Baseball and Mariachi Bands

Strange combination, but this is how Will spent his six month birthday. Mike's youngest brother Andrew plays baseball for South Paulding High School. Last night was their opening game and Andrew got the start(he is a left-handed pitcher, just like Mike). Anyways, it was Will's first baseball game. He watched for the first few innings, but he then got hungry and tired. After he ate his cereal and green beans, we snuggled him up in blankets and he fell alseep on Mike's chest. Will woke up in time to watch the last inning and see SPHS win. Andrew was credited with the win...sweet! Will wore his I love Baseball shirt which evidently brought Andrew some luck. Baseball players are notorioulsy superstious, so we promised Andrew that Will would wear the same shirt to the next game that he starts.

After the game we went to a Mexican resturant called El Nopal (If you happen to be in Rockmart this is a good place to eat). When we walked in we heard a mariachi band playing. They were not playing "tradional Mexican" songs. They were playing Margaritaville, evidently they did cover songs. It was pretty funny. Anyways they were walking from table to table taking requests. When they stopped at the table next to ours, Will was standing in my lap and he could not take his eyes off of them. He even laughed out loud at one of the guys playing a super huge guitar thing. The band got a kick out of Will and so they had to play at our table. Paul requested "Lonley Boys" and the band circled our table and played. One of violinists would poke his bow at Will and even brought his violin close to Will and plucked the strings so Will could see it. He was fascinated! We have some baby music instruments at home(thanks Colleen!). I might have to pull them out so that will can start playing with them. You never know, we might have a little musician on our hands!

P.S. It would have been great if I had some pictures from last night, but I left the camera at home. That figures!

We made it 6 months!

This is Will in his Master's gear. Last year Mike went to the practice round on Wednesday with my dad, uncle and cousin. My dad bought him this shirt. A member at the Frog, where Mike used to work, bought Will the hat (the Master's logo is on top). The Master's is not until April, but the PGA Tour season has already started, and yes, we are watching!
Will's clubs.
If you are going to golf, you have to have the equipment!

Well, we have been parents for half a year now, and guess what? We're still clueless!:) Parenthood has been a humbling experience for both Mike and I. We have learned that Will is the boss in our house, and if we think we have him figured out one day, he changes things on us the next day! One thing we do know is that this little guy has changed our lives forever. We honestly never believed we could love someone as much as we love Will. Each day he is doing more and more things, and our joy in watching him grow only increases. Our patience might be tested every day, we might not get to sleep as long as we had hoped, but that doesn't matter. All that matters anymore is seeing that precious smiling face look back at us. With that said, here are some new pictures of Will in honor of his 6 month birthday(which is Tuesday the 24th).
Reading a book at DiamondStarz. This is where Mike teaches pitching lessons and where he hosted an FCA banquet for Paulding and Douglas County baseball teams.
Hanging with my daddy!
Not only does Will roll over on the floor and in his crib, he has now decided to roll over in the bathtub. I sit bedside the tub on a stool everytime he takes a bath, but now I really have to watch him.
Getting ready for my pjs.
All the Fessler boys so far. Myself, Debbie and Joy hosted a couple's baby shower on Saturday for my sister-in-law Tammy. She is due to have a little boy named Caleb at the end of March. Once he gets here we can take a new picture of the guys.
Will in his new baseball pjs. I love him in his pajamas. He is soo cute!

Update on Will:
*Will is sitting for longer periods of time before falling over.
*We still haven't cut a tooth, but we feel like it can't be long.
*Will is starting to "talk". He is constantly babbling, almost like he is having a conversation. As painful as it is to say this, it sounds like Will is saying da-da-da. Mike is loving that!
*Last night he slept in his crib for three hours straight! Wow! But he woke up screaming three times after coming to our bed and had to rocked in order to go back to sleep. We are still trying to learn to sleep-I hope he gets it soon!

P.S. Katie, if you are reading this, Happy Birthday!
Will on Katie's shoulders at the Tech ballgame last week. Will turns 6 months on Katie's birthday.

Take me out to the ballgame...

Will's first trip to the ball field. I broke him in by taking him to watch TN Tech, my alma mater.
This past weekend was Will's first Valentine's Day. He had some very important firsts that happened as well.
Look at me! I can sit up on my own!
On Friday, Debbie(Mike's mom) came over to see Will and give him his Valentine. I put him on the floor while we were talking. Will was playing on his tummy, but after we watched him more closely we noticed that he was inching backwards. Almost as if he was crawling backwards. I have been told that this is a sign that crawling will happen soon. He has also been working hard at sitting up. He did it for the first time unsupported a couple of weeks ago. Now he is sitting up for longer, 10-15seconds until he falls over.
Practicing sitting.
We are still having trouble in the sleep department. He is still starting in his bed and ending up in ours. He has been very stuffy over the past few nights, so we finally gave him some children's Benadryl. It cleared him up and has allowed him to sleep better. Now if we can only figure out how to get him to sleep in his crib all night long. For now, though, I have to get up and go to work, so trying to learn this skill is not at the top of our priority list. All three of us sleeping is much more important that just Will sleeping! :)

My parents came in this weekend because my dad was coaching at Kennessaw(my dad is the volunteer pitching coach for Tennessee Tech where myself, my sister and two cousins played ball). Will went to the ball field to see his Poppy coach. This was his first time at the ball field and he loved it, naturally!:) Now he is ready for baseball season so he can watch his Uncle Andrew play ball for South Paulding.
Will watching Tech play.
Driving at Valentine's dinner.
Our Valentine's weekend was very low key, it always is with Mike and I. This year we enjoyed spending it with our cute little Valentine, Will!

What is Will up to?

No major milestones are going on at the Fessler household, but some blog worthy events have happened in the past week.

Will has settled back into somewhat of a nighttime routine. He is going to sleep in his crib somewhere around 9:30. He sleeps for a little while before waking up. Once he is comforted, he goes back to sleep. He usually wakes up around 1:30am, and Mike brings him in to our bed so he can eat. He then sleeps the rest of the night with us. He seems to be sleeping ok this way for now. I have noticed that he is not eating as much in the middle of the night. I guess he is getting bigger and doesn't need all the milk.
Will and his 3D Super Bowl glasses. He didn't care much for the game or the commercials. Just the cool glasses.

Sunday Will went into the nursery at church for the first time. What a big boy! He didn't even seem to notice that we handed him over to a complete stranger. He must have been excited at the swings and jumpers that he saw in the room. It must have been heaven to him! When we went back to get him, he was in one of the worker's laps. She was rocking him and another little girl. He looked so content! They told me he did great. That was a relief(Mike and I frantically watched the screen during the service to see if Will's number would be posted telling us to come get him).

Will has been rolling over for awhile now, but he has taken this skill to a new level. Now, he just rolls over and over until he bumps into something that stops him from rolling. You can literally put him on one side of a room and look up a few moments later and find him on the other side of the room. Needless to say, we have to keep a close eye on our little man. But don't worry, we have started to baby-proof the house.
Yes, I'm sitting in a laundry basket. My mother put me here.

Yesterday, I gave Will a sippy cup with a little juice, but mostly water. I just wanted to see what he could do with it. He brought it up to his mouth but had a hard time holding it there. Once Mike or I would hold it for him, he did his best to get some juice out. Evidently, sucking on a sippy cup is different from a bottle. He seems to like a challenge though, so we will see how long it takes him to figure this out.
Giving my sippy a try!

Will and Grace

We have a chihuahua named Gracie. She was our first "child". She is a very easy-going dog. All she needs is a blanket, a bowl of food, and someone to love on her. She does yap(like most small dogs), but once she gets to know you she will love you for life. Since Will's arrival, her world has been thrown for a loop. She no longer gets our sole attention. We were afraid that she would be jealous of Will and act out because she was not getting all of her normal attention. But, she has been just the opposite. In fact we call her "Mama Gracie". She wants to be wherever Will is. When he goes down for a nap in his crib(a rare occurrence right now), she curls up in the rocker in his room. If he cries, she howls. She loves to kiss him(we don't encourage this, but sometimes she sneaks a kiss on his cheek when we're not looking). She is also very protective when anyone wants to hold Will or when anyone approaches our house.

This past weekend, Will started to notice Gracie. All of a sudden he watches her as she runs around the living room. Last night as he played in his jumper he saw Gracie sitting on the ottoman and laughed out loud. Grace was doing nothing but sitting, but Will thought it was hilarious. When Gracie jumped down, Will stopped laughing. But when Mike put her back on the ottoman he would laugh again. We were rolling!

Will has even started to reach out and touch Gracie if she is near him. Mike and I are both trying to guide Will's curious little hands softly over Gracie's back. We want to teach him early how to treat animals, we don't need any unfortunate accidents in the near future.

Will and Grace, a boy and his dog. What could be better!

Poor Baby Will!

Will is starting to become a little man. How cute is he!

Well, in the last post I talked about how well Will was doing sleeping in his crib. This week, all of that has gone out the window. Will has been a little under the weather therefore our schedule has been totally thrown off.
Early Monday morning, Will got his first noticeable fever. He has been real congested lately and hasn't been breathing really well. I told Mike that I wanted Will to sleep with us so that I could keep an eye on him. Around 2:30 am, Will got restless. I thought it was time to eat, so I rolled him toward me. That's when I noticed how warm he was. I sat up and started to unzip his pjs and felt that his little body was really hot. I got Mike up to get the thermometer. Will's temp: 103. Yikes! We tried to keep calm, we gave him some tylenol and put lukewarm rags on him to bring the fever down. After a little while it went down to 101.6 and then down to 99.6. On Monday, his fever went back up during the early evening, but then it came back down. We thought that it could be the beginnings of teething, but when I called the nurse at the Dr.'s office, she also suggested an ear infection. She told us that since his fever has been down for a couple of days there is not much that they can do and to call back if his fever goes back up. Not much help to a new mom, let me tell you.


I love this hat!

So, all of this to say, what progress we had made with sleeping last week seems to have gone. Will still sleeps ok at Aimee's (baby-sitter), of course. But at home its a different story. Last night he did not want to be put down. If I sat him in his high-chair, swing, bouncy seat, or heaven forbid, his crib, he screamed. He did fall asleep twice, once while I rocked and once I was just cuddling him and sitting in bed. But both times he was being held upright. The night before, we did get him down, but he was waking up every 10-15 minutes. Poor little guy, he doesn't feel himself. I have no clue what to do, other than to love on him, and try not to lose my patience when he fusses for three hours straight.

Learning to Sleep

Look at those blue eyes!

So...its been awhile since I've posted. I am back in the swing of things with school, so that makes me a full time teacher and a full time mommy. Needless to say, I'm a little short on time. But there are some new things going on at the Fessler house.

Will chilling on the couch.
Daddy and Will at dinnertime.

First, we have a new schedule. Mike is now working from home. He starts work about 12:30 and works until about 7 every evening. My friend Aimee is watching will from noon until 3:30 when I get there to pick him up. Its been a good set-up so far. He basically goes to her house to nap and eat lunch, but in the process he has made some new friends. Aimee's little girls, Abigail and Naomi adore Will, and he loves the attention they give.

Will was laughing so hard, until Mike got out the camera. Of course!

Second, Will has finally started to sleep in his crib. He is not sleeping there all night yet, but we are slowly moving that way. He has been sleeping in the bed with us. Which has been great until recently. Will has been getting real restless in bed and has been keeping both Mike and I up at night. So last weekend we started laying him down in his crib. He got it, after a few tries of course. It does take a little work, making sure his pacifier is in or rubbing his back, but he eventually doses off. Three and a half hours straight is our record. Hopefully we will start going longer here soon. I miss my little cuddle bug, but I don't mind having my side of the bed back either.

Playing with my blocks during tummy time.

Will after bath time.

Will has also started to get himself on somewhat of a routine. He is eating solids three times a day and we think that is also helping him sleep better. Every night after dinner, Will gets a bath, clean pjs, story and milk. We let him stay up with us for a little while, but by 7:45-8:00 he is showing signs that he is tired. So we put him down. He will sleep for about 30 minutes, before waking up, but once his paci is back in, he usually goes right back to sleep. Its amazing the things I can do once he goes to sleep. I can finally read again!

Will eating his feet. He loves his feet!