Alayna

Since Grandma left our house accomplishments have slowed greatly, but we are getting there. Bryn got a couple of things hung tonight while I had Kaia. The problem is that we have the opportunity to do things when she is sleeping, but then she is sleeping and we can't be drilling, hammering, etc.

Yesterday we ventured to Warwick. It is about 30 minutes away and has many of the stores that we don't have around here. So we got to go to Babies R Us and pick up a number of things including teething accessories. We have a feeling that it is just around the corner. Kaia has begun to chew on a couple of harder things instead of her usual sucking on everything. We also got to hit Border's, Target and some other misc stores. In San Diego we were 5 minutes from anything we might need (OK Babies R Us was about 15 minutes), but here that is not the case.

Kaia is experimenting with a number of new skills. The most noticeable is the use of her voice. She has been "talking" for awhile, but the last couple of days she has discovered that she can scream. So she will be happy and screaming to hear herself. Luckily, she hasn't realized how loud she can be when she is playing. It is amazing to see how specific and purposeful the use of her hands is becoming. She can pull her pacifier out and if it is close enough she will push it back in. We have also learned that when she is tired sometimes we can give her something soft to hold on to (a small animal or a cuddle blanket) and she will play with it with her fingers as she dozes. Yesterday I put a cuddle blanket that had a small bow on it and she just kept twirling it with her fingers. She has twirled her hair from the beginning, but she didn't have to be so specific with her hair since it was all over her head. Unfortunately, the trick isn't working at night. We are back to her night routine when she was 2 or 2 1/2 months in San Diego. She has turned back into the night owl. Tonight I gave her a bath and feed her and she was out by 7:30pm. We were optimistically excited. But as usual lately, she woke up soon after and has been fighting it for over two hours. She gets so upset and is up for so long that there are usually many bouts of eating until she finally goes to sleep. Last night she finally went to sleep for good at 12:30am. She is good once she is down for the night and will sleep from 7 to 11 hours. In San Diego it took us about 1 1/2 weeks to finally get her going to bed at a decent hour. She was good with the traveling and even when we first got to Newport, but not any more. I'm sure we will get there. And hopefully before Bryn starts school. He has to go in tomorrow to check in and find out about schedules, orientations, etc.

Please send us good normal bedtime vibes:)