Formerly the blog for my daughter Eliza, where we posted from her birth until she began Kindergarten, now all the old posts are integrated into Pattern Recognition.
Ellie had a great day exploring downtown Chattanooga today with Betsy’s family. Her brother, sister-in-law, and nieces all came to visit, so we spent the hottest day of the year running around downtown.
After visiting the aquarium and having some ribs, we went across the river to Coolidge Park, where Eliza loved the fountains and carousel. She even managed to get sprayed a little to cool down. Elze is quite the trooper when we’re running around, and seemingly loves everything and everyone.
Eliza plays with her first toy from Uncle Kevin… a bubble machine.
Eliza made her first big trip to Kentucky over the weekend. She met more people in three days that she had met in her life so far. Great grandmother, great grandfather, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends. Everyone fell in love with her, of course, and she seemed to have a great time.
Here she is with cousins Drevin and Hannah, happy to be the newest member of the group.
Just wanted to give some perspective here. Look how much Eliza has grown. First picture = little E at 10 days old. Second picture = Eliza in same chair, 5 months old (22 weeks, to be precise). I can’t believe how much she has grown and changed in so little time.
Last week we got to hang out with my friend Bridgette and her daughter Amelia, just 2 months younger than Eliza. They drove from Atlanta to visit us at Nana’s house in LaFayette. It was great to see them! The girls were very interested in each other at first, with lots of smiles and reaching out. But then they needed feeding, naps, etc. I guess “play dates” won’t make any sense until they’re a little older! But more importantly, it was good for the mommies to reconnect.
Thanks to Nana for this awesome picture.
Eliza is 5 months old today. She can roll over, eats “real” food, tries very hard to sit up on her own, loves to stand up with support, and loves being sung/talked to. She’s a little attached to mom and dad right now, which means she gets a tad upset when we leave her sight. But in general, she is a happy baby. Still curious about everything and everyone she sees. She absolutely adores going all over the mountain: shopping, to lunch with friends, to get coffee, walking around campus, even department meetings are fun for her. 5 months old! The time is flying.
So my first Mother’s Day was tainted by the fact that I had to “work” (Sewanee always has its graduation on Mother’s Day). No matter. It was still amazing to wake up and know that I, too, am a mother now. Still a bit surreal.
Eliza couldn’t pick out my gifts, but Dad did an awesome job. A beautiful cedar trunk to put her keepsakes in, something I hope to pass down to her. A “peanut” charm for my bracelet, since that’s what we called her before we knew she was a girl. And a brand new coffee maker to help take the sting out of early mommy mornings.
I made my first batch of Eliza Food today. It went like this:
went into this
then I put together this contraption
and put the sweet potatoes in like this
and then portioned it out into 4 oz tupperware like this
and ended up with this
All in all, 9 servings of sweet potatoes that are, unlike processed baby food, delicious. Plus it’s kinda fun knowing exactly what she’s eating, and being able to fix it myself. I’m looking forward to doing this on weekends, and throwing a weeks worth of food in the freezer for her.
Here’s how we know Eliza is teething:
Overall, our verdict is that this teething thing sucks (pun intended). I understand that it’s necessary, but it’s hard on poor little babies who have no idea why this is happening to them. Can’t wait to see a little tooth pop up, though. Problem is…it could be a month or two of this before we see any results!
Eliza is outgrowing all her baby seats. As you can see, she’s trying desperately to sit up. So…even though she is strapped into this cushy, soft, vibrating seat , she is trying to get out of it. She has several little “chairs” but they all recline, so she isn’t fond of them anymore. She wants to sit straight up and see the world. No chilling out for little Eliza! Are you kidding? There’s too much to see and do!
