Misc. pics and goofball videos

Like I promised, here is the video of Mara in her slumber, being messed with by Trav and I. I also included some other random pics for your pleasure.


Thank you Great Grandma and Grandpa Ista for my cute kitty. I love her!


I HATE this sitting up crap! Make it stop, Mommy!


I LOVE hanging out up here, by Daddy's cool spiky hair!


Oh, to sit and ponder the theory of relativity...or maybe just eat my hand.


Look at those amazing blue eyes!

Go Badgers!

Travis' dad made us a sweet pole for Christmas to hang our awesome Badger flag on. SO, since yesterday was the start of the ever awesome, we've-been-waiting-all-year-for-this, NCAA football season, it was only fitting that the flag went up and Mara was dressed appropriately (thanks to Auntie Tanya!)


Our beautiful flag, flying high!


'Nough said.


Mara admiring her Badger outfit



She is ready to cheer her team on.


Mara watching intently as the Badger crushed Akron State, 38-17.

Update

Mara had her hearing test yesterday and Cardiac ECHO and all is just fine. Thank you God! No worries!! She was a trooper and slept through the whole hearing test so she didn't have to be sedated! However, for the ECHO she did (mandatory) and didn't come out of the sedation too well. Very groggy. I think she slept 20 of 24 hours from yesterday at 9am to today 9am. Poor little girl. Anyway, we have some fun video of us messin' with her while she was zonked out yesterday. I will post that tonight. Otherwise, she is just a perfectly blessed little girl!

PS: She is trying so hard to scoot/crawl/army crawl now. Guess I will be spending the weekend baby proofing the house! =)

Mara's Bedroom!!

At long last, all the wainscotting is up in Mara's bedroom! Trav spent all day Sunday putting it up while I weeded my flowers and cleaned up our mess of a house (well, a mess to us.). Next weekend the plans are to put up the moldings up and down and maybe some painting. I can't wait for this to be done! No pictures until it is done!

In other news, Mara tried to sit up. Or maybe, I tried to make Mara sit up. Whatever. Usually she will just fold over when I try to sit her up, but instead she put her hands out to try to hold herself up. She was able to sit with her hands for about a minute or two before she hated it and begged to be loosed from that position! Great progress, though! I suppose it is hard to sit up with that great big head of hers! I guess it isn't really that big, though. She was also weighed today: 12.6lbs, 24". Continuing on the 25% curve from her birth. Way to go chunky chicken (our new name for her and her buddha belly)!! She is almost outgrowing her 0-3 month PJ's...next month maybe!

Imaginary Friends

Here are some videos of Mara talking to her imaginary friends: her toys, Psycho Duckie and Letter Q.

Playing with Toys

Mara getting a bath after a hot day outside.

Mara playing with her camel.

Mara playing with her frog from her auntie Rachel (what should we name the frog and camel?)

Mara eating her letters she got from Auntie Dorothy.

Nap time.

Where did all these aminals come from?

Super cute!

Super Mad!

Mara and Daddy after an eventful diaper change, getting ready for bed.

Samara's First Pool

Yes, we bought Mara a pool. A huge, Olympic-sized one....err, not really. A blow-up, $10 one from Walgreens. Whatever. We both like it, but I don't think that Mara is sold on it yet.

We tried it yesterday. First the water was way too cold, so I had to empty some out and put some hot water in to warm it up. So she sat in it, with my help, but wasn't too interested in any of the blow-up toys or the water. She just sucked on her nuk and her hands. Then she fell asleep. In the pool! I couldn't believe it. We don't have any pics because Trav wasn't home and I was all wet. Maybe we can get some from this weekend if we try the pool thing again...

Pictures!

Here you go!


Mara, cool as a cucumber.


I'm a winner!


Squeaky Clean!


Daddy having some Mara time.


Mara working her biceps; oohh so close!!


Peek-A-Boo!


My first pair of shoes!


Where is Daddy and Mara?


There they are, in their fort!

'I love this camping stuff!'

Where's My Internet??

Our modem is dead now. Great. It took 1 hour on the phone with Time Warner on Wednesday to figure this out. And while Trav was on the horn with them, Mara was doing something very unusual: crying. She cried for an hour when I tried to get her down to sleep! What the.....? She did it again on Thursday (only 15 minutes of screaming) and again on Friday (30 minutes). No idea what is going on, but she was fine the rest of the weekend. Pretty uneventul. Trav played in his annual gold tourney and sucked it up as usual. He spent more time tipping people's golf bags over and squealing the tires of the cart then teeing off. Sunday we made some headway on Mara's bedroom and today we spent the morning at Children's Hospital again for an ENT appt. All is well, just more appts. we have to do.

Samara is doing fantastic. She has learned how to reach for toys now, although she doesn't do it a ton yet. On Friday I had lunch with some friends and Mara made it interesting by rolling over (more of a flip) while I was changing her dirty (yes, DDIIIIRRRTTTYYY) diaper onto my friend's carpeted floor! No doo doo got on it, but it was close! Anyway, she is also making tons of new noises and basically makes our days completely fun and enjoyable! Here's to hoping we can get a new modem today and put up a crazy amount of pics of our little one.

Easy Peesy

So I guess that I have had it easy with how well Mara has been sleeping through the night since she was 2 months old. Well, now I know how the other side feels. She had a rough night last night and was cranking (new word) at 3:15am. I couldn't get her back to sleep till around 4a and then I have to get up at 5a. All this equals= mommy is tired and Mara gets to nap all day.

More info on the plastic surgeon appt: he wants to see test results from Mara's MRI and an EMG (some kind of electric test with needles and such to test what muscles in her face work and how strong they are) that the neuromuscular Dr. will do. Once he gets those results, we will know what options we have, which could include graphing a muscle from her leg into her face/mouth area in the hopes it will regenerate and work like it should. That is just one option, though. He was very happy that Mara was not drooling a ton; that could mean full paralysis. Instead, it just seems that a small portion is not working. We still don't know what caused this and that is what all the other tests are going to tell us. Frustrating thing is that a lot of these tests you can't do until you have a consultation. So we have a cardio consult, then have to schedule another appt. for an EKG; a neuromuscular consult, then an appt. for the EMG; a plastics consult, then schedule the next appt., etc.....Looks like this will be going on for a long time. Not to mention that we will be having a therapist coming to the home weekly to work with Mara (probably a PT) and a service coordinator meeting with us monthly if not weekly. So, with this, I am cutting out most other things in my life except essentials to focus on our little girl. We trust that this will end well and she will continue to be the amazing Samara that she is.

With that, she is rolling like nobody's business! She rolled over 3 times in a row Sunday while I was cooking dinner and almost rolled under the couch! I may complain that now I have to watch her more carefully, but I just love how active she is! She is forever rolling over in her crib, on our bed, everywhere! She is learning slowly to suck her thumb and yesterday while Trav and I were playing with her, she was working on doing the Army crawl on our bed! Crawling is just around the corner!

Break...

We haven't been able to post anything because our internet is down, so here is a quick update without pics:

Mara is 23 1/2 ", 11 lbs. 6 oz. She is in the 25% for her height and head circumference and 10% for weight. We are upping her milk to 5 oz. and trying to lengthen the time in between her feedings to 3.5 hours. Saturday was great, Sunday was a disaster. Today we met with the plastic surgeon (not much to report. He needs test results from other upcoming Dr. appts. to figure out what we are going to do next). Next Monday it is the ENT Dr. and on the 25th Cardiology, 9/2 MRI/Chest X-ray and 9/17 Eye Dr. She is also having her Birth-3 intake this Friday. Needless to say I am very busy, frazzled, and cranky.

Hurricane!

...Or maybe that was a Tropical Storm! Either way, Trav was in the midst of it in Houston and is finally coming home tonight! He said that where he was it sprinkled but most people had either fled or stayed inside all day for fear that it was going to get pretty bad.

On another note, thank God Brett is gone! Seriously, why did the evening news have video footage of Brett GETTING ON A PLANE as breaking news? Holy Crap, Brett has two legs and he used them to climb six stairs into a metal-looking thing that went up in the air and took him to Mississippi! What a momentous occasion! Come on! What is wrong with you guys? Forget him, go on and get ready for Badger Football, the only real football team in this state!

Family pics

About 2 weeks ago we had our Vickerman family reunion. My dad's second cousin Kris gave us all pictures of my Grandpa Howard's brother and sister-in-law, Uncle Tom and Aunt Lucille. I thought the pictures were beautiful, so I thought I would share. I love family history and storytelling and the reunion made me realize there is a lot of family history on my Grandpa's side that I never knew. I can't wait to impart some family history to Samara when she is older!


Aunt Lucille


Vickerman Farm


Uncle Tom

Back to front

Mara is now rolling over back to front. This is great, but it also means that she can't be left alone too long, like on a bed while I grab a drink. She won't stay still. She arches her back in attempts to roll over that Trav calls her a banana. She is growing up so fast!

I just have so much to say!!

Mara is such a talker, so I thought we would take some video of what she has to say to everyone. She also is a big ham and wanted some pictures taken.


I am trying so hard to sit up, but in 1 second I am going to tip over!


Don't you just love me!


Yum, Yum, my hands taste like chicken.


Hi everyone!


Don't you understand what I am saying? I said 'pick me up' not 'take my picture and laugh at me!'