Lucky Number 7 Months

Our baby is turning into a little minx right before our very eyes! So much changes between 6 and 7 months, her personality really comes out. She's growing so fast. I don't know how much she weighs but she definitely feels more and more solid, which is good because exploring brings along bumps. I love her squishy, chunky little tighs, and her squishy little cheeks. She really is such a sweet, happy child. Oh, don't get me wrong, she can scream and screech like the best of them, but she usually has good reason for that (shame on us for leaving her in her jumper too long!).

She's not been doing so hot on in the sleep department lately. She's started waking up sometime between 10-12 and then again sometime beginning at 4, it varies. Usually the first wake up doesn't bother me because I'm still awake. I just go in and pick her up, cuddle her back to sleep, and we're good. I'd love for that to be the only wake up, but we still have the early morning ones to deal with. Oh well, she'll grow out of it eventually.

I'm still having my random night "terrors" about her being in the bed. Last night, I gave myself a little pep talk before falling asleep. "She is not going to be in the bed! You don't ever bring her to the bed in the middle of the night! She's not going to fall off the bed! You can do this Turner!" I actually think it might have worked. I don't any recollection of having a weird moment last night.

A week or so ago, I went on a big shopping trip. Spent way too much money in an attempt to revamp my style. It was tough because I've still got a belly that if you didn't know better would convince you I was rather pregnant. Boy, pregnancy does a number on your body! Well, that and a poor diet. I was/am pretty limited in what I can wear that doesn't accentuate my belly. However, I want to start making more of an effort. I'm pretty tired of my tee shirt habits, and I'm sure my husband people are tired of looking at shlumpy me. I certainly have plans to start a workout routine and lose some of this weight before I get pregnant again, but in the meantime I can still look good. I hope I wear everything I bought and make that effort!

Enough about me! On to...

Bonnie Brags

• She's gone from looking like she might want to crawl at 6 months, to full on "crap where's she going now!" It's definitely not safe to turn your back on her for very long. She has this funny little evil laugh she does when she gets into something that she normally wouldn't have access to, it's like she knows she's not supposed to have it.
• Oh, you thought crawling was an accomplishment?! HA, she's on to bigger and better things. She loves to stand up. For a while her fav was to crawl over to me and lift up her arms so I can grab her hands and pull her to standing. Well, she doesn't need my help anymore, any ol' object will do. I walked into her room at 5:30 this morning and she was standing up in her crib, facing the door, waiting for me.
• She has two little teeth on her bottom gums, the cutest thing to see when she smiles really big (which is often). However, it also makes kisses lethal. Nothing says love like two puncture wounds and a puddle of drool on your face/arm.
• As I mentioned above, she hasn't been sleeping perfectly but whenever I go into her room to get her, she wraps her arms around my neck and snuggles her head on my shoulder. Seriously, if I've gotta be up at all hours, this is definitely the kind of treatment I like. So snuggly cute!
• Her Grandma swears she can say "kitty cat". She's tried to film it for me as evidence, but no luck yet. It'd be truly tragic unfortunate if her first words are "kitty cat" considering we don't even own a cat. But, Johnathan and I did swear we heard her say "doggie" the other day. We could have been imagining things, but you never know!
• She has a jumperoo at Grandma's and a doorway jumper here at the house. So she's very proficient in jumping. If she's chillin out and not jumping all we have to say is, "bouncy bouncy bouncy" and she'll start jumping again. It also works when she's sitting in a shopping cart, she'll start bouncing in place. So cute!

"Excuse me while I put 'anything' in my mouth"

"I'm not so sure about this peekaboo thing!"

"Yeah that's right, I can stand and I'm good at it!"

Blurry, but such cute little puffed out cheeks

No doubt she has her eye on something she shouldn't have. Also, note the nap-head she has going on.

"I don't mind putting this in my mouth either. It's from Mexico!? Even better!"

Women Belong In the Kitchen! (or do they?)

Growing up various members of my family (mostly women) insisted that I needed to learn how to cook. Of course, it's the woman's responsibility to cook in a family. I was a girl (someday woman) ipso facto I had to be able to cook. The fact that my own mother didn't know how to cook when she got married didn't seem to matter. The fact that I grew up in a house with no mother and a father (man) who cooked also didn't matter.

Now, I'm no fool in the kitchen. I can do basic cooking. I know how to boil water, scramble eggs, make grilled cheese sandwiches, brown meat, etc etc. I am a master of cans and boxes, I have yet to find one that stumps me. I'm not sure if those rudimentary skills were what they were talking about, but at least I wasn't going to starve.

Lucky for me I grew up in a household where every penny counted so I was used to simple fare. In fact, I mostly preferred it. Fancy restaurants could suck it, give me Kraft Mac and Cheese (Kraft Dinner for my Canadian readers) any day! Therefore, my style of cooking  was just fine, in fact, it suited me. But a culinary queen I would never be.

But God was looking out for me and my future children. He knew how much I love to eat and saw fit to give me a mate that would feed that hunger, and feed it well. My husband is a fantastic cook chef, and actually loves doing it (in your face voices from the past!). Sometimes I beg him for simple fare and he looks at me with a "Girl Please!" look. He just can't leave well enough alone, always adding this and that to his food, experimenting like a good cook chef should.  I've always said that he's the dreamer in our relationship and I'm the rule follower. That's what makes him a good chef, and me a semi-good baker. Because with cooking, you shouldn't follow the rules and with baking you must. Don't we just make the perfect couple!?

Thanksgiving 2011 where he did most of the cooking. Hunky, no!?

The fact that he does most of the cooking means that I have the freedom of putting Bonnie to bed without having to worry about how I'm also going to get dinner on the table, he's got it covered. However, because of Bonnie, I've also started getting the culinary bug. I'm cool with Johnathan being the master purveyor of foods, but I also want to at least dabble a little. I want my children to be able to say, "My mom makes the best ______." Heck, I thought my Dad had invented Italian Chicken until I moved out into the real world and realized it's pretty common. But that doesn't change the fact that it was some darn good chicken!

Since Bonnie was born I've started my dabbling, to bake/make some things that are tasty treats. They're not something you'd make all the time, because they're certainly not good for you, but I'll have the lock down on tasty treats in this family! Also, they aren't that hard to make, because I do have a skill limit and I'm very aware of that. Oh and don't you worry your little heads about Grandma, I've given her pies and cobblers because she's great at it and I have no interest.

Below are some of my dabbles, underlined because these are what's going in the blank above:

Pumpkin Pie- I've been making this for years and it's the only pie I'll make, in deference to Grandma (or Grammy, or YaYa, we're not really sure what to call her yet).

Has a secret ingredient, and oh so tasty

Mascarpone-Stuffed French Toast with Salted Caramel-Banana Sauce

Butterscotch Scones

Chocolate Gravy- Because a childhood friend's mother always made this for us when I visited and who doesn't want to be the bomb diggity Mom who hops your children's friends up on sugar for breakfast and then sends them home to their mothers!?

Parmesan Risotto

Underwear, Unicorns, and Babies...oh my

When I was little I use to sleep walk. Sometimes it was simple: walking into the living room and telling my Dad that I was there to watch TV. Sometimes a more sordid affair: walking into the bathroom, taking off my underwear and putting it in the toilet. To the frightening: standing in the hallway outside my Dad and brothers rooms and screaming at the top of my lungs, "We're all gonna die!!!!!!"

Did you know that sleep walking is hereditary? I got my sleep walkers badge from my Grandmother. Did you know not to wake up a sleep walker? I know from personal experience that it's pretty traumatizing. To wake up from a dead sleep; to be in a place and situation you don't expect!? Tears and hysterics abound.

As I grew older, it changed. I didn't walk so much as talk. Over the last few years it manifested itself as middle of the night discussions/arguments with Johnathan.

Sleeping Me: We should really take the unicorn to the museum this weekend.
Sleepy Johnathan: What? Unicorn? You're crazy, not making sense, and you're sleeping
Indignant (sleepy) Me: I am too making sense! The unicorn! Don't tell me you don't remember the unicorn!? And I am so awake! I've been laying here thinking FOREVER!
Annoyed Johnathan: I just heard you snoring, you're not awake. Go to sleep.
Childish (grumbling) Me: Am so awake! *humph**roll over*

But here's the kicker, I would remember it all in the morning which isn't common for sleep walk/talking. The next day I would sheepishly apologize to Johnathan, and he would graciously tell me, "yeah, you were crazy." Touche.

Over the last few weeks, I've developed a new manifestation. Panicking and scrambling to keep Bonnie from either being crushed in the middle of the bed, or from falling off the bed. I'll see her shadow sitting up about to tumble, and I lunge grabbing and shaking Johnathan trying to catch her. Obviously this disturbs his sleep, because naturally any hysterical woman would disturb. The thing is, Bonnie hasn't slept in our room for at least a month so it's complete lunacy (see how I did that!? lunar. moon. night. sleep. crazy.). Aside from it bothering Johnathan, it bothers me. Who wants to have moments of panic every night? Certainly not I.

I'm sure it's because Bonnie is getting more and more mobile which means she has to be monitored more then she use to. I have a theory that every baby gets dropped at least once in their life, but we've been lucky that hasn't happened to Bonnie yet. It's "easy" to be nonchalant about dropped babies when it's not your own. Sure, sure, they're resilient, blah, blah. I know all that, it's just...it's MY BABY!

Have any of y'all gone through baby hallucinations? Or am I alone on this mattress!?