happy girl!

Eleanor is happy and I'm so happy!  For a while there I was getting worried something might be wrong.  It was really, really hard to get her to smile and her laugh was almost like a cry at times.  She fussed a lot and I thought maybe she's just so different from Hutson as a baby.  People are always saying how different their kids are.  But something just always felt off since she was about 6 weeks old.  She slept fine though so I was a little baffled.  I was getting nervous.  At Christmas time we spent time with my brother and his baby that is 7 weeks older than Ella.  Mia was so happy and it made me sad.  Why wasn't my baby as happy?  Was it me?  Was it because she wasn't in daycare?  Was I not giving her enough attention?  Could she be autistic?  Then right after Christmas her sleep went haywire.  It was taking me forever to get her down and then she was up more at night than ever.  I was frazzled and frustrated.  So I took her to the pediatrician.  Healthwise she was fine except for some gross details about her bowel movements (sorry).  The pediatrician suggested I stop dairy to see if that would help and we came up with a plan for the sleep thing (Ferber).  Turns out she has an intolerance for the dairy I had been consuming.  Now that I've stopped dairy she's a whole different baby.  She's smiling all the time and laughs and is just happy!  Life in general is just better.  I feel really bad it took me so long to figure it out.   Here's a sweet picture of my happy, dairy free baby!  :)

more Carruth Christmas fun

The day after Christmas Jeffrey, Lynette, Benton and Mia arrived. Hutson was so excited Benton was there. He followed him around all day long.  The boys also got to ride the tractor with Daddy Jim...a highlight of the trip.  It was SO cold when we were there.  Hutson has been talking all year that at Christmas it was going to snow.  We kept trying to explain that it generally doesn't snow in Texas or Mississippi around Christmas and we don't get snow every year.  He proved us wrong though.  Although you can't see it, it was lightly snowing in these pics.

Christmas continued

We spent Christmas with my family.  We arrived a few days before Christmas and spent Christmas Eve and Day with my parents.  Hutson had a great time with Daddy Jim and Grandma.  He was excited to see Santa's gift.  He specifically asked for a watch for Christmas.  Santa put it in the bottom of his stocking.  When he saw what Santa brought he excitedly said, "But I didn't order all this!"  He was thrilled he got more than the watch.

Hutson putting cookies out for Santa.  A note about the pjs.  When I bought them in November they fit pretty well.  By Christmas they were too small.  Hutson has grown a lot this year.  It's surprised me since he's always been on the smaller side.

 Loot from Santa.  He was so excited!

 One of his gifts was a working stethoscope.  Isn't that cool!  Mike and I had fun playing with it too.  Here he was checking Daddy Jim's ticker.  Hutson said it was all good.

 A favorite was the new headlamp light.  He loves this.

 Ella didn't understand what all the fuss was about.  :)

smiley girl

four and five months

With the holidays and everything going on last month, I neglected to post Eleanor's four month update.  So I'll do it with the 5 month post.

Ella had her four month check-up last month.
She weighed 11lbs, 8oz and was 23 1/2 inches long
Hutson at this age was 14lbs, 4 oz and 24 1/2 inches long.

Between three and four months she:
-started rolling over
-laughed
- grabs for everything

four month pics:

She has hair enough to hold this on for a second.  Thanks Aunt Ti for the fun clip!

This past month she's been keeping me quite busy:
-we did some sleep training
-She's rolling over constantly
-She's trying to scoot
-She is getting up on her hands and knees
-She can sit unassisted briefly (in the tripod position)

She still will not take a bottle but I'm going to introduce a sippy cup in hopes that'll help.  She seems very interested in eating.  She watches us intently as we eat.  I'm still going to hold off just a bit in introducing solids.

five month pics:

staches

Christmas with the Harpers

We spent Christmas this year with my family, so before we trekked to Mississippi we had a Christmas celebration with Mike's family.  Hutson had a great time.  He was so excited about the gifts.  His first gift was a button down shirt from Aunt Ti and Uncle Joe.  When he opened it he got so excited and said, "My very first button down shirt!"  Too funny!

Ella slept through most of the fun.

Christmas recap - decorating

We had a great Christmas this year.  Hutson really understood this year the festivities and loved participating in everything.  He loved helping decorate the tree.  Eleanor enjoying watching.  

Hutson asked to have his toenails painted.  Apparently one of his friends (a boy) at school had painted toenails and he wanted it too.  :)  Made us laugh.  

Our Elf on the Shelf.  Hutson named him Linus.  Hutson had a great time finding Linus each morning.  If you don't know much about Elf on the Shelf.  Santa sends the elf to your home and he flies back to the North Pole each night to report on the children's behavior.  The next morning Hutson had to find the new place he landed.

 A smile!!  :)

for my brothers

I've been so busy with the baby I've barely had time to do much.  But I wanted to come and show my brothers and sister-in-laws a cute one of each of their families.  Too bad I don't have one of our family of four.  It's so fun to me how we all had a boy then a girl.  In fact, the grandchildren are three boys first, then three girls.

nieces and nephews - Carruths

We visited my family this year for Christmas.  While I have lots and lots of picture from our holidays and the month of December, I've worked on these to show right now.  In between taking care of the Hutson and Ella I'll get to the rest eventually.

Here are my brothers kids.  Aren't they cuties!

Clayton (he looks just like my brother Michael)

Benton (he looks just like my brother Jeffrey)

Johna Claire

Mia

I have to say we have good genes!