Hazel and Nora from esther benoit on Vimeo.

I have no new pictures of Hazel to share with you today, but I do have a picture of the cute shopping cart cover that I ordered from Goose Hill Designs. The cover is on its way and I can’t wait to try it out with Hazel at the grocery store this weekend! This is a nice alternative to always schlepping the car seat/carrier into the grocery store- especially since we will eventually be moving up to a car seat that can’t be carried out of the car!

She loves to spend time on a blanket without a diaper or an outfit- she loves to move around, rolling and trying to crawl and it’s much easier when she doesn’t have a big ol’ diaper to restrict her movement. We try to keep a cloth diaper underneath her so that we don’t end up with a wet blanket. This is not always a successful endeavor!

Our sleep schedule has been somewhat interrupted for a while now- maybe two weeks. Hazel has been waking up in the middle of the night to have a little snack almost every night. We think this is partly because she is starting to teethe- her bottom right tooth is poking through just a little bit and the bottom front left tooth looks to be on its way as well! As if teething weren’t enough discomfort for Hazel to go through, she also seems to be going through another growth spurt. She’s learning to sit up all on her own and we’ve read that that takes quite a bit of work- physically and mentally!
Here are a few pictures of Hazel sitting up and playing with some of her favorite toys. She’s wearing a fabulous new outfit that her Aunt Joanna and Uncle Matt sent her. Isn’t she stylish?

She is starting to really get the hang of sitting up unassisted- she seems to love the view. Hazel loves squirming and wiggling around constantly now. When I went up to get her from her nap a few days ago she had managed to wiggle her arm out of her sleeve. She is constantly on the move!

This week we got a new recliner and decided to rearrange the furniture in our living room. This has been a 3-4 day process because we had to rewire all the electronics and spackle and paint over the holes left by the art we had hanging up. Jered did most of the work and he did a fantastic job. Our living room looks so much better now and the entertainment center is all ready for our next movie night. Clayton got to come and try out our new set up last night. He watched Hazel for us while Jered and I went out to catch the latest Bond flick. We’ve decided that once a month we are going to try and go out on a date in the evenings. Hazel goes to bed around 7 and then sleeps through until at least 3 or 4 am so babysitting for us in the evenings is pretty much the easiest money a teenager could earn! It was nice to get out, just the two of us, and reminded us that we need to make time more often to get out on dates!
Here are a few shots of Hazel- in this first one she is trying out our new recliner- remote control and all. I think she approves.

In this one, she’s wearing our slippers- they are still a little big for her feet.

These next pictures were taken this morning- we love our lazy Sunday mornings!

Enjoy the videos- it’s hard to believe Hazel is 5 months old already.

Making Hazel Laugh from esther benoit on Vimeo.

Sitting in the Bumbo from esther benoit on Vimeo.

Hazel’s First Amusement Park from esther benoit on Vimeo.

Pseudo-Crawling from esther benoit on Vimeo.

This sleep disturbance has been a bit surprising as it seems to have come out of no where. Usually when Hazel is going through some sort of growth spurt or is reaching a developmental milestone, her sleep schedule goes out the window for a day or two- but this time it has been almost ten days of middle of the night wakefulness. I know that there is a major sleep regression between 4-5 months due to some of the developmental stuff her little brain is trying to process, but it seems like this has been above and beyond what we might expect for that sort of thing. Joanna mentioned in a note to me the other day that she thinks Hazel could be teething- this is something I’ve tried to push to the back of my mind, as the thought of nursing a baby with teeth scares the bejeeezus out of me- but I think she might be right! Hazel has a little white spot on her bottom gum and it looks like there is a tooth in there just waiting to cut through.

So all this hard work on Hazel’s part, what with the constant waking and eating and wanting to be held, never comes without its reward. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, all of these fussy, wakeful, irritable times always end up happening just before something new and exciting emerges in Hazel’s world. This time I think it might be more mental than physical- according to some of my development books there are major things going on in Hazel’s brain right now, most importantly she is learning how to distinguish patterns and her brain is starting to figure out cause and effect. I can only imagine how challenging this must be for her- although she doesn’t know that she’s being challenged. She is starting to realize that when she chews on her fingers it hurts, but when she chews on mom or dad’s fingers it just feels good.

Aside from the important brain stuff that’s going on right now (sorry to use such clinical terms), Hazel is also approaching some physical milestones. She is almost able to sit up completely unassisted! Here is some evidence- taken this past week. She has become quite adept at tripoding herself with her hands to make sure she doesn’t topple over.

I can’t tell you how proud we are that she is able to sit now- it makes her so happy too because it gives her a completely different outlook on our world.

We’ve taken a few great videos this weekend of Hazel and I hope to post them sometime this week so be sure to check back often!

We ended up getting a very large and tall pumpkin which Jered carved up before our Halloween party Friday night. We had quite a few people over for a potluck and movie night. We watched Ghostbusters and took Hazel trick-or-treating early in the evening before she decided she wanted to spend the rest of Halloween in bed. Here she is as Princess Leia, with her dad- Darth Vader.

And finally, Hazel with me as a witch- Jered and I decided to go low key on our costumes and just wore fancy hats (Darth Vader mask/witch hat).

Happy Halloween!

We got Hazel all suited up to eat her first bites of solid food- Great Grammy graciously reminded us to put a bib on the kid, and it’s a good thing we did!

We mixed the cereal up with Hazel’s beverage of choice- so it was rice au lait for our sweet bebe.
At first she didn’t really know what to do with it and just stuck her tongue out to feel the ricey gruel.

Eventually she realized that the cereal tasted somewhat familiar and she enthusiastically started to gnaw on the spoon.

Everyone got to give Hazel a spoonful of the lovely rice au lait concoction. She literally ate it up.



I fed her the first few bites, but alas there is no evidence- just pictures of my hands.
For those out there who are having a difficult time picturing the whole thing, I’m adding all the video footage of the event to this entry. It’s nearly 7 minutes long, but quite entertaining if you’ve got the time!

Hazel’s First Solid Food from esther benoit on Vimeo.

Hazel in the Command Center from esther benoit on Vimeo.

This second one is of me and Hazel enjoying a few laughs last weekend. Look for a more substantial update with lots of pictures and videos later this week!

Silly Time from esther benoit on Vimeo.