The Toohigs

Sunday, August 21, 2016

Cheer Camp

Helen Grace had been looking forward to cheer camp all summer. Hanging out with the CBHS cheerleaders all week was soooo cool!

Super pumped for the first day. Despite living 9 minutes from school now, I only got her to camp on time one day all week. Ugh. Getting out the door with the baby in tow has proven challenging. Luckily, HG is as cool as cucumber and could care less if we were on time.

Bubba came to visit that afternoon.

Tuesday morning started with a bit of excitement. I was awakened by Blue chasing around what I thought was a pony tail holder. I got up to make him stop and realized that he was chasing a LIZARD!!!!! Unfortunately, my lizard chaser (HG) was asleep, so I had to pull myself together and catch it under a cup. I set the cup outside the back door, and when HG woke up, he was still caught inside the cup. Unfortunately/fortunately, she remembered that Grandma had given her a critter-catching cage, so she scooted him in there and was enthralled. We finally let him out by dinnertime that night.

Throughout the chase, he lost a little bit of his tail. HG and I learned that his tail would still wiggle when it was chopped off. EWWWW!!!!

One of the big girls had fun braiding all the little girls’ hair.

Maddie came home with us one day after cheer camp. This level of excitement lasted all day.

Early morning shenanigans

We met the Fiks for lunch after camp on Thursday. As always with the Fik girls, Cressey was a big hit. Lilah invited HG to spend the night and ride to camp together on Friday morning, and she made it all night! Katie said she was a little sad at bedtime and missed mama, but she didn’t want to go home. After Katie rubbed her back for a minute or two, she was snoring! I was proud of her for pushing through.

They did a performance on Friday and showed us a cheer and dance. HG really did well with both and enjoyed it a lot. She had been practicing at the Fiks, and Katie said she was making this biggest ‘cheerleader’ face when doing the shimmey. She chickened out and didn’t do it up so big in front of the crowd of parents!

Grandma, GD, and Spiffer came to cheer on our cheerleader!

Cressey’s first (but not last!) time in the Davis Gym.

We celebrated a great performance over lunch at the Booksellers at Laurelwood.

CMT: 3 and 4 Months

Cressey had her first sleepover with grandparents around three months while we were at Yellowstone.
By three months, Cressey’s 5-6 a.m. ‘snack’ (before going back to sleep again) was getting later and later. On July 21st, she dropped it and slept from 9 p.m. to 9:30 a.m., and she continued that schedule until school started.

At three months, she was holding things in her hand, playing with the bunny rattle strapped to her car seat, enjoying the Oball Bounce-O-Bunch, drooling like crazy, and has to be held and/or moving at all times.

On July 15th, she had her first fall (on her head). HG was playing with Cressey and had her sitting in the chair in her office. HG stumbled a bit and as she recovered, Cressey lost her balance and fell off the chair. I walked into the room just as Cressey hit the rug head first. She cried for a minute but soon calmed down, and she didn’t even have a bump on her head.

By 3.5 months old, her umbilical hernia had all but disappeared. On July 23rd, she started pushing the buttons on her Oball, and on July 31st, she started tricking people with her fake cough. She was wearing 9 month onesies and eating 8 oz every 2-3 hours.

At four months, she started baby food. HG insisted on serving Cressey her first meal, which was carrots. She was not too terribly impressed. (We’ve continued to try a variety of food, and she’s not crazy about anything yet.) By August 10th, she really had a hearty laugh and loved showing off her new talent. On August 13th while HG was spending the night with Grandma, John and I were sitting in the den with her doing tummy time, and she rolled over from tummy to back. She loves the water, and bath time is always a hit. She’s been in a size 3 diaper and could bump up to size 4. Since school has started, I have to wake her up at 7 a.m. (instead of 9-9:30), so we are still learning her new routine. She will typically sleep for 30-45 minutes after a bottle, so she seems to sleep or eat most of the day. She might go to bed a little earlier (around 7:30-8), but if she naps around dinnertime, it can be as late as 9:00. She has decided that she’s not a big fan of the car at times, and the constant crying makes HG and I crazy. While HG still loves her sissy (the last few days, she’s really wanted to feed her a bottle as much as possible), the honeymoon is definitely over, and she is very impatient when asked to soothe her in the backseat. Every day is a new day though, and she often runs upstairs with me to wake her up and coo at her, and she has to get her morning cuddle in before school. She’s disappointed if I don’t bring her with me to pick her up from school or eat lunch with her there.

July 8, 2016: Three Months

August 8, 2016: Four Months

Weight: 20 lbs, 11.8 oz (off the chart)

Height: 25 in (75th percentile)

Head: 44.5 (off the chart)

HG insisted on coming with me to the appointment, so we made it the day before school started and a day after Cressey's 4 mo mark. Thankfully, Spiffer came along too, and I was thankful for an extra pair of hands. Looking back on the night's sleep we had that night, it wasn't the best idea to do this the night before school started. Zzzzz...

The calm before the storm

She really warmed up to Dr. Vargo. Don't let this pic fool you.

She did well enough with the shots (although her sister about lost it just watching- again). Cressey cried a lot at the time but calmed down with milk before we left the room. Her legs were just really sensitive for about two days, so we had to stay on top of the Advil.

Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Yellowstone 2016: Part Two

On the 9th, we woke up slowly, or I should say HG and I woke up slowly. I’ve enjoyed her seven-year-old body adjusting to the summer schedule and sleeping until 8 or so, but John was up with the sun, anxious to explore. He’d go out to take pics for an hour or two and come back as HG and I were just getting going!

We packed up and headed north toward Mammoth. We went through some really neat gorges with interesting geological features (and lots of gusty wind) and several beautiful meadows with snow capped mountains in the distance. (Not a single animal, though.) After exploring the crazy looking place that is Mammoth Springs, we grabbed lunch there, oogled some elk snacking on plants at the hotel’s front door, and then turned east for Tower/ Roosevelt. We stopped for a glance at Undine Falls and then ran across park-arazzi, only to discover that they were watching a mama bear and her two babies! They were waaaay off the road, but HG was able to check them out with the binoculars and see them a little as they bounded through the grass and climbed on a tree.

Soon, we made it to Roosevelt Lodge and explored the corral. Yellowstone requires kids to be 8 to ride, but after we explained that she has ridden horses for years, they put her up on a horse and led her around the corral for a small loop. At least she got to hop on! Afterward, we enjoyed rocking in the rocking chairs on the lodge’s front porch, soaking up the view, which was one of the top reasons we wanted to go back to Yellowstone. We ate an early dinner and set out to explore a bit more, stopping at Tower Falls. The sky looked like a bad storm was about to hit and then the raindrops started to fall, so we didn’t make it too far.

The morning of the 10th, we woke up to RAIN. And even worse, COLD rain. Ugh. We tried to warm up with breakfast by the fire at the lodge and then hopped in the car to explore the mountainous road between Tower and Canyon. John would hop out from time to time to take pics, while HG and I took selfies inside the car. We made it to Canyon to see the northern rim of the “Grand Canyon of Yellowstone,” and kept going down to Lake again, on the search for BEARS. We made it to the fishing bridge, and despite all the road signs warning of bears, all we saw were lots of bison and an osprey. Bah humbug. We had seen so many bears in 2008, but after a few days in the park in 2016, we were beginning to think that had to have been a stroke of luck. We turned around, had a late dinner at Roosevelt, and went to bed (with the heat cranked way up!).

The 11th was our last morning in the park, and it was again rainy. We decided to make another drive down the Lamar Valley, which is usually known for tons of animal activity, but again, nothing more than bison and an antelope. We finally gave up and decided to head on to Bozeman, MT, where we were set to fly home the next day. Around the spot where we had seen the mama bear between Tower and Mammoth several days before, we came upon cars stopped dead in the street, both directions. But no one was out of the car like you usually see with the park-arazzi, so we looked to see where they were looking. And then we saw it- a BEAR! Right on the side of the road! It was on the opposite side of the road, so we turned around so that we could pass right next to it. I could have literally reached out my window to touch it- AMAZING!! So we finally had some redemption and not a minute too soon!

We got to Bozeman early afternoon, so we went to see “The Secret Life of Pets” and then settled into our {comparatively} wonderfully luxurious hotel room. (Highly recommend the Element. Very new and modern with excellent customer service, and within a block of Main Street) HG, in her pajamas, snuggled into the deep, fluffy comforters, laid back to watch TV, and said, “I feel good!!”

By the way, Bozeman was a beautiful little mountain town with tons of organic food (co-ops) and local restaurants. People were nice, and the town was covered in colorful flowers. Kind of like an Oxford out west.

We got home really late on the night of the 12th. HG ran straight to Cressey’s bed and made me get her out so that she could hold her. She kissed her face over and over and held her hand. She said, “She smells so good, Mama!”

We loved having a few days to disconnect from reality as a family (well, mostly…when this mama wasn’t hanging off the top of a mountain to get cell signal to check on the baby). Although we missed Cressey like crazy and were a tad stressed by renovation projects/ decisions at the new house, it was so nice to have some quality face time together, and we loved showing Helen Grace a very special part of the country and letting her experience a park that held special memories to us.

Seven years in, and I still can’t stop staring at her sleeping angel face.

Gibbon Falls- this was a beautiful place to stop and take in the view. The falls open into a stream through a beautiful forest with a mountain view.

Between Norris and Mammoth

I didn’t get out of the car here because I watched John and HG almost get blown off the side of the mountain!

Mammoth Springs

Elk are everywhere you turn at Mammoth.

Undine Falls- another beautiful and steep view

HG was a little scared to sit on that wall, so she’s carefully perching.

A mama bear and her two babies! See the baby climbing up the vertical tree branch?

You can see the mama here.

Riding at Roosevelt

Lamar Valley

See the osprey nest?

The view from Roosevelt Lodge

I’ve waited a long time for this experience with my baby!

Our hard-earned Frontier cabin

Tower Falls

Here comes the rain

The start of a new day (10th)…but more rain

A little different view at breakfast than from dinner last night

Trying to warm up. It was in the 40s that morning.

Sightseeing from the car

The top of Mt. Washburn

“We’ll stay right here, Daddy. You go get that picture!”

Lower Yellowstone Falls

Another osprey

That elk was still there on the way back. He hung out in that field all day.

Bison crossing

And off he went into a field…

As we pulled over later to look at an elk (or something), we turned to see a bison coming up behind us on the other side of the road. He then crossed the road to our side…right at us…eek!