Fun With Cups!

We have been having a lot of fun with Paprika teaching her all about cups and incorporating her into our nightly dinner routine. We usually put Paprika in the swing or in her exersaucer next to us while we have dinner, but she decided a few days ago that she wants to be a more integral part of the conversation. She was not happy unless she was right up at the table with us! So, we have started putting her in her bumbo seat and pulling her up to the dinner table with us while we eat. We give her some cups to play with while we are eating, and she pretends to drink out of them!

Paprika continues to babble, babble, babble! Sometimes she chats for an hour at a time, and other times I can't get her to say a word. She is entering the stage of being much less cuddly. I miss that cuddly baby! Now she just wants to explore everything, try to crawl, examine her toys, and put anything and everything in her mouth. She still likes being rocked ot sleep at night, thank goodness!

Paprika usually wants to go to bed around 9:30pm, and wakes up at about 7:15am. A lot of nights she doesn't wake up at all. Sometimes she wakes up once around 4:30am to eat and then goes right back to sleep. The nights she wakes up at 4:30, she often sleeps in later, which I love. I think I like it better when she wakes up once during the night and then sleeps in later in the morning. I am really not a morning person at all, but I can stay up all night.

She is now taking two naps a day--one around noon, and one around 5pm. Her first nap is usually about 1 1/2 to two hours long and her second nap is shorter--about half an hour or 45 minutes. Sometimes she just takes one big nap of two to three hours, which is great because I get so much done around the house! I attribute this increase in napping largely due to changes in my diet. I cut out all soda and caffeine about a month ago, and this has made a huge difference. Also, I have since cut out 90% of the dairy in my diet (I find it irritates her), and also most of the extra sugar. I still have some maple syrup in my oatmeal in the morning, but other than that, I am sugar free. It's a day by day thing, but I really like the healthy changes I'm making in my diet. It's benefitting both of us!

Fun Stuff!

Paprika is almost 6 months old. I can't believe it! Time is going by too quickly already. We had another Mommy & Me class on Monday, and I think Paprika is really enjoying the classes. The teachers focus mainly on motor skills, and already she is sitting up better since we started the class last Friday. I think it's good for her to get out and meeting people, too. She already has one baby friend named Ella from the Mommy & Me class. She likes to roll the big red ball back and forth with her. It's really cute! Paprika especially likes the big ball pen, where she gets to play with lots of differently colored balls. Looks pretty fun to me!

This past weekend was majorly exciting, not in a small part because the Colts won the Super Bowl! What a dream come true! I'm not a huge sports fan, but I still love to root on my home team and all I have to say is, "it's about time"! I've never been so proud to be from Indianapolis! It was just really a wonderful moment and I am so happy that they won!

Mr. Mustard had to work all day on Saturday, but because he got overtime, we celebrated by ordering a nice dinner in on Saturday night. On Sunday, we took Paprika to the zoo!

The weather here has been unbelievably hot-- we are roasting most days. I've been keeping all the windows open and may even have to turn on the air conditioning before the week is finished if it keeps up like this. I've heard that other parts of the country (Indiana, for one), are freezing and buried under inches of snow! Right now I would welcome a little bit of snow to cool things off. If only we could all reach a happy medium!

I bought a mini tripod for our still camera, so hopefully there will be more pictures of Mr. Mustard, me, and Paprika together. Usually we just take pictures of Paprika, or her with either me or Mr. Mustard. But, since we have the tripod now, we can experiment with the self-timer mode and get some great pictures of all three of us! This is our first test photo. I think it turned out pretty good!

Hauser and Paprika

Hauser and Paprika have a great time together! We can't seem to get enough of catching their interactions on tape. Too cute!

Mommy & Me!

We had our first Mommy & Me class at My Gym this morning. It was fantastic! There were two instructors, who were very nice and helpful. Paprika really liked interacting with the other babies. She practiced sitting up, and got to play in a swing, roll on a ball, and work on her standing and grasping skills. She had a great time and fell asleep on the car ride home. Success! When we got home, she slept through her normally scheduled feeding and didn't wake up for two hours. I guess the whole experience really took a lot out of her. Since she woke up this afternoon, she has been really talkative. I think she's trying to tell me all about how much she liked the class today!

Paprika Makes Friends With The Animals!

Paprika is doing great sitting up. She loves playing with her toys and stuffed animals and she is so interested in the world around her. She is such a joy!