Home Sweet Home

We are finally home from our trip to Charleston. I'd like to say it was a much needed, relaxing vacation, but honestly, it was anything but that. Things sure are different when you're travelling with a one year old!!

It started with the trip down when she screamed for two hours straight. Now I tried to plan it so that she would nap on the way there, but she had other plans. Then, add on a traffic jam for over 5 miles with a screaming child and you have two pretty frustrated parents. We arrived just in time for Dave's meeting to start so I thought it would be a perfect time to introduce Savannah to the pool with her new float. WRONG!! I quickly discovered that she's terrified of the water. She didn't even get her legs completely wet and was just shaking with fear. It was sad to see her so terrified . . . and also frustrating for me because that's what I had planned to do to cool off and unwind for a few days.

The weather was in the high 90s every day so a quick stroll to the market took place each morning, but then we were at the mercy of hotel room entertainment for the afternoon hours. Whew! Let's just say that we LOVED seeing daddy each afternoon, but one night he had to go with the group to dinner so we were on our on for a long time.

Then there was today. Check out was at noon and Dave's meeting wasn't over until 1:30 so again we didn't have many options. It was way to hot even for a walk in partial shade so we strolled the hallways of the hotel over and over as she just screamed louder and louder. She needed a nap but was fighting it in the worst way. Finally I gave up, loaded our stuff in the car and just drove around downtown until Dave finished up.

The drive back was just as bad . . . another awful traffic jam, screaming from Savannah, and now exhausted parents. At one point the song came on the radio about beautiful things and there's one line that talks about a dad who gives her daughter away on her wedding day. Trying to change the subject I asked Dave if he'd ever thought about giving Savannah away on her wedding day ~ to which he replied "No, but I'd give her away to anybody right now."

Thankfully we are finally home. I just can't help but think of the Wizard of Oz . . . There's no place like home , there's no place like home . . . We're both looking forward to a nice long night of sleep in our own bed!!!

An Unwelcome Transition

We are still trying to transition Savannah into drinking milk from her sippy cup . . . it's not going so well. It totally baffles me at how she'll take water no problem from the cup, but once you put milk in there she immediately throws it onto the floor (temper, temper). Anyway, I finally decided that she was going to have to make a hard decision today and I stuck to it. For her middle of the day milk, I gave her a bottle filled with water and a sippy cup filled with milk. The choice was completely hers ~ water from a bottle or milk from the sippy cup. The way I figure she's still getting plenty of milk in the morning and at night through the bottle, so missing milk once a day isn't going to hurt her nutritionally. We have to start somewhere. So, you can probably guess what happened, she decided not to drink either. FINE. Here's a picture where she's trying to decide what to do. I've also include a funny picture of her newest trick, sticking her tongue way out of her mouth. She must have picked that up from Dave! :)

All in a Day

It's been a rough day for my little one. She managed to survive even with the following:

• eating a hand full of hair off of my bathroom floor
• screaming like she was dying because I was in the shower
• slipping on some playing cards and going face forward on the kitchen floor
• taking only ONE nap that was 1/2 her normal length
• eating some dryer lint straight from the dryer
• pulling out an entire container of wipes one by one
• falling from the stairs straight back onto the hardwood floor

Never a dull moment around here. We made it and were SO thankful when daddy got home! :)

Baboon Walk

Savannah is trying so hard to walk . . . we're just not quite there yet. Now that she's perfected the real baby crawl, she's on to bigger and "better" modes of transportation, what I like to call the baboon walk. It's very difficult to describe, but hopefully the picture will help. She goes across the room with her legs fully extended, her hands on the floor, and bottom high in the air. No matter what I'm doing when she takes off I just laugh like crazy!!

I QUIT!!!!!!!!

Well, today was not such a great day in the Bachmann household. I spent the entire morning trying to get chores finished up from the weekend "to do" list, entertaining a baby who needs attention ALL of the time, discovering that our downstairs air conditioner was broken (might I add that we just found out Sunday a week ago that the upstairs unit will probably not last another month and has to be replaced ASAP as well), and just feeling pretty defeated all together. Praise the Lord that Dave was already scheduled for a half day of vacation this afternoon because I met him at the door and told him I was headed to Target to apply for a job!

Wouldn't it just be easier to take Savannah to day care and let her throw cheerios on someone else's floor . . . and let someone else try to figure out her new schedule . . . and let someone else change dirty diaper after dirty diaper . . . and let someone else entertain her 12 hours a day??? Today I actually felt like it would be worth working full time and putting my entire earnings toward day care. Whew! As the saying goes, when it rains it pours ~ I think we're flooding here!

Progress

The transition continues of trying to switch Savannah to whole milk. As most of you know she has been on an incredibly expensive formula that is completely broken down making it easier to digest for about 9 months. Now that she is a year old, the time has come to switch her to whole milk. The doctor is unsure whether or not she has a milk allergy so we're having to go extremely slow with trying the whole milk but we're making progress. Just today I tried 4 ounces of whole milk mixed with 4 ounces of formula and she's tolerated it okay. We've been building up from one ounce so we're headed in the right direction.

Another big breakthrough . . . she's finally doing the real baby crawl! She still prefers to do the army crawl (and has perfected it with quite a bit of speed) but from time to time I catch a glimpse of her actually crawling on her hands and knees. Exciting times.

New things

Sunday morning as we were leaving for church Aunt Cherry called to say that she was coming to finish the window treatments in the office and living room. By 10pm last night we had successfully finished the office ones, and the living rooms are in a temporary state. I LOVE THEM! Don't you just love new things? Here is a small picture of the living room ones.

Savannah also got something new . . . her long awaited ABC books came in the mail today. I got a great deal on eBay for these 26 books of the alphabet. Look how excited she is to get them!!