, we've been able to keep her hydrated, but listening to her tell us how hungry she is and then not want to eat anything is so hard.

Needless to say, her sleep has been affected too. This is how I found her during lunch today:

You Know Your Baby Is Tired When...

She falls asleep in the changing table!

Mary's Tries Solid Food

Last Friday, one week before Mary turned 6 months old, she tried her first taste of rice cereal. Our speech therapist, Nikki, had the honors while I looked on with my camera. The whole time Mary seeemed unsure of it, but did get a couple of good swallows in. We've had it a few more times at home and she seems to enjoy it more. I even caught her anticipating the spoon's arrival in her mouth and opening wide for it!

I think she is kind of smiling at me in this one!

A New Babywearing Wrap

A couple of weeks ago I swapped my mei tai wrap for a maya wrap. To practice wearing my new maya wrap, I asked Charlotte to help. She snuggled right in and seemed really happy to be worn again. It has been a long time since I last wore Charlotte.

Once she was done being worn though, Charlotte wanted to try it out. I didn't go for anything fancy since I had 5 yards of fabric to deal with on her 25 pound body...

I swear I didn't ask her to pose for this picture... it is just a natural outpouring of her love for "Baby Doll."

Portraits of Love

Valentine's weekend I took the girls to Hollis Gardens for a mini photo session with local photographer Emily Magdics. She sent me a cd with all of the images she shot and after going through nearly 150 photos (for just a 15-minute session!), these are my favorites. Not all have been photoshopped, but I think you can see she did a great job. Which ones do you like best? I am thinking it is time to redo my blog design and was thinking of using some of these in my new header.