Gymboree Play & Learn

In August I enrolled Raegan into Gymboree Play and Learn classes in Carmel. She goes once a week and LOVES it! When she started she was in the Level 3 class with 10-16 month age group and very well advanced. When she was 14.5 months old they told her to move up to Level 4 which is with 17-22 month olds. She fits in so much better and has learned so much.

We sing the Gymbo songs at home all the time. She loves when Fridays roll around and I tell her it's time to go to Gymbo!

At the end of every Gymboree class the teacher blows bubbles and we sing 2 bubble songs. She goes crazy! Ryan bought her the bubble maker and we are giving it to her for Christmas. She pops the bubbles and has a great time!

If we ever miss a Friday class we make it up on Saturday so that Ryan can take her. They have so much fun together.

It's expensive for only one class a week but when I see how much she is learning and how much she loves it, it's well worth it.

I am looking forward to starting her in soccer lessons in March and possibly dance or swim lessons too!

Raegan's words!

Raegan loves to talk. The kid never shuts up. And thankfully since I am with her all day, everyday I know what she is say.

Once we started Raegan on cow's milk in July (even though I was still nursing morning and night) we started doing sign language with her. Just simple everyday commands and she picked it up so fast. She signs- milk, done, more, and food just so we know what she wants when she gets whiny.

Now that she can say all those words she doesn't really sign as much but it was great for those couple of months.

As of now, she is up to 40 words that I have remembered to write down. She is even putting words together to make phrases. Some of my favorites are

"No dog!"

"Down dog!" that is when Izzie is jumping up on her highchair trying to steal her food!

"Hi daddy/Bye daddy'

"Pop bubbles"

"Hop on pop!"

Her list of words so far is....

1. Dog

2. Dad

3. Daddy

4. Hi

5. Bye

6. Bu-bye

7. Mom

8. Mommy

9. No

10. Izzie

11. Yuck

12. Outside

13. Kitty

14. Duck (will point to duck)

15. Bath

16. Baby

17. Book

18. Go

19. Ball

20. Shoe

21. Eye (will point to eye)

22. Touchdown

23. ut-oh

24. Done

25. All done

26. up

27. ouch

28. awwww

29. Milk

30. Phone

31. Juice

32. Puppy

33. night night

34. Binky

35. Cookie

36. Pop

37. Bubbles

38. Bottle

39. Fishy

40. Hop

She loves to read books and singing songs and dance and that has sent her vocabulary through the roof. She will say "hop on pop" and go get the Dr. Suess book. When she wants a bath she will go to her bathroom and start taking her clothes off. When she wants her milk or food she tells us.

Right now her favorite song is London Bridge. She loves to say "all fall down" and fall down! She also loves I'm a little teapot, The Itsy Bitsy Spider, and Twinkle Twinkle and doing all the little hand movements and dances that go with it.

She is growing up tooooooo fast!!

FALL 2010 update

Fall of 2010 was great!

Ryan and I got to go to two Notre Dame football games. I am now the biggest ND fan! What an amazing experience!

ND vs Purdue tailgate with friends

ND vs Purdue

ND vs Navy

We also moved Raegan's playroom upstairs to the loft/ bonus room so that she could have carpet to play and get off of the hardwood floors. We mounted a 42" flat screen to the wall and got a new sectional couch and some new toy organizers.

Bug was a little pig for Halloween. Her and cousin Ava surprised Grandma and Grandma Hahaj and were Pig Ducks. It's an inside family joke.

I also had my 26th Birthday in November. Ryan and I had a wonderful weekend. Friday night we had courtside seats and suite passes to an Indiana Pacers game. And then Saturday Mama Hahaj came down and watched Raegan while Ry and I went wine tasting and to a wonderful dinner at Eddie Marlots. He also got me a GORGEOUS ruby ring! Ruby is July's birthstone so it is a ring for him and Raegan. The square ruby is surrounded by diamonds and then has two diamonds bands... one for each of them. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my ring and it means so much to me! One day (hopefully) I can pass it down to Raegan and she can cherish it as much as I do.

Thanksgiving was spent in Fort Wayne with the Kocks side of the family. It was a quick trip to Fort Wayne but a wonderful time as always.

Time to get back at this blogging things

Well, it has been 8 months since I last wrote a blog entry. I don't have a lot of time to sit down and write but I miss writing everything going on in Raegan's life. Her baby book doesn't have much room to write every little thing and I don't keep a journal. So I need to get back into blogging. My New Years Resolution is to be better at this.

How do I recap 8 months so short and fast? Well I will start by saying Raegan is truly amazing. She amazes Ryan and I everyday, she is so smart and so funny and of course SO STINKIN CUTE!!!

She is 16.5 months old already and getting ready for her second Christmas.

Lets see if I can quickly recap some of her milesstones...

On Mothers Day 2010, when Raegan was just a little over 9 months old, she took her first steps!! And she hasn't slowed down since. Just a few days later she was running all over the place!!

July 10, 2010 she cut her first tooth!! FINALLY!!!! Bottom right incisor. We have now realized that whenever Raegan is about to cut a tooth she gets an AWFUL, very painful diaper rash that has to be treated with a prescription diaper rash cream. It only took 4 months and about 10 teeth to realize that it was her teeth causing this rash and not a food allergy or reaction to diapers or wipes.

Her teeth have come in very out of "order." She had one bottom tooth come in then two top teeth, 2 more top teeth, 2 bottom teeth, all 4 molars and then finally that last bottom tooth. She now has 4 bottom teeth, 4 top teeth and 4 molars. We are waiting for her canine/fangs to come through. I hear those are the worst. She has a big gap between her two top teeth that is the cutest thing ever!! I love it!!

July 30, 2010- HAPPY BIRTHDAY RAEGAN!!!!!

What an amazing year its been!! We had a party at our house with about 20 friends and family, ladybug themed of course!!

I made her tutu and birthday onesie! HAHAJ 1

Eating her cake! HAPPY BIRTHDAY BUG!

I made her cakes too!!!

Raegs loved opening her gifts. She got so excited and was screaming with excitement!

AND a BIG pat on the back to me... I made my goal of breastfeeding for a year!! GO ME!! Once we introduced her to cows milk when she was one I weaned to just morning and night. By August/September we were down to just mornings. At the end of October I went away for a weekend for a girls weekend and took my pump but decided I was done. I didn't pump and when I got home she never "asked" to nurse! It was a VERY painful couple of days but we did it. 15 months! What an amazing bonding experience! Not to mention FREE! And also very healthy for both of us! Good work Raegan!

Video: First time eating grilled cheese!!!

Video update... because I am terrible at writing post!!

Raegan laughing!

So bug is now ticklish!! So here is a video of her laughing!! You can fast forward to 1:10 and thats when she starts to really get going!! She is so much fun!! I LOVE HER!!

This shit is bananas B.A.N.A.N.A.S!

Here is a video of Raegs eating a banana which she loves and then a picture of her eating broccoli for the first time which she hated!! That is my girl!! She also had corn which she hated as well. We were making buffalo chicken dip the other night and gave her some rotesorri chicken and she thought that was yuuuummy!!! She however is not a fan of pot roast. When I was at the store the other day I bought some Gerber Puffs (banana flavored of course!) and Mixed Berry Yogurt Bites. The puffs are taking some time for her to get use to but she is doing pretty well with them, still working on her pincer grip so she can feed them to herself. She can pick them up but the don't make it into her mouth yet. The yogurt melts are a different story... she does not like them. I guess she is like her mommy and doesn't like the texture of yogurt because just like when I eat it I gag and so did she. She was gagging so hard she threw up. She was not chocking on it because I could see yogurt on her tongue and was able to take it off, so I guess we will waiting a few more weeks before trying those again! I think that is all the table food she has tried for now. Sorry this post is all over the place, its late and I am tired but wanted to get the videos up!

And she is crawling!!

Raegan started crawling on Tuesday February 23, just shy of her 7 month birthday!!! She had been trying so hard for a couple of weeks but her legs just could not figure out how to follow her arms. On the 23 I told Ryan that when he got back from Philly on the 25 that she would probably be crawling. So after dinner Tuesday evening I was cleaning the kitchen like the good wife I am and Ryan and Raegan were in the living room playing. He called me in and said she was getting ready to crawl. I grabbed my camera and off she went. This video isn't the first time she crawled but it is was taken yesterday now that she is cruisin!!! Well she cruises until she gets to the hardwood floor and then cries because she doesn't know what to do, but she is starting to get use to the hard floors!!

Oh and here is a video of her crying and crawling!! I kept putting her on the other side of the room away from her toys so she would crawl to them so I could get it on video and she got mad at me but its super cute!!!

So proud of my husband!!!!

Congratulations to my wonderful husband on his promotion and raise last week!!!! He has been working so hard and I am so thankful for everything he does for our family!!!! Ryan is now Sales Manager for Officescape as well as General Manager of Telework Advocacy. He has started working on the 2010 T.A. show that will be out in California in November.

Ryan has also started traveling quite a bit again for work. He went to Sea World in January and then was suppose to go to Washington DC but because of all the snow his flights kept getting cancelled so they just cancelled the trip. Later this week he will be in Philly, next week Atlanta and then in March he will be in Utah.

Keep up the great work babe! Raegan and I are so proud of you and we are so lucky that you provide such a wonderful life for us!

Food update!

The little princess is growing up fast! Now that she is 6 1/2 months old we are starting to branch out and give her more foods! She is now on stage 2 purees. I try and give her as much organic as possible. She has finally started to like green beans and peaches. She loves bananas and pears as well as sweet potato's and carrots. She has had strawberry's and other berries and I was terrified of her having an allergic reaction but she did great and loved them. She even had a fruit smoothie that was called Hawaiian delight (bananas, peaches, pineapple!) Just call her Popeye the Sailor woman, she even ate spinach! All I know is I miss her innocent breastfed only poops! These diapers are starting to get NASTY!!!

For breakfast Raegan eats organic oatmeal and a fruit. Today she had pears and pineapple. For lunch she gets usually a veggie and dinner is rice cereal with a veggie. We are getting ready to start her on meats as well as more solid foods. When we start her on meats she will eat fruit for breakfast, veggie for lunch and meat for dinner. Friday for lunch we shared a plate of spaghetti. I cut up elbow noodles teeny tiny for her and she loved it! I am looking forward to getting her some puffs and mum-mums and see how she does with those as well as other table foods. My plan is to have her on all table food/ finger foods by the time she is ready for stage 3 purees. Since we are getting ready to start giving her more table food I had Ryan and I brush up on our infant CPR. The television show The Doctors had a segment on it the other day so I DVR'ed it so we could watch it together that evening and be prepared in case anything were to ever happen to her.

She is also drinking water out of a sippy cup with all of her meals. It is so cute she will take a bite of food and then grab her cup and take a sip, put the cup down, eat a bite, pick the cup up take a sip and does this throughout the whole meal! It amazes me how smart she is and how quick she learns things.

Will You Be My Valentine?!

We spent Valentine's weekend in Fort Wayne so that Ryan and I could have a date night while Grandma Hahaj babysat for Bug! Ryan and I went and saw Valentine's Day the movie and went to dinner at Casa's! The movie was really good, we definitely recommend it. They even have some Hoosier jokes in it that had the whole theater laughing! Ryan surprised me with a dozen long stem roses after we arrived at his parents house, and he also got me a beautiful pair of earrings!

Raegan had fun playing with her cousin Ava all weekend. They are at such a fun age right now. Ava just turned 9 months today and Raegan is 6.5 months.

Playing with Ava

Will you be my Valentine Daddy?

I have the worlds best valentine!

Cousins!

Best Friends too!

Hi Ava!

Going after the Sunday newspaper!

They are so cute together!

Ava teaching Raegan new tricks!

My beautiful roses from my wonderful husband!

R.I.P. Black Betty

RIP Black Betty.

Born in Mazda land circa 1999. Zoom Zoom

Died: February 10, 2010

On Wednesday Raegan and I were at The Cooks babysitting Addison and Channing. We recieved our check that day so when we were done at 5pm we went down the street to Chase Bank to deposit our check. We had only been in the car for 5 minutes and thats when it happened. We were sitting at a red light and as soon as we hit the gas to go, Betty decided to take her life. I was in the middle of an intersection at rush hour with a crying baby in the back seat. Luckily a guy stopped and pushed me to the side of the road and we waited for Ryan to get up to us in Noblesville, as he had just left work. Raegan was warm and toasty in her carseat finally sleeping as I froze sitting there waiting for my husband to save the day. He finally got there and I thought that the engine had just died so we tried to jump Betty but she still wouldn't start. We had her towed to Car-X. A mechanic took a look at her the next day and said she blew her head gasket causing anti-freeze to go all over the engine, killing her. He said best case it would be about $1400 to fix her. But more likely we would need to rebuild the engine which would be more in the $4000 range. As much as I love Betty and as good as she was to me over the last 7 years, she just wasn't worth that. We posted her on Craigslist on February 17 for $2000 and we sold her to a mechanic named Jeff 2 days later on the 19th for $1400. We didn't think we would get more than $1000 for her so we were pleased with Jeff's offer. It is now time to start looking for my mommy SUV!

Time to start thinking about baby proofing

Ready to start cruising!

Stop Mom... I don't need your help! I can walk by myself!

Come on baby doll, lets go for a walk!

I think I can! I think I can! I think I can!

Raegan is trying her hardest to start crawling. She is getting on all 4's, moving her arms but her poor little legs haven't learned to start following yet. She is now pushing up into a downward dog position so it should be any day now. She can also stand on her own and loves to walk when you hold her hands. When walking she does high knees... shes a born athlete!

She has mastered the army crawl... backwards! The other day she scooted herself off the rug and on to the hardwood floors and then she was all over the place! Until she got stuck in between the bookshelf and entertainment center. Now I just need to put a swiffer duster under her and she can clean my floors for me while scooting around!

Sorry for the quality of the pictures I took them with my Blackberry!

Scooting off the rug... backwards!

Cleaning the floor!

Ut-oh! Almost to the TV. How do I go forward?

This is not looking good for me!

HELP MOM! I'm stuck!

6 months old!!!!!

Happy half Birthday Raegan! At her 6 month wellness checkup she was 17.1 pounds (70^th percentile) and 26.75 inches long (80^th percentile) She had 3 shots and one oral vaccine and did great! She didn’t cry at all!!! Dr. Freeman said she is perfect and is already reaching 7-9 month milestones! So proud of my baby girl!!

And let me pat myself on the back for a moment too! I made it to my 6 month goal of exclusively breastfeeding! So now I have 5-6 more months to go! Counting down the days!

starting to crawl

so pretty

6 month rolls and bald spot with seedlings!

Happy Half Birthday Bug!!!

Almost 6 months

I wrote this back in January but never published it... why I don't know?!

Raegan is growing up so fast! She is rolling over but doesn’t really like it. As soon as she rolls from her back to her belly she starts crying. She hates being on her tummy, even though I have caught her sleeping on her tummy a few times. When she is on her tummy she will push all the way up with her arms and tries to get her butt in the air but hasn’t quite made it yet. She loves to sit up all by herself and play with her toys. She especially loves ones that make noise and that she can bang and throw around. She is trying to feed herself when we have solids for breakfast and dinner. It’s cute and messy but at the same time a disaster because sometimes she will scream when I take the spoon away from her to put more food on it! For breakfast she eats oatmeal or rice cereal with applesauce. We haven’t introduced any other fruits yet but we will soon and then she will have other fruits for breakfast besides cereal. At dinner she gets a vegetable. So far carrots and sweet potatoes seem to be her favorite with sweet peas close behind. She hates green beans, which surprises me because green beans is one of the few veggies I will eat. All of her cereal, fruits and veggies are all organic.

We are going to be baby proofing soon because someone is about to start crawling!!! Ryan is so excited for this stage!! If it were up to him she would be running already. When Raegan is sitting up she leans over onto her hand and then kneels and starts to rock until her pathetic little arms give out on her!!!

Raegan is also talking up a storm!!! She loves saying dadadadada!!! Even more so she loves yelling it at me, like “I am saying his name mom, now where is he!!!” When she cries she says mama, only because she pouts when she cries so her lips are together and out comes mama. I like to think she is saying it on purpose but unfortunately she’s not L Every once in a while when you say hi to her she will say hi back! We are working on waving hi and bye!

Baby's First Christmas!

While Raegan is napping I am trying to play catch up with the blog. Hopefully I get better at this as well as her baby book! So now that it is almost a month past Christmas I will try and get this published.

Raegan and I got back home from Florida Tuesday afternoon! Ryan took the afternoon off of work so he was home and waiting for us. That evening we did our family Christmas together. I got Ryan a Northface jacket that he has been wanting for like 2 years. He was so surprised!! Raegan have him a Notre Dame shirt. I got new running shoes, workout pants, socks, and a fleece jacket (all Under Armour!)

Santa was so good to Raegan! She must have been very good this year! Santa brought her lots of toys and clothes! She is finally wearing size 3-6 months!

On Christmas Eve I took Raegan to Santa’s workshop and she got to sit on Santa’s lap! She loved him! Santa told her that he wishes he had more kids like her and it would make his job a lot easier. Ryan worked a half day on Xmas Eve, so after he got home we left for Evansville. Christmas morning we woke up and had Christmas with Grandma Miller, Aunt Tricia and Uncle Jon. Raegan got her first Cabbage Patch doll, as well as more toys and games. Christmas afternoon we went to Newburgh where my other grandmother lives, I am so lucky that my grandparents live 5 minutes away from each other! When we got there we had Christmas with my dad, and Aunt Tricia and Uncle Jon. Once again more toys for Raegan! Her favorite toy is Sophie the Giraffe! She loves chewing on her and making her squeak which drives the dogs crazy! We had a wonderful Christmas dinner with the whole Cooksey side of the family. And then that evening yet again there were more presents to be opened!!! All of the great-grandkids (Nadia, Berke, and Raegan) got toys while the adults did a white elephant!!! Raegan is going to have 2 more cousins on the Cooksey side later this year. Aven Saige Reising will be here in March and then Baby Eisenhauer will make its appearance in July… just before Raegan’s first birthday! Christmas will be even more fun next year with all the little babies!!!

For New Years we just stayed at home in Fishers. Oh how times have changed! Raegan went to bed around 7:30 and Ryan and I stayed up and partied! HA… yeah right! We were in bed by 11:30 and could barely keep our eyes open to see the ball drop at midnight! 12:05 we were sound asleep!! HAPPY 2010!!!

New years day we went to Ft. Wayne to have Christmas with the Hahaj clan! Ryan and I were able to get out and have a wonderful, and much needed and overdue date night at Casa’s! My favorite restaurant in Ft. Wayne!

The Holidays were crazy busy with the trip to Florida, Ryan’s dad’s surgery and all the traveling all over the state to be with family but it was well worth it and we are very thankful to have such a great family. Thank you to our family for making Raegan’s first Christmas very memorable!

Raegan's first trip to Florida/ Sarahs beach wedding

On December 18, my dad, sister, Raegan and I packed up the Yukon and drove 17 hours straight to Anna Maria Island, Florida for Sarah Smiths wedding. Ryan was unable to go because his father was in the hospital and had to have bypass surgery for an abdominal aortic aneurism that doctors just found a few days prior. We are very fortunate that the doctors discovered the aneurism and my wonderful father-in-law is recovering comfortably at home. He was lucky and got to leave the hospital on December 23, just in time for Christmas and on he and my mother –in-laws wedding anniversary. What a wonderful gift! My sister’s husband Jon was unable to make the trip to Florida because he works as a residence manager at IU and had to close down the dorms for winter break. We left Bloomington around 6:30pm and I think Raegan was asleep in her carseat before we left the driveway! I was very nervous about how she would do in the car for that long but that is part of the reason we drove through the night so she would just sleep the whole time and we wouldn’t have to stop 18 times. We stopped at a gas station around midnight to get gas and feed Raegan which was an interesting stop since there was a van full of inmates at the pump next to us. Let’s just say after we got gas we drove across the street to a different station so that I could feed Raegan. The next few hours were smooth sailing until my sister started driving! AHHHH!!!!!! It’s around 2am and we are driving through Atlanta and she starts feeling sick. I was feeling sick too from her driving through ATL! (kidding Tricia!) So once she was done puking on the side of the interstate in downtown Atlanta, I took over driving for a few hours. We got to the beach just before noon on Saturday. We went to one of the best burger joints known to man which is a total dive hole in the wall called Duffy’s. After we got done eating and checked into our hotel Raegan and I went swimming!!! It was her first time and she loved it. The water was around 86 degrees but the air was a little on the chilly side since it was a windy day. Sunday we just hung out around the hotel and then Sarah and I went to go get mani’s and pedi’s that afternoon before the rehearsal. The rehearsal on the beach was quick and to the point! Then we had a wonderful dinner at an Italian restaurant.

Monday, December 21 was the big day for Sarah and Mark! The wedding was beautiful! It was a little on the chilly side for a beach wedding but there was the most beautiful sunset that evening. Raegan looked so cute in her little pink and white dress that Sarah got her. After the sun had set Raegan ended up wearing her snowsuit at the reception!! Once the party was over we changed clothes and packed up the car and headed for home!!!

Once again Raegan was a perfect angel on the way home. She slept most of the car ride and when she was awake she was just looking out the window watching the world go by and playing with her toys!! It was a great wedding and a short but sweet trip to Florida but we were glad to be home and enjoy our first Christmas with our new baby!!!