The Ashlan show: Standing, more crawling, and big appetite!!

It seems like I just did the blog yesterday even though it was a week ago! Time is going by so fast lately, well, as always, I guess! We were busy last week. We went to the beach one day and then the pool another day with friends and then Dan had off so we did some errands and such during the weekend.

Ashlan was pretty cranky when we got to the beach because she only slept for 5 min on the way when that was her scheduled nap time. I have no idea why she couldn’t sleep but she snapped out of the crankiness pretty quickly when we got there. She didn’t want put down in the sand or ocean at first. Then once she saw the 11 month old crawl in the sand, she wanted down! They played together for awhile and then Ashlan decided she wanted to eat the sand! I tried to be so quick but she was too fast. She didn’t get a handful, just a finger’s worth but I put her binky in her mouth after that and she would just play with it instead of try to taste it, thankfully!

Most of the time we spend at home is spent chasing after her now. She is so quick to do things like crawl, pull herself up on the couch, getting down, etc. She even sometimes pushes her highchair around the kitchen tile! She is just so fast now, especially when she wants something! Or if we tell her we’re coming after her, she starts crawling faster and giggles. We have been using babylegs on her so her legs don’t get scratched up since she likes to crawl on the tile…without knowing it, she is dusting my floors in the process of crawling, lol!

She started standing in her crib on August 9th, which was the day after I did the last blog entry. She is also starting to stand without holding onto anything. For instance, she’ll have pulled up on the couch and grab something like the remote with both hands and stand straight back up with the remote in both hands, not using the couch to even lean on! Frequently, we also see her (while she's crawling) arch her body like a pyramid without her knees on the ground, like she wants to stand herself up. This seems to all have happened in the last two weeks.

And she has a BIG appetite! She has been eating a ton…she nurses 5-6 times a day now, and has two regular meals plus snacks. Her meals are something like a half of banana in the morning and chicken and broccoli or pasta in the afternoon. Then at night she gets about 5-6 oz of breastmilk in a bottle plus 7 tbsp of oatmeal. Plus, in between she is getting snacks of Puffs, yogurt bites, or mum mums or a combination of the above. I just can’t believe her appetite! I took pictures of what her plates look like and she always polishes everything off her plate. I have to say she is pretty independent though. She will allow me to feed her the banana with a fork (she started using the fork a few days ago- us feeding her, not her feeding herself!) but when I tried to feed her the chicken and broccoli, she started getting very cranky. I knew she was probably hungry but I didn’t know why she didn’t want to eat off the fork. Then I thought maybe she wanted to feed herself since she’s used to it, and sure enough, that’s what she wanted! I happened to be skyping with my mom then so she got to witness this. She also has been pushing me away when I try to kiss her though that has been going on for awhile. My mom said I did the same thing…I just wasn’t prepared for it to happen this soon!

We had to move the exersaucer up another notch. It is on the final one and though she doesn’t use it all that often anymore since she’d rather be crawling and getting into everything, it’s still nice to use if I need her to stay put for a bit. I also use the high chair too when she’s having snacks so I can do dishes and things around the kitchen but the exersaucer works well when we’re not in the kitchen.

And lastly, she was eating Puffs a few days ago and was down to her final few on her tray. I was making faces at her and “eating” her feet and hands while she was putting the Puffs in her mouth and chewing and smiling. She then picked up a Puff and offered it to me, which I stuck out my tongue half jokingly, thinking she’d never place it on my tongue but she did! I still thought it was a fluke. Well, she then picked up another one and gave it to me the same way too! I hope this is her learning to share but more likely, she was probably just full!

Dan "helping" Ashlan build a castle. :)

Dan's amazing abilities! I think he has more fun than her!

Eating diced apples

Ashlan is getting too big!

Play time with Daddy. She's definitely turning into a Daddy's girl!

Here we were at the beach.

Give her snacks and a drink and she is good to go even though it was in the 90s!

I don't know if you can see it, but there is a bruise on her forehead from falling in her crib when she stood and fell down. Now she does it so she falls straight backwards on her bum.

My little piggy! Eating a mum mum with one hand and drinking with the other, lol!

After she started standing, we purchased a crib rail guard so she can't chew on the wood since it's a convertible crib and she'll be using the bed for a very long time, hopefully!

Cruising the furniture.

She pulls up on the glass a lot. I have soooo many little handprints on the glass! :)

Here she is getting her knees off the ground, though it's hard to tell here. I don't know exactly what she's doing but she does it so often!

She would definitely rather be on the outside than inside!

Watching Daddy do yardwork. It was so cute, she could see him mowing and would get a big smile on her face when he would take a break and wave to her.