Angelica and her cousins!

As promised, here is a picture of Angelica with her two cousins, Willy (20 months) and Anna (just over 1 week in this picture). There was a lot of excitement going on, and none of the kids really wanted to stay still for the picture. I got about four shots, but this was the only one where Willy wasn't a blur. So cute, though, all three of them together!

I realized yesterday that I forgot to blog about Angelica's bedtime routine success! We started it about a month ago and she is almost consistently sleeping through the night now.

We start her bedtime routine with a bath time song...which has helped her enjoy baths (she used to scream her head off every time it got to be bath time). It's a silly little song I made up that goes:

It's the fun Gellie bath time
It's the best time of the day
First you get all wet and clean
Then you get all warm and dry
Then you won't be dirty anymore
And you'll get a baba
Then you'll go to nite-nite
After the fun Gellie bath time

Repeat ad nauseum (or at least until bath time is over).

After her bath time is over, she gets dressed in her jammies and half-swaddled (just the lower half now) in one of her swaddle-me blankets, so that it stays on all night and she can't suffocate on it). Then we turn out all the lights and I snuggle her on the couch with the baba that the song promised. Usually about 1-2 ounces in the bottle she's out like a light (don't worry, she usually gets a pre-bath bottle of 3-6 ounces too, about an hour before bath time, so the one afterward is just a snack before bed) and I put her down in her crib...this is somewhere between 9:30 and 10:30...we go by her signals and when we can tell she's really getting tired, we start the routine. And she sleeps until between 6:30 and 7:15 the next morning. This has been working like a charm for about a month now! During her growth spurt she regressed slightly and started having a feeding around 4 am but I think that's passed now and she's back to normal.

This weekend's going to be exciting for her...she's gonna spend time helping Aunt Stefanie and Uncle Will move (which really means just spending more time with her cousins Willy and Anna) and then she's going to meet her Great-Grandma Norman, who will be arriving on Friday! She'll also be going to dinner with her other Great Grandma June (along with Scott and me). I'll make sure to get a picture of her with her GGs and post that sometime next week.