Foto Friday

It's time for another edition of Foto Friday! This week, I'm going to include some photos from last week as well, since I didn't get a chance to upload her photos before Friday. We have so much to catch up on!

Last week, Annabel, Grammy and I met up with Auntie Amy at Neimans for a Lancome make-up event. Annabel was the belle of the ball! Nobody could pass her by without exclaiming what a beauty she is. I was a proud mommy!

Annabel snoozes while she waits for her turn...

Pretty girl taking a nap at Neimans!

Our next big adventure was heading to the Hawk residence for a pot luck dinner with our childbirthing class. Much fun was to be had, and the girls barely lost in a rousing game of Trivial Pursuit. Here are some photos from that evening.

Tuan checks out the spread. Pasta, anyone?

The moms trade baby stories. From left: Sylvia and Andrew, Ginny and Paige, Dana and Jake, and Corry and Kenley.

The Daddies (plus Annabel's Papi) talk "man stuff."

The babies! From left: Annabel, Kenley, JP, Jake, Paige, Andrew and Tyler.

Two daddies with their mini-me daughters: Jeff and Paige, Brett and Kenley.

Some other pictures from last week and the weekend...

At the Pritchett's house for dinner, Annabel takes a snooze on Auntie Sara.

Annabel shows off her new baby bling paci.

The red-headed stepchildren wonder what all the fuss is about during Grammy and Papi's visit. (Macee is on the left, Baylor on the right.)

Riding in the sling with Daddy at the mall. She's still trying to work out getting all those fingers in her mouth at once!

This is my first week back to work, and I think Annabel is adjusting more quickly than I am! The first day (Tuesday), when Chris and I dropped her off at her in-home care (Lori's, for future reference), I was crying like a baby. Well, I guess not so much like a baby, since Annabel seemed to be just fine. When I picked her up that afternoon, she was still great, although she didn't eat or sleep as much as she normally does. However, her second day with Lori (yesterday), she went right back to eating and sleeping as usual.

Wednesdays and Fridays, I work from home, so Nanny Kristi comes to the house. And on Wednesdays, JP joins us! Our first Wednesday was a little chaotic, as everyone was getting used to the new arrangement, but overall it was a good day. Today with Nanny Kristi, Annabel was again her usual happy, sleepy self. Here are some photos from the week about that...

We make one last visit to the ladies at Daddy's office during Mommy's last day of maternity leave.

Annabel smiles for Nanny Kristi during playtime in her bouncy seat.

Monkey is Annabel's favorite friend on her bouncy seat! They gossip, trade advice on swinging, the usual stuff babies and monkeys chat about.

JP comes to hang out on Wednesdays. He's makes himself right at home in the new exersaucer from Grammy.

While JP's daddy looks on (those are his toes in the background), Baylor says goodbye to JP for the day.

Next we have some Annabel milestones. This week, we've started the process of breaking our precious sleeping baby of the swaddle. In her swaddle, she sleeps from when we put her to bed (usually around 8 or 8:30pm) until we wake her up in the morning (during maternity leave, around 7 or 7:30am). We had tried no swaddle before, but when she jerks in her sleep, her limbs go flying. This totally freaks her out, and she wakes up screaming bloody murder. So it was back in the swaddle she went!

At the advice of a friend (thanks, Monica!), we're leaving one arm out of the swaddle, switching arms each night. As shown below...


So the first night, she woke up around 3am, and we could not get her to go back to sleep for about 45 minutes. This was the night before I had to go back to work... I don't know why we were so crazy as to start trying this on such a stressful night already! But, that was the only time she woke up, and slept until I woke her up the next morning at 6am to eat before we headed to her in-home day care. The second and third nights, she woke up at around 4am. The second night, Daddy was able to get her to go back to sleep pretty quickly. The third night, we let her cry it out, and she put herself to sleep in less than 10 minutes. The fourth night (last night), she slept all the way through again! Woo hoo! So we'll let her sleep with one arm out for a couple of weeks to get her used to it.

And one other thing that Annabel has added to her repertoire is razzing. She does it when she starts getting really mad, although she does it sometimes when she's laughing too. It's pretty darn cute (and messy! spit bubbles everywhere!), and we were able to capture some video of her doing it. It's also cute to see her in the jumpy seat.



And finally, a some pictures of bedtime with Daddy...

Yummy bottle!

I love you like frogs love flies too, Daddy, but what's Mommy doing over there?

Annabel thinks this is an excellent book.

Of course, you can find these photos and more in Annabel's June/July photobucket album. Oh! I get to start a new album today!

Cheers!