Shoshana at 6 months

I have to admit, I'm feeling pretty uninspired to write. It is so tempting just to put up a set of photos and call it good, but I know I will regret not having written anything when I look back on this later.

So, I will keep the notes on Shosh at 6 months brief (and hopefully I won't kick myself later for not adding in more details). Shosh turned 6 months on 1/13/14.

She is a big fan of making the "bbbbbb" sound.

She has discovered how to YELL. And she does it. Often. Just for fun. It is noticeably different than when she is upset and crying. It is pretty funny... see also: loud.

I guess she was really into sounds this month, because my third note I made was she makes the "bwa-bwa-bwa" sound on repeat.

She went through a not so fun phase of waking up before 7am.

She must have gained some core strength/balance because this month she was able to sit for longer periods of time.

Shoshana became interested in toys.

Shosh also became very interested in grabbing. She grabs all the things: hair, mouth, face, clothing, her feet...

Apparently she gained a sense of humor this month because she started giggling at everything. She finds Judah to be especially hilarious. I feel like she is easier to get to giggle than Judah was as a baby. Bill was always good at getting Judah to giggle, but I had a tougher time, with Shosh it is musch easier. Maybe we have just improved our comedic timing for babies.

Shoshi started wearing her 9 months clothes.

We started having a dedicated book reading time before bed (Goodnight Moon). She gets lots of random book time when we read with Judah throughout the day, but now we are working on incorporating reading into her bedtime routine. She is trying to incorporate book eating.

Shosh had her very first real bath this month, with Judah no less! It took 6 months, but our baby has now officially been in water and cleaned with soap. She still gets coconut oiled after bath time though.

When on her stomach she can fully extend her arms to push herself up, like cobra pose. Her butt is still down though. We still have awhile until she will be crawling (phew!).

We wait until Shosh was 6 months to introduce food. We follow baby led weaning, so no mushy baby food for her. The evening of the 13th we gave her avocado slices to try. She was pretty unimpressed with them. She preferred just sucking on her fingers. When she actually managed to get the avocado in her mouth she looked utterly disgusted and spat it back out. Silly baby.

*the black and white images should not have a color cast to them. Something about blogger's import formula messed them up (and made me sad/frustrated). I've been trying to fix them, but I can't seem to figure it out. I guess you just have to trust me when I say that the normal version isn't freaking sepia toned or blue toned. True black and white all the way!!*

------UPDATE-----

I figured out the issue with the images. It has to do with blogger being linked to gmail... which links to google+. Even though I never made an actual google+ profile for the email address linked with this account, google did. And in that profile they automatically selected "auto enhance" to all images uploaded onto blogger. Awesome. Except,  NOT AT ALL. To fix it I had to create a google+ profile and go in and turn off auto enhance under the settings. Ridiculous. 

Snow

I have a couple of posts that should come before this one (Shosh at 6 months, and one on Gert), but I don't have the photos prepped for them yet. Instead, let me tell you about this one time that it snowed. I'm sure you had noooo idea that it snowed in Portland the other week. It wasn't on the news or anything. And they definitely didn't call it Snowmageddon or Snowpocalypse or anything silly like that. Side eye to Portland news and media outlets. Major side eye.

A few days before the snow hit, Judah came down with a nasty cold that his friends from school had shared with him (and everyone else). He had already missed one day of school from it when the storm hit. He then ended up missing a week more. He was also nice enough to share his cold with Shosh... and then Bill and I as well. So nice of him!

Turned out the cold developed into ear infections for both kids (in both ears). Between sick kids, sick parents, severe lack of sleep (due to aforementioned sick kids), and being house bound it was a pretty miserable week. The kids were super needy and grouchy. Bill and I were super tired (and therefore grouchy) and we were all together. In the house. For a very long time.

These photos are from the only time the kids even went out into the snow... and they only lasted about 30 minutes or so. They definitely look a bit pathetic and sickly in these photos, even if they were having a good time.

We left our sleds in Tacoma, so Bill is pushing Judah around in Ralphie's water dish instead.

There was one member of our house who loved the snow though: Ralph. That guy is all about it! It turns him into a puppy. He runs (and trust when I say he NEVER runs) and plays and fetches and is just generally adorable and snow dog-errific.

I definitely look forward to future snow days (hopefully not this year, though) when the kids are A) not sick and B) able to enjoy being outside.

I'm happy to report that everyone is pretty much healthy again. Judah finished the last of his antibiotics for his ear infections this evening, but Shosh still has a few more days left of hers.

Christmas

This was our first Christmas together that we spent Christmas morning in our own house! It is definitely the way to go. I think next year we are going to go all out and spend ALL DAY at our house. 

When we lived in Tacoma we always came down to Oregon before Christmas and spent a few days (or however much time our schedules allowed). We would split our time going back and forth between my parents' house and Bill's parents' house, which is only about 5 miles apart, but still, back & forth, and back & forth, and back & forth. It tends to get a bit tiring. Then, once we had Judah it was even more tiring to go from one place to the other on holidays. We never got to really settle in an relax at either place as we were always worried about timing and making sure we would be at the right house for the right activity. Blah. Enough of that. With Shosh's arrival there was no way were going to go back and forth between the two houses on Christmas day, so we spent the morning at our own house and then went to Bill's parents' house that afternoon. Later in the week, once my brother and niece were in town we celebrated Christmas with my family (my sister-in-law had to make a last second trip back to China because her dad had heart surgery. The surgery went well and she was able to be there to help him recover, but that is why she ended up missing Christmas state-side). 

One neat thing about this year was it was the first time Judah has really gotten into the whole thing. We sang a lot of Christmas songs, had a countdown calendar where we hung felt ornaments on a felt tree, talked about Santa and presents (What do you want Santa to bring you, Judah? "Presents" What kind of presents? "Toys" What kind of toys? "Blue and green toys" Uh, okay...). Every day he wanted to turn on our Christmas lights and would often get busted taking ornaments off the tree. Our fragile ornaments will have to stay in hiding for a number of years still. 

Okay, and I'm just going to do a photo dump, as I think Christmas photos are pretty self explanatory.

Judah's first glimpse at what Santa left behind... He was still a bit sleepy at this point.

Reading the note Santa left for Judah thanking him for the cookies and whatnot. 

Santa only brought Shosh one present- a Baby's First Christmas ornament

Christmas dogs!

After the presents were all opened, Shosh was decorated with ribbons and bows

Cousins

My mom and her two granddaughters 

This was suppose to be a photo of my parents with all their grandkids, but Azalea refused to be in it without her dad. haha

Ahh, the smell of new books... or something like that.

Azalea was a bit confused with her gift at first

We dressed Shosh in the same outfit Judah wore for his first Christmas. Also, when Shosh makes this face we think she looks like the baby dinosaur from the 90s show Dinosaurs

Here is the post about Judah's first Christmas...

Judah modeling the robe he got from my parents for Christmas