4 months old

Sadie had her 4 month old checkup on Monday, and she's 23 inches tall and 14 pounds, 4 ounces. She's right where she should be with her weight, but she's pretty short for her age. Granted, Steph and I aren't going to dunk any basketballs ever, and the Dr's not worried about it, so we're ok.

She's recently figured out her ability to scream, and she does it with much joy on a regular basis. She carries on conversations with us now, and I think it's only a matter of time before we hear mama and dada. She's getting much better with her hand eye coordination and can get most things to her mouth with ease. She explores our faces when we're close to her, and she loves to see us. It's so great to watch her develop more and more each day. I'm really excited, and can't wait until she's crawling and walking around. Christmas should be a lot of fun.

We ate dinner with some friends last night who have a 2 year old son named Isaac and a 2 month old daughter named Blair. Isaac loved Sadie and kept giving her kisses. Sadie would mess with his face and give him the open mouth kiss that she gives anything and everything that comes close to her lips. I think she's got her first boyfriend. I didn't get a picture of the kisses, but here's Isaac trying to make Sadie smile.

We spent some time this past weekend going through her dresser and closet to get ready for the move to 3-6 month clothes. She's getting a little big for her 3 month outfits, so we wanted to make sure everything was washed and ready. We not only found a crap ton of 3-6 month outfits, we also found a drawer full of 0-3 and 3 month clothes that we completely forgot about. We don't use her nursery that much now, and I apparently put some clean clothes in there instead of our bedroom. It's amazing the amount of clothes this child has, and we haven't even bought that many clothes for her. Gotta love showers and grandparents!

Here's a picture of Sadie wearing a dress that my mom bought for her. I think she'll only be able to wear it one more time, but she looked really cute in it.

And finally, here's one of Steph getting Sadie to laugh. It's a week or two old, but I love it.

My birthday is this weekend, so we're going to do some wine tastings and spend some time shooting potato guns and real guns to celebrate my last year as a 20 something. It's hard to believe I'll be 29, but my grey hair and inability to lose weight without trying really hard tells me that I'm there. 

It's a Farm Life for Me

So, I think this may be the first and only post without a picture of Sadie.

Today we went up to the farm early. Once we had held Sadie for a while, Alan and I went out to complete another side of the goat fence we're building. It's our plan to get goats in the spring that are pregnant so that Sadie can watch the kids grow up.

It was pretty slow going in the morning. The auger we were using wasn't drilling like it should have, so we had to use post hole diggers to get another 6 inches out of the hard ground. For what it's worth, we're spacing the poles 20 feet from each other and plan on putting metal poles in between them.

The work we did today was setting the wooden poles. We used the auger to go 30" into the ground, then we leveled the pole, poured concrete in the hole, and tamped dirt into it. Long and very physically demanding process. I'm writing this at 9:45 and I haven't been this sore in a long time. Even after P90X and Insanity. We worked from 9:00 until 5:30 today. Tough stuff.

Here are some pictures from today.

 Cleaning out the hole the auger drilled

 The posts in the background are what we set last weekend

36" is a deep hole

And finally, here's a video of us drilling the initial hole. I have to keep the auger in line, so I had to keep the tamper pushed up against the drill. 

All in all, a very tough day. It's very rewarding to look at a blank field in the morning and a line of fence poles in the evening. 

Teething

By all apparent signs, we are in the throes of teething. It's tough to watch Sadie struggle with the pain and know that we can't do anything about it except give her frozen washcloths and baby orajel. She's not a fussy baby, so it makes that much more of an impact when she's inconsolable.

She's growing rapidly and is developing more and more each day. She has reached the stage where anything she can get in her hands go into her mouth. It's really cute to watch her try and figure all that out. She's got a doll that she absolutely loves. She talks to her, sucks on her head, and loves holding her whenever she can.

She definitely recognizes Steph and I, and has a preference for Steph at this point, unless I'm singing to her. She seems to really like that.

She also has mastered the art of drinking from a cup. She loves drinking water. Anytime we have a cup and we're drinking while we hold her, she does her best to get her hands around the cup and pull it to her mouth. And she can drink water without spilling any! I might be partial, but that seems pretty advanced for a 3 month old.  

She spent her first night at the farm on Saturday night as I spent all day setting posts for a goat fence. We're going up again this weekend to finish up the job. I hope to have pictures of the efforts from this coming weekend. We will have goats at the farm by Spring, which is exciting. We've always loved goats, and I love that Sadie is going to grow up around these animals and learn the basics of farming and self reliance.