I’m almost 7 months pregnant now, and I’m feeling pretty good. My belly is bigger than it was with my 1st daughter at 7 months- I was actually just starting to really show with my first daughter at this point. Because I’m bigger sooner, I’m already getting that wonderful lower back pain you get when you stand too long. It’s not a big deal though. My bigger issue is grasping the fact that I’m going to have a newborn here in January- 2 months. I feel guilty because I haven’t given this baby any of my “mental time,” since I’m so busy chasing around my 20-mth old. With the first I used to rub my belly and talk to her every night, I would play her tons of music on my ipod with the earbuds right on my belly, and my husband would play guitar and sing to my belly. This new baby actually has to remind me that I’m pregnant by kicking me in the middle of the night; otherwise, I forget. Panic is staring to set in though since we haven’t done ANYTHING to prepare for the baby. We have to switch rooms/furniture around, I have to decide which room my older daughter is going to be in, and I wanted to have her switched BEFORE the baby gets here since that will be enough of a change for her. Plus, I have to get her in a twin bed since the new baby is getting her crib. I found a used bed rail, but the bed still looks too tall to be safe for her (she’s not a good climber), so I think I’ll just put the box spring & mattress right on the floor. I’m nervous about how she’s going to adjust to a new bed and possibly new room. I’d love to have the room painted (which is now my husband’s office), but he’s being stubborn and won’t do it. If I wasn’t pregnant I’d paint it myself, but obviously I can’t do that. I don’t mind the color too much- it’s a dark gray-blue, but the walls themselves are in bad shape since you can see spackle marks and uneven bumps in the wall from when we first painted the room 5 years ago and had no clue what we’re doing. Oh well. We want to move a few months after the baby is here anyway.

As for music, my daughter LOVES it. Whenever I bring her to those free baby/toddler classes at the library, she dances and runs around the room like crazy whenever they sing or play music. As for my kind of music, my friend is attempting to get our favorite musician ever to play at my house- 2 weeks before my due date. Haha. The date is crazy, but it’s the only one that works out for us. The musician told her that he’ll play a private show for her since she helped him out on the past few tours, so she’s going to see if he can play at my house right after Christmas. The reason she wants my house is because she now lives out of state, and around Christmas she’ll be back in Jersey, and so will our other friend who’s a big fan and who also moved out of state. Plus, I can’t go too far in case I go into labor, so this was our idea. I don’t want to say who the artist is, just in case it doesn’t work out— or just in case it DOES work out and I’ll have strangers lined up at my house to see him. Haha. I’m not getting my hopes up, but it would be a REALLY cool thing to experience. Plus, my husband is dying to jam with him. If it actually happened, can you imagine how him coming to my house, along with my Nesting instinct (cleaning) from the new baby will make me a CRAZY woman? I won’t even want to be around myself! haha.

I’m 15 weeks along in my pregnancy now. I’m feeling good: no more nausea and not too tired. I do get shortness of breath sometimes, but it’s dealable. I’m still stuck with the current house, but I think I’m close to talking my husband into moving his big office to the smallest bedroom in the house, so that I can move my daughter into that room, and the future baby will go into my daughter’s current room. We’ll still be seriously short on closet space, but oh well. It could be a lot worse.

Lately, I’ve been wondering how exactly I’m going to manage a newborn with a 23-month old running around. Specifically, nursing. I know with “the Diva,” she nursed for like 45 minutes in the beginning, and then I had to start all over in 30-45 minutes. I was a constant feeding machine. How am I going to run around and chase my daughter and make sure she’s not getting into trouble while trying to nurse the newborn? I’m also trying to figure out the “gear” now. I think I’m going to use my daughter’s current crib for the baby (after a few months in a bassinet), and then I’ll have to move my daughter into a twin bed with rails. I didn’t want to do it at 23 months, but it just makes the most sense. And then potty training will probably have to start around then also. I really hate having all these changes for my daughter at once: new baby, new room, new bed, potty training. I worry that she’s going to feel like she was kicked out into the cold. She has sooo much attention from me now, and she’s definitely a “mama’s girl.”

As for music, my daughter LOVES it. She dances and claps whenever she hears music. Today I was playing a dvd of Jimmy Gnecco’s video “Mystery,” on the computer and she noticed and started swaying back and forth. Speaking of Jimmy/Ours, his new record label, Bright Antenna, has been streaming chat sessions with Jimmy, and they’re awesome! In fact, right now I’m watching a live concert of him playing at the Brooklyn Bowl show. I’m really loving the things this small label has been doing for him. It’s really a shame that the large labels he was with in the past didn’t give him the advertising or backing that he’s worth. At least he’s doing everything on his own terms now. And I mean everything- vocals, guitar, bass, drums, keyboard, producing, etc. I’m loving his solo album, “The Heart.” A big portion of the album was dedicated and/or influenced by the passing of his mom from lung cancer last year. I think the reason the album hits me so hard is because my dad was going through lung cancer the same time as his mom was, and they both died in November 2009. In a live recording from a past show, he talks about the meaning of the song “Bring You Home,” and how part of it is about putting his mom in the hospital even though she didn’t want to go. And how he wish he could bring her home, regardless of what the right thing to do is. I understand that struggle 100%. Before my dad was home on hospice, he was in a rehabilitation center for 2 or 3 months where nurses cared for him and tried to get him up and walking because he was so weak from cancer. He hated it there and once said to my mom, “I’m gonna die here aren’t I? They’re never gonna let me go home.” That was so hard to here. So whenever I hear Jimmy’s song, it hits a note. A deep, harmonic minor note.

I had the big appointment today at the OBGYN to determine if my pregnancy is “viable” or not. Before my appointment I went to the gym to de-stress and kick up my happy endorphins. I hate when you go to the doctor’s office and they call you in right away, and you get undressed, but then you sit there FOREVER- naked, cold, & bored. At least there’s magazines in the waiting room. Well, that’s what happened this time. Because I was nervous to begin with, sitting there doing nothing made it worse. So I started to visualize seeing a heartbeat on the ultrasound monitor, and even tapped the machine and said, “show me good things!” My nervousness was getting the best of me though, so I finally just laid down and sang the song “Dizzy” in my head from the band Ours. That song always does the trick–I was relaxed and happy. The doctor who I like came in and said my blood work from last week looked good, so he’s going to do the ultrasound which will be the final determining factor–I guess the factor of whether it’s a miscarriage or not. I noticed he didn’t turn the monitor towards me in order for me to see the results immediately, which I was grateful for, because I didn’t want to look. He then turned it towards me and said, “We have a baby, and a heartbeat.”  Yay!! I was ecstatic, but as usual I played it off like I didn’t care and said calmly, “oh good.” Inside I was freaking out though! He said I have to get a Dating Ultrasound to determine my due date, since I’m “sizing small,” based on my last menstrual date, but we both acknowledged that it’s because I have a crazy cycle, so I know I got pregnant later than a normal cycle would.

As for my pregnancy symptoms this time around, I do get morning sickness (and evening sickness), but as with my last pregnancy, it’s not too bad. At least not enough that I vomit. I only get nauseous, especially if I have an empty stomach, so once I eat it goes away. I have a “beautiful” pregnancy mask. Ugh. Actually that was one of the reasons I took a pregnancy test to begin with. Nothing like looking like a freak to tell the world you’re pregnant! Haha. I have killer sinus headaches that make me miserable. The other day at the food store I actually had about 10 minutes of blurred vision, which freaked me out a little bit, but once I went outside it was fine (followed by a terrible sinus headache). My blood pressure is really good though, so the doctor said no biggie. I’m already urinating a lot and already have a belly, which is crazy to me. It must be bloating since I think I’m only about 7 1/2 weeks, but it’s weird since I didn’t show at all until I was about 5 months pregnant last time. They say it happens with 2nd pregnancies though. One symptom I DON’T have, which made me nervous about going into this appointment, is breast pain. With my last pregnancy, it was the most obvious symptom to me…but with this one, I have none at all. That’s fine by me. I told my husband the good news, and I started “telling” my 15-month old daughter by pointing to my belly and saying, “there’s a baby in there.” Hopefully she doesn’t start saying the word “baby” and repeating it to her grandparents because I don’t plan on telling them yet.

Well, the Diva still isn’t walking yet. She’s 14 months old now, almost 15, and a week ago she actually let go by herself and took 6 or 7 steps, but now we’re back to just maybe 2 steps, if I let go of her hands. She can stand on her own for a good amount of time before toppling over though. It’s a little inconvenient that she’s not walking yet, because she’s REALLY heavy. I don’t know her exact weight (we go to the doctor next week), but I think when I checked a month or 2 ago she was 26 pounds. So my back is killing me from carrying her everywhere. I’m still calling her a baby until she walks. Once she walks, then I’ll call her a toddler. Towards the end of 13 months old, she started to blow kisses which is adorable. Around the same time, I dropped her to just one nursing session a day- right when she wakes up in the morning. And I’m very proud to say that 3 days ago, I weaned her for good! I was waiting for a good day to do it, and the other day she actually woke up in a good mood without screaming, so I figured it was the perfect time. I distracted her with some books, and she actually forgot about nursing. The next day I wasn’t so lucky. She had a major FIT. She screamed these really intense guttural sounds, kind of like she was growling, for a good 15 minutes straight, and she kept bucking around while lying on her back. I tried giving her a cup of milk and reading her a book, but she just pushed them away. Finally when she lost some steam, she sat there quietly and listened to me read to her and drank her milk. Today she woke up happy again and seemed to forget all about nursing, so YAY!

One of my favorite things she started doing at 14 months old was pointing out most of her body parts when asked: head, nose, ears, eyes, mouth, lips, hair, fingers, thumb, hand, arms, feet, legs, toes, back, and my favorites–belly button and tongue. Nothing cuter than her sticking her tongue out and going “mmmm” to show me. Yeah, that will get old when she’s a bratty little 7 year old sticking her tongue out at me and I scold her for it. Haha. She seems to understand a lot of words, but in terms of saying them, “ba” is a ball and a balloon. “Da” is dad, duck, and dog. That’s about it. But if I say a word, she usually can point it out.

She still loves music and will push buttons on her musical toys and will sway from side to side and clap her hands when she hears it. She’ll also start dancing in her car seat when she hears music. She is now tall enough to reach the keys on my piano, so I leave it open so she can walk over (technically, creep over) and play whenever she wants. She always gets a big smile when she realizes that she’s the one making the noises on the piano.

A few months ago I joined a Young Mom’s Group, and I really love it. It’s so nice to get advice, support, and adult company every now and then. Plus, I think it really helped my daughter with the separation anxiety she had in the past. She loves seeing other kids now and even if I’m taking her for a walk in the stroller, if she sees another child pass us, she’ll start waving and smiling at them. Overall she plays really well with the other kids. Sometimes she’ll hit instead of just touching, so we’re working on “gentle.” She’ll do “gentle” for a second and then back to hitting. In time, right?

Lately I’ve been going through major music/concert withdrawal. One of my best friends who moved away temporarily, will be going to a Jimmy Gnecco show next week in Austin, Texas and I wish I was with her. I’m dying for some live Jimmy right now. I’ve read his most recent diary post on his website (www.jimmygnecco.com) and he said he’s been dealing with a lot of stuff recently, and listed one of those items as his mom passing away. I knew about it already, but him saying it out loud made me think of how I’ve been really thinking about my dad a lot lately also. I really wish he could have seen my daughter (”The Diva”) crawl, cruise, & babble away like she does now. Both my dad and Jimmy’s mom died from lung cancer in November 2009. He did a benefit show awhile back to raise money for her health bills, and at a show before that, we talked a little about dealing with seeing our parents with cancer, and how much is sucks. Anyway, all that makes me feel closer to his music right now, so I’ve been listening to a lot of his solo music and Ours. I also have been addicted to a song from Lukas Rossi’s “Unreleased Demos” album, “Wherever You’re Going.” That song hits me like a brick wall and feels like he wrote it through my eyes, or hand rather. It deals with cancer, so don’t listen to it unless you want to bawl or are into that sort of thing. I’m drawn to dark, depressing stuff, so I love it. I’d love to know who inspired that song for him.

I can’t believe my daughter is already 13 months old. Craziness. At 12 months she started cruising, and can now walk “along the wall” by pressing up against it, kind of like a cop in a movie who goes outside the window of a 20-story building to try and talk a “jumper” out of jumping. You know how he presses against the wall for dear life? Yeah, that’s what she does. As for feeding, I was nursing her 3x a day, and planned to stop breastfeeding when she turned 12 months, but we’re a little delayed, which is fine. The trouble was that she would not drink cow’s milk. She spit it out and refused to open her mouth for the cup. Finally this week, after a suggestion from a friend, I mixed in some yogurt or Gerber Yogurt-Juice with the whole milk and now she drinks it. I’m thrilled because I was able to cut out her mid-day nursing and replace it with cow’s milk. So now I just nurse her when she wakes up, and right before bed. I hear these last 2 can be a pain to wean children from, so we’ll see how that goes. Once she’s off of breast milk/nursing for good, I can’t wait to drop her off at her grandma’s house to spend the night! Haha..does that sound horrible? I can’t imagine being able to sleep in, but it sounds wonderful. Today I was playing the piano and she cruised right over and started hitting the keys, so I put her on my lap and we played together. She lasted a good 5 minutes before she kept trying to tear down my sheet music. Oh well. She has a longer attention span for guitar. She loves to pluck the strings and she hasn’t broke any yet, so that’s a plus. I still think she’ll wind up a drummer though. It’s always hard to find a drummer, so we’d be thrilled.

My daughter “the diva” is now 11 months old, but she’ll be turning 1 in three days. About a week after she turned 11 months, she started to do a real crawl! I was thrilled because most of the other babies I’ve seen were crawling at like 8 months old. She can’t pull herself fully up to a standing position, but she goes to the tippy tops of her knees and then she get frustrated since she can’t get up any further. Sometimes I give her a little boost and she can pull herself up from that point. She now opens & closes her hands, and can also put her hands on her head. Today I looked in her mouth and the poor thing has 4 molars coming in, and 2 incisor teeth. No wonder she’s been super cranky this week. We go to the doctor for her 1-year checkup/shots ON her birthday. Good thing she won’t know it’s her birthday because I feel bad about her having to get shots then.

As for music, she still loves to sway and sing along when her dad plays guitar for her. It’s funny because my husband and I will harmonize on a song and hold the note, and she will belt out a flat note REALLY loudly and makes us crack up. A few weeks ago I was cleaning the floor, so I decided to play some music to help me deal with the chore. I was playing Nine Inch Nails (NIN) and the song “Hurt” came on. “The Diva” was playing with her toys on a mat, and about 10 seconds after Trent Reznor stars singing, she started humming and then singing really loudly. I was surprised because “Hurt” isn’t the kind of song with a strong beat or rhythm, at least in the beginning, and the vocals aren’t high pitched or upbeat. Then I remembered that this child has been hearing the band Ours and other melancholy music her entire life, so why wouldn’t she respond to that sort of music. Haha.

Since her 1st birthday is on February 8th, we were going to have her very first party this Saturday, the 6th. We never throw parties so this is a big deal. I bought all kinds of decorations, I bought lots of food for cooking & baking, I was going to order a pretzel tray, an ice cream cake, and we were going to have just family over, so we were expecting 17 people. Well, as any of you who live in the North East know, it’s freakin’ snowing out as I type this. Let me rephrase that. It’s a blizzard outside! We’re expecting about 12 inches of snow, and all of the people who were supposed to come to the party live about an hour away, and many of them won’t drive even if it’s only 5 inches of snow. I was going back and forth like crazy yesterday trying to decide if I should cancel it or not, because I never trust the forecasts. But it looks like this is definitely going to be a bad one, so I had to cancel it. I rescheduled it for the following Saturday instead, but because it’s last minute and Valentine’s Day weekend, 4 or 5 of the people can’t come to the party now. I’m annoyed with Mother Nature because I bought all this food to make like 2 big ziti’s among other things, and now I don’t need that much. Plus I’ll probably have to buy new produce since that stuff goes bad so quickly. I also heard that we might get snow next wknd also. If that happens, I’m just going to have her party anyway, and whoever shows up, shows up. Even if it’s just us three and maybe I’ll invite the neighbors to help eat the food. I’m not good with change and love consistency, so whenever this last minute stuff comes up it drives me insane. I feel bad for my little girl, but I know that 1 year olds have no clue what’s going on anyway. Hopefully having snow on her birthday doesn’t become a pattern, like that one little girl I saw in the news who is 3 or 4 years old and has never had a birthday party because EVERY one of them has been canceled due to snow. Poor kid.

One of the fun new things that my daughter started doing at 10 months old was swaying side-to-side whenever she heard music playing- either someone singing it to her or hearing it on the radio/tv. Sadly, she even did this to the theme music of the Wendy Williams Show. Haha. Since I love music so much, it’s great to see her react to it. I was playing Bulls on Parade by Rage Against The Machine in the the living room one day, and she actually surprised me when she started rocking back & forth to it. She’s also done this to Toxicity from System of a Down.

My daughter now knows the word “kiss” and whenever I say, “give kisses” she’ll give a kiss, which basically looks like she’s trying to eat your cheek. It’s adorable. She also can point and wave, and when she points at you she does this really serious look like you’re in trouble and she’s pointing at you to scold you.  I’m very happy to say that she’s finally starting to crawl, well kind of. She started “army crawling,” by crawling with her stomach on the ground. Hey, it gets her from point A to point B at least. I’m still blaming it on her huge size, being in the 95th percentile for height and weight. The girl has a belly dragging her down!

She had her first case of being sick–during the week of Christmas. (Or course, you know, when everyone is closed for the holidays.) She was running a fever, so I kept an eye on her, but she was eating and acting totally fine. But then in the early evening  her fever went up to 102.2 and she got really quiet (which is unlike her), so I gave her some Infant’s Tylenol and kept checking her temperature to make sure it went down, which it did. I was so scared though because I had no clue what “too high” is for a baby, plus her normal temperature is lower than the average, so 102.2 was probably more like a 102.9. She cried a lot and was really tired so we put her to bed early. The next day (Christmas Day), she had a low fever of 100.5, but I gave her some Tylenol again because we were going to my mom’s house, and I didn’t want the baby to feel too awful. Well, 3 hours later she was perfectly fine and her fever went away and she became perky and really playful. I was glad her mystery fever only lasted 2-3 days. The next day I noticed she had a rash all over her neck, back, and chest. It looked like small red circles everywhere and when you pressed her red skin it became white for a second. She was acting normal and the rash didn’t seem to itch or bother her, so I checked the internet to do a little searching first, instead of calling the doctor. After researching, I’m pretty sure she had Roseola, which is also known as Sixth Disease. Apparently you are just supposed to wait it out, so I’m happy she didn’t have to get any prescriptions. The rash lasted 3 days, and then it disappeared. I think once you get it you aren’t supposed to get it again, so that’s one illness out of the way!

At nine months old, my daughter developed very strong stranger/separation anxiety from me. It wasn’t bad when I put her down for naps or bedtime, but it was impossible to deal with if I wanted to hand her off to someone else, like either of her grandmothers (and she liked both grandmothers). If I wasn’t in the room and they held her, she was fine. But if she saw me in the corner of her eye or if I just came home from being out, she would suddenly scream and reach for me, with full tears and pure hysteria. This made it really hard at Thanksgiving because relatives wanted to hold her, but she just wasn’t having any of it. I didn’t feel like dealing with the screaming, so I just held her the entire time..and my girl weighs just about 24 pounds. (This is why I weigh less now than before I was pregnant.)

She still isn’t crawling or pulling herself up, but she can drag herself on her belly, using just her arms. Good thing we have hardwood floors in the entire house. Maybe that’s why she isn’t crawling? Hurts her knees? Who knows. She started to clap, which is so adorable to see. Along with her nursery songs, I like to sing and clap to modern rock/alternative rock songs, and she follows my lead and claps also. Nothing like seeing a 9 month old baby girl with pudgy cheeks clapping to Muse’s “Hysteria” from the Absolution album. Priceless.

I’m still nursing her 4 times a day, and after 9 1/2 months of breastfeeding, my period came back. Lucky me. I was wondering when it was gonna show up again. When I first had my daughter, my intention was to become a Stay-At-Home-Mom (SAHM) for a year, and then look for a job again. Now that she’s almost a year old, I’m not ready to put her into daycare with people I don’t know, and miss all her 1st milestones, especially because she’s a little late with a few. If I had a family member that could watch her all the time, I’d happily go get a job, but I don’t want to leave her with strangers, at least not quite yet. I have to sit down and look at the financial issues also and weigh the costs of daycare,  not working, and paying for private health insurance (which is what I do now). Sometimes I feel like I do want to work again because I miss having the extra money, and I miss having a life. Yes, I’m a mom now, which is a life, but I miss parts of my old life, like feeling successful and productive, and going out with the girls after work for a margarita every now and then. Maybe that day will come again, like when my daughter is older and I don’t have to be home right away, but when that time comes I might have another baby at home by then. -SIGH- Do you ever wish that sometimes someone would just make up your mind for you because making decisions can be so stressful.

My daughter had 2 more teeth cut through at 8 months old, bringing the total to 6. To get her to open her mouth so I can see them all, I like to sing to her while she’s on the diaper changing table (she always sings when I sing and opens her mouth wide while doing it). I tested out Bohemian Rhapsody on her, and she cracked up at the up-tempo part. Probably because I looked & sounded funny doing it since I did all the different pitches and accents. She also finally started to roll from her back to belly, so she could now roll fully around like a steamroller- meaning I had to watch her like a hawk from now on if she was on my bed because she could easily roll off. She once was sitting up on the couch next to me playing with a toy and I leaned in the opposite direction to pick a different toy up from the ground, and when I sat up and turned towards her I saw her leaning forward off the couch about to fall. She did fall. She dropped her toy off the couch and leaned forward to get it and winded up doing a somersault, but her head hit the hardwood floor as she tumbled over. It was slow motion to me and I couldn’t get there fast enough, and the thud is etched into my memory. Then I panicked hoping she’d laugh or something, but instead she did that silent scream with her mouth open, where it’s building and building and she’s turning red and you’re dreading the end result of all that energy. She screamed so loud and my heart truly broke. I became _that_ mom who dropped my child on the head– the one that we all have jokingly accused our own mothers of being at one time or another. “Why can’t I think straight mom? Did you drop me on the head when I was a baby?” Only I actually did let my baby fall on her head! She didn’t cry very long, actually not long at all, and she didn’t get a bump or bruise, but I kept an eye on her the rest of that week to be safe. I really felt horrible. I remember a few years ago my friend told me her baby rolled off the changing table while she turned the other way, but she luckily had a pile of laundry on the floor that he fell into. I hate my hardwood floors.

About 2 weeks after the falling incident, I noticed that my daughter started to tilt her head to the right. It was a constant head tilt and it was especially noticeable when she was sitting in the highchair. At first I thought it was just a preference, and that she just liked to lean to the side of the highchair to be comfortable, but then I noticed that her head was cocked to the side even when she was sitting on the floor with nothing supporting her.  I thought maybe she just slept on it wrong or pulled a muscle. After about 7 days it went away, but then a week after that it came back again, only this time it was REALLY tilted and looked really odd. It was like her right ear was almost touching her right shoulder all the time. We called the doctor to get her looked at, because I figured she must have an ear infection or a muscle pull or something. I also looked online before going, and I read that it could also be Torticollis, which is basically when one side of the neck muscle is tighter than the other, so you have to do physical therapy to help fix it.

We go to the Pediatrician and he says he’s not sure what it is because of how it went away & then came back again, and he called another Pediatrician in to get her opinion also. She said she doesn’t think it’s Torticollis or a muscle pull and they both said we should go to the hospital to have my 8 month old baby get a CAT scan because it could be a brain tumor. A freakin’ what??? I thought this was going to be a quick visit to the doctor to get some ear drops or neck stretching exercises, and now my poor little baby has to get a CAT scan to see if she has a tumor? My husband and I were freaking out, and on top of that, the Dr. said we have to go to this special hospital where they can put her to sleep so they can do the scan. At the children’s hospital the doctor there said he thinks it IS Torticollis, but he’s going to have the scan done anyway since the Pediatrician wants it done. It turns out they didn’t have to put her to sleep for it, which I was very thankful for, so they rolled up all these towels to try to prevent her from moving too much. Halfway through she started screaming and moving, but I guess they got enough of what they needed because they didn’t say anything. We waited for a full hour in the hospital room for the results, but it was worth the wait because they said she’s fine and there were no tumors on her brain. I felt SUCH relief! I think I even cried a little. I still feel horrible that she had to get all that radiation from a CAT scan at such a young age, but I guess the doctors figured that it was worth it. I just hope that it doesn’t affect anything with her in the future.

They determined that it was Torticollis and that she’d probably have to get some physical therapy done to stretch out her neck muscle. My husband and I looked online and found some specific stretches that are supposed to help with the condition, so we did them for about a week. Well, her next doctor’s appointment for her regular 9-month old checkup was a week after that, and by then her neck was fine. In fact, the doctor said that she looked fine and she probably won’t need any therapy. I don’t know if her rolling off the couch caused it, or if it was a mild case of Torticollis that didn’t show up until she was 8 months old, but I’m glad that issue is over with. I was really scared having to bring my baby to the hospital, especially for a CAT scan, but many parents tell me that this is only the first case of many “scares” that come with being a parent.

Even though I was given the ‘ok’ from the pediatrician to start my daughter on rice cereal at 4 months old, I didn’t start her on it until she was 5 1/2 months old. I didn’t want to rush things and I read a lot of information that said you should actually wait until they’re 6 months old. I knew she was ready because whenever I ate my own cereal in the morning she would stare me down and open & close her mouth like a fish. I’ve heard that the first time you try to give your baby solids, expect it to go bad, so I braced myself for the tight lips, the crying, and the pushing away. Surprisingly, she LOVED it. She gave me a big smile on the very first spoonful, and she ate the entire serving. Finally, something that went nice and easy for me. She’s definitely a good eater, just like her mama. Only instead of cheesecake, chocolate, and ice cream, she likes to dive into sweet potatoes, peas, even prunes. I still haven’t found anything she doesn’t like. Actually, I once tried to give her a spoonful of the jarred Beef & Broth, and she made the biggest grimace ever. I tasted the stuff and I didn’t blame her. It looked and tasted like cat food so I threw it out. She prefers my homemade Turkey Sloppy Joe’s anyway (I have a great recipe btw..if you ever want it just email/leave me a comment).

At the end of 5 months she finally started to roll over from belly to back, to the right. Other kids were rolling in both directions and their parents loved to tell me about it and ask about my daughter’s progress. As a first time mom, it really is hard not to compare your kids to other kids because you want to know what “normal” is, whatever that means, so I did my best to fight the urge. I think my favorite part about 5 months old was that she finally started to sleep longer stretches at night, and I only had to nurse her once through the night, usually around 2:00 a.m. This gave her a 5 hour stretch of sleeping since she usually went to bed at 9:00 p.m., and I’m told that 5 hours is considered “sleeping through the night” (STTN) for a baby. It is amazing what sleep can do for you when you haven’t had it in sooo long.

As for music, my husband and I constantly would make up songs for her. He would write his own songs and play them on the guitar for her, usually acoustic, and I would usually make up little jingles on the spot. She really loved to hear “her” songs, as in the songs we made up that have her name in the song. Whenever she would hear them she’d get really excited and if she was in her bouncy chair she’d start rocking it like crazy. She was now in a period where she was crying less so I didn’t have to resort to singing constantly to calm her, but I still did anyway. I tried out some Jeff Buckley on her for the first time, by starting with “Hallelujah” (of course). She got really quiet and stared at me during most of the song. Then I played “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over” and sang along with it to her (Damn, I love this song). I actually got a smile out of her during it; can you blame her? Haha. Beautiful song. Ah, Jeff. R.I.P. Whenever I would drive anywhere with her I would carefully select a cd to play for her. I usually stuck with softer, “art rock,” but every now and then I’d throw in some Rage Against The Machine. She didn’t seem to react to that either way. I’m curious to see what her music preferences will be as a toddler and if she really will like alternative rock as much as nursery rhymes. I shall have to wait and see.