Lydia: 8-9 Months

Our little Lydia Elise is nine months old today.

Nine. Months. Old.

I'm holding on to every sweet baby thing about her, because I can see the baby starting to leave and the toddler starting to take it's place. I know it's a bit early to be feeling that way, but listen: Lydia can crawl, stand, cruise around furniture, and is getting that gleam in her eye like she wants more than anything to walk. She is eating small pieces of fruit, cheese, bread, and potatoes. She is starting to copy everything I do, and sometimes I look down at her and think that she looks so much like a little person that my heart wants to burst.

This month has been a busy one for us, and our darling girl has been SO amazing through all of it. As soon as we got home from our Christmas holiday we started packing up all of our posessions, and the last full week of being 8 months we cleaned (and cried), cleaned (and cried), and cleaned (cried) some more. She learned and then practiced her crawling amid all of the half filled boxes. She learned to cruise along stacks of boxes that were just the perfect Lydia height. She was content to play on her own while I worked endlessly to pack and clean, and I may never have been more grateful for such a good baby. The last few days of cleaning were the hardest, because she was just getting over a little cold and just wanted to be held. She would cry as I cleaned, but as soon as I scooped her up - all was right in her little world.

We will go to her nine month checkup this Friday, and so I will have her official stats then - but as far as non-official stats go... She is slowly growing into the size 3 diapers we moved her up to at the beginning of the month. She is solidly wearing 6-9 month clothes, but still fits into the smaller end of that range best.

*Update- Lydia's Official 9 Month Stats are:*

Weight: 15.98 lbs (15.66%)

Length: 26.25 (7.25%)

Head Circumference: 17.25 inches (49.75%)

--I had a really hard time moving her up to size three diapers. They are just so much bigger than the size twos. Although I know it's kind of silly, I wanted to go and buy another pack of twos and just squeeze her in them for a little while longer. The best day was when David found a little stash of size twos hiding in our brown diaper bag and we got to use them for a couple of days.

-- Lydia went from getting stuck in a semi-crawling position and then moving back to her bum to crawling all over the place. She is seriously pro. My favorite thing is when she crawls to me, whether that is a few feet away or from the next room over. I just love to see her smiling face grinning up at me while she hurries her little self over. Sometimes while I was packing, I would set her in the front room and go back to one of the bedrooms to work on packing a box and she would slowly make her way back to me, grinning proudly all the while. It gave me some time to get some baby-free packing in. However, as she practiced more and more - she got so speedy that she can now move vast distances in hardly no time at all. I have to keep an eye on her at all times because she can disappear in the blink of an eye.

--The day that Lydia turned 8 months old, she slept through the whole night. It was a miracle and such a blessing to her poor sleep deprived mama. Unfortuately, she has only repeated that accomplishment a handful of times. Our schedule now mostly consists of her sleeping from 8 p.m. until 4 a.m. with a small intermission and then waking up for the morning at 6:30. (At which point I bring her into our bed and nurse her until I'm ready to get up around 7:30.)

--I haven't been able to get a good picture of it, but Lydia has started doing the strangest thing with her fingers. She will cross her fourth and pinky finger then play with her thumb and third finger by rubbing them back and forth on each other. I've noticed that she does it most when she is a little nervous about something that is going on. It's so cute, but also so interesting. I wish I had a picture to show, but you'll just have to use your imagination.

--Lydia can pull herself up on pretty much anything now. At first, you could tell that she was using her arm strength to get her to the standing position and then she would just kind of lock her legs to keep her upright. But now she can stand just using her legs as long as she has something to balance against. She can stand up against a wall or even a package of diapers. She can cruise around while holding on with only one hand and loves the ability to get somewhere without having to sit down and crawl to it. She has even started letting go with both hands and balancing for several seconds on her own. (She mostly does this when she is holding a toy and decides that she needs both hands to inspect it.)

--Recently, she has started standing up, then reaching down with one hand to pick up the nearest toy. It took her a while to be able to accomplish the tast without tipping over, but now she is really good at it. She will stretch her arm down and pick up the toy/remote/small object then grin at herself as she drops it on the ground and starts the whole process over again.

--Something that has been fun is that Lydia recognizes David more and more when he comes home from work and greets him with a big grin. She is still a pretty big mamas girl - but she sure loves her daddy and she lets him know when he walks in the door. (The other day she was in the bath and she heard the front door open and she kept looking over my shoulder waiting for him to show his face. Her eyes were glued to the doorway.)

--Our nightly routine consists of feeding her some yummy mashed up food, giving her a nice warm bath, wrapping her up in her towel and making faces in the bathroom mirror, changing her into her pajamas, some nursing time, and then down in bed. At first I didn't think I would like giving her a bath every night, but I actually really enjoy it. She used to LOVE the bath, but now it takes her a little while to warm up to it. Regardless, I think that the warm water helps to calm her down and signal to her that it is time to sleep.

--Lydia is eating lots of food now. I was so worried about the "Stage 1/Stage2/Stage 3" foods. I read on a friends blog that their pediatrician had okayed their child to move up to Stage 2 foods, and so I got that into my head that I had to wait for approval from Lydia's doctor. Finally I read the label on a Stage 3 food and realized that it said "crawls with tummy off the floor." So we kind of jumped into Stage 2 and Stage 3 foods all at the same time. I have this constant battle as far as food goes - I want to make sure that she safe and eating good food at the right times, but I also want to be able to feed her food off our plates. I'm pretty sick of having to wait four days between new foods - because I want to be able to feed her spaghetti with sauce and I don't want to have to introduce tomatoes, then pasta, then mushrooms, then basil, etc... I just want to be able to feed it to her. Obviously, I want her to be safe and we would use our baby food grinder (such a fun new thing that we bought this month) but I don't want to have to wait to introduce every new thing. I don't know.

 --I got sidetracked on the bullet above. It was supposed to be about the foods that Lydia has eaten. She still loves apples, pears, peaches, squash, and sweet potatoes. One of her new favorite Gerber foods is Pears, Oatmeal, and Cinnamon. She eats small bits of bananas really well and has also done really well at eating small pieces of potato, cut up mandarin oranges, and little pieces of cheese. She is pretty happy to eat anything and we have been really enjoying our family meals where David, Lydia, and I all eat dinner together.

--Lydia still loves tags. If there is a tag to be found, you better bet it will be in her mouth asap.

--Some of the baby things that I am cherishing so much are:
      -The way she clings to me when she is tired.
      -The way she looks when she is asleep, peaceful and so tiny.
      -Her little baby gurgles and squaks.
      -How cozy she looks in her carseat carrier when she is bundled up in her blankets.
      -Her cute little clothes that make my heart melt!

--Some of the fun toddler-like transitions we are making:
      -Pulling herself up on furniture and looking so big standing up!
      -Starting to cruise around furniture and starting to stand on her own.
      -Sitting up in the shopping cart at the store and riding in the big kid part of the stroller.
      -Exploring everything and seeing the light in her eyes while she figures things out.

--One of the sad things about transitioning from my sweet baby... she is just getting SO big! She is growing out of her baby diapers, baby clothes, and baby swing/bouncer. I tried to put her in her little bouncer while I was doing the dishes one day, and just had to laugh at her little feet hanging off the end. When did that happen?

 --While we were spending some time at my parents in Morgan, Lydia was absolutely entranced with the gas fireplace in the basement. Because it sits pretty level with the floor I would make sure that I was always between her and the fire so that she wouldn't go and lean on the glass and burn herself. One night from about 2-4 Lydia decided that she wanted to be awake and playing instead of sleeping in her bed, so I pulled her out and let her crawl around on the floor while I laid in front of the fire and dozed off. I kept waking up to her trying to get around me and get to the flames. She would wait until I was starting to fall asleep and then she would make a run for it around my feet or above my head. I would simply just grab her and turn her around to go and play with her toys, but that girl is smart! Even during the day, if I turned my head for one minute she would make a beeline for the opening I had accidentally left for her. I made sure that I was far enough from the fire that there was no chance that she would get to it before I got to her - but she certainly kept me on my toes.

--About halfway through the month, I was busy packing a box and I looked over and Lydia had figured out how to climb up on a small game box as she was standing by the couch. I couldn't believe it.

--As if climbing up on a box wasn't enough, Lydia decided that she was going to learn how to climb up the stairs! At this point, she has only made it up the bottom two steps, but really - once she gets it... she gets it. We are going to have a get a baby gate as soon as we move into our new house. Something fun is that we actually caught it on video. Unfortunately, I can't make the stinking video work here. I will try tomorrow because it is so cute.



--Everything goes into her mouth still. In fact, maybe even more than before. My favorite is her special attachment to the wii remote. She will put the end of the wrist strap in her mouth and then drag the remote with her as she crawls around. It kills me. She will crawl around the room dragging the wii remote between her hands and knees. If the end pops out, she will sit back up, put the end back in her mouth and then head out on her way again.

--The only sound she really makes is "ba" - as in bababababababababa. I know lots of other babies say "mamama" or "dadadada" - not as in the names, but just the sounds. However, Lydia is pretty happy with just her babababa's. She went through a stage where she would make a loud "Whah....wwwhah" noise, but now it's mostly just screeches and gurgles or bababa's.

--While staying with David's parents, his mom Sue brought out a little stuffed giraffe and Lydia went crazy. She was SO excited. She was screeching and laughing - and she was loving playing with it. I couldn't believe how happy she was about it. The only thing she has ever reacted as strongly to is my parents dog, Dante, whom she loves. I loved her big smile as she petted and played with her little giraffe friend. (I realize that there are a lot of pictures of this, but I just couldn't choose.)

--There were so many other things that I wanted to post about, but I can't remember. I'm so sad - but I'm too tired to worry about it right now. If I think of anything else, I'll probably just come and add it to the post retrospectively. However, the one thing that I know is that I absolutely adore this girl. She is our whole world and we love her SO much. She is so happy, and she makes our lives so bright. (My only hope is that this month we can work on the whole sleeping thing, as this mama is pretty exhausted.) So to finish off, here are some more fun pictures of our nine month old baby:

We love you Lydia Elise!

A Mortgage

Last week I was stressing a bit (okay, a lot) about the insane process of buying a house. I called my mom in tears and told her about all of my stress and frustration. It was a good release for me, and she reminded me that buying a house is one of the most stressful things a person and specifically a couple will do. There are lots of "stress test" questionnaires that are around (I used to have my students do one in my Child Development class when we were talking about marriage and children.) Buying a new house or moving is worth a huge amount of points.  Moral of the story being that buying a house isn't supposed to be easy. It will always be stressful. But it is how you deal with the stress that matters. You can let the stress get to you and destroy yourself and your relationships. Or you can grit your teeth do what needs to be done and come out on top.

As I am trying to make this blog more realistic as a journal of our life, I decided that I probably ought to write about this process... because eventually we will want to be able to look back and be grateful that we survived. (Or maybe we will need it as a reminder to NEVER EVER MOVE.) However, I'm grateful that through the whole thing (save a few breakdowns) we were able to stick together and deal with the stress in a good way.

The last Friday of January we got a phone call from our mortgage lender, Box Home Loans, to say that they were sorry but they weren't going to be able to process our home loan. Say, WHAT!?!? We have been working with them for months and here we are, just a few weeks away from closing, and all the sudden they can't work with us anymore? The reason they gave us is that we are part of a down-payment assistance program and they won't accept money from any down-payment assistance programs. So, let me back up.

Our last semester at Utah State, I was working in my IT Computer Lab Manager Office and one of my friends, Larry Bucio, comes in and jumps on the computer next to me. He starts telling me about this program that he just heard about in his Family Finance class called the IDA program. The things that he was saying sounded way too good to be true, so we both started looking up their website. Utah Saves works in conjunction with the USU Extension (and other finance courses) to provide a program that promotes saving. In this society, saving money seems to be a lost art - and so they have set up a system that teaches peopel how to save and then rewards them for it. The deal is that you save a certain amount of money each month into a special savings account and then at the end of 2 years, they match your money $3 for every $1 for use on starting a small business, paying for college, or buying a house. That very hour I signed David and I up to be a part of this program, and it was fantastic. We went to financial literacy classes, which were great in of themselves as we were still trying to figure out our finances as a married couple. We filled out some paperwork and were accepted into the program. It was amazing that we heard about it when we did, because after we graduated we both got jobs and we wouldn't have been able to qualify for the income restrictions. Every month for two years we drove to Zions Bank and deposited our $62.50 into our IDA account. Now that we are buying a house we have $1,500 saved and the IDA program will be matching that money with a $4,500 cashiers check. Amazing opportunity right?

Except, now - back to the present. Box Home Loans won't work with us because of our IDA. They don't even have a reason why, except that they "just don't work with downpayment assistance programs". Well, $4,500 is a whole lotta money, and so that next Monday I start making phone calls. I call our IDA rep, I call Box, I call 5-6 different mortgage lenders to get their quotes for a 30 year term with 10% down. Seriously 20 phone calls later, we realize that Box is lame but interest rates have gone up and if we go with anyone else - our $4,500 is really only worth about $1,000 because our 3.25% interest rate would now be 3.625%. (Cue me calling my mom in tears.) Not only would our interest rate be higher, but most of these other companies aren't even sure that they can push the loan through soon enough to close during mid-February. (Oh yeah, and McArthur Homes still hasn't given us a closing date at this time - so we could be closing anywhere from February 8th to February 20th.) The people at IDA were pretty ticked off and were making some phone calls of their own. The head lady, Martha, was so up in arms that she was talking about calling Congressmen and all sorts of other high-ranking people. David and I spent several hours discussing our options, and finally we decided that due to the increase in interest rates and the trouble that it would cause - we would just stick with Box and forgo the money that we had tirelessly worked to earn in hopes that IDA would figure out a way for us to get that money. (Even if we had to write a business plan and then put the money into Red Ladder.)

Needless to say, we were pretty upset. I'm not sure why Box won't accept the money. Honestly, the way they treat it - the IDA money is as good as Monopoly money to them. I had another mortgage lender explain their version of why some lenders are a little hesitant to use down-payment assistance programs. It makes sense to me to a point: "Due to the mortgage crisis that we experienced a few years back, many mortgage lenders are hesitatnt to work with down-payment assistance programs. What was happening is that people were getting into homes that they couldn't afford and they were using these DPA programs to pay their entire down-payment.After they got into the house, they realized that they couldn't keep up with the monthly mortgage payments and because they didn't actually have any money invested in the house, they wiped their hands clean and walked away - leaving the banks to deal with the defaulted loan." He then explained that because we were already paying 5% out of our own pockets his company wouldn't bat an eye at the IDA because people can qualify for a loan with just 5%, so why would they care where the rest of the money was coming from. So, okay. That makes sense to me. I get why a company would be a little hesitant to work with someone whose whole down payment was coming from a down payment assitance program. But here is the thing - check our income, check our credit scores/history, and look at the rest of the money that we have for the downpayment. We are obviously not a risky investment! We have high credit scores, we have plenty of income to make the mortgage payment, and we have enough money saved to make a decent downpayment on our own. Argh, it is so frustrating!

The back and forth stretched on for DAYS. We had no idea exactly what was going to happen. Box was being pretty snotty with us about the whole thing. IDA was trying to figure out a solution to help us. We were just praying that everything would smooth out in time for us to actually get into our home. IDA finally contacted us and said that they had made a ton of phone calls and finally worked it out so that we could use the IDA money as a "principal payment" at the time of closing. It wouldn't count as our down payment, so if we wanted to keep our monthly payment and mortgage insurance where it was we would need to come up with the rest of the downpayment on our own. Through an incredible miracle and tender mercy, we were able to find the funds to make the rest of the down payment.

Whew. Sigh of relief, right? We called Box and left a message saying that we were glad that they had worked everything out with IDA and that we were just going to be able to use the money as a principal payment. We thanked them for their efforts in helping us (which was generous because they were being really stinky about the whole thing) and gave them some information they needed to continue the process. Later that night I missed a phone call and when I checked my voicemail, it was Box calling us back. The message basically said "We have no idea what you are talking about. Everything that we know says that we won't accept the IDA money, ever. Stop wasting our time." I was honestly so done at this point. I didn't have enough energy to be upset or angry. We were basically resigned that Box was going to not accept the money and just put our faith in IDA that they would figure out another way for us to get the funds. The loan was still proceeding through underwriting - so we took a couple of days as a breather and just tried not to let the whole situation get us down. (Oh yeah, have I mentioned that at this time we have now moved all of our belongings to a storage unit and are spending hours and hours and hours and hours cleaning our apartment. It was exhausting in of itself, not to mention this whole situation with our IDA.)

Finally we decided that we probably better work things out, and called IDA back. Our contact, Scott, was pretty annoyed at Box and basically said that they were being lame and wouldn't lift a finger to help with the situation. However, being the wonderful organization that they are said that they had finally found a way for us to get around all of their loopholes. We are still going to be able to make a principal payment (interest is nasty stuff!), but we have to wait until a week after closing in order for them to accept our monopoly money. Whatever.

I think that we finally have things figured out. Through the whole disaster there were countless little blessings, such as being able to come up with the money for the rest of the down payment, talking to many friends and family members who were supportive 100%, having the people at IDA work so hard to make sure that we would be able to use that money, and even finding the IDA program in the first place. It was an extremely stressful time. Looking back at this post, the words don't even do justice to the frustration and hours and hours spent worrying about trying to get it all figured out. Not to mention all of the normal stresses that come with completing paperwork, paying for apprasials, submitting information and all of the other loopholes through which one must jump when they want to buy a house.

I hope that this is the last time that I have to mention anything about this - and that from here on out everything will go smoothly and that in less than two weeks we are in our home! But if not, we will keep our chins up and grin and bear it. Someday, someday, we will be in our house and then this will all be worth it.

Five Things

1- We got everything moved out of our apartment and are officially homeless. Thank goodness for great parents who love us and are willing to let us crash with them for the next two weeks.

2- We finally got a closing date on our house. February 14th. Happy Valentines Day to us! (Too bad we won't get the keys that day.)

3- I'm SO SO tired. We both are. This week has been so busy with trying to get things lined up for our loan and trying to move out of our apartment. Today I fell asleep while Lydia was crawling all over me. Literally up and down my body but I just couldn't keep my eyes open.

4-This morning we met with the contractor of our house to talk about the concrete patio that they are pouring off our back steps. It has been too cold to pour any concrete, but it finally warmed up a tiny bit. We wanted it poured so that there was just a little landing at the bottom of the stairs and then it spread out to a large pad to the right of the stairs. He sprayed the outline with his can of spraypaint and we felt pretty good about it. We asked him what he thought, and he said "I think that it should be a little longer right here - and proceeded to add about 20 square feed to the pad. We asked him if that meant that he would have to make it shorter somewhere else, and he just looked at us like we were crazy said "No, my guys will just pour it." Love the attitude of the contractor vs the salespeople that were very much like "You only have 160 square feet unless you want to pay for more." Looking at the outline of our patio makes me SO excited to put a little picnic table out back where Lydia and I can eat lunch in the summer, do fingerprinting, and play with chalk on the concrete. It makes it seem so real.

5- It's obvious that this week has been all about our house. Packing, moving, cleaning, and getting things prepared to close on our house. We had a bit of trouble with our mortgage lender (I have another post half-written about that) and it's been exhausting trying to get everything figured out. Lydia hasn't been sleeping well because of all of the stress and changes, and that means that we haven't been sleeping well either. I'm just grateful for David and how hard he works to make things better for our little family. I have the tendency to stress out and get really upset - but he manages to stay calm and focused and do what needs to be done (all while comforting and supporting me). I can't tell you how happy I will be when things finally slow down a little bit and we can rest for more than two minutes.


This isn't much of a Friday Five post - but it's all that I've got in me tonight. Happy Friday!