The rest of the long weekend

What a fun Labor Day weekend.

• 2 cookouts
• 1 party to celebrate an old friend who was in town
  
• 2 trips to Stone Mountain
• 1 race
• some Chick-fil-a sandwiches (exactly how many I'd rather not say)

I ran my first race with Mary Lawton in her stroller. I talked my friend Heather into running, too. I started in the back (good stroller race etiquette) but nearly lost my mind because everyone in the back was walking. It took me a couple of minutes to get out of that mess. We still finished ok in under 30 min.

Can we start running now?

Labor Day cookout. Mary Lawton had a blast. Here she is playing with our neighbor Jeff.

New favorite toy

Empty cereal box
Hours of cheap fun. It makes a noise when you bang on it. It's covered in colorful pictures. It slides on the carpet when you push it.

How much do I love my husband?

This much:

(Check out that passing arm!)
Don't worry--next week she'll be wearing her Gamecock outfit.

The start of a long weekend

I took today off work. Actually, today I took a "floating holiday," because we are being furloughed on Labor Day. Thanks, Sonny Perdue.

Anyway, Mary Lawton and I have had a wonderful day so far. We ran around Stone Mountain, went to Target and the farmer's market, and Mary Lawton did a lot of exploring. She's a really fast scooter now.


Mom, I'm gonna get you!


Taking a break to examine the carpet fringe

Heartbreaking

Today is day 1 at the new daycare. I just visited Mary Lawton. I honestly thought that at 6 months old she might wonder about this new place but not mind the change too much. Wrong. She's never acted so excited to see me. She was practically breathless, squealing, grabbing on to me, hands all in my hair, looking at me like, "why am I here, and where have you been, and where are the people I know?" It was heartbreaking. The mommy guilt is nearly overwhelming at this moment, so I'd better stop before the crying starts.

Dinner

Carrot/sweet potato medley, oatmeal, zucchini (first time with zucchini)

Happy eater.

How old are they when they learn to clean up?

Her favorite game now is pulling all the toys off the shelves. And then playing with something like her sun hat.

New daycare

Today I met with the lead teacher in what will be Mary Lawton's new daycare. I work in higher ed, and the campus runs two daycares out of the College of Education. She was on the waiting list for both, and of course we enrolled her in the first center with an opening, which is where she is now.

Well, her name came up on the other one last week. The 2 centers are supposed to be of equal quality of course, but no one really thinks they are. Mary Lawton has been in the not-as-good one. The new center is larger, so there is the potential for more children in her class. The new center seems much more structured, and the workers seem more professional. Sometimes her current daycare is a little too relaxed for me...like when I have to go looking for her teacher every morning because she's visiting with the teachers in the other classrooms.

The meeting was great, the teachers are great, the room is gorgeous, and the children there were so happy. But, I still cried in the bathroom stall when I got back to my office. It's still daycare.

oh well. Wish us luck. She starts on Tuesday. The upside: It's even closer to my office than the other place--about 2 blocks away.

6 months old

We blinked, and our girl is half a year old. Each month gets a little more fun. The theme for this month has been Adventures in Food. Mary Lawton eats:

• rice cereal
• oatmeal
• peas
• sweet potatoes
• carrots
• avocado
  
• bananas (in the mesh feeder)
  

and has tried honeydew (mesh feeder) and apples. She eats rice cereal for breakfast every morning at daycare and for dinner eats oatmeal and a couple of veggies. Except for when we were on vacation and the cereals, I've been making her food. It's been easy and has worked out well. I have bags of frozen scoops of food in the freezer and take out and thaw whatever she's going to eat.

One night she fell asleep in her highchair. Her eyes were half-closed, yet she kept opening her mouth for more. Finally, she gave in.

One night she realized she could eat her dessert banana and play at the same time. Why stop eating or playing when you can multitask?

Now that she can scoot around pretty well, she's begun exploring more and more. Nothing is off limits (in her mind). She is very happy. Strangers comment on how happy and smiley she is. She loves to watch people. We went to the aquarium again recently thinking she might enjoy watching the fish more than she did last time. She watched them a little, but she was much more into the people-watching.
She loves peek-a-boo and chewing on all her toys. She seems to have become ticklish. I was scrubbing her feet one night and she was laughing hysterically. Sweet LJ was tickling her belly and got the same reaction.

At her 6 months' appointment she was 14 lbs, 15.5 oz. (so let's just say 15 lbs.), and 26.5 inches long. Still long and lean and healthy all around. The vaccinations were very traumatic for all of us and resulted in a very long night, so we are considering spacing out the 9 months vaccines. It was too much and a little scary.

Love you, little chicken.

Vaca day 7

On Friday we prepared to go home and took a big, family nap. Sweet LJ basked in the glow of victory.
Our trip home on Saturday was uneventful and pretty quick. Mary Lawton did great.

We're so grateful to have such a generous aunt and uncle to take us on this great trip. Thanks so much, Bruce and Jan. We had a blast.

Vaca day 6

We had a lot of pool time on Thursday afternoon. I think there were also tug-o-war and relay races on Thursday, but I supervised naptime instead. I got to see tug-o-war from the balcony. It just looked painful.

The culminating decathlon event was a karaoke contest, complete with a karaoke DJ who claimed he is "the best karaoke DJ in the state of Florida." The numbers included:

Padaddy: Annie's Song/John Denver
Philip: Signs/Five Man Electrical Band
Emily and Olivia: Part of Your World/The Little Mermaid
Jan: Believe/Cher (in full Cher costume)
Kent and Heath: We Are the Champions/Queen
Bruce: Some Garth Brooks song/Garth Brooks
Andrew and Jason: Man of Constant Sorrow/Soggy Bottom Boys (in Soggy Bottom beards)
Kenny: Proud to be an American/Lee Greenwood
Carrie and Nikki: Bohemian Rhapsody/Queen
And me and Sweet LJ: Keep Your Hands to Yourself/The Georgia Satellites

Alisa, Biffy, and Kit judged. The criteria were entertainment value and actual singing ability. After about 10 minutes of deliberation, the judges announced the winners: Sweet LJ and me!!! I can't tell you how glorious and sweet this victory was. The win put Sweet LJ on top in the points contest, and he won the decathlon.

The quality of these pictures isn't so good. I think my sister was rocking so hard she had trouble with the camera.

Vaca day 5

Mary Lawton was so wiped out after her late night at Crabby Bill's that she slept in.

I was on the winning wiffle ball team on Wednesday. I like to think I won us the game, but I think all I did was catch one out.

Wednesday night we went to dinner at The Columbia, a fabulous Spanish restaurant. It was amazing--we had snacks and sangria on the deck and then a wonderful dinner.

Vaca day 4

Tuesday was another fun day. I missed the kickball game due to a sweet, sleeping baby, but I got a photo from the balcony. It was fun to watch. Sweet LJ was on the winning kickball team.
We ate dinner at Crabby Bill's. I love Crabby Bill's. Mary Lawton fell fast asleep after some carrots and milk.
After dinner we played family trivia. Each question was about a member of the family. Apparently, I made the questions too hard the last 2 years, because this year's organizers made the questions multiple choice. I still won.

Vaca day 3

On Monday of our vacation Mary Lawton played very hard in the pool again--so hard she fell asleep in Sissy's arms and slept that way for over an hour.
She missed the first event of the decathlon--the bellyflop contest. Ike won. No photo, but it was impressive.
Sweet LJ flopped. I was a little slow taking the picture, but here was his splash.

Liv also flopped. Good form.

Two years ago Sweet LJ and I brainstormed a competition consisting of 10 events and named it for my grandmother: The Jeanne A. Decathlon. Each event is worth points, and the person with the highest number of points at the end of all 10 events wins a trophy. The competition is fierce. My grandmother passed away last year, but she got to participate some that first year. She thought it was pretty cool.

Later that day was cornholing. Due to the number of people and time, we don't play actual cornholing rules. Each person gets 5 throws and 5 points for each beanbag in the hole. Susan won.
The sand was so blazing hot that the competition turned into how many people can fit under a standard beach umbrella.

Andrew showed up in style wearing Gail's hat.

Vaca day 2

On Sunday Mary Lawton had her first dip in the Gulf of Mexico. She was very observant watching birds and people go by, but didn't seem too impressed by the water and sand. She played in the pool for a long time then went in for a lunchtime nap. She had lots of fun swimming with her cousins. I wish I had some photos of them teaching her the backstroke and butterfly. They are so sweet and patient and LOVE her.

First time in the gulf

Poolside with Biffy

Poolside with Dad

Before we made it outside, Mary Lawton learned how to pull all of the paper towels off the roll.

Sunday night all 40 of us went for dinner at Ruth's Chris. Mary Lawton was passed around to lots of different people and didn't complain once. She ended up falling asleep in my arms, and then slept in her carseat until we left. This was the latest she has ever stayed out, I think. We left the restaurant at about 9 PM.

Biffy and Padaddy

Bruce and Jan

Heath, Sissy, Mary Lawton

Olivia and me

Vaca Day 1: The trip down

We left for sunny FL yesterday around 8 AMand got here in about 9 hours. Mary Lawton did pretty well. I ended up spending most of the trip in the backseat with her because she wanted OUT of her carseat and didn't understand why she couldn't roll around and play. We didn't have to stop too much more than we did pre-Mary Lawton. We did take our time at lunch to give her a chance to stretch and hang out outside of her cage (as Sweet LJ started calling her carseat).

We packed so much stuff that we barely had room for Mary Lawton.

Last night there was a pizza dinner for all the family already here, and they keep rolling in. Mary Lawton got lots of cuddling from her Biffy and Padaddy. Some of my dad's grandkids call him Grandpa and one calls him Granddaddy, so we think maybe Mary Lawton should try out Padaddy.