Happy Valentine’s Day!

8 Months Old (and then some!)

Time for a baby update... Alyssa is doing something new every few days!

She has started crawling! She started by moving forward or backward several steps before deciding that she would rather just roll to her destination. It was pretty awkward for her, and so cute to watch! While she is testing out her skills, she occasionally pulls off some yoga poses... she does a mean downward dog! On Friday, she started for real. She is already able to cross the room with her new skill.

She has learned how to feed herself snacks. She LOVES Cheerios and Gerber snack puffs. She gets so excited when you put a bunch in front of her that she usually squeals and grabs some with each hand. It has been a real treat for Mike and I because we are able to eat in peace! We've even ventured out to eat and had great success. Yay for babies entertaining themselves!

Over the weekend, she has figured out how to pull herself up to her knees by holding the couch or the stairs. Mike said she even figured out how to pull herself into a sitting position! He found he crying yesterday morning at about 2:45 holding her blankie and sitting up. He thinks the poor baby had a nightmare or something :-(.

For a few weeks we have had a little babbler in the house. She started with bababa and mamama around Christmas. She has recently started with dadada and it hasn't been quiet since! She likes to shriek and squeal when she is tickled with herself (which is very often since she is so busy trying new things). Just yesterday she shrieked as we sped up to get on the highway... she has always liked high-speed driving, and now she can tell us so! We're not sure that anything she has "said" qualifies as her first word since it sounds mostly like babble and isn't really associated with anyone or anything. Thoughts, anyone?

I am sure there is something I am forgetting, but it will have to come later!

I never put these pictures anywhere except the photo gallery... Christmas Card photos! They are some of my favorites!

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Baptism… a while ago!

Sorry, yet again, for our tardiness in posting! The Sunday BEFORE Christmas, Alyssa was Baptized at Hope Lutheran Church in Wake Forest, NC. Most of the family was able to attend (we very much missed Aunt Allison, though, who was at work in Winterpark, Colorado)... great grandmother, grandparents and aunts and uncles on both sides! It was a very nice ceremony and she didn't make a peep (at least, until AFTER we sat back down!) She wore the dress that Tula made for Aunt Ashleigh's Baptism when she was a baby, and a sweater made by MY Great Grandmother! The Seam Team made her a beautiful quilt to remember her day, and Aunt Ashleigh and Uncle Jeff (the Godparents) were given cards to send her on her first 12 Baptism Birthdays. We had a really nice day!

Tula and Seanachai gave Alyssa her very first cross to commemorate the day, as well as a cute hat and purse set. Grammie and Grandpa Harke gave her an engraved picture frame. Aunt Ashleigh made her a beaded bracelet. The Schandert family gave her her first Bible and a sweet picture frame. As always, what a lucky little girl!

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Christmas with the Baby

We had a very busy Christmas... Mike's family came to Raleigh to see Alyssa's first Christmas for themselves. Mike's Dad Ron got to meet Alyssa for the first time! My parents hosted Christmas Eve dinner for both families (ham and shrimp cocktails and the BEST prime rib I have EVER had... way to go Dad!). We stayed at my parents Christmas Eve night so that we could do Christmas morning together. Add in other family dinners, a bit of work and a Baptism (more on that in another post), and you have a crazy, fun Christmas! Check out the photos!

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A little catchin’ up

No photos yet (I'll let Jennie handle those), but I figured I could bring the blog up-to-date a bit with some status reports on Alyssa's recent activities.

Most importantly, Alyssa is finally sleeping through the night!

For the past few months, we've been using a swaddler to get her to sleep. The upside to the swaddler is that Alyssa calms down quickly enough to get her to fall asleep in her crib. Unfortunately, she rarely slept more than a couple hours at a time while using the swaddler. Starting sometime around the weekend before Christmas, Jennie and I decided to try bedtime without the swaddler. The result? 8-10 hours of nonstop sleep for baby and her parents ever since.

A few weeks ago, Jennie mentioned Alyssa's discovery of rolling across the room. Well, in the past few days, she has also displayed signs of wishing to crawl. She will push herself up with her arms and start rocking forward and back. Just the other day, she even crawled backwards a few inches. Looks like it is time to baby-proof the house.

I'll wrap up this post with Alyssa's latest measurements: weight is 16 lbs., 15 ounces and her height is 26 inches.

More to come soon!

We’re baaack!

If you've attempted to check out The Harke Herald in the last week, you probably noticed that the site had disappeared. The fault is mine, as I failed to renew mharke.com in time. Whoops.

The bad news is that mharke.com is now being held hostage by the company I registered it with, and will most likely cost me too much to get it back.

The good news is that The Harke Herald is back online at its new address, www.harkeherald.com. Easy to remember, right? So please bookmark this new address and keep an eye out for a new batch of posts and photos in the near future.

6 Months Old (and Happy Thanksgiving)!

Boy, has it been a while! November has gone by so quickly (just like the rest of the year, I guess)! Alyssa has been quite a busy bee since my last post. She is just now getting over her first cold, and I'm not sure who was more traumatized... baby or Mommy and Daddy!

Alyssa has really gotten good at rolling over. She is using the new skill to make her way around the living room. At this point, I think that she has made it around the entire floor! She likes to push up when she gets herself onto her stomach. I think she enjoys all of the new vantage points. See what I mean?!

I am also proud to say that she has learned to sit up on her own! When she wants to, she is able to stay upright for several minutes at a time! She is so proud of both of her accomplishments and grins from ear- to- ear when we tell her she is a big girl!

I will be posting baby stats after her 6- month checkup next Friday!

We hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving! I don't know about you but I am soooo looking forward to Christmas this year (could it be because this will be Alyssa's first?)!