6 months has come and gone

6 months, my how the time has flown by. We can't imagine our life before Cassidy, but really she's 6 months old already, so hard to believe. 6 months ago we were in the hospital, Cassidy yellow with jaundice soaking up the sun in the incubator and now look at us. She went for her 6 month check-up on Friday. We have a new pediatrician now since our insurance made us switch. The new doctor and team of nurses think she is adorable and several times she was referred to as the "Gerber baby." Cassidy is now 14 pounds 12 ounces (25th percentile) and 26 inches long (50th percentile). She is definitely a peanut, but a perfect peanut! And now a whole bunch of recent pictures.
Cassidy at 6 months, we have moved locations for our monthly shots now because she can sit up on her own!

Cassidy's cousin Emily (3 months) wanted pictures on her wall from all of her cousins. We'd been postponing this because what can an infant do for artwork. Well we decided it was time to make her first masterpiece so it could be framed in Emily's room. Here we are deciding what colors to use.

Using hands and feet we made a flower and butterfly. Thanks mom for helping, this is definitely more than a 1 adult job. Every time we changed colors Cassidy insists on rubbing her painted foot on my leg (thank goodness wet wipes take everything out).

The last bath in the baby tub in the sink. We decided since she could sit up and enjoy the bubbles it was time to move to the big tub. She is completely fascinated by bubbles, but very frustrated and they cannot easily be picked up in her hands.


First bath in the bathtub in her new seat. It went ok and she did enjoy the bath toys a little bit.For Brian's dad's birthday we went to visit and spent Sunday at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago.

Brian's dad took this picture for us. The goal was the Shedd Aquarium sign in the background, instead we have this wonderful little boy in our picture (we laughed a lot on the way home about this picture when I discoverd what he'd done). It's a great picture of our family and this little boy on the sign :)

Watching the dolphin show.

Brian is showing Cassidy some fishies, she enjoyed them as much as a 6 month old can.

Cassidy helped Grandpa open all of his gifts. Someone needed to taste test all the wrapping and tissue paper.

Allison was a big helper and fed Cassidy at the birthday party. Good thing she took that babysitter class we just may need her someday.

4 generations of the Gerken Family. Brian, his grandma (Jean), his dad (Tom), and Cassidy!

Some quality time with Gretchen. They love to play together, that is until Cassidy gets a good hold on Gretchen and she runs away for safety.

6 month update

Accomplishments:

Can sit up on her own

Is just starting to raise her hand in a wave

Can hold her own bottle

Can drink out of a cup and sippy cup (with assistance)

Eats and loves all veggies

Has finally doubled her birthweight (apparently a milestone)

Can scoot backwards on her tummy

Can,wait for it.............................SLEEP THROUGH THE NIGHT!!!!! (officially since the first week of January...only 5+ months in the making....oh how sweet)

Before we sign off for our 6 month update I must share mine and Brian's absolute without a doubt favorite time of day. We love going in, in the morning when she's just starting to wake up to get her. We open the door and from the doorway you can see the smile. We both fight to see who can get to the crib first (when either of us realizes the other is going in for morning duty we drop whatever we're doing for this moment). That morning smile she gives us is absolutely priceless. Someday in 10+ years I can see us running into her room doing the same thing just staring at her and she'll think we're crazy, but I know we'll both never forget those morning smiles.

Growing by leaps and bounds!

Every single day is something new with Cassidy and we are loving it! We are amazed at how quickly she has taken to sitting on her own. She will sit and play with her toys without any support for as long as we leave her there. Occassionally something will catch her attention and she'll turn and lose her balance, but not often. This makes it much easier and way more fun to play with all those toys she got for Christmas now.

If only we could have gotten Cassidy to look staright ahead for this one.

What a cutey, we just can't get enough of her these days. And now for a great video. Brian sharing my drink with Cassidy, notice how her whole body shakes with excitement over getting a drink. Much of the water went down her front, but she got to enjoy some and loved the experience.

Fun at the Gerken's

Well hello again from the Gerken household. As promised more pictures from the new camera and a video at the end! While Cassidy has been rolling from front to back for awhile (not often, but does it) she has yet to roll from back to front until this morning. In the wee hours of the morning we heard crying and it was going on for awhile so we checked on her. I found her on her tummy resting on her elbows sobbing. She must have rolled over in the middle of the night and didn't know how to get back. She did not like being on her tummy when she wanted to sleep. After soothing her and putting her back to sleep on her back she was out in seconds. We're not thinking she will be rolling over again like that soon.
Here Cassidy is watching the NIU bowl game on January 2nd. Sadly they did not win, but she enjoyed watching the game all snuggled up in her seat.
Brian decided to let Cassidy try drinking out of a cup since she stares at us when we do it. It was an adventure, very mess, but she liked it, not that her eyes reflect it in this picture.
Cassidy likes to cheer daddy on when he does his push-ups. When it's sit up time she likes to sit on his legs.

This is what we got Cassidy. She loves to look at herself and it plays music. She loves it and the songs unfortunately are very catchy so Brian and I find ourselves singing them even when they toy isn't on. Notice all that hair, she is finally getting more.On New Year's Eve we decided to let Cassidy celebrate a little by trying her first food other than rice cereal. She had sweet potatoes and loved them. She gobbled them up. So far she's had sweet potatoes and carrots. She likes them both. Brian even made homemade of them both after trying the Gerber kind. Verdict is homemade sweet potatoes pass the test but carrots were a big failure, I guess no one makes them like Gerber.
After cleaning up from the sweet potato mess Cassidy got all dressed up for the party. She did not wear the scarf later, just for the picture. We were so excited for her to welcome our guests in her party dress and tights, but she was tuckered out when they arrived and was in jammies and headed to bed.
Cassidy's cousin Isaac is reading to her from the new book he got her for Christmas. He volunteered to babysit if we needed it too. He's such a good big cousin.
Cassidy and Brian made dinner while I was gone to a meeting, this is what I came home to.
Over Christmas break we visited with some friends and this is their daughter Kayleigh. She is about 6 months older than Cassidy. During their playdate Kayleigh was silent and explored while Cassidy babbled on and on. We figure that in a few years Cassidy will be bossing Kayleigh around, we have no idea where she gets that :)


I cannot figure out how to change the orientation of this video, but we had to share this. This is Cassidy in her all time favorite toy, the jumperoo, which we affectionately call the poop-a-roo at our house. No matter when you put her in there she will have a dirty diaper when you take her out and boy is it messy. She loves her time in there, best garage sale purchase we've ever made, only $20!

We hope you've enjoyed our update.

First Christmas

We made it through our first Christmas as a family with all the traveling and had a blast with family and friends. We've been taking lots of pictures lately so we'll keep the words to a minimum and focus on pictures!This is Cassidy for her 5 month photo shoot. We can't believe how much she's grown and changed in 5 months. Finally a smile for the monthly shot. (Her onesie says, "Dear santa, I've been good all year, just ask my mommy." As someone pointed out it wasn't even a whole year. Speaking of lots of pictures, I got a new camera for Christmas and have taken lots of pictures and some video already, which is why we'll be posting more later this week. Brian took a picture Christmas morning as we opened the new camera, he said the old camera was sad.
Cassidy got a new winter hat for Christmas from Grandma and Grandpa Gerken. Her hat looks very similar to her Uncle Brett's. Here they are showing off their hats while checking some important info on the laptop.
Christmas Eve morning we headed to Gigi's (Brian's grandma's) for breakfast and gifts. Gigi was excited to finally get to spend some time with Cassidy while she was awake.
Brett got an Xbox and this nifty headset for it for Christmas. He was kind enough to show Cassidy how it works. She'll be playing video games before we know it.
A family shot all dressed up before we head out for Christmas Eve mass.
That's what you get for not smiling for the camera.
Cassidy enjoyed the paper and tissue paper much better than any gifts she got. This is how she helped us open her gifts.
Cassidy and Brian got a new bedtime book written by Brian's favorite band, They Might Be Giants. It included a CD too.
Monday before Christmas we headed to Dixon for our annual cookie baking/decorating event. Cassidy got to join in on the fun and decorated this adorable yellow star for her daddy. We sent it to work for him later that day and he loved it. It was quite a messy project, but she had fun.

Well that's it for now, we'll post more pictures soon including many with her new toys. Our house is full of toys that light up and make noise now and Cassidy loves it!