The Renton Family: Half-Year Birthday!

Time flies when you're having fun. The first 3 months of Caroline's life craaaawled by but man the last 3 have flown by! Good times and lots of exciting firsts! She gets to be more and more fun with every day. I wish when I was in the hospital they had just handed me a 6 month old. This age is great! We have some decent routines down, I pretty much know what she needs when she needs it, and every day she is learning something new. There are still occasional hurdles that get thrown in the mix but we're getting better and better at jumping them and still keeping pace. (Can you tell I've been very much into the Olympics this year??)

going for Gold in the jumperoo

The one word that best describes her at 6 months of age is BUSY. She is a busybody if ever there was one. She's happy and outgoing but has the attention span of a gnat. After about 10 minutes of whatever activity she's engaged in, she's ready for something new. My mom says I was a very content baby, that she could just put me in the playpen and I would occupy myself for hours and maybe even just fall asleep at some point. HA. Not this girl. She is in need of constant stimulii and frequent changes of scenery. Bill and I are both pretty calm-natured....where did this little ball of spastic energy come from?? The funny thing is, we knew even before she was born that she would be a handful. She was ALWAYS bouncing and kicking and bopping around in my belly. That's pretty much how she is now. If she's awake, she's moving and shaking. Diaper changes, outfit changes....forget about it. It's a two-hands and yes, two-feet endeavor to keep her stationary long enough.

all hands (and feet) on deck for diaper duty

Her adventures in eating have been pretty entertaining. What she likes: pears. What she will somewhat tolerate: peas, squash. On the gagging/dislike list: rice cereal, sweet potatoes, carrots, prunes, avocados, strawberries. One thing she really enjoys though is the mesh teether toy that you can put food in and she can gnaw away at. We'll put a piece of banana in there and she will happily gum away at it for a whole 10 minutes!

nom nom nom....

She's still working on sitting up, hasn't fully mastered that yet. She can pull herself into a sitting position and sit by herself with some assistance but not completely on her own yet. She particularly likes to practice this skill when she wakes up in her crib. It's so funny to turn on the baby monitor and see her sitting up staring directly at the camera.

Look at me! So proud of myself!

Hello? Anybody out there?

And the latest chapter in the sleep chronicles has been 'I Don't Want To Go To Bed at Bedtime.' She'll go down for her naps during the day just fine, but come 7:00 she is NOT interested in going to sleep. The problem here is not that she cries (she'll fuss and complain but doesn't usually cry), it's that she will flop around so much that it makes her throw up. Then we have to go back in, turn the lights on, change the crib sheet, and start all over. Last night we played this game for two hours and finally had to resort to the old drive-around-in-the-car-till-the-kid-falls-asleep trick.

hey kid....why won't you go to sleep??

She still looooves bathtime and has discovered the art of splashing. I let her take two baths per day....one just for fun and splashing in the morning and one 'real' bath for actual cleaning purposes in the evening. She would happily spend all her waking hours in the tub if I let her.

And last but not least, a little lagniappe of photos from the last month!