This week Eli started sitting on his own without support! And tonight he surprised me and Ben by pulling himself up to sitting from lying on a pillow on our bed - so he wasn't flat on the ground, but maybe at a 30 degree angle (this picture is not from tonight - here the pillow is propped up pretty high). He's never even attempted that before! We were very impressed. It's funny the things that make you excited when you have a baby - there are so many big and little milestones as they grow. And today I noticed Eli's second bottom tooth is coming through his gums - the first has come up pretty far and you can feel the second, but it's just barely poking out.
This afternoon I was playing with Eli and it was so cute - he was in the type of mood where anything I did made him crack up laughing. I think we were both laughing for about 10 minutes - it reminded me of college when my roommate Emily and I would just laugh and laugh and laugh...
Eli is not one to show off in public though. A lot of times when he is around an unfamiliar person, he gets this blank stare and saggy cheeks, like he has lost all expression. Earlier today I went to a gym to check it out and Eli just stared at the girl giving us the tour. *I recently had my "Eli is 6 months old and I'm still not back in shape" crisis and know I need to do something to change it. I like to think that having a c-section makes it harder, but by now it is no excuse! My biggest concern is leaving Eli in the gym's childcare while I'm exercising (the people who work there are supposed to be great, but I'm still anxious!!) - Let me know if you have any tips to make it easier!
Here is an example of the blank stare:
I do think it will be good for Eli to get used to being with other people, since he is just with me in the majority of the day. He gets excited when Ben comes home from work, which I think is so cute. There is something so special about having a connection with a baby... tonight Ben was feeding Eli his baby oatmeal and squash, and Eli kept looking over at me and laughing - for no real reason, just because he was in a happy mood. I love it!
Here is a picture with my chubby baby from two Sundays ago:
I'm officially a year older today. Yesterday we got a group together and went bowling, which was fun! Here are some pictures of Ben, Davey, and my friend Rebekeh and her cute daughter Marlee bowling:
I realized as we were leaving that I wasn't in any of the pictures inside the bowling alley. And I would have liked to take a picture of our group. Oh well! Here I am with Rebekeh outside of the bowling alley afterward in the freezing cold :)
Two nights before, we went out to dinner at Francesca's with the Christensens (shown below) and went shoe shopping at Pink Frog Shoes in the city. I got some fun boots for my birthday!
Today my actual birthday was pretty low-key. Steve (in the picture above) shared his delicious pork carnitas with adobo sauce - Eli was SO exhausted after church, so we did a trade and at at our own homes rather than eating together - Ben made a good salad and salsa to share with the Christensens, and they shared the carnitas. YUM!
Ben got my favorite ice cream turtle pie from Baskin Robbins, which I have every year. Eli enjoyed staring at the candle flames. And then while we ate ice cream pie, we fed Eli baby oatmeal and peas, which he liked for the most part but it made a huge mess as you can see below. And to drag my birthday out one more day, my friend Rachael is bringing her homemade kettle corn over tomorrow, which I am really excited about!) I'm thankful for fun friends and family to celebrate with. Thanks for all of your sweet phone calls, cards, and emails!
Ben and I have spent every Thanksgiving in our almost 7 years of marriage with my family (my parents, Davey, and Gram). This means I have never had to even think about making a Thanksgiving dinner on my own. Well, this year was a little different.
My Gram went to Italy a few weeks ago to meet up with some friends. Keep in mind that she is 82 years old, but very spry and energetic. However, while they were in a train station in Milan, she tripped on a bolt and broke the neck/top of her femur. Gram had to have surgery (in Milan, where few staff speak English) to have a pin placed in her hip. Since then, she has been at this hospital recovering and having physical therapy. My parents decided a few days after the accident that they needed to fly to Italy and help her, so they used up every airline mile they could muster up and went to Italy, totally last minute. They will all fly home on Nov. 29th. Gram is doing well, working on walking with crutches. She said her Italian surgeon is "dashingly handsome," which cracks me up!
Well all of this meant my parents would be gone for Thanksgiving. I thought about cooking the Thanksgiving meal for about 2 minutes, before deciding it would be way too much work, especially with Eli. So we ended up going with some friends to a very nice Thanksgiving dinner hosted by Kellogg, the business school at Northwestern. As you may know, I am QUITE picky, but I was really impressed with the quality of food. There wasn't too much or too little -we had turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, tasty sweet potatoes with marshmallows, a green bean/bell pepper dish, different types of rolls and croissants, etc. We even had the option for some Indian food - basmati rice and a sweet potato curry - apparently this was on the menu because the Dean is Indian (and there were a lot of Indian business students at the dinner). Then there were lots of desserts to choose from, from an eggless chocolate cake to mini pumpkin pies.
This ended up being the easiest Thanksgiving - we showed up at 1:45, ate dinner and socialized until 4, then came home and relaxed. There was no cost, no cleanup, and no fighting the crowds at the airport or traffic on the highways. Thank you Aaron and Jenn for inviting us!
We had Davey with us last weekend and then again for Thanksgiving through this weekend.
We put a napkin around Eli's neck and he looked like a little bandit!
We gave him a lemon wedge to chew on - he loved it!
The dinner was in the Allen Center, with a nice view of the Lake behind us.
Eli chewed on that toy for a while...
Ben played some football in the snow/wind with temps in the 30s on Thanksgiving morning - he had a great time but I heard the game was pretty rough...
I can't believe Eli is 6 months old today. It's been a fun day for other reasons too - today was Oprah's Favorite Things show (I totally cried while watching it because I was so happy for these people!), and my Aunt Babz sent me beautiful flowers for my birthday coming up this weekend. These were bonuses to the sweet feeling I had interacting with my now 6-month-old little boy today. Here is how our day went (this is a long post, sorry):
7 a.m. - Eli wakes up (so I did too). I think I heard him fussing a little around 6:15, but he went back to sleep. This RARELY happens! Other days this week, he has woken up between 5:45-6:30 a.m. A little too early for my liking. So I was really happy to get him at 7! Plus I didn't feel well last night (probably b/c our condo was 78 degrees inside, totally out of our control... ugh it made me nauseous), so I went to bed at 10:30 p.m. (I never go to bed this early!)
7 a.m.-8:30 a.m. - I feed Eli, give him a bath, and we play for a while. I take a million pictures of him while he plays. He starts getting fussy and rubbing his eyes, so I put him down for a nap around 8:45.
8:45 a.m.-10 a.m. - Eli naps. Then he wakes up a little grumpy and still tired.
10 a.m.-11 a.m. - I shower (Eli typically plays in his bouncy seat in the doorway of the bathroom while I shower). I also make some more birthday invitations for the family I used to nanny for and put those in the mail (someday I'll put the samples of the invitations on my other blog, but no time now).
11 a.m. - It's time to leave for Eli's 6-month drs appointment. He of course decides to poop before we left, so I hurry and change his diaper, then run down the street, through the drizzling rain, to get to the appointment on time.
11:30 a.m. - Eli is finally seen by the doctor, 15 minutes after his scheduled time (the office was pretty busy). Eli is 50% in everything. Except weight - he was 25-50% in weight, which I attribute to the fact that he had a huge poop right before, and hadn't eaten since before his nap. (If I had fed him right before the appointment, he would have been up a few ounces). No big deal though. Eli gets three shots and an oral vaccine... he's happy until the last shot and then totally bursts into tears. I squeeze my eyes shut through the shots and afterward, Eli gives the nurse very sad looks until she leaves the room.
12:00 p.m. - I'm starving - I just ate a grapefruit for breakfast, but now Eli is fussy from getting shots and there isn't an easy way to make myself lunch without him crying. I grab my favorite granola bar (the totally fattening, but yummy sweet and salty peanut bar by nature valley - yum!) and cuddle with Eli in my arms while we watch Oprah's favorite things on the DVR. I never sit and watch tv with him (unless he's nursing and can't see the tv), but he seemed like he needed to be mellow and to be held. It was funny watching the people in the audience jump and down, scream, cry, etc. and watch Eli taking it all in.
1:30 p.m. - Eli is tired again. I put him down for his nap, spend way too much time reading the news, researching the Beco carrier, responding to emails, thinking about how I'm not working on the article that should have been done last week, and then Eli was up again.
3:00 p.m. - Eli and I play with his toys. I got a few phone calls and wasn't super productive... suddenly it was 4:30 and time was slipping away! I needed to get our place clean because I was hosting a baby shower at 7:30 p.m...
5:00 p.m. - I feed Eli baby oatmeal and prunes for dinner. And since it's his half birthday and a special occasion, I give him peaches for dessert. I talk to Ben - he is working late tonight. Great. Now I have to finish getting the house clean, run to the store to get a few last-minute things for the shower, feed Eli one last time and put him to bed, all before 7:30.
6:00-6:40 p.m. - Go grocery shopping. I have Eli strapped on in the bjorn so I of course get a whole range of looks and comments, from - "he's so cute!" to weird stares, like it's totally unusual to carry a baby in that way. I race home, try to avoid the traffic on my street from Northwestern's basketball game, and haul Eli and the groceries up the two flights of stairs. And this was the first time Eli rode in his new convertible car seat, now that he's too chubby for his infant car seat. I think he liked it!
In the end of my craziness, poor Eli was practically begging me to just feed him and put him to bed. Poor little guy! I finally fed him at 7:15 p.m. and finished nursing him as the first people buzzed to come up. He went right to sleep. The shower was lots of fun and our living room is clean. Eli is 6 months old and I just love him to pieces. I'm excited to see what the next 6 months bring!
Here are a few pictures and a video from today:
Flowers from Aunt Babz - thank you!! They are even more beautiful in person.
Eli stayed somewhat entertained for a few minutes (while I was cleaning/getting ready for the shower) sitting in the booster seat, chewing on its straps and playing with one toy that he eventually threw off of the tray.
And below is a video of Eli pushing up - I love when he smiles with his accomplishment! At the end, you'll see a consequence of working so hard... :)
This week Eli started sitting on his own without support! And tonight he surprised me and Ben by pulling himself up to sitting from lying on a pillow on our bed - so he wasn't flat on the ground, but maybe at a 30 degree angle (this picture is not from tonight - here the pillow is propped up pretty high). He's never even attempted that before! We were very impressed. It's funny the things that make you excited when you have a baby - there are so many big and little milestones as they grow. And today I noticed Eli's second bottom tooth is coming through his gums - the first has come up pretty far and you can feel the second, but it's just barely poking out.
Ben played some football in the snow/wind with temps in the 30s on Thanksgiving morning - he had a great time but I heard the game was pretty rough... 
