Calling all family and all cooks!

Sorry, no new pictures to post this week, we have been a little busy and I haven't taken any this week. I did have two favors I wanted to ask of you. Firstly, family, I have one of those ribbon bulletin boards in Abby's room and I want to put pictures of family on there for Abby to see so she can know who family are. I have Eric and Lauren's Christmas picture from last year and I have pictures of Grandma and Grandpa Butz. I'll have to look through our pictures, I may have others but if anyone has a picture you would like to send me, that would be great. You can e-mail it to caldschick@hotmail.com (yes, I know, my e-mail address is kind of lame but I have had it for 10 years and am too lazy to change it now) and I will print it out. Also, for all of you cooks out there, I am trying to compile healthy holiday recipes. My goal this year is to make an Abby friendly Thanksgiving so we will be ready for next year. I have a few ideas but I am struggling with desserts. I also want to get ideas for other holidays as well as regular every day meals. We can be a little flexible. She can have a total of 30% of her calories from fat in a day. That means if she were to have something that was 100 calories (I know, hardly anything would have 100 calories but this is just an example :) and 40 of them were from fat and then have something else that was 100 calories and 20 were from fat then that would equal 30% total so we have a little lee way but not much. We just have to make sure it all balances out (time to refresh my math skills). Also, little tid bit of information when you are trying to figure out fat calories and it only lists the fat in grams. 1 gram of fat is 9 calories. It is pretty sad that I probably learned that in every single class I had in my major and I still had to go look it up the other day. I really do think my IQ is dropping daily but I still know what DABDA means (the stages of grief). At least I am retaining some of my education. Sorry, strayed from the subject for a moment. If you have recipes, you can also e-mail them to me. Thanks everyone for your help!!

My first bowl of rice cereal (as told by Abby)

Mom, Help! I'm feeling a little lost in here!
That's better!

I don't know about this weird goopy stuff mom keeps shoving in my mouth but I really like this pretty pink spoon!

All done! I think I fooled mom! She thinks I ate some of the food but it is really all over my face and clothes!

THE END!!

Abby likes Dresses and Puppies!

What a cutie Abby is in this dress she wore last Sunday!

Last weekend we were watching our friends' dog while they were out of town. Abby was so enthralled, I think this is the first time she had seen a dog up close!

She just kept staring at Lexi, she even petted her once. Well, it was more of a case Abby stuck her hand out as Lexi walked by and Abby's hand ran down Lexi's back. I really wish I had my camera close by for that one!

Cherish the moments!

So today I had tons of stuff planned to do. It is now almost noon, I have gotten hardly any of it done and my sweet baby is sleeping away on my lap. I tried several times to move her but she is only happy sleeping here. Then it struck me how in just a few short months she will probably be too big to sleep on my lap and how much I will miss it. It is so easy to get caught up in the day to day busyness and pass up these sweet moments. Okay, okay I know I am starting to sound really cheesy but I have been thinking about this a lot lately. In the first few weeks of Abby's life, I used to wish that I could fast forward to the future and see that Abby was living a wonderful life despite MCAD. It made me think of that movie "Click". I know, bad movie but it had a great message. How could I miss all of these days that will never happen again? On Sunday Jason and I were talking about how nice it will be when we can lay Abby down with us and all take a family nap (Sunday nap time is pretty much non existent right now) but how when she does get bigger we will probably miss when we could just hold her. I already miss when she would lay her head on shoulder and just relax, now she has her head up and wants to look around. It gets hard at times to balance keeping a clean, orderly house and enjoying your child. Those of you who know me know that I cannot stand messiness and it is extremely hard for me to relax if there is still chores to be done. I've realized though that I need to relax a bit, the chores will never be completely done and I cannot rewind time and enjoy these moments again. So, some chores will have to wait for tomorrow while I let my baby continue sleeping soundly on my lap.

P.S. Abby is starting to get better, her fever is pretty much gone but she still has a stuffy nose and wakes up several times at night. Thank you all for your prayers!

Sick : (

So today Abby is 6 months old and the poor little munchkin is sick. I have to say that I have been dreading this day ever since we got her diagnosis but knew it would happen eventually. It isn't too bad yet, she has a little cold. Her nose has been stuffy, she has a cough and a low grade fever. The poor kid has been having trouble sleeping at night. I usually wake up after 4 hours for the first night feeding and 3 hours for the second. Saturday night she woke up twice before the 4 hour mark. Needless to say we are feeling even more sleep deprived than normal at our house. The good news is that so far we can manage everything at home. This morning I called the geneticist because her temperature was 100.4. When she was a newborn we had to take her to ER for a temp that high but they said now just to give her tylenol, make sure it doesn't get higher and make sure she keeps eating. Please keep her in your prayers that she doesn't get worse and need a hospital stay. Thank you!