Maisie will be walking soon....

Maisie was 5 1/2 mths old when she pulled herself up to stand for the first time and since then she has been working on taking steps. I love watching her play during the day, pulling herself up on anything she can grab...sometimes trying to stand up on her own and then trying to take a step. Sometimes she is successful, she may get two or three steps in before she falls, and sometimes she seems like she goes straight to the floor. It is funny when she happens to take three or so steps successfully toward me and she has the biggest grin on her face like she knows she is a big girl. I just can't get over how fast they grow, she is trying so hard to do everything right away.

We hate saying goodbye...

Had to say goodbye to my parents again, they left to go back home...it is funny how, to most people, we see them quite often, yet to us (and them) it just doesn't seem like enough.

Maisie is doing pretty good right now but I have a feeling tomorrow is going to be a rough day. She just loves her grandma and grandpa...she usually gives me a couple grumpy days when it is just me and her and daddy.

Another Popeye's fan!

I really think that if I give Maisie anything I am eating she will just take it, no questions asked. My dad brought home popeye's yesterday and that is one of my ABSOLUTE favorites, I love the red beans and rice and the spicy chicken and the mashed potatoes, okay, and the biscuits...I love everything! well, Maisie has had beans, and rice and potatoes but nothing really with any spices in it...mainly because I am not really sure when you can introduce spices...so I said, what the heck, she can just try some. Well, needless to say, she didn't want to stop, she ate a bunch...i was lucky to get any...haha. I thought afterwards she may get a tummy ache, but she was just fine...no problems at all!

She tasted the beans and rice and the potatoes, the biscuit and the chicken....yes, the chicken. I tore a piece out of the middle and she used her bottom teeth to tear a small piece off and just couldn't seem to get enough of it....I almost lost a finger in the process...LOL. I hope she keeps this up!

Maisie and the peach...

I just love giving Maisie new things to try because she doesn't seem to be afraid of anything.....yet, that is. Since we started her on solid foods, most of what she eats has been homemade...she just doesn't care for the storebought food, and anytime I am eating something she insists on trying it. So we decided to give her a fresh peach because they were so ripe and soft when we bought them. Well, I took her pants off (cause I knew she would be a mess) and put her in her seat and gave her the peach and she LOVED it!!

What a weekend!

We got to see some friends we haven't seen in 3 years! When we were stationed overseas at Lajes we met a wonderful couple who we just clicked with right away...and we just hated that they left after a month of us really getting to know them. Well we visited them this weekend and had a great time...I just wish it could have been longer...maybe next time.

It was fun watching Maisie with the kids, she loved watching their boys and their baby. She also loved their dog :)

Hate Sickness...

I think Maisie and I are FINALLY almost over our colds. Maisie had never been sick until just over a week ago when she got a small fever. Then, she was congested in her nose, it made it hard for her to nurse and eat, I felt so bad for her. She is usually so happy and all over the place all day and when she had that fever, she just wanted to snuggle....I actually loved that part...it was so sweet. It is funny how being a mom makes me think up all these worst case scenarios about what could happen to my poor baby...she has a little cold, which I know is not uncommon and yet I felt the need to turn her baby monitor up so I could make sure I heard her breathing :) I also felt the need to check her temperature every five minutes...haha...it is funny how paranoid I started feeling.

Well, she got over her fever in less than two days but it feels like the mucus just stays with you forever! She even started losing her voice a little...which was cute because she could hear the difference and played with her new sounds. She still has a little cough...and I can still hear some congestion in her nose...but it seems to get a little better each day, Praise God.

We have been kidnapped :)

I have to say sorry to all my Mississippi friends, I have been kidnapped for the week by my parents, they were desperate to see Maisie. I think it has been a month since they have seen us and they said they were going through withdrawals so I agreed to be taken :) We are now safely arrived in GA and Maisie is asleep...she is not going to like getting up in a few hours...it will be a long sunday, but it will be good!

And for those of you who know my parents, the reunion was sweet. Maisie was quite comfortable snuggling with Grandma and Grandpa, she had not forgotten them as I know they always fear :)

Happy Mornings

I think my favorite thing of all is the mornings, there is nothing greater than walking into your baby's room and her greeting you with a huge smile. Maisie is just SO happy in the morning, she eats and then just talks to me and gives me sugar. Then, she is off to play with her toys talking and laughing and squealing at nothing and everything. She is just a genuinely happy baby and that makes me happy.

My Very First Blog

I have always liked reading peoples blogs, especially people I haven't seen in a while. Also, now that I am a mother, I just love reading people's blogs about their experiences with their children. I hope that by getting started I will be able to remember a lot of the little things that are usually forgotten.

First I would like to say, for those who may not know me THAT well, that I am a military brat. Georgia is the place I call home because I lived there most of my life. I am a born again christian, married to an Air Traffic Controller in the Air Force. We are, for now, living in Keesler, Mississippi. My husband and I got married in GA, moved to Lajes, Azores for two years before moving here. I have a bachelor's in Spanish Education and a Master's in Human Relations.

Like most married couples, my husband and I hit a rough patch a little while back, but by God's grace we got through it and I think came out the other side for the better and are now the proud parents of our first baby girl. I got pregnant in Oct. 2008 quite unexpectedly but found it to be a nice surprise. I was sick for most of my pregnancy, was sore, had pain and even through it all was excited about what was to come. I thought I had prepared myself for anything when the time came to give birth...then I realized I had prepared for everything except the possibility of a C-Section, which is what I ended up having. I was 41 weeks and hardly progressed at all so they decided to induce me. My labor progressed fine for a while until I stopped dilating at about a 6, they let me stay there increasing the pitocin for about 4 hrs and they said there was nothing else they could do but prep me for a C-Section. I was TERRIFIED but didn't really have time to do anything seeing that everything after that happened so fast. Needless to say, the procedure was surprisingly fast...don't even think it took a half hour, and my beautiful baby was born, I saw her and knew she was perfect. Maisie Marie McQuary was born July 17, 2009 at 8:30pm at 8lbs 3oz.


Since then, Maisie has been the most active baby ever....not that I have been around a ton of them. She decided she was ready for the world and didn't need to sleep all day. She was barely two months when she decided she wanted to be on her feet, I would prop her up on the arm of the chair with the boppy so she could watch baby Einstein. She would hold herself standing, I was just there so she would fall sideways. She wanted to play in all the toys that were for infants at least 6mths of age. She loves to just jabber, and I love to listen to her. My dad calls it her song, she always has a song to sing. I think she was not quite 4mths when she started rolling over and scooting on the floor, she was crawling and sitting by 5 mths and started pulling herself up to stand before she turned 6mths. Since she started pulling herself up to stand she has been trying to walk, she will hold on to the furniture and walk accross the floor. She is now almost 8 mths and is doing the one handed walk (holding on to stuff with just one hand) and will then let go and stand there on her own deciding whether or not she wants to take a step.. She is a happy baby, laughing, squealing, playing with minimal fuss throughout the day. She gets grumpy if she is hungry, tired, or not feeling well and that's it.

When she was between 1 and 2 mths she had some gas issues, she is a breastfed baby with VERY minimal bottle use so I know it had to be just regular gas. It really only bothered her at night and sometimes when I would try to feed her....but I started to give her mylicon and gripe water and that seemed to work wonders so I consider myself blessed not to deal with colic or major gas problems.

She started teething at 3mths and those dissolving tablets were a life saver....she tolerated those better than the orajel. and she has two beautiful bottom teeth. I was going to wait until she was 6mths before starting her on solid foods, but right after she turned 4mths she insisted that she was ready so I started her with the cereals. She has loved food ever since. I think one of my favorite things I remember was making apple pies with my mom in the kitchen and Maisie took an apple quarter that was peeled and cored and started to use her bottom teeth to scrape off some pieces...she was only 6mths at the time I think...a little young for solid apples...lol. Now everytime I am eating food she insists on trying it, she has tried fresh tomatoes, nectarines, green beans, potatoes, among other things. I also make 90% of her baby food because she likes it better than the store bought.

Maisie is also an animal lover, I have a cat, dog, fish and a chinchilla (new addition) and she just loves all of them and tries to show them by pinning them to the floor and climbing on them, i just love it.

Well, I have officially written a book...and still haven't said everything I could have. In a nutshell, I love being a mom, I couldn't have asked for a better baby, she is so beautiful and truly a gift from God. Even if nobody else reads this....I know I will be able to look back and remember how great God has always been.