10 Months! (May 24)

YES!! I’m almost a month late posting this update, like I have been with the last several month updates!  Oops…!  The real point is, I’m somewhat keeping up with them- that’s what really counts!

These months continue to be some of my favorite!  Annabelle Grace is a big bundle of energy that goes NON-STOP and I LOVE it!  Reality is setting in though, that in no time at all we will have a “toddler” on our hands!  Our baby will be considered a TODDLER!  this first year of her life with us is flying by faster than I could have imagined it going, so even if these monthly updates are late, I will continue to write them!  I don’t want to forget a second of this time!  This particular month has been full of so many “firsts” for Annabelle Grace!!

She got her first bottom tooth at 8 months and 22 days, her second bottom tooth arrived this month at 9 months, 2 days!  She has handled teething like a champ so far!  We’ve been fortunate to not have wake ups due to teething yet.  Annabelle Grace remains a sleeping champion, just like her Daddy.  (For that we are thankful!)

This month Annabelle Grace had her first trip to the North Carolina coast!  She did GREAT on the car ride!  (We choose to drive through the night on long trips like this so that she will sleep and maintain her normal schedule when we arrive.  This makes for a long night/day for us, BUT, we would MUCH rather be the tired ones than have a tired, cranky baby.  So far this form of traveling with a baby has worked great for us!)

We do lose an hour driving to NC, and the trip did take us 18-18.5 hours.  We leave a little before dinner, eat dinner on the road, and even though Annabelle Grace pretty much goes to sleep after dinner, we still stopped about every four hours just to get her out so that her spine wouldn’t stay in the curved position of her seat too long.  She would wake just  a little, but once we put her back in her seat, she would go right back to sleep- the darkness helped a lot.  We also stopped and all had breakfast at our normal time as well, and Annabelle Grace remained awake for the last few hours of the trip!

We visited with my family.

We took Annabelle Grace to the beach for the first time!  The first day on the beach she did fine in the water and sand, never cried, screamed or anything, however- she was also ready for a nap, so she was kind of just out of it!

She ended up with a pretty great beach nap!

She had her first ever sink bath this month… and she kept trying to climb out!

The week had more family time, and we even got to see my friend Seama again!

We had another day on the beach!  Annabelle Grace was a little more awake this time, so she enjoyed swinging through the air and touching the sand with her fingers!

We let Annabelle Grace try ice cream for the first time this month!

We had some delicious meals!  I’m pretty sure Annabelle Grace’s favorite part was getting the fluffiest pancakes ever every morning with some really great scrambled eggs!  She gets both at home, but eggs are like every three days, and pancakes are once a week! She also seemed to be a big fan of the shrimp, and demanded a bite of my burger when we took her to Provision and Co. in Southport- one of our favorite places!

We had our best beach day on Wednesday!  Annabelle had a great beach nap in her stroller and when she woke up we got her in the water!  She LOVED it.  Her face does look a little confused in it, but I promise there were lots of smiles and giggles.  She loved floating around, and being splashed in the water.  She had no fear of wanting to crawl in the sand and had the best time having her snack on the beach.  We couldn’t have asked for better weather and the tide had made a perfect little tide pool that made it easier to let her float around some.

We made a quick stop by The Christmas House in Southport to get our new family Christmas ornaments and took a quick stop to see my grandparents on the way back to Arkansas.

We didn’t make it back home until 5:30am- and pretty much started the day immediately!  (Annabelle Grace slept perfectly in the car on the way home, so she was fine all day!  Will and I were completely exhausted! We did drive through a lot of very heavy rain on the way home too, so that made the drive even more exhausting.)

As I mentioned before, this month continued to be full of first experiences for Annabelle Grace!  We took a day to visit the zoo, and show her REAL penguins (since she loves her Penny Penguin so much!)  We also decided to become members because it was only $70 for a year long membership for the three of us, including free parking, and lots of discounts for the next year, and our current admission went towards the $70.  It’s truly a wonderful zoo!  The day obviously started with lunch for all!

We saw lions, ducks, elephants, monkeys, panda bears, and of course the penguins! (We saw lots of other animals too, but Annabelle Grace needed her afternoon nap during some of them!)

While at the Zoo, we also realized the had camel rides!  Will most certainly asked with we could let Annabelle Grace ride, so she and I did- a first for both of us!  She loved it!

We ended the day with Bruster’s Ice Cream!  I worked for two Bruster’s Real Ice Cream locations in North Carolina for years- actually until right before moving to Arkansas!  This was special for me to share with our daughter!

Another first this month was taking Annabelle Grace on her first boat ride, June 3rd!

We had some great family time with Will’s grandparents!

Obviously we have been swinging and eating more cheese quesadillas…

We all three went to Stone Pony in Mississippi to celebrate our four year wedding anniversary!  Stone Pony is where Will and I had our first date!  This was also the first time Annabelle Grace had ever had pizza- she had cheese pizza!

Will got to celebrate his first Father’s Day!  I wrote all about him being such an awesome Dad earlier this month.  For Father’s Day his one request was to try watching a Disney movie with Annabelle Grace.  We NEVER have the TV on in our house.  The only time she has really seen it is if it happens to be on in a restaurant or at someone else’s house.  At first it seemed like she may enjoy it, but she quickly decided she would rather climb and play and try to catapult off of the bed!

We ended the month getting to see Will’s brother’s family and his parents for a couple of days- fun quick trip!

Turning 10 months old was a lot of fun over here at Cashion Plantation.  Annabelle Grace is lively, happy, still sleeping through the night, eating well, and just so much fun to be around!

As for me- I am still doing really well!  We are barely sliding through nursing this month.  Annabelle Grace only nurses a handful of times a day, and only for a few minutes a time. We have gotten her used to using her weighted straw cups and 360 cups which has been great- however, I struggle to be able to pump enough.  She will not touch formula, so we are squeaking by with what I pump and nurse, and what I have in the freezer!

Life is good!