A Christmas Cold...

Katerina has her first real cold. She had one back in October, but that was just the sniffles, this is a real COLD: runny nose, cough, tearing eyes, etc. Because she's congested, it has been difficult for her to sleep, and consequently her parents are not getting too much sleep either.

Mike also has a cold and this morning I woke up with a scratchy throat. It's probably only a matter of time.

Katerina has been pretty miserable too, especially when she first wakes up. I feel so bad for her. In order to keep her content she needs lots of distractions. Well at 5:45am in the morning, after having been up with her just a hour before, I decided I needed some coffee first, so I broke down and put on the Baby Einstein DVD. Katerina layed on the bobby quite contently for a good 15 minutes--bless that DVD. I figure when you're sick, the no TV rules get thrown out! :)

Celebrating the Holiday Season

The last couple of weeks we have truly enjoyed the holiday season. Last weekend we went to pick out our Christmas tree. It was a 30 degree day, but the sun was out. Katerina seemed to enjoy herself. We found out tree fairly quickly, and as we did, it started to snow...it was picturesque!

Then, we were at a holiday party at church this evening and Katerina met Santa Claus. Everyone was wondering if she would cry--but she didn't. In fact she was completely intrigued by him.

Finally, the last two nights after Katerina went to bed, Mike and I made cookies. Next year, Katerina will join us...I can't wait.

7 months old!

I can't believe Katerina is seven months old. She is becoming such a little person! And she never stays still...I tried several times to take a picture of her and Mickey ...and this is what I got.

Here is an update on her recent milestones.

She has a tooth that is almost completely in, and a second one on the way.

She does an "army crawl" to get a toy she really wants. She can also crawls sideways a few steps.

Her crying has become quite sophisticated. If you take a toy away from her she starts to cry. If you set her down and leave the room, she starts to cry. Ms. Heather from school said, "Welcome to the world of an older baby."

She ate some avocado for the first time the other day. I thought it was disgusting, but she loved it.

She has begun to improve her fine motor skills with the help of cheerios. Grandma gave her some during Thanksgiving, and so we've been practicing at home too. She doesn't get too many in her mouth yet, but she's learning.

Katerina can sit up by herself now. Occasionally she still falls backwards, but not too often.

Finally, she has discovered the wonder of hard surfaces. She loves to scooch over to the wood floor in the family room so that she can bang her hand on it over and over again. She also tries to do the same thing at daycare!

First Thanksgiving

Katerina celebrated her first Thanksgiving! She had a wonderful time visiting first with Yiayia and Papou and then Grandma and Papa Eddie and of course her uncles and aunts.

She even enjoyed some of the holiday meal--sweet potatoes, carrots, and green beans.

Over the holiday it also became obvious that she is teething! The poor thing has been in a bit of pain as she waits for the bottom tooth to poke its way through. Those teething toys really work, as does Motrin and baby oral gel. :)

It's now a week later and the tooth has poked through! It's pretty sharp, and only a little is showing at this point. It won't be long before it's fully in. Maybe she'll have two front teeth by Christmas.

Peas...Yukky

This weekend I made home-made baby food for the first time: sweet potatoes, pears, bananas, apples and peas! So far she has liked everything except peas. When I first gave her the peas, she made a face, held out her tongue then started gagging/coughing. It freaked me out, so I was ready to throw the peas out. Then Mike mixed the peas with some carrots...and well she ate it just fine. She was actually really hungry last night, and so we also brought out bananas and mixed peas with bananas. Yum!

Tonight she had sweet potatoes with a little peas mixed in. She'll get her greens some way!

6 months and counting

Katerina is a little over 6 months old now. Here is her monthly picture with Mickey. She is about the same size as he is now.

Yesterday at her doctor's appointment we learned she is 15 pounds 11 ounces and 27.5 inches long.

She is certainly not a little baby anymore. Below are some of her recent milestones.

• I think she will be crawling in a couple weeks--she gets up on all fours and rocks back and forth. She even moves her legs forward, but she doesn't quite understand how to balance and move her hands yet.


• She is sitting by herself for several seconds at a time.


• She is getting very strong too. It's difficult to hold her if she doesn't want to be held because she wiggles out of it.


• She is "talking" non-stop. She has "da da da da" down pat, and she is starting on her "mmms." The other day it sounded like she said "Hi"...Mike and I think that's going to be her first word because we say it so much.

This is such a fun age, because she is really starting to develop a personality. I can't believe its been 6 months already...where does the time go?

Katerina's Baptism

Last weekend was Katerina's Baptism. It was a beautiful weekend and we were blessed with the company of friends and family.

Katerina was very a good girl. I was nervous that stranger anxiety would set-in, but it didn't. She was a social butterfly most of the weekend--talking to people, showing off her skills, i.e. rolling, sticking her feet in her mouth and saying "Da da da da."

Katerina loved all the attention, but it certainly wore her out. She slept for awhile at the restaurant during lunch. Then, after cake and desserts as guests were leaving our house, she went down for another nap and slept for over two hours. Mike and I had to actually wake her up.


The Baptism ceremony was wonderful. Father Pat made it very relaxed.


Katerina began the ceremony wearing the gown that was hand-made for my mother, which I also wore. Katerina is the third generation to wear the gown. Then, after she was Baptized, she put on new clothes that her Nouno, Stratis bought for her in Greece. She looked so adorable!


She only cried once as she was being "dunked." The rest of the time she was fasinated by her dress, the people, or her shoes, which she kept tapping together.


She also did a great job taking communion for the first time, although she did dribble a little.


Strat, Katerina's Godfather, did an excellent job too in his role in performing the sacrament! We were thrilled to be able to honor Strat as Godfather and Meghan as the Witness for the ceremony. They both mean a great deal to us and we know that Katerina will have a special relationship with them.



It was a fun weekend spent with friends and family. Thanks everyone for making the trip to be with Katerina.

Happy Halloween

Katerina was a beautiful butterfly for Halloween! Yesterday there was a halloween party at school and all the babies dressed up! It was super cute. She actually liked her costume too. In this picture she is really getting into the character--do you see how she is sticking out her tongue?

Now, if you go to Katerina's blog you will notice she was dressed as a pumpkin today. That's because Mike and I couldn't agree on what she should be--sooo we compromised and she was both.

Either way, she was super cute.

On the Move (Almost)

We better start child proofing this house because Katerina is going to be on the move before we know it. She has mastered the "scooch" backward move. She can be in one corner of the room and before we know it, she has scooched backward to the other corner. She is also almost getting up on all fours too.

She's getting good at reaching for things too. Yesterday when she went down for a nap, I watched her spit out her binky, roll over, grab it and put it back in her mouth! This is such a fun age. She's doing something new every day.

Growth Spurt

Katerina is going through a growth spurt! We weighed her this morning and she's about 16 pounds. Some of her one piece 6 month outfits are also getting small. Instead of a pant outfit, she looks like she's wearing capris.

She's also been getting up some nights and appears to be starving. Then on Thursday night, Mike and I went out to an event and Meghan babysat. She dranked much more of a bottle than we had anticipated while we were gone and subsequently slept through the night!

She's still not too interested in table food though. She might take a few bites and then puts her lips tight together so nothing more can go in her mouth. She's also trying to hold the spoon and put it in her mouth herself. At first I thought it was cute and now I am realizing it's a bad habit to get into, unless I want these feeding episodes to take an hour.

We think she may be a lefty...although it may be too soon to tell, she always grabs the spoon with her left hand. Time will tell I guess.

Pumpkin Picking

The Christakis family went pumpkin picking earlier this week. It was a beautiful fall day and not too cold.

We each picked out our own pumpkin and of course took some pictures. Katerina is wearing a pumpkin hat in this picture.

We also picked out some corn stalks. Katerina really loved the corn stalks. In fact, in order to load them in the car, we had to put one of the back seats down and put the stalks through the trunk and back seat. We thought they were out of her reach, but within the 5 minute drive home she had managed to grab one of them and was playing with it!

Mastering Rolling Over

A week or so ago, Katerina rolled over for the first time. She has now mastered the task and rolls over every chance she gets. I think the days of sleeping on her back are also over. Last night when we went to check on her before going to bed, she had rolled over onto her tummy. This is a picture of her napping this morning.

However, she has only figured out how to roll over in one direction--when lying on her back she can only roll to the right. She tried very hard to roll to her left this morning as she really wanted a toy that was laying in that direction, but she couldn't quite get it. As a result she got very frustrated and started to cry. It was pretty cute.

The solid food adventure hasn't been very successful thus far. She gets pretty cranky after a few bites--which mostly end up on her chin. She continues to spit the food right out, which may actually tell us she isn't quite ready. We can continue to waste time, effort, food and laundry at this fruitless prusuit, or we may just wait another week and try again. We'll keep you posted.

5 Months and Rolling Over

Today is Katerina's 5 month birthday! See how big she's gotten in this picture?

Last night she rolled over from her back to her tummy for the first time. It was actually quite amusing how it happened. She went to bed at 7:30pm, and 2 hours later she started fussing. After a few minutes, Mike went up to try to give Katerina her binky, and he comes back down stairs about 30 seconds later laughing. "What's going on?" I asked. "I just watched her roll over," he said. I couldn't believe it...so I ran upstairs with him and sure enough, Katerina was fussing on her tummy in her crib. We just stood there smiling at each other for a bit, and then we finally rolled her back over. And so it begins...

Then this afternoon, she rolled over twice, but I missed it both times. Tomorrow I might set the video camera up so I don't miss it. If I catch her in action, I'll be sure to share it with you.

Solid Foods!

Katerina had her first taste of solid food today--applesauce! Mike and I were so excited to start.



We decided to start with applesauce because the rice cereal can make babies constipated--and Katerina already has that problem sometimes. So we started with applesauce--high in fiber!



It was amusing watching her take the applesauce in her mouth, then push it out with her tongue. I think she probably got about a tablespoon or so in her stomach, because most of it ended up on her chin, bib and hand. At one point it was all over her hand and then she rubbed her eyes and got it all over her face--she's going to get a bath tonight! :)



The adventure only lasted about 5 minutes--after that she started to get fussy. So we put it back on the floor to play and 15 minutes later she pooped...was that the applesauce??



We'll try again tomorrow and see how she does. Check out Katerina's blog later today because she will be sharing her video of the experience.

Apple Picking

I LOVE the weekends. I never valued them as much before I had a child. But every Sat/Sun morning when I wake up to Katerina "calling" for me, I don't even mind that its early in the morning because I know we can just hang out. Even Baba will wake up early to hang out (well not as early as us girls, but still fairly early for a weekend).

This morning, we had a great big breakfast and then went apple picking. It was Katerina's first apple picking adventure! It was a beautiful crisp morning--and we picked Cortlands, Empire and McIntosh apples. Yum! Katerina really enjoyed herself. She loved looking at all of the trees and kept trying to grab the leaves. It was too cute.

Mike and I got some cider donuts and hot apple cider afterwards. Wow! I especially enjoyed this apple picking experience because I missed it last year...I was too nauscious. :)

4 Month Stats

Katerina had a doctor's appointment yesterday. She is 13 pounds and 14 ounces and 25 inches long. It was so much fun watching her interact with the doctor this time. She tried grabbing his tie--which was a NY Giants tie- luckily Baba wasn't around to witness it. She also tried to chew on his arm. It was quite amusing.

She did so great getting her shots too. When it was time to get the shots, I gave Katerina her binky and started reciting the book "Moo Baa La La La" to her. It's her favorite book. It worked pretty well as a distraction. She didn't start crying until after the second shot and then only for a few seconds. The nurse was chuckling at me as I recited the book--but I say--whatever works right?

Updates

Okay, so I've been meaning to write a blog post for about a week now to give an update on the new things that Katerina is doing.
First, she could roll over any day now. When on her back, she arches her back so far, gets up on her side and has half of her body on her stomach, but then that one hand gets stuck. :)

She has discovered her head. She touches it a lot and plays with her hair...maybe she will be a hair twirler like her Mom!

She giggles a lot more too. In fact, everytime you take off a onesie she giggles!

She has become a lot more possesive about toys. If she is playing with a toy, and is really into it, and then drops it and can't get it back, she starts to fuss or cry. Once you give her back the toy, she is content.

Finally--we are trying to figure out if she is starting to teeth...she bites on things pretty hard. In fact I gave her my knuckle the other day to suck on and it kinda hurt!

She has a doctor appointment on Monday--so we'll send another update then.

Woes of a working Mom

I feel like I am going through the adjustment of being a parent all over again. When Katerina was first born there was all kinds of adjustments: breastfeeding, lack of sleep, and just the constant attention that a new born requires. Now, I have all of that down, but can't figure out how to work, spend time together as a family and do all of the other things necessary--like make and eat dinner. And we only have one child...:)

I've only been working full-time for a couple of weeks, so I am sure we'll figure it out eventually...we just need a little more time.

Luckily, Katerina is doing pretty well adjusting...I just need to catch up!

Maine!!

I know, I know...I have not been very diligent about posting over the past two weeks. But between vacation and then going back to work...I just never found time.

Maine was a great vacation. Katerina did quite well...her sleeping was a little off, but that is to be expected. She loved interacting with her friend Wilson. I think the feeling was mutual. Here's Wilson trying to hold Kat's hand. Ahhhh...so cute.

Rolling Over!

Yes, my daugther, Katerina Christakis rolled over on Saturday morning, August 15. We were doing tummy time on the quilt Grandma made for her, passing the time until we left for a vacation in Maine. All of a sudden she started moving her right left and pushing off with it. I asked her, "Are you going to roll over Katerina"...and sure enough, a few seconds later she rolled over! She had a startled look on her face, but never got upset. I, on the other hand, was praising her, telling her how proud I was of her. I was so loud and excited that I woke Mike up. Katerina hasn't rolled over again...but I know she will in time.

3 months and counting...

Katerina is 3 months and 1 week old! How much she has grown. Her accomplishments include:

She smiles, talks and laughs all the time.

She is great at holding and grabbing onto toys and putting them in her mouth. In fact she can even take her binky out of her mouth and put it back in (well sometimes she can do that).

She can do tummy time for 5 minutes without getting upset. You should see how high she gets...she'll be crawling before we know it.

She is mobile...when lying on her back she can turn herself 90 degrees so she is facing the opposite direction.

She is noticing mirrors and has become very fascinated with them.

She is understanding how to push things away or grab onto them...I was trying to use the nose sucking device (what the heck are those things called?), and she kept putting her hands up by her nose to prevent me from doing it. It was pretty funny.

She recognizes me and her Baba. When around other people, she will look for us...it makes our hearts melt!

What Katerina has learned in School

Katerina is doing great in daycare, aka school. Every time we bring her she is so interested in the other babies. Apparently one afternoon she was sitting across from a little boy and they were just smiling and talking at each other! She has also gotten ten times better at tummy time since being at daycare for a week. Mommy is so proud about what she has learned in school already. It is becoming easier on me every day...and hopefully it will only get better.

Okay, so I don't mean to brag, but Katerina looks like she could be a Gerber baby in this picture!

Like her Aunt Meghan

Well Katerina didn't nap much at daycare today, so she was quite tired when she got home. We put her down for a nap with her binky, but she soon spit it out. Instead, she fell asleep sucking on her two fingers just like her Aunt Meghan did when she was younger. Doesn't she look cute!!

Tomorrow is day four of daycare. It is going as well as can be expected. Her teachers seem great, so I am not too worried about her. It just is not the same as having Grandma or Yiayia watch her!

Happy Birthday Mommy and Baba!

Well, it was a birthday weekend. The family all came up to Albany to surprise me for my 30th birthday. I was certainly surprised! It was beautiful weather and we had a wonderful time. Thanks everyone for making the trip. I was truly touched. Then, on Sunday, we celebrated Baba's birthday, finishing off the carrot cake from the day before! We both got some great gifts...but one that stands out is the gift Meghan gave us. It is a portrait that she drew of Katerina when she was about a week or so old. You can see a picture of it here. It's absolutely beautiful and we plan to hang it in our hallway. Thanks Aunt Meghan.

Welcome!

Welcome to my new blog. Yahoo moved the "original" blog and the new format and interface was not meeting my needs. Therefore, I have moved to this sophisticated and user friendly Blogspot. You can still see the archive of the old blog at http://profiles.yahoo.com/christa_nyman.

In addition, Katerina has begun her own blog at the young age of 3 months. You can view her blog at http://katerinachristakis.blogspot.com.

Enjoy!