Elle goes to "school" 5 days a week...

It has been a little over a couple of months since I have gone back to work. Since then Eleiana has been going to day care two days a week. We wanted to slowly transition and ease her way in at day care. Well, tomorrow, Elle turns 6 months old and starting today, she officially goes to "school" (as we call it) five days a week. She has grown and developed a lot since she first started going to day care. We would like to believe that going to day care has helped a lot in her development. Daddy Jarbs and I feel that she is now ready to go there every day. We are happy with our day care providers and feel that Elle is well taken cared of while she is there. She is always happy whenever I pick her up in the afternoon and that makes Mommy Jarbs happy as well. When she first started going to day care, she can barely last one minute during tummy time but now, when you put her down, she immediately rolls over to her tummy, hangs out and plays for a few minutes. Now that she is bigger, she gets to play on the exersaucer like the older babies. If you remember, a couple of months ago, we planned on buying her one but she did not care for it too much.  



Here is a photo taken this morning from the day care webcam.

Elle is the baby in the middle, having a ball on the exesaucer. 



Eleiana's 1st swim class!

Today was Eleiana's first day in swim class! There were a lot of babies in the class. Five of the babies from my PACE group were in the same class too so Elle got to see her friends. It took a while for Elle to warm up to the big "bath tub". Towards the end, she started kicking and splashing herself :-).

Practicing her freestyle ;-)

With the babies from my PACE moms group

Here are the babies jumping on the pool

Elle liked playing with the rubber ducky but started crying when Daddy Jarbs took it away

With my future Olympic swimmer ;-)

"Crawling" backwards!?

As we were getting ready to leave for work and the babysitter this morning, I put Eleiana down on her back on the activity mat while I got all our stuff together.  A minute after, I looked back and saw that she already rolled over to her tummy, on all fours and pushing herself backwards across the living room! I could not help but laugh and asked where she was going. I called Daddy Jarbs, who was upstairs, to see her "crawl" backwards! We were both in awe watching our little girl hit another milestone :-). Then, she started to kiss and lick the wood floor! That's when I immediately picked her up and said "that's it, you're done!" lol. She's not officially crawling yet but I was told that babies learn to crawl backwards first before the learn to move forward. We now have to start thinking about childproofing our house because before we know it, she'll be running around the house and creating havoc :-).

1st time on a high chair!

We went out for dinner tonight with Grandma Jarbs. Eleiana was in a great mood and behaved well while we were in the restaurant. Since she can now sit up, so we thought we'd try and have her sit on a high chair. Well, she liked it! She watched us ate while playing with Sophie :-). Now, I have to get a high chair cover. She practically licks everything she puts her hands on. We do not want her licking those dirty high chairs!

Elle's 1st Easter basket

Here are photos of Elle with her 1st Easter basket. The Easter bunny got her a lot of goodies: Aden + Anais sleep slack, hibiscus summer hat (which she'll hopefully wear when we go to the beach this summer), Baby Banana training toothbrush, huge bibs (for when she starts eating solids), Trumpette Minnie socks and tights, Sassy Look Photo Book (which includes photos of family members), Green Sprouts stacking cups and of course, a Kaloo bunny doll.

Checking out her Easter basket

The bunny ears tastes good!

Elle's 1st Easter!

Today we celebrated Elle's 1st Easter! We had a full day but nevertheless a fun one!

When Eleiana woke up, she hang out at Mommy & Daddy Jarbs' room where we read her Pat the Bunny book. We did not realize until later that she's wearing her bunny pajama on Easter! :-)

We had our own Jarbs family Easter brunch at Bombay Club. It is one of our favorite Indian restaurants. The last time we were here, Daddy Jarbs and I just started dating! Elle behaved really well while we were having lunch. She was happily playing with Sophie while Daddy Jarbs and I were enjoying the buffet brunch.

 

Daddy's girl :-)

 

  Mommy Jarbs with her favorite daughter :-)

Later in the day, we headed off to Grandma & Grandpa Jarbs' house for Easter dinner. 

Here she is with Godmomma/Aunt Kim and Aunt Terri.  Aunt Kim gave her books for Easter. Grandma Jarbs got her a stuffed bunny and a singing duck.

Family softball

Mommy Jarbs and Elle watching the game

Look who can sit up (unassisted) now!

Her new skill! Since she has discovered her toes, she can't get her hands and mouth off of them!

Goodbye swaddle..hello, tummy sleeper!

We have finally decided to wean Elle off of swaddling aka straight jacket. Lately, she's been rolling over while swaddled during her sleep. It got me worried that she'll get stuck face down and won't be able to breath. This weekend, we finally made the decision to transition her to a sleep sack. She sleeps really well while swaddled so we were not sure how she'd take the transition. Well, the first night she was on a sleepsack, she slept like...umm a baby :-). We were surprised to see her roll over to her tummy and slept very soundly! When she was a newborn, we noticed that she has a preference on sleeping on her tummy but we did not encourage it for fear of suffocation and SIDS. Now that she has great head control and can roll over, we just let her sleep however way she wants it :-).

Here are a couple of shots from the video monitor. It's so cute to see her do baby push ups and turn her head side to side. She sleeps on her tummy practically every night now :-).

Another play date with Henry

Eleiana was at our friend Pam's /babysitter's house today. Pam was kind enough to take these photos and send them to me while I was at work.

Here are 8 month old Henry and 5 month old Elle working on the animal puzzle. Pam said they both liked the horse puzzle piece! Perhaps, we have to get one of these puzzles for Elle to play at home.

Pam said Elle was sitting up unassisted close to a minute! Good job baby!



Rolled over from tummy to back!

Daddy Jarbs was playing with Elle yesterday morning when she rolled over from back to tummy! I missed it as I was in the other room putting her clothes away. Hopefully, I'll catch it next time and if we're lucky enough, have it on video. Yay for another milestone!

Eleiana meets Sergio

We visited our friends Arlynn and Israel who had their baby Sergio last February.  Elle finally got to meet Sergio who is about 3 months younger than her. Sergio is 9 weeks old now and he's a cutie pie!

Elle meets Sergio

Elle was holding his leg..how sweet

But wait! She got us fooled. She was really eyeing Sergio's toy! lol

Elle was happy..Sergio wasn't

We told her to give the toy back to Sergio so she started to cry.

We gave her Sophie instead.

Everybody happy :-)

Elle was beat by the time we got home. She was cranky when we got home so we put her down for a cat nap at 6:45 pm but she did not wake up until 7 am the next morning! Sergio tired her out :-).

Saturday fun day...

Daddy Jarbs had to do some work at his Gallery Place condo (which will be up for sale soon) today so Elle and I came with him. Elle and I went shopping at Ann Taylor and walked around Gallery Place while waiting for Daddy Jarbs.

Here's Elle sitting up unassisted while we were inside the condo. Before I took this photo, she was looking down on the floor so I kept saying "Elle, Elle, look up. Elle...Elle". Well, she wouldn't look up! And then I started hearing her giggling like she's making fun of me and purposely not looking up! Silly girl!

 

After Daddy Jarbs was done working in the condo, we walked to Pennsylvania Avenue to check out the Japanese Street Festival. The festival was going to run until 6 pm but we did not get there until almost 5 o'clock. Well, things worked out perfectly nevertheless. Since it was already late, we were able to get in for free (skipped the $5 per person entrance fee) and the food stalls were selling their food on discount! Yay!

Fun day with Grandma Jarbs!

Daddy Jarbs came home early from work today so he and Grandma Jarbs took Elle for a walk.  The weather was beautiful so it was a perfect day for a walk. The trekked from our house all the way to Gallery Place. Daddy Jarbs worked on our Gallery Place condo while Grandma Jarbs walked around the neighborhood. Elle napped in the stroller while they were out. She loves the outdoors so she was in a great mood...except when Grandma Jarbs stopped at Tangysweet to get some frozen yogurt. Elle started fussing while Grandma Jarbs was in line to get her froyo. Eventually, Grandma Jarbs had to leave her place in line and skip the frozen yogurt :-P. Interestingly, frozen yogurt was the only thing I did not want to eat while I was pregnant. Maybe Elle remembered? lol

When I got out from work, I met them for dinner at our neighborhood Thai place, Beau Thai. She was in a great mood the entire dinner. She was babbling a lot, shrieking, smiling...

Here she is playing with her favorite toy, Mr. Monkey



 Then she started grabbing Daddy Jarbs' glass of water. Since we'll have to start giving her solid food soon, we caved in and gave her a sip. It was funny to watch her suck and spit the water back out.



Here she is babbling...and then she grabbed and wanted to eat the camera

(sorry, Daddy Jarbs forgot to turn the camera again)

Monthly cupcake!

Of course Elle's monthly birthday will not be complete without her monthly cupcake cake! Well, it is actually more of a treat for Daddy and Mommy Jarbs' but don't tell her :-P. This month we got her an oreo cookie cupcake from Crumbs. Yum!

Then she wanted to eat her monthly Picky Sticky....umm photoshoot's over!

Elle turns 5 months old!

I feel like we just had her 4 month birthday a couple of weeks ago. She is growing up too fast!

These are my favorite photos from this month's shoot.

This is the gummy smile that greets us every morning when she wakes up

Elle's many faces

Fun facts @ 5 months:

* Raises her arms when she wants to be picked up. She just started doing this a couple of days ago which surprised both Daddy Jarbs and myself.

* Puts practically everything in her mouth

* Mr. Monkey and Sophie the Giraffe are her favorite toys these days

* Gets excited when she sees her milk bottle. It's funny to see the twinkle in her eyes when she sees the bottle. Most of the time we have to hide it from her until it's all warmed up and ready for her to drink. Otherwise, she gets frustrated or grabs it and wants to drink asap.

* When she started at day care, her daily report described her as "content". Now, her report says she's "sociable" ;-).

* Loves being outdoors

* Can stand up assisted

* Understands the concept of cause and effect. She knows that if she starts wailing while she is in her crib, mommy and daddy will come get her (and then welcomes us with a huge smile). We've seen her cry, stop and look around to see if somebody is going to come to her rescue lol.

*Turns her head when you call her name

*Very close to sitting up unassisted. She can sit unassisted for a few seconds and then tips over

*Loves to grabs things and tries to put it in her mouth..mommy's hair, mommy's necklace, mommy's bracelet, her nosefrida (nose sucker) ugh.

*Goes to bed anytime between 7:30 pm -8:00 pm until 7:00 - 7:30 am. Will wake up at night to look for her pacifier and go back to sleep. She gets hungry around 6:00 am so we give her a bottle after which she goes back to bed.

*Side sleeper. It's funny how she will automatically turn to her side while swaddled

Trip to the National Mall and the Fish Market

Finally, it feels like spring! The weather today was beautiful so we HAD to go out and enjoy the day. Elle and I started the day by going shopping at Buy Buy Baby. We later met up with Daddy Jarbs downtown. We parked the car in my office and walked to the National Mall. There were too many people checking out the cherry blossoms so we did not bother to stop and take pictures. Besides, we already took photos with the cherry blossoms last week :-).

Elle napped in the stroller while we walked to the Fish Market. She woke up when we got there. Well, she started to get bored in her stroller and started screaming to get out lol. As soon as Daddy Jarbs took her out of the stroller, she was all smiles. 

Little PINK riding hood, all cozy in the stroller ;-)

We originally planned on buying seafood and eating at the Wharf but our order took forever to come out and it was cutting close to Elle's bed time :(. As soon as we got our food, we walked back to my office where we parked our car. We ended up taking the food home and eating them for dinner...at least whatever is left of it.

Seafood!



Daddy Jarbs couldn't wait to try his fried oyster sandwich!

At the Butterfly Garden