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The little monster went to her 9 month Doctor appointment today. Yes I said monster, she kept me up for 3 hours last night walking around the house because that's what she wanted to do between the hours of 11pm and 2 am.

She is off the charts for the percentile for her age group. She is just a bigger baby, the size of a 1 year old. Since she has started crawling the weight gain has slowed down a little.

Weight: 24lbs 2oz

Height: 30 Inches

I asked the Doctor what to do about night time since she is a horrible sleeper and by this age she should be able to sleep through the night. But however that is not Kendalls plan she still wakes up 3-5 times a night depending on her mood. 2 of those times are to eat, another thing which she doesn't need to do but it has become a habit for her. So starting tonight I will be sleeping in my parents room (they are going out of town for a week) and just letting her cry it out. I tried this last night but it didn't work. Instead of giving her a bottle full of formula I will be giving her a bottle with water in it. I know she wont be starving and she really can wait until morning but I will still feel bad making her cry. These habits need to be broken if we are ever going to get any sleep.

I am not looking forward to it at all but I realize I have been a bit of an enabler letting her do these things. She knows at night time it is bedtime and she goes to sleep fine around 8pm and she usually wakes for the day between 6:30 and 7:30 am. Its all the time in between that is the problem. It will be hard listening to her cry but she needs to learn. I will step in if she gets to hysterical but other then that she is going to stay in her bed and cry :(

Learning week

Some really good family friends of ours have a daughter who is extremely talented with drawing and painting and creative things. She has been doing a lot of pencil work lately and sketching pictures she has taken. She also makes jewelry. She took this picture and for my birthday her parents "hired" her to do a pencil drawing of it. It is perfect and looks exactly like Kendall her attention to detail is amazing and I love the picture. She did an awesome job.

Onto the learning. This past week, more like the past couple days, Kendall has learned a few new things. Tuesday night she started shaking her head no, she doesn't know that is means no she just thinks its funny and smiles when she does it. She can now wave, she used to do it randomly but now if you wave to her she will wave back. When you get excited at her for waving and clap and smile at her she will do the same and clap her hands (although it makes no sound when she does it). Its really cute. We have not pushed her to do it, but we play patty cake and clap her hands but now she can do it herself and she LOVES it.

She really likes going to school as we call it, but it is more of a day care. At first she wasn't so sure when i would drop her off in the morning and it would take her a few minutes to warm up to everyone else. Now that she is familiar with everyone she has such a good time. I take her in and set her on the floor and she just takes off and will stop for a split second when i get her attention and wave at me. She is excited to see me at the end of the day. I am so glad she likes it and has such a fun time playing with the other kids.

Pinterest!!!

A while back Prairie Princess talked me into getting a Pinterest account cause it was so amazing according to her. I thought differently, i didn't get how to use it. I kept seeing and hearing people talk about how addicting and awesome it was and i was like eh, its not my thing and i ignored it. Until today, I decided it was worth it to get back on and check things out and boy am I glad I did. I LOVE IT!!! It may be an understatement. There are so many good ideas on everything and its all so easy to do. All the DIY toys and kids activities are going to be perfect for Kendall next summer when she is old enough to run outside and play in the sprinklers on a hot day. Or when its cold outside and we can make reindeer cookies together. The DIY gift ideas are perfect too. For Bunco this Christmas we are doing a homemade gift, gift exchange and I have found some really neat ideas for that. Needless to say my hesitation at from not knowing how to use it is long gone and i am now going to be addicted!

Bumps and Bonks

Kendall has reached the stage where she has bruises and scratches and is constantly running into things. In the picture you can kind of see the end stage of rug burn on her nose from when she decided to crawl off on Auntie Danielle's bed, oopsies! (OK so maybe you cant see if very well at all).

Wednesday at school she got bit by one of the other kids cause she had a toy he wanted to play with. So I had to sign an accident report and she has a spot on her arm which kind of just looks like a little pinch mark.

Yesterday Danielle picked her up from school and when I got home from work I noticed she had a nice bruise smack dab in the middle of her forehead. I brushed it off cause i figured it had happened the night before when she hit her head on the TV twice or when she lost her balance holding on to the couch and hit her head on the side of it. But when I dropped her off this morning I had to sign another paper cause apparently she got the bruise from standing at the shelf in her classroom and losing her balance and hitting her head on the corner of it.

I know its going to happen. She is at the age where she is SO curious about everything and can crawl and try to get it. She just runs into everything and loses her balance a lot. It does bother me a little that she got bit, but i know that's going to happen too and it will probably only worry me if the biting becomes a regular occurrence. I cant prevent her from falling and hitting her head, she will have to learn the hard way.

Monday Night Football

Almost every Monday night we go to our friends (Kurt and Chrissy's) house for dinner and football. This Monday Chrissy wasn't there (she had to work) so Kurt cooked us dinner. We had fried eggs, hash browns and sausage links. I love having breakfast for dinner. Kendall got to have some of the hash browns so she really like it too. We all take turns cooking dinner. Usually Chrissy and I do most of it while the guys are yelling at the TV and playing with Kendall. But there are times they cook for us too (dinner seems to take longer on those days between cooking and trying to watch football).

Since this Monday we were there was Halloween we had a bowl of candy to give out to the trick-or-treaters who stopped by. Kendall was being whiny since she didn't get a good nap and it was almost her bedtime so hey lets give her a sucker before bedtime. Thank goodness the sugar didn't seem to effect her but sitting there on Jason's lap playing with it made her pretty happy. I had taken her clothes off and she was just in her diaper and there was green drool running down her stomach getting all over the place.

We have been going to dinner there once a week (sometimes twice) for at least the last year so Kurt and Chrissy have kind of become extended family. Since Kendall was a mess i had to give her a bath there. There was no i was going to get all the sticky goo off her with just wipes. After words she cuddles up with Jason and had her bottle and fell asleep laying with him. I didn't get any pictures of her asleep but the one above is right before. The only time she really likes to cuddle is right before bed.

I have been bowling on Monday nights so I haven't been able to go to as many of our dinners as I would like, but Jason takes Kendall and then I meet them when I am done so I can take her home. Bowling has been fun but I have to many other things going on Monday nights (I also have bunko once a month) and it is also a 26 week long season and I just cant make that long of a commitment right now so I have a replacement and will fill in for her if she needs a night off. I really enjoy our dinners its a fun thing for all of us to do after work we just get to relax and hang out.

Babyshower

This is going to be a long post, but it is all pictures with descriptions.

My older sister Prairie Princess hosted my baby shower (she planned everything only asking my preference for things). She ordered the invitations off of here i don't have a picture of those. She came into town for a special visit just for the shower and we had a really good time with lots of friends.

The picture below is of our party favors. Its a "Candy Bar" we bought little boxes and a bunch of different kinds of candy which we put into different size wine glasses.

The next 2 pictures are of the gift table, there were so many and we really appreciate how generous everyone was. It was a lot of thank you cards that had to be written, it took me forever!

I decided cupcakes would be better then cake, so we had strawberry cupcakes with pink and yellow frosting flowers on top. My dad even helped decorate them.

The party was in the middle of the afternoon so we made a few finger foods that were easy to eat

The theme was pink and yellow so we did pink lemonade with lemon slices in it.

We had 3 games but only have pictures of this one (you hold a paper plate on your head and try to draw a baby, you are not allowed to look until time is up)

Choosing who the winner is

Opening gifts

Everyone was so generous, and it was fun getting to spend time with Jason's mom (we had never really spent time together before) after it was over we had a nice family dinner with some of our closest friends (who we consider family). Its hard to believe it was almost a year ago (December 5Th)

*** To add a little note, the camera cord has been found, there are lots of pictures to come from the last couple of months.

Hooray

This morning I dropped Kendall off at her first day of Head start, and I only have a LITTLE anxiety over it. Not really, it was a lot harder to leave then I thought it would be. Leaving her with the babysitter this last week and a half was easy cause i knew it was just her and Kendall and she would get plenty of attention. Now she is in a classroom with a teacher and a helper and 7 other kids. She is the only girl in her class so she will get lots of attention from all the little boys. It will be an adjustment for her but she will get into a better routine and make lots of friends.

We also have to get up at 6am now (currently on my second cup o coffee with a new peppermint mocha creamer in it, reminds me of Christmas), so she can be to the center by 8. It is rather dark and cold that early in the morning. I was hoping Kendall would sleep in until 7 but no such luck there, she woke up with me at 6. I am hoping now that she will be started on a consistent schedule sleeping at night time will be easier for her and she will be able to sleep better or at least want to sleep.

I miss her a lot and I cant wait to go pick her up this afternoon to see how much fun she had. Since she has to be picked up by 3 my sister will do it most days. I am picking her up today and I will on Fridays, most days it will be my lil sister DM since she is done with work earlier then I am. Who knows though, since I will now be getting to work an hour earlier i might finish earlier then i normally do. Up next look for my post about my babyshower (it was almost exactly 1 year ago)