Halloween Chicken

We got the chicken costume from Maryann who had used it for her daughter Lily last year. It was homemade, with a white feather boa for feathers and yellow dish gloves for the chicken feet. Somehow Gabs kept kicking the feet off though, and we had to pluck the feathers because they were itching her, so it quickly became just a white onesy with a red chicken head thing (what is that called, a chicken crest?).

happiest baby

Gaby is such a happy baby. She squeals and squeals and laughs all the time. I love her deep belly laughs. She thinks Annabel is especially funny. The other day Annabel was pretending to fluff the pillows like her mom, and as she's pounding on the pillows, Gaby is laughing and laughing at her. This just made Annabel fluff with more intensity and Gaby laughed even harder.

Today Gaby rediscovered herself in the mirror and thought she was pretty funny. She kept grabbing and kicking and laughing. I was worried she would hurt herself as she tried to launch into her own image in the mirror.

Gabs can roll over!

She is doing it pretty regularly now in both directions. She loves it. She will roll over, squeel and then roll back over to where she started.

solids

Gaby ate her first solids today. We tried some rice serial last week, but she wouldn't go for it. Today, Kristin added a little applesauce and that seemed to do the trick. I guess she is an applesauce girl...

sleep training

Gabby has been a relatively easy baby. She has slept well and eaten well and is generally pretty content. Up until about three weeks ago...

Then she started waking up every two hours or so and we were back in a special sort of hell that they reserve for new parents where everyone has a short fuse and are practically catatonic with sleeploss.

We hired a sleep expert (a little jewish gandma named Vivian Sonnenberg) who told us the following:

1. She needs to sleep on her tummy, not her back
2. She can't be up for more than two hours during the day without a nap
3. She must always nap in her crib
4. She must be put down awake and left to fall asleep in her crib on her own during her naps
5. No pacifiers
6. She should be put down for the night at about 6:30
7. She must be fed before she is put down
8. We should let her cry for up to an hour before going in to feed her

She cried for almost an hour the first time, and then a few times for a half hour. Now she sleeps pretty regularly from 6:30pm to about 7:00am, and we have our easy baby back. Amazing!