The Banes Bunch: November 2013

“Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not;

remember that what you now have was once

among the things you only hoped for.”
― Epicurus

"God has two dwellings; one in heaven,

and the other in a meek and thankful heart."

― Izaak Walton

Well, we're a little past due on our seven month update, but I wanted to include our Thanksgiving holiday with the post too, so I've held off. The past month has been quite a triumphant month for Emma. She's reached a lot of milestones, including learning how to crawl and getting her first two teeth. Needless to say, our lives just got a lot more interesting.

So here's our monthly round-up categorized by things we are thankful for!

Almost mobile!

A healthy and growing baby: Emma's done a lot of growing in the past month. First, she has officially surpassed our dog Lizzy in weight (by a whole pound), and while she might be on smaller side falling in the 30th percentile, she is mighty and doggedly persistent. At the beginning of the month, she was just starting to sit up on her own, but she didn't really care for it much. So to encourage her to practice more, we began to let her sit up during bath time, which is one of her favorite times of the day. It was like she had this great epiphany: splashing with my hands is fun; I can see more things; and I got new toys to play with in the tub! From the first night we let her try it, she was hooked. Of course, with sitting up came the knowledge that she could go from sitting up on to her knees and that her knees moved. I think it was about a week from rocking on her knees to figuring out how to move her arms and hands to actual crawling. You can see the progression of her development pretty well in this month's videos. And of course now, there's no stopping her. She's ready to explore this whole new world (or at least find the next door stop to play with).

Video: Emma legitimately crawling!

Can you see my little teeth?

The weekend she learned how to crawl was also the same weekend that her first two bottom teeth came in! She had been battling with these teeth for a while, but it seemed like they were never actually going to show up. But one day, I was putting some Orajel on her gums, and I noticed it felt different - a little rough. So Kevin and I tried to finagle a way to look into her mouth (open and say "ah" just doesn't compute), and when we finally got a peek - there they were just barely poking through. While they're still not all the way in, you can clearly see them now whenever she smiles or laughs. Now that she has teeth, she's had to realize what kind of things they can do - like when she puts her feet in her mouth and bites down. Now, it hurts and tears most likely follow. There's definitely a learning curve to be had here.

Emma sitting in Grandpa
Elmer's lap at cousin
Christian's soccer game

Parents and grandparents who love us and our child: We are truly blessed that most of our family lives within an hour of our house. This means that Emma gets to see all her grandparents, great grandparents, aunt and uncles, and cousins pretty frequently. To say she's spoiled would be an understatement. I don't think she leaves any grandparents' house without first giving away all her kisses.

This past football season Kevin's parents, Sandra and Elmer, have been keeping Emma, so that we can keep up my family's tradition of going to the Texas A&M home games in College Station. My youngest brother Stephen is still working on his undergraduate degree in aerospace engineering there, so it's a chance to catch up with him too. Emma's had a lot of fun adventures with Sandra and Elmer, like going to bible study, soccer games, and a baby shower. Since some of the football games have been quite late, she's even gotten to spend the night multiple times! She definitely loves it because she gets spoiled with all the attention, there are new places to explore, and two more puppies to love on at their house.

Emma playing with
her Pappy after work

She also usually goes once a week to my parents' house to spend the day, so that I can have the day to do errands, housework, or just have some personal time without a baby under foot. Emma and her Mimi spend lots of time snuggling and giggling while Pappy is at work. But as soon as he gets home, he's ready to play with Emma. He's the best at making all kinds of weird noises and faces to get her to laugh. Emma loves playing with all with all of my mom's "retro" toys and spends a lot of time chasing her plush ball all over the living room.

It means so much to us that our families willingly give up their time to help us out or to spend it with Emma. For Kevin and I, it's meant that we can spend some quality time together, just as husband and wife for a bit, which in turn helps us better a better mom and dad to Emma.

Our last view of this Kyle Field before renovation construction begins

Making new memories as a family: A year ago at Thanksgiving, we were just finding out that we were having a little girl. We couldn't have imagined then just how many different ways that little girl would impact our lives. Our lives now revolve around bottles and bed times, giggles and gurgles. Sure, it's a big challenge trying to figure out what to do as parents (they really don't give you manuals) and there are days and nights when Kevin and I look at each other in exhaustion and wonder how we're going to make to the next day - but we wouldn't trade it for the world. Whenever we're away from Emma, we find ourselves talking about her, mimicking her latest noise to pester each other, or laughing at some Emma moment that we forgot to tell the other about. She's always on our minds and in our hearts.

Here are some of our personal favorites: