16 Months Old: What's Happening

This has been an extremely busy month for us, but we've had a lot of fun, and Emily has enjoyed the adventure. I guess most little girls haven't lived in three houses by the time they're 16 months old--hopefully this will be the last time she'll move for a good long time!

Emily is becoming more of a toddler every day--there are very few "baby" moments anymore, which sometimes makes me sad. When she's sleepy or doesn't feel great and wants to cuddle, or when I still get to rock her for a few minutes before bed are those sweet, wonderful times that I cherish now.

Animal sounds and impressions continue to be some of her favorite things to do. She can stomp and swing her arm like an elephant trunk, walk like a penguin, and raise her arms and growl like a bear. We have several different CDs we listen to in the car with her with songs like "Old McDonald," "If You're Happy and You Know It" and "The Hokey Pokey." She'll do most of the commands in the songs--including raising her arms up and saying "Ray!" when the song says to "shout Hooray!" It's just too cute.

Emily is quite the little helper--she's usually the first one in her class in the mornings, and her teachers tell me that she walks around and helps them get the classroom ready. She's great at pushing buttons on the copier or pulling out supplies or books :). She's the same way at home--I usually start making dinner as soon as we get home at night, and I've been giving her a job to help me. She really loves it, and is much more content when she's involved in what I'm doing. The island in the kitchen is huge, and there's plenty of room for her to sit closeby while I'm working there.

I had a big pile of chopped veggies that I wanted to toss in some olive oil and spices, so she put them all in the bowl for me while I fixed the chicken. It was funny when we sat down to eat and found tooth marks in some of the squash and zuchini!

Emily has decided she really enjoys washing her hands lately. We wash our hands pretty frequently because we're always touching the dogs, but they also have specific hand washing times at school, so she sees everyone doing it there too. I don't know if it's the soap or the water she enjoys more, but it's certainly not a bad habit to have.

Something we probably weren't prepared for this month is the perfection of the temper tantrum. Emily is such a happy, good natured little girl most of the time that her tantrums sometimes almost catch us off guard. She really knows how to test the boundaries, and likes to make sure we really mean it when we tell her no. She can turn on the tears with the best of them, and they look so authentic it's tough not to pity her!

We're still not quite settled completely (so please excuse the mess in the picture of the kitchen above), but I finished the main wall in Emily's room.

I wanted to leave it simple so we can add stuff as she gets older. Here's the before picture--

The potato heads had to go! I left the window valance up, and it matches the accent wall really well, so I'm happy with the way it turned out. There's plenty of room for her to grow into it, and she even has her own private bathroom, which will be nice as she gets older.

Cleaning Service

We've been thinking of hiring a cleaning company to come in a few times each month to help us keep up with everything.

Maybe we won't have to now--Emily has become quite attached to the Swiffer, so I took a couple of sections out of the handle to make it her size. She loves it--she'll even go to the closet, get it out on her own, and then put it away when she's done!

Weekend with Family

We've been looking forward to this weekend for a while now--my family all came to visit, and we couldn't wait for everyone to see what a big girl Emily is now, and to share our new house with them.

Jason, Jenn and Cody came in on Wednesday night, and then Julie's flight landed around noon on Thursday. My parents got here right after we returned from the airport that afternoon. Everybody was excited to be together, and a little tired from traveling, so we didn't do much on Thursday except spend time around the house. Emily showed off her sliding skills to her Grandma.

And read lots of books with her Papa and Cousin Cody!

She even showed Uncle Jason how she can stick out her tongue.

Thursday night, it was still warm enough to head to the pool for a late night swim.

On Friday, it was too hot to do anything except get in the pool again, so that's exactly what we did!

That night, Cody and Emily had fun in the bath together--we bought these letters and numbers that stick to the side of the tub when they're wet, and Mick said the tub looked like alphabet soup! He's actually right :).

Emily is such a clown in the bathtub some nights, and Cody really enjoyed her silly hairdo.

We spent some more time at the pool on Saturday, and Jason, Jenn and Cody decided to leave that afternoon to head home. There's always so much to do on the weekends to get ready for work and school on Monday--we hated to see them go, but understood why they needed to get back and have Sunday at home.

Emily helped Aunt Julie check in for her flight and print her boarding pass before she left on Sunday. Then we grabbed a quick lunch and headed to the airport.

We never feel like we have enough time with everyone, and I'm always disappointed that I didn't take more pictures! I guess that just gives us something to look forward to next time.

Settling In

Things are slowly coming together in the new house--everyone seems happy to be in our own place again, and it's really beginning to feel like home. Even Gracie and Bella seem more content than they have over the past few months. I'm sure they could sense that we weren't settled and things were never quite in their place in the rental house.

Emily is having a great time exploring everything. We have these built-in shelves and cabinets in the main living room, and decided to devote a couple of them to storing Emily's toys. She certainly wasted no time crawling right in to pick out the ones she wanted!

Books are still her favorite thing by far.

She's still been eating great, even though she has some side teeth and her molars still cutting through. I wrote recently that Emily had finally eaten a banana after my relentless attempts--well, sweet potatoes were my most recent victory! I absolutely love them, and was just sure Emily would. I've tried them so many ways and she refused to eat them--I even baked sweet potato fries, and she wouldn't eat them. It turns out that she loves them mashed with cinnamon.

The doctor told us last week that sometime over the next several months, it would be perfectly normal if Emily completely changed her eating habits and became really picky. We're hoping that won't happen, but are prepared for it if it does.

We're slowing down a little with unpacking so we can take some time to enjoy the house right now. Emily's room is almost done, which is really my priority. I loved her room in our Atlanta house, but didn't put any effort into her room in the rental house, so I'm ready for her to have a little getaway again! I'll post pictures soon of the before and after.

A Little Disconnected

We have a lot going on, but I haven't posted anything because we're disconnected right now--we had our cable/internet service turned off at the old house on Friday, and it isn't scheduled to be turned on at the new house until Saturday the 16th! Probably good timing because we'll be unpacking, but it means I won't be uploading pictures or posting about Emily's fun adventures exploring her new surroundings for a few more days.

Swimming!

I mentioned that we had signed Emily up for swimming lessons--it's an 8-week class and meets every Saturday morning at a local place called Charlotte Aquatics. Unfortunately, we missed the first two classes because she was sick the first week and we were in Brunswick last weekend. We took her on Saturday morning, and she had the best time!

It's a toddler class where they play games in the water while learning some very basic swimming techniques. Check out our little synchronized swimmer with arms and legs flying around! On Sunday, we decided to take a break from unpacking and go to the neighborhood pool. One of the things we're most excited about is the pool and playground where we've moved--and this weekend was so hot, it was perfect for an afternoon in the water! The pool has a waterslide and a separate kids' pool that goes up to 1 1/2 feet deep with big umbrellas in the middle and fountains along the edge. I have a feeling we'll be spending quite a bit of time there this summer--it was tough to get Emily to come out long enough to have a little snack and drink some water!

15 Month Checkup

Emily was due for her 15-month checkup, so I scheduled it for Friday afternoon, and took a break from moving to pick her up early while Mick met the movers to get started with the furniture.

Emily weighs 23.4 lbs now (only the 50th percentile) and she's 32 inches tall (90th percentile). She's doing everything she should be, and she got a great report!

She did have two shots today--chickenpox and the Hib vaccine. The doctor gave her some stickers and she was pretty excited about the one with the doggie on it, so she held on to it and only cried for a minute.

This is NOT Vacation!

Mick and I both were off on Monday for July 4th, and took the rest of this week off to move. We've worked long days and nights to get everything packed, and rented a U-Haul yesterday so we could make fewer trips with more stuff.

At the end of the day today, we returned the truck and have almost everything done! We're using Two Men and a Truck to move the big furniture, and they're scheduled to come tomorrow afternoon. Tonight will be our last night in the rental house, and we're so excited to officially be in our new house. It will take us more long nights and weekends to get everything unpacked and settled, but that's the fun part :).

Our next vacation will not involve this much work!

4th of July Weekend

We went to Brunswick, GA to see Mick's family for 4th of July weekend. It's about a 5 hour drive, so we decided to make the trip Friday night, hoping Emily would sleep the whole way. She only slept for about an hour, and we didn't get there until midnight. We went straight to bed when we got there, but she was up at 6:00 AM ready for action. Despite not having enough sleep, she was in a great mood on Saturday.

We spent all day Saturday outside--it was hot, but there was a breeze blowing and it was nice under all the shade trees. Everybody took a turn blowing bubbles--even Emily!

Her cousins played in a big inflatable pool, but Papa had a special pool just for Emily, and she had a ball.

Grandma and Papa have this rocking horse at their house that Emily completely fell in love with--it played a "Giddyup Little Cowboy" song that she danced to over and over.

On Sunday, we went down to the pier on St. Simons Island. There was a playground that everyone enjoyed.

Emily even went down the big slide with Grandma!

That afternoon, she read some books with Grandma and Lala (Great Grandma).

We discovered that she's a big Mickey Mouse fan--she's watched him in some cartoons, but never seemed particularly crazy about him until this weekend. Her cousins had a big stuffed Mickey doll, and she just didn't want to put him down!

The tide was so high when we went to the pier Sunday morning that we couldn't get on the sand, so we went over to Jekyll Island later that afternoon so Emily could run around a little.

We didn't stay long, but she had a great time.

We decided to come back home Sunday night. We tried the same thing again--had dinner, gave Emily her bath, and left around 8:00 PM. Emily did much better on the trip home. We barely stopped, and got home in less than 5 hours. She actually slept for most of the trip, but we were all so happy to get home and in our own beds when we finally pulled in the driveway a little before 1:00 AM.

15 Months Old: What's Happening

Where do I even start this month!? Emily is growing and developing by leaps and bounds, so I'll try to hit some of the fun highlights from her fifteenth month.

Emily has become even more attached to Gracie and Bella this month, and they're pretty crazy about her too--she loves to "help" feed them dinner at night. Her help mainly consists of opening and closing the food bins, and walking back and forth to the bowls while we fill them. She is really good at feeding them treats though--she claps every time they take a dog biscuit from her hand. They also get the occasional goldfish cracker or other little goodie from her menu :).

She loves shoes and socks now--it's been so hot that she wears sandals almost every day, but she'll pick up a pair of socks or shoes and try to put them on by herself. We've passed by several pairs of galoshes in stores, and I can tell we'll end up buying her some pretty soon!

She still loves reading, and will stop anything to grab a book and crawl in our laps. One of her favorites is a book of "action rhymes." Itsy Bitsy Spider is one she loves--she'll put her little hands up and try to make a spider! She reaches for her toes when we get to This Little Piggy, and she just laughs when the last one says "wee, wee, wee all the way home."

Emily is more determined to feed herself every day. Tonight at dinner, we thought she wasn't hungry at all--I had made chicken and dumplings, and broccoli (her favorite), and she refused to eat anything while we tried and tried to feed it to her. Finally, we put some on her Mickey and Minnie plate and put her little fork and spoon down, and she gobbled it up. She's so independent! She has a little snack cup with a no-spill lid that was a shower gift, and she gets so excited if I let her carry it around with crackers or dried fruit in it.

She's making new sounds all the time--Mick and I have commented that she sounds like she's having a real conversation (just in a different language!). She says something that sounds like "whicha whicha whicha," and we're still figuring out what she means by it. She repeats a lot--I asked her if she could say bumblebee, and she said "bu bu bu." She was so proud of herself. She's also said her version of purple, baby, ball, and of course doggie at least 100 times a day. She loves working on animal sounds in general, and the growl seems to be her default sound--if she's not sure what an animal says, she growls. She knows a duck, doggie, lion, tiger, bear, sheep, cow, elephant and for some reason, she thinks a crocodile says "yum yum." It's very cute.

She plays with different toys now--she loves her shape sorter, and likes stacking toys too. She'll stack and unstack my mixing bowls in the kitchen floor until she gets them in the right order. Speaking of fun in the kitchen, she loves to pull a spatula out of the drawer and walk around waving it like a magic wand. She has started wanting to help when I'm cooking, so I'll give her different ingredients to throw into whatever I'm making, and she loves it.

I could go on and on all night about how much fun Emily is, and what a good month she's had! We're so proud of the little girl she's becoming.

Princess Toes

Emily always seems fascinated with the polish on my toenails, so I decided to paint hers. She is getting much more patient when I cut her nails, and sat very still for me to paint them.

I didn't think she'd sit still for long, so I used some nail polish that's supposed to dry in 50 seconds. She wanted to touch her little princess toes immediately!

Toddler Tantrums

I guess we knew the day would arrive when our sweet little girl would start to throw tantrums in order to get her way. Emily has perfected the art of stomping her little feet, or lying flat on the floor and kicking when she doesn't get what she wants. The episodes are typically very short-lived, and she's pretty easily distracted. This week though, the tantrums have escalated to a new level, particularly when it comes to nap or bed time. Yesterday, she only took a 30 minute nap all day long!

Tonight, after a day with only a one-hour nap, she was so tired she could barely hold her eyes open, but she refused to go to bed. She wanted to play, sing and talk to us, and wouldn't settle down, even when we rocked her or read stories. I finally put her in the crib, kissed her goodnight, and left her with her lullaby music. She screamed (I use this word deliberately, because there weren't even tears when I went to check on her!) for almost 45 minutes on and off before finally giving up and collapsing with exhaustion.

We never completely used the "cry it out" method--not because we disagreed with it, but because we never really needed to, and Emily has almost always been ready for bed when we put her down. We aren't sure if this week was bad for sleep because she hasn't felt well, or because she's entering a new phase, but we're hoping it passes quickly.

What a Week!

I ended up working from home and staying with Emily through Thursday of this week--she had diarrhea so bad on Monday that I changed her diaper 12 times! She was pretty consistently going every hour, and by the end of the day, her tiny heiny was completely raw--it was just heartbreaking.

Her appetite was normal though, and I tried to give her plenty of things that I thought would help. I've been trying to get her to eat a banana since we started solid food with her, and she always refused it. Something changed, and she ate an entire banana! I was so excited that I took this picture.

Mick said I was surely losing it...and it was only Monday!

On Tuesday, she was down to 6 diaper changes, and was continuing to eat and drink well, so I was optimistic that things were getting better. She stayed very active--running around with her popper

and playing in some of the moving boxes we have.

Wednesday, things seemed like they had improved enough for Emily to go to school--in fact, her teacher called to check on her, and I told her she'd definitely be there on Thursday. She enjoyed wearing Mick's flip flops around the house that morning :).

Little did I know that Emily would be up almost all night Wednesday night with a fever. She's been struggling a little with sleep this week, and Wednesday night was by far the worst. She still had a low fever Thursday morning, so I kept her at home again. At this point, we were convinced that teething was the culprit. Her diarrhea had been gone since Wednesday, and she kept chewing on her fingers and rubbing her jaw and ears. Still, she was in a good mood most of the day, but didn't want to eat much. She was much more interested in playing with the dogs, and covered Bella with these flower hair clips (since Emily won't leave them in her hair, I'm glad someone is getting some use out of them!).

Bella is an unbelievably patient dog :)

On Friday, Emily went back to school after a good night of sleep.

It was truly an exhausting week for all of us. We also had severe storms that left us without power two nights this week for about 5 hours each time. We're glad to see the weekend arrive, and it's such a relief to know Emily's getting back to normal.

Father's Day

Since the minute we found out we were having a baby girl, Mick has been determined to have her doing yardwork and playing golf with him. So on Father's Day, it seemed fitting that Emily wanted to help Daddy mow the grass!

She actually spent some time swinging while Mick did the real mowing, but when he was finished and the mower was turned off, she helped him push it around the yard.

Tummy Trouble

Thursday afternoon, Gateway called me about an hour before I'd normally leave work to pick Emily up--she had diarrhea, and it had been most of the day. I left early to get her, and she's had diarrhea nonstop since then! I stayed home with her on Friday, and it looks like I'll be home with her on Monday too.

We ended up taking her to the doctor this morning--he told us she most likely just had a stomach virus, but that babies' intestines just recover much more slowly than ours, and she could have diarrhea for three weeks! The strange thing is that she has no other symptoms, and except for the bad diaper rash she's getting that makes it miserable when we change her, she's perfectly happy.

He did tell us that while kids most often have respiratory illnesses in the winter, they usually have intestinal issues in the summer because they're just out and about more, and interacting with people and water. Makes sense, but certainly doesn't make it any easier to handle :(.

Quick Visits

Jason and Jenn were on their way to Brevard to take my mom home and to visit my aunt and uncle on Friday, so they stopped in to spend the night in Charlotte and break up the trip.

We were so glad to see them, even though we knew it would be a short visit. There was a Family Fun Festival Friday night at our favorite spot, so in addition to the live music and fountains, there were bounce houses, crafts, and tons of people. We ate dinner and then let Cody and Emily loose in the fountains! They were so excited and had a great time. Emily was a little more interested in dancing than playing in the water,

and she made her rounds to see everybody!

On Sunday, Jason and Jenn were heading back to Wilmington, so they stopped in for the night again. We were headed back to the fountains for a little while that afternoon, so they just met us there so Cody and Emily could play.

Emily spent a little more time in the water, but really seemed to have more fun playing with Cody and reading stories when we got home.


Before bed, Emily and Cody even took a bath together--it was the cutest thing!

Little Artist

Most of Emily's artwork at school is kept in a portfolio that we'll be able to keep when she graduates from Gateway, but sometimes we take some home too.

These are a few of her latest works in Toddler 1!

The monkey and giraffe are pretty recognizable, but I'm not sure what she was going for with this abstract :).

We have a little artist on our hands!