Someone has a tooth!

Riley finally let a tooth break ground! It's barely showing, but it should be in full view in a few days. She had a little sharp bump for a few days and this morning it finally showed up! Mommy and Daddy are very happy! Riley tried her hardest to keep it from happening, but she will have teeth after all. Pictures to follow....

There may or may not be a tooth......

It does appear that we are very close to getting a tooth. Riley's two bottom teeth are dangerously close to poking through. You can see the outline in her gums. The final word is that we don't actually have a tooth that has broken ground yet. These teeth better be amazing after all the time they took to make an appearance! As you can see Cousin Taylor is missing a few teeth. She has now lost 4 teeth! Her goal is to make Riley not feel so alone and loose all her teeth too.

Is Riley the most photogenic baby or is it just me? This child does not take a bad picture! Look at her posing.

BREAKING NEWS!!!!! We may have a TOOTH!!!

This just in......Grandma says she thinks a tooth broke today!!! I have not witnessed this yet and will not believe it until I see it. This could just be a vicious trick that Grandma and Papa are playing on Daddy and I. I'll keep you posted and let you know if we truly have joined the world of "babies with teeth"!

No teeth........but trying to crawl

Ok, so there's still no teeth. The low fever Riley ran was a dirty trick. She still refuses to grow teeth. I am even having dreams now that she has teeth. Another dirty trick my mind insists on playing. I guess we'll just hope and pray that someday, somehow Riley will join the rest of the 8 month old babies and have a tooth.

However, we are learning to crawl! Right now it's more of a lunge forward and flop on our face then flip over move, but it's a start. She whacked her face pretty good last night and got her first boo boo. She milked that for all it was worth. Her cry is so cute! Don't worry, people, I didn't let her sit and cry. Mommy kissed it and made it all better. It's going to be a whole new world once she is mobile. It's hard right now to let her sit alone because she will NOT sit still. She wants every toy that is just out of her reach. She stares the toy down for a second and goes for it. I spend a majority of the time sitting her back up so she can try again.

Riley is also experimenting with sounds. She cracks us up with all the sounds she makes. She does this funny laugh that I can't even begin to describe. You have to hear it to believe it. Still no mama or dada, but we keep our fingers crossed that it will happen any day.

People....this is BIG news!

Holy cow it happened! Riley finally rolled over. It actually happen a few weeks ago, but I held out on writing about it just in case it was a fluke. She fell forward trying to get a toy and after laying there for a minute waiting for Mommy or Daddy to pick her up she just flipped over. It happened so fast. Dave and I were shocked. We sat there for a minute stunned and then erupted in applause and congrats. We were so excited that it scared Riley and she began to cry. We waited until she calmed down and tried again. Nothing. She did her usual bury her head in the carpet and cry. Later that night she did it again. Then we went several days with no effort on her part at all. However, now she will almost always roll over if she's on her tummy. She has made it very clear that this is not to be preformed for entertainment purposes. It is simply a strategy used to get off our belly when we flop forward. We are not allowed to place the baby on her tummy to show friends and family our new trick. That results in arms flying and legs kicking while pressing her face into the carpet.

On another topic.......I have been asked by a few people (who are expecting) why parents always use the term "we" and "our" when talking about the baby. All I can say is you will do it too once you have a baby. You figure out that every accomplishment that the baby makes is actually your accomplishment for the time being. Yes, it's selfish, but who cares. Once Riley is old enough to tell her own stories we will make every effort to refer to her as "her" and "she". Until then, it will be "we rolled over" and "we are sleepy" or "we need new clothes"....you get the point.

Our other two babies

Brown and Cal had a rough weekend. Both pups were suffering from doggie issues. Charlie Brown had a bad ear infection and Callieann had something wrong with her nose. Both dogs were worrying us and needed their annual shots anyway, so we loaded them up in the car and took them to the vet. As usual, Brown had to be chased all over the yard to get her harness on her and Callie had to be drug to the car. Our dogs have some serious issues with the car.

Cal's nose had been pretty dry for a while, but last week it started to crack and bleed. I was very concerned that she was sick and knew we better get it looked at. Callie is an extremely energetic dog (that's putting it mildly) and didn't seem to be slowing down at all, but I still wanted to make sure she was OK. She was first at the vet's office. She took her shots like a champ and the doc gave us some antibiotics for her nose. Like a perfect angel she hopped off the table to let Brown get her check up.

Charlie's ear had been bothering her for quite a while. Every time she would scratch her ear she would squeal in pain. It eventually got to where if we barely touched her ear she'd flip out. Those of you who know Brown know that she is a very vocal dog. When I say flip out, I mean scream like you were ripping her limbs off. Brown was a hysterical mess once she got on the table at the vet's office. They gave her 3 shots and by the 3rd one she completely lost it. Next they had to clean her ears. I tried to hold her, but she was violently fighting to get away from the cotton ball. Dave had to finally step in and hold her. She was so hysterical that every person that worked there came into the room to see what in the heck we were doing to that animal. No one hid their laughter once they realized she was just getting her ear cleaned out. She continued to scream like they were pulling her toe nails out one at a time for the next few minutes. Once it was clean they put medicine in it. Turns out Brown had a bacterial infection in her ear. They rubbed cream in her ear canal and she just laid her head on Dad's shoulder and whimpered. She continued to whimper for the next 10 minutes. It was this long drawn out whimper coming from the bottom of her throat. She sounded like she was dying. It was pretty embarrassing.

After all this, we finally got them home and Brown has milked this ear infection for all it's worth. Her ear is almost all better and doesn't seem to hurt anymore. Cal's nose doesn't look much better and we may have to take her back and see if it isn't something else. These two dogs are a lot of trouble sometimes, but we sure do love them! There's nothing we wouldn't do for them. Love you girls!!

Where's your teeth, Baby????

Riley is 7 months old now and still has no teeth. Not one! Honestly, I don't think she's evening trying to grow any. She loves her soft baby food. She loves to gum graham crackers and chew on soft toys. I think she's perfectly content never having any teeth. I keep telling her that she will feel a little awkward once she gets in school and everyone else has teeth and she doesn't. I'll keep working on her.....

Riley can do one pretty amazing new trick, though. She can stand on her own!! We skipped rolling over and I'm pretty sure we are going to skip crawling. Her feet go a million miles a minute and I have a feeling that she thinks crawling is for wimps. We can put a toy on the coffee table and she'll stand there and play with it for 10 or 15 seconds. Of course, then she see something shiny somewhere else and goes for it. That causes her to fall on her bottom. She isn't pulling herself up yet. Daddy sets her by the table she she simply holds herself there. It's pretty cool to see!

Riley has also discovered a love for the camera. She can be sitting in her high chair working up a fuss and once she sees Mommy with the camera we become all smiles. I'm wondering if that means she needs to be in commercials or something. Is that a sign? She won't quit smiling for the camera. She LOVES it! And I have to admit, so do I. I'll just keep snapping away for all of you to enjoy!