my weekend in photos

Posted in Random by Kendra G.

friday morning teeth cleaning turned into getting two “small” cavities filled
(i blame the pregnancy hormones)
luckily we had a lunch date planned at lazy moon for a big slice of pizza

very early saturday morning overlooking lake eola

getting ready to walk in the march for babies 5k for jack’s pack

pit stop between miles two and three for a rainbow fruit bar. delish.

had an awesome time representing jack’s pack in florida
our weather was a little better that morning than the crew in indiana
and everyone thought kenley was baby jack. ha.

the early morning resulted in several naps,
which resulted in sleepy face

saturday night we headed to the jenkinson’s for game night
and kenley and kyler’s first sleepover…at least half the night

kenley loves to grab everything, including kyler

stopped by the festival of chocolate at the ucf arena

then headed down to avalon park to take on the food truck bazaar

they were out of our favorite dessert. bummer.

the girls played while we ate some delish food including flatbreads and a korean taco box

***

how was your weekend?

25Apr2012

27 Weeks :: eat, drink, and be merry

Posted in Family by Kendra G.

The update this week will be short and sweet.

Solid foods include organic peas, organic zucchini, and rice cereal so far.
The more runny the food, the bigger mess that is made.

We tried a sippy cup once, it didn’t go over too well.
Just a lot of chewing on the top and milk everywhere,
we shall try again this weekend.

The saga of phantom teething continues,
and yet, there are still no teeth.
All the signs are there, so we’ll see how long this continues.

Majority of the time the issue is just tiredness, which leads to over-tiredness.
There is a fine line between getting her down for a nap just in time and too late.
You’d think we’d have it down by now, but no, we’re still learning.

However, following a nap, we have the happiest baby on the block.

24Apr2012

Sally’s Surprise Shower!

Posted in Party Time by Kendra G.

Back when I was pregnant with Kenley, which seems like forever ago,
Sally and Lindsey threw a baby shower and brunch for me here in Florida.

Now that Sally is expecting her second, a girl, baby Margot,
I was honored to be able to return the favor for Sally, with Lindsey’s help, of course!
The best part of it was that Sally had no idea we were doing this until she showed up!
Fun fact: we later learned that Sally found out she was pregnant the morning of my shower!

Anyway, the surprise had been in the works for a while, Lindsey and I had so much fun planning.
Of course, we searched high and low on Pinterest for ideas,
but it’s hard to find all these great ideas and not be able to pin them!
We didn’t want to give away our secret!

The shower was at 2pm, because, let’s be serious,
I knew I couldn’t pull off getting everything ready in my house a minute earlier than that.
We figured everyone would have already had some sort of lunch
so we thought desserts would be perfect!

The menu included:
Build your own fruit pizzas
Chocolate dipped Oreos
Chocolate dipped marshmallows
Chocolate dipped pretzels
Strawberry fluff dip with graham crackers, strawberries, and Eggo waffle bites
Mini cupcakes from Sweet
Regular and chocolate milk

Since Sally and family didn’t need any big ticket items,
we wanted to help fill Margot’s closet with lots of cute girly clothes!
The adorable clothes doubled as decor, so it was perfect!

I put my diy chalkboard wine bottles to good use.

We wanted to display the invitation we had made from Etsy, too.
One, because they were super cute and two, because she hadn’t seen them!

Just under two weeks in advance, I asked Sally if she wanted to “babysit Kenley”,
of course, she agreed and it was set, she was going to come over around 2-2:15pm.
We had talked about it a couple times since then, but I tried to be as vague as possible,
because I truly felt bad “lying” to her… even though it was for a good reason.

Needless to say, she was very surprised!

We had a wonderful time celebrating baby Margot.

She’s is going to be the best dressed baby on the block!

Lindsey and I had a great time scheming, planning, and making all those sweet treats!

Baby Margot we cannot wait to meet you!

22Apr2012

my weekend in photos

Posted in Random by Kendra G.

kenley successfully tore up the entire roll of paper waiting for the doc,
but the visit was a success all in all, minimal crying.
her six month stats: 16 lbs. 15 oz. – 50th percentile
26 3/4 inches – 80th percentile

enjoying some peas

friday night was spent making sweet treats for saturday’s festivities

here’s a preview sally’s surprise shower to celebrate baby margot

sunday we celebrated another baby-to-be at brian and kristen’s shower.
kenley and cooper played while we ate walking tacos

holding the toy in one hand and chewing on her toes with the other

we met the jenkinson’s at the park
i promise the girls weren’t this grumpy the entire time

***

we had a busy weekend!
how was yours?

19Apr2012

Six Months!

Posted in Family by Kendra G.

We are halfway to a year today!
I’m not sure how that’s quite possible, but here we are.
Six months old!

After reading our five month update, I’ve realized so much has changed in just a month!

She can sit up on her own for an extended period of time.
but she hasn’t learned how to get down from sitting to the laying position on the floor,
at least not intentionally.

She also can roll freely from belly to back and back to belly.
She started out backwards rolling from her back to belly first and it took a while to master
the belly to back roll, but she does it with no problems now.

She is by no means completely mobile but did manage to roll right off our bed on Monday.
She was perfectly fine and only cried for about a minute.
I, on the other hand, was hysterical. Crying and shaking for a good ten minutes.
It was definitely more traumatic for me.
Poor Greg thought she had broken several bones by the way I was acting.
I’m sure it’ll be the first of many, but it still doesn’t make it any easier.

No real signs of crawling just yet and I think we’re ok with that for now.

Another month has past and still no teeth.
Not even a sign of one!
I thought for sure she’d have at least a tooth two months ago,
ahem…thanks mom…and grandma.
But nothin’
So, the wait continues.
And we’ll keep blaming her sporadic fussiness on the phantom “teething”….

I can safely say that I have no idea what color her eyes are right now.
They were more blue when she was born, but they aren’t quite green yet.
I’m pretty sure they’re more of a grey color and anxious to see if they’ll continue to change.

She is becoming very social and likes to know what’s going on at all times.
As you can see, always needs to know where Daddy is.
One of her teachers told me today that she’s very attentive and will get upset if another baby is crying a lot.

She is also quite social while she is eating these days.
If there is any noise, she’s easily distracted.
During the week it’s not too bad because I’m feeding her early in the morning and right before bed,
so it’s dark and quiet with the sound machine on and we’re both tired.
On the weekends, however, it’s a challenge.
During the day, she’s all over the place turning her head with every sound,
flailing her arms, and trying to grab everything.
I would imagine she’s probably the same way with her bottle at school.
Bless her teachers.

We go back to the doctor tomorrow for her six month check up and shots,
so I will update you this weekend on her stats.
I’m anxious to see how much she’s grown since our last appointment.

Updated: Six month stats
16 lbs. 15 oz – 50th percentile
26 3/4 inches – 80th percentile

I know I’ve said this the last couple of months and I’m sure I’ll continue to say it,
but this is such a fun time right now.
She’s becoming more of a little person!

Happy half birthday Kenley Dee!

18Apr2012

26 Weeks :: introducing solids

Posted in Family by Kendra G.

I’m not sure why, but I wasn’t really looking forward to the introduction of solids.
While it’s exciting, it’s also more work. It’s so easy to feed her now.
We’ve developed a good schedule with her feedings and I didn’t really want to deter from that.
And let’s be honest, it’s a whole new ballgame in the world of cloth diapering.
I also came across this thing called baby led weaning, which made me second guess
our decision to puree our own food, which made me even more nervous that I wasn’t going to do it right.
Overall, it was very silly how much time and thought I put into this,
but we were approaching the tail end of the 4-6 month starting point for solids, so we did it.

Again with the over-analyzing, the next decision was what her first food was going to be.
Alas, we decided on organic peas. They were super easy to cook, thanks to our Baby Bullet.
I’m sticking with our original decision to puree foods for her, especially after I now know how easy it is.

Here is her first bite!
After seeing how interested she was in the spoon, I think she’ll want to feed herself some.

On her last couple of bites, I think the taste finally hits her.

She did very well with her first serving of peas, better than I thought.
She’s had one serving of peas each day at school this week too and has done fairly well.

I am still nervous about how it’s all going to go, but feeling better than I did.
I still have so many questions.
When do we move up to a second daily feeding? And then a third?
When will she start needing less breastmilk?
What should we feed her next?

My goal is to continue feeding her only organic fruits and veggies.
At this point, for us, there just really is not reason not to.
I have zucchini, squash, and white sweet potatoes all ready to be pureed!

So there you have it. We conquered our first food!

And little miss is half a year old!
26 weeks today and six months tomorrow.
I’m not sure how that’s possible.
Stay tuned for another update tomorrow.

16Apr2012

Joining the Pack

Posted in Family by Kendra G.

Jack’s Pack!

Remember this little guy?

You can read his story here.

Recently, I was browsing the 5K races in the area, in attempts to try to get back in shape,
I came across the March For Babies 5K in Central Florida on April 28th.

I knew this day sounded familiar because majority of my family is doing the
March For Babies walk in Lafayette, Indiana that same day.
Unfortunately, we can’t attend, but I thought how awesome it’d be if I (or we) could do the run here.
I emailed the helpline to see if we could jog with strollers, which you cannot, for safety reasons,
but you CAN walk with them!
Yippiee!

After a little more research, I found out that we could join the Jack’s Pack team in Indiana,
but walk here in Central Florida that day.
I was pumped.

So, in less than two weeks, we’ll be sporting our Jack’s Pack shirts
and walking for all the babies born too soon, like Jack!

[ via ]

If you’ve already donated to Jack’s Pack, awesome, thanks!
If you feel so inclined, you can donate at one of these three pages, it all goes to the same place.

Jack’s Pack
Kendra’s Page
Greg’s Page

Thanks for your love and support for baby Jack!

15Apr2012

my weekend in photos

Posted in Random by Kendra G.

it was both an eventful and uneventful weekend for us,
if that’s possible…
greg and i are fighting colds that we seem to just be giving back to each other.

headed to the orlando brewery for happy hour to celebrate two birthdays

nicely put

if i’m going to be on a one drink limit, it’s going to be a damn good beer
organic blackwater dry porter
i’m definitely broadening my horizons

this is how our counter looks 99.9% of the time

wandered around downtown avalon to check out the vendors
babywearing

peas turned into pea puree
doesn’t that look appetizing?

first solids
much more on that later

daddy-daughter fun
yes, our easter basket is still sitting on the counter
:: sigh ::

first bump on the head, smack dab in the middle of her forehead
thanks to falling over onto the laptop

***

like i said, we didn’t do much, but had some big events
how was your weekend?

11Apr2012

25 Weeks :: wiggle worm

Posted in Family by Kendra G.

Our weekly photos are becoming more challenging, but also more fun!

Kenley is quite the little wiggle worm. She definitely doesn’t sit still (or lay still) anymore.

Kenley has been in a little bit of a funk this past week,
she randomly had a fever one day which kept her home from school a day,
but never really seemed sick.

She was a little bit of a crabby pants over Easter weekend and we are almost certain that she’s teething,
buuuuuut, there are no teeth, so that shows how much we know! Ha!

9Apr2012