Teeth brings lots of talking

Niah's bottome 2 teeth came in while we were on vacation but now her top 2 teeth are coming in. She looks so cute with her little teeth.
Here is a picture with her teeth... You have no idea how long it took me to get a pic of them


Not only is Niah getting teeth but she is talking up a storm. She says hi, bye, dada, mama, whoa, huh,oww and a whole lot of other consonant sounds. Niah learned whoa because we would say it and she would mimmick and now she says it all the time like when she did something she thinks is cool or when she falls down. She tries to mimmick not only sounds but words a few words she will mimmick is oww, rubber ducky, and ohh. You never know what word she will choose to mimmick but when she does it is so funny and absolutely cute.

Niah is pulling up on furniture and just started walking from one piece of furniture to the next. She will walk around furniture so she has became quite the cruiser. I have quit buying toys because she will not play with them. Her favorite "toys" are mommy's kitchen gadgets. Niah has drawer she pulls out and plays with and so mommy puts different kitchen things on it such as mixing cups, mixing spoons, bowls, and she loves it!!
Here is Niah playing in her cabinet


Everyday she is doing new things and it is such a joy to watch her grow and develop and be apart of that.

My first failure as a mother: sleeping

Sleeping sells more baby books than any other topic (I looked it up) and I can tell you why. Sleeping determines everything for your child, if you will have a happy child, or a sad grouchy child, a child able to have a fun day, or a bad day, what errands you can run with your child, or what activities you can do with your child. Studies show a well rested child performs better academically. Everyone has a technique on how to put your child to sleep and how to keep them to sleep, and everyone is an expert.
As Niah's mom, I feel like I have made my first of many failures, I am sure. Lets face it every parent fails their child thousands of times in their lifetime. Niah was a wonderful sleeper up until the holidays with traveling and activities I became more relaxed. She had started going to sleep on her own with little to no crying at about 4 months and did so till november. Then we went on a trip in November and had a new surroundings and new people which puts Niah on overload, I felt bad for her and would rock and nurse her to sleep. She was not going to bed at her normal time and stayed exhausted she was waking in the night, so again I would rock or nurse her to sleep. This would have been fine but it continued because she liked it and protested going to sleep any other way. In fact even now when she wakes up she sobs and cries so hard until she gets in my arms, if someone else goes to get her (even Matthew) she cries harder until she sees me and gets in my arms. Then at Christmas we went on another trip and the habit got worse and more night wakings. She was till an excellent napper taking two, two hour naps but again lost the ability to go to sleep on her own.
After vacation which she did fairly well on and I had finished my research on the importance of sleep, I decided that I was hurting her rather than helping her without making her have good sleep habits. The process has began again on making healthy sleep habits. My favorite book on sleep is "Healthy sleep habits, happy child" and he says, "You do not stop changing your child's diaper because they cry and sleep is the same way." So my approach now is that this is the best for my child and I hate that it is harder on her now because she is older and more aware than when I originally trained her and there was no tears. There have been a few more tears but it is working.
Niah has been sleeping through the night not waking up till after 7 for over a week now. She may wake up in the night and I see her on the moniter adjust and move to a new sleeping position and goes right back to sleep!! Niah has a 7 to 7:30 bedtime(with the exception of wed. at 8), a 9:30 am nap sleeps till noon or 12:30, and an afternoon nap of 2 or 2:30. I have to tell myself when she fights sleep, I do not want a child that can not sleep as a teenager or adult because I failed to teach her to self soothe as a baby. I am so proud of my little one for learning to self soothe.

Niah's first Vacation

Niah went on her first family vacation and she loves vacation and warm weather as much as I do. This vacation was alot of firsts for Niah, first time out of the country (first stamp in passport), first time to the ocean, first time to play in sand. Among those first were her first teeth... thats right teeth, before now Niah has had no teeth to come through and on the 2nd or 3rd day she bit my finger like always and a sharp thing was in her mouth. By the end of the trip you could see not one but TWO teeth coming through.
Niah loved the sand and the water from the ocean. She loved playing with Kyah!! Niah gets so excited when she sees Kyah, it is so cute.
Here is Niah and Kyah at the ocean


Niah loved the pool and floating around in the pool.


Niah perfected the pulling up and tries it with everything including Kyah's head and that is more of pushing down on Kyah's head to stand up. Don't worry Kyah pushes her off. She also tries to walk now... They grow up way to fast. Here is Niah trying to stand and walk but can't stand on her own so she just tries to walk with her hands. This how she crawled all morning and was frustrated she could not stand all the way

This is where Niah took one of her naps every day :-)

Our family!!


We loved vacation and Niah had a blast.... Can't wait for the next one but for now it is good to be HOME!!

Busy Body

Our little girl is growing up WAY TOO FAST!! She has been crawling for several weeks and can get into anything and everything she wants. Shelves, cabinets, drawers are no longer out of reach for her :-) I now have every bottom shelf, drawer, cabinet, or anything reachable is now kid friendly.... All things she can pull out and play with. She loves pulling things out of my drawers, pantry and baskets!! Which means there is absolutely nothing on my floor and it is swept daily!! If there is one crumb or leaf or anything she will find it!!

Just today she has learned to pull up and stand on her own. She has been trying for awhile and today she accomplished it. When I saw her pull up to a standing position, I was both excited and scared. Excited she did it and scared she was going to fall!! Our little girl has no concept of gravity, falling, or the fact that when she is 5 feet off the ground she can't just crawl off.

here are pics of her today





Niah is getting ready to leave for her family vacation. But for now mommy has to leave because she is getting into her suitcase and rearranging :-)

Crawling!!

Our baby is CRAWLING all over the place. Niah gets up and goes and is into everything :-) Her curious mind takes her to doors, drawers, and cabinets. She loves to get into anything and pull stuff out, right now it is the cutest thing. Probably 3 months from now I will not think so. She is also sitting up from lying down. !!

Not only is Niah doing all of these things for a couple weeks but yesterday she figured out that she can sit up and crawl her in crib. I lay her down she crawls to the head of the bed and sits up and looks straight in the camera and smiles, like she knows. Bedtime has now gone to me constantly going into her room and laying her down. I am hoping with much persistance she will get it. The books, magazines, and good left out all kinds of important things like what to do when your baby HATES her carseat, when she sits up in her crib, when she does not want to pick up food with her hand but will eat it out of spoon, or when she does not like food at all! I guess I can tell those things :-)

We have been very busy the last few weeks but next weekend I am hoping that it will be a quiet weekend at home doing little jobs around the house and cleaning. Matthew has been on all kinds of projects for everyone else and I told him it was my turn next week :-) Good news is he was more than willingly agreed. I have a few pinterest ideas, this being one of them
Then after next weekend is VACATION!! Hot, bright sun, sandy beaches, and yummy food. What more could a girl ask for

Christmas and New Years

Our family has had an extremely busy December. It seems that the month went by way too fast and very soon I will have to sadly take down our christmas decorations.

Matthew and I truly enjoyed celebrating with Niah on her first Christmas. She started to get the hang of the opening presents and even got excited when she saw inside! Niah got puffs in her stocking and has tried them for the first time. She loves puffs but is still working on trying to get them in her mouth. She has a hard time releasing them, she wants to suck on it from her hand.
Here is a picture of Niah and Kyah opening presents

Here is Kyah and Niah playing with their toys



Niah brought in the new year with her best friend and cousin, Kyah. Niah gets so excited and loves to play with Kyah, it is adorable. I learned it takes a very planned woman to have twins as I was watching Kyah New Year's Eve. Niah did not like to see her mommy putting another baby to sleep either. Thankfully, both girls are great babies and the night was relatively smooth!
Here are the girls on New Years


Niah has been a busy girl this last month and has accomplished plenty. Niah now gets up on all fours on a regular basis, but does not crawl YET. She can now sit up from a laying down position. Niah thinks she can walk on her own but she is not quite there yet. She will push your hands off of you while standing up. She is also starting to pull up on the furniture to stand. She is liking food more and more. We can now eat our serving in 15 mins instead of 30 or 40 min. Our little girl is growing.... WAY too fast :-)

No more sleeping through the night

Niah starting sleeping through the night at 3 weeks old. She would go to bed at 10 pm and not wake up till after 9 am. She did this till she was around 6 months and then all of sudden when she woke up there was no more going back to sleep on her own. There was also less sleep for me. We have been working on different ways to go back to sleep on our own. Usually, I just need to go in her room and rub her belly till she goes to sleep, no problem. It is really cute (maybe not at 4 am but the next day thinking about it) Niah wakes up crying and as soon as she sees us she smiles, ear to ear. Research tells me the problem when a child grasp object permanence it is common to wake up in the night and miss there parents and know they are not there. I guess I will have a few disturbed nights sleep till she understands and realize that we are there in the house.

Niah tried avocados. It took at least 4 times before she ate a full serving but now she likes them, I think :-) We moved on to green beans, she makes very funny faces but does eat all of them. Next we will try carrots. We are working on eating twice a day 1 oz of cereal in the morning for the iron, 2 oz of veggies in the evening. She does not always want to eat 2 times a day but I figure let her eat what she will and just try at both meal times. Eventually she will get use to eating 2 meals and then we can progress from there.

Niah is very mobile now! She scoots and rolls across the living room. I look up and she is in the living room, then in the kitchen, on one side of the room, and then the next! I love watching her try to get her legs under her to actually crawl.

Niah helped me wrap presents tonight, her favorite christmas activity so far. I let her unroll the paper and play with the extra cut off paper. She sat next to me laughing and playing the whole time.