Little Miss Tiny-Hiney

"I su beebee" = "I'm super baby!"

Points to self and says, "ooh ah" = "I'm a monkey!"

Tiny is saying tons of words and sentences these days. The problem is ... what are they? 

Baow = bum, ball, bath, or bar (as in granola bar)

Nana = banana or Nana (grandma) or possibly Ninnie (my sister)

Su-see = herself

Uh fauw = I fall

caow = car

teet teet = bird

Ceauw = cereal, Wa-wa = water

soo-AH = shoe (she puts AH on the end of lots of things these days)

bu-AH = book, Foo-AH = food, Scoo-AH = scooter, Moh-AH = more

binty a binty = binky and blankie

Bobo = teddy bear

A doe? = Where'd it go?

HI-EE! = Hide!

What's your favorite animal L? Neigh!

Baby L is 1!

Predictable though it may be to say, I cannot believe my baby is 1! She seems like she's been part of our family for forever and yet, there's no way it's been a year. Just saying all that makes me so old. But at least as a reward for being old, I get to snuggle with this Tiny Treasure!

Granted, I do prefer when I get to snuggle with her face...

And when she looks up at me with this darling face, it's impossible to not want to cover her in kisses! She's so stinking cute! 

As M says regularly, "I don't want her to ever get bigger!" Haha! This face just cracks me up.

Ooh look! Cake! She didn't have a clue what it was but she was excited by everybody else's excitement, and Photo-bombing Dude was excited to "help."

What is this? They've never put anything like this on my tray before. Is it safe?

Do you ever get that feeling like somebody is watching you? Like if you hesitate or turn your head, your food might mysteriously disappear?

Hmmm...this is good! I think I like it.

Yeehoo! This is awesome! Fist pump to the face!

Look at me, Ms. One-Year-Old-Big-Shot, I'm a big kid now!

Baby L has been a wonderfully, amazingly happy baby. She's quick to smile at anyone she lays eyes on. Her siblings delight her. She greets dad with a dimple-fisted point and a grin. Seeing mom is so exciting she hyperventilates. Her new, hilarious move is coming in for a hug with her belly stuck out, her head tilted back so she's smiling at the ceiling, and her feet moving a little faster than her balance can afford. Some eating problems aside, she's been exactly what we needed from a fifth child. 

However, she has been a walker for over a month and is constantly on the go - totally exhausting to keep away from toilets, trash cans and roads. Watching her try to run is hilarious and watching her start to climb on everything is terrifying. She's determined, affectionate, silly, and hungry. And she's ours!

6 months old!

It is just mind blowing how much babies learn in the first 6 months! I'll do a quick review of some of her developmental achievements of the last few busy months. Just look at this little rolly goober learning that she has tasty toes:

 She's been trying to crawl for weeks now. She'd assume the position and rock, inching one knee forward and then inevitably pushing backwards to try to sit up instead. Silly girl. 

And speaking of sitting up...

Ta dah! She somehow mixed things up a bit, learning to get into a sitting position before she learned to actually sit, but did master the sitting itself shortly after turning 5 months old. 

 Okay, mostly mastered. She falls sometimes too but is never unhappy about it!

She's also learning to play with toys. This face clearly says, "This is so much fun!"

 Big brother is doing his best to teach her how to play. Isn't this the cutest?

 And speaking of cutest ... 

Then this blue-eyed girl finally figured out the crawling thing AND pulled herself up to stand the very same day. One developmental milestone at a time crazy girl!

To make up for it, she's not so advanced at the whole eating food thing. Actually, I'm pretty sure she thinks we're trying to kill her when we put something in her mouth. And I'm even more sure none of it actually gets down her throat. How exactly is it possible for her to have spit it on her eyelid???

Oh and I would also bet money that big brother taught her to make this face for the camera too:

Baby L is for keeps

 Flying high, defying gravity:

 I hold "it" by myself (She gets lots of love):

I LOVE HER SMILES:

 And her bug-eyes too, even if they look a little creepy at times:

 She ALWAYS sleeps like this. Me? My neck would never be the same:

 Put 'em up, put 'em up:

 What is this delightful thing I've found to suck on? It's comes whenever I want it to:

 A little help here guys? Oh sure, take a picture first:

So happy to be sitting up to see all the action:

 Sisterly Lovin':

 

Obligatory darling baby in a hoodie towel picture:

 I've got my eyes on you mom:

 Life is so tough:

Meeting Miss L

And home at last! L is going to have to get used to lots of love because every time I turn around somebody is asking to hold her, or as G says, "I hold it!"

J and M love to sing to her and are pretty confident they can calm her down whenever she needs it and basically solve any problem. Handy in a tight spot, these girls.

Dude is fascinated by her but only ever wants to hold her for about 3 seconds. Then you better make sure you have a good grip because he just drops his arms and moves on. Classic. He's most interested in her belly button. About 100 times a day he asks, "can I see that brown thing again?" When he sees it, he always asks what it is, and then announces, "it hurts her so much." We assure him it doesn't and that it's going to fall off soon, to which he responds, "then THAT will hurt her so much." Doesn't matter how many times we refute this. He just keeps saying it. He does love her too even though a few days after getting home he referred to her as "that baby" and said he wanted her and me to go back to the hospital. I asked if he wouldn't miss me, and he shrugged his shoulders and said, "we could Skype."

And could G look any prouder of herself. She has the opposite problem from dude. She never wants to let go, and when you try to get Baby L back, she squeezes and tries to twist away. Not exactly ideal but at least she's doing it out of love at this point!

Nana and Bopa had been holding down the front at home and while they had got to briefly meet Baby L at the hospital, I think they were even more excited to see us back home to "try" to start getting things back to normal. Whatever normal is going to look like from here on out!

She's here!!!

Announcing the arrival of the beautiful addition to our wonderful family!!

 It's a girl!!! 

7 lbs 5 oz, 21 inches of perfect.

The morning started with them not being able to give me my IV. They tried 4 different times, thinking they had it a couple of times and releasing the IV fluid into the ever-puffier back of my hand instead. Man, was my hand lumpy and messy (and seriously bruised and swollen for more than a week afterwards)! But 3 nurses later, they finally got it in the side of my arm, painfully going through a nerve to get there. Not the best start! Made my superstitious side a bit nervous too since the last time they'd had that much trouble was when M was born, and things didn't really go too smoothly after that start.

But we got in there and before we knew it, our baby was crying! They brought her over for us to admire instantly and said, "here he is!" Coop responded, "a he? It's a boy?" The nurse said, "oh, I didn't look actually. Nope. It's a girl!" Unfortunately, her blood sugar levels were way low which meant her temperature was dropping so they had to whisk her away to get her stable.

 As they sewed me up, I started to have problems with my legs from the epidural and got miserably nauseated, so they gave me an anti-nausea medicine, which I promptly had an allergic reaction to! Poor Cooper. The things I put him through. For the next hour plus, I thrashed and flailed around like one possessed without any ability to control my own head or arms. It was awful. And pretty freaky for Cooper to watch. But they had wonderfully competent doctors closely monitoring me and my blood pressure the whole time to make sure it didn't get worse, reassuring him that I would be okay. And eventually things calmed down and we were able to hold and fall in love with our baby girl. She is so worth the long struggle to get her here!

She's such a darling little peanut! So grateful she's here!

Almost looks like a smile already. She certainly has been wide-eyed from the beginning. Actually the very first thing they said about her was, wow! She has some serious lungs! And she does. It's not just a tiny newborn squeak, but a full-blown eagle screech. Followed by a snort. Rather ladylike. She's going to make sure she's heard over the noise at home! 

And speaking of home, we decided to leave just two days later to get home and introduce our little lovely to the rest of the gang. Because the flu is so bad here in ND, the hospital was on lockdown and nobody under 13 was allowed to visit. The girls were devastated. We skyped frequently so they could see her (hearing G say her name was about the cutest thing ever, and the second the video was up dude would be demanding to see her. Looks like they might like her!), but it's not the same. So as soon as we were given the okay, we checked out, bundled up, and drove on home!