Tessa at 5 Months

It's hard to believe that at this time five months ago I was laying in the hospital, exhausted but too wound up to sleep after giving birth to Tessa!  She is at the height of cuteness right now.  You can't help but love a five month old.  They are so smiley and cuddly and alert and are always discovering something new.  For example, this weekend Tessa discovered that the dangly toy on her car seat can be pulled and that it vibrates as it retracts.

WHAT? HAVE YOU GUYS SEEN THIS?

She is at the height of baby dishevelment.  She has started pulling her socks off and putting them in her mouth.  Also, she drools so much that she is always wearing a bib and the bib is always sopping wet and under the bib her shirt is wet.  If she didn't wear a bib her shirt would have a drool ring down to her waist!  She has her two bottom teeth and I wonder when the next one will show up. 

 

Everything goes in her mouth which adds to the drool!

 

The precious baby days are flying by!  I wouldn't be surprised if she was crawling by this time next month!  She is starting to love baths, and is starting to sleep without her swaddle. Also, she is getting very vocal!  She squawks and talks constantly and is figuring out that being really loud is a way to get attention.  One morning I woke up to both her and Ben talking to each other in their rooms.  Ben was standing at the gate in his doorway and I heard him saying, "Good morning Tessa!  Mama sleeping!"  and she squawked back at him.  Very cute. 

 

In other news, I have a cold and am uncomfortable.  At least, now that I am not pregnant, I can take some real medicine (Hello Dayquil and Nyquil, my loves!).  However, as any parent knows there is hardly a worse job to do when you are sick because there is just no opportunity to get any extra sleep.  I would be in heaven if I could get, say, ten hours of sleep some time in the next few days but that will just not be happening. Especially since Tessa has taken up trying out her new vocal skills at odd hours of the night.  Last night I felt kind of lame sleeping instead of watching the "blood moon" eclipse and the moon was visible right outside the window by my bed and I told myself that if she woke up at night I would just use it as an opportunity to see the eclipse.  She woke up right after it ended at around 5:30!   I hope I can fight this off before the weekend and also I really hope that Ben and Tessa will dodge the bullet. 

 

Also, I know this is a Tessa oriented post, but I have to share some good news about Ben.  It is not a big deal but for me it is very exciting!  He had his two year doctor's appointment today.  It was month late because the doctor had a conflict and had to reschedule a few weeks worth of appointments in March.  I am so excited and relieved to say that he gained five pounds since his last appointment at 18 months and more than doubled his percentile!  This is such a relief to me after months (actually more like a year) of stress over his lack of interest in eating to the point where he would go days without eating.  He was gaining so slow for awhile and I was at the end of my rope.  I tried all the advice the internet had to offer about "offering healthy snacks, cutting back on liquids, don't give up and offer the same foods over and over until they eat (and then eventually throw away the food over and over again), they will eat when they are truly hungry (wrong, by the way, he didn't).  The appointment today took a huge weight off my shoulders.  Just in time for Tessa to start eating baby food in a month or two!