First Kids Meal!

It’s official- Emily had her first complete Kid’s Meal tonight. We met Paul by the hospital because he was on call and then went to Panera for dinner. Paul and I each had the Pick 2 (loooove the Pick 2s!!) and Emily had the grilled cheese and Horizon milk....which she drank partly out of the straw, having figured that out a few nights ago. Such a big girl! While she ate she was being SO ladylike (for once I’m not being one bit sarcastic here!) She ate only tiny bites, threw NO food on the floor (this is huge, people!) and even wiped her mouth with the napkin. I know, right- incredible! She EVEN tried to feed Mommy a little bite of grilled cheese off the table....now how sweet is that? (No, I didn’t eat it, but she didn’t know any different!) She is getting so very very grown up now, you know.

Sick Day

Poor Miss Emily has her first real illness- a vomiting/diarrhea bug! I actually had to take a sick day today to stay home with this little lady. She is very clingy and only wants me to hold (but only while I’m standing up...no sitting allowed!) She took a 2 hour nap this morning and is just waking up. Let’s hope she feels better soon! Poor muffin.

Pretty Impressive!

So the list of things Emily has learned to do just gets longer by the minute- I figured tonight I had better sit down and write them all out before I can’t remember all of them. She is really amazing us lately- she is like a little sponge, learning things so quickly!


Drumroll, please! :)

1.First, she has figured out how to do all the shapes on her shape sorter. Even the star. She doesn’t struggle at all with putting them all in the right holes!
2.She has learned to point to items or things that she wants.
3.At Miss Jamey’s the other day, when Jamey began reading a book about Elmo, Emily left the group and went over and PICKED UP an Elmo toy, bringing it back to the group. Brilliant!
4.She can stand completely unassisted and is taking an increasing number of steps every day. Walking is truly just around the corner. We have a little trepidation about this! :)
5.Lately, when she is having trouble figuring out how to do a toy (like the musical ones we have that require a firm touch to turn them on) she will reach over, grab mine (or Paul’s) hand, and make US do it for her. She knows that we will help her but what’s funny is that she completely guides our hands to do the work for her-- she knows how to do it, just doesn’t know exactly how to get her own hands to do it.
6.She was playing with a set of Geometric Solids (solid wooden blocks in geometric shapes used for classroom instruction....yes, she’s a Teacher’s Kid, what can we say?!) and kept putting the lid on the box, taking it off, putting it on, etc. Then she began getting all the shapes out of the box and putting them back in. Occasionally I would place a different type of toy in the bin and she would immediately stop and pull out the one that “didn’t belong.” Also, she took the initiative to stack up several of the blocks by herself!
7.Another great pastime right now is “helping” with the laundry....helping is a rather loose term but if you need a washer/dryer door closed, I’ve got your girl! She is also good at removing things from the basket in case you need assistance with that aspect. :)
8.On a cute note, she wore bunny slippers to bed last night and has also been wearing them around the house a lot. It is sooo precious! And, last night I put her bathrobe on and she loved it. Plus it looked adorable....you could almost see how happy she was to be wearing something like that (she had never had it on before).
9.She can eat a sandwich- we don’t let her, obviously, but if you give her a sandwich (or a French fry) she can bite off on little bite, chew it up, and then will (sort of) ask for more. So big!


OK, so that’s all I can think of. Amazing that all of this is happening a matter of weeks, right? I just cannot get over how quickly she is learning so much!

13 Months Old!

Emily is 13 months old! I know I say it every month but time is flying by. She took her first steps on November 16 but make no mistake- she is not “walking”. She CAN walk, but she adamantly refuses to even try unless it’s HER idea (she gets that from her Daddy). I am hopeful that she’ll decide to walk before Christmas, since Thanksgiving is right around the corner and it looks like it’s a no-go on the walking. She walked all over the house with me last night, holding on to 1 of my fingers with only 1 of her hands.....so I know she has the balance to do it. She is just a stubborn girl I guess!


Emmy has also picked up a couple of new words- More, which sounds more like “mah”, All Done, which sounds like “ahh-duh” (like just the beginning sound of all and done), and Hello, which sounds like “ehyo”. It is so funny to hear her talking but it is sure helping us to understand what she wants!


Her newest love is talking on the phone-- so much so that her Grandaddy gave her one of his old cell phones to have as her own. She won’t put it down! She constantly is pushing the buttons and saying “ehyo”. Last night in the car she talked to her friend on the phone for 25 minutes- the whole way back home. So cute!


We decorated for Christmas and have a gorgeous Christmas tree....which is surrounded by some panels from Baby Jail. Poor tree. So far we haven’t had any “break-ins” to touch it. Emily is not nearly as interested in the tree as we thought she would be but there’s still 5 weeks until Christmas so we’ll see what happens! We have the tree protected as best we can right now, even if it does look a little funny!


There is one holiday decoration that she DOES love- it’s this Nutcracker thing that was mine before we got married. It plays the Nutcracker Suite and the CanCan, and it plays them very, very loudly. The nutcrackers on top of the toy dance when the music plays. We have some hilarious videos of Emily dancing with the Nutcrackers- she cannot get enough of this toy!


Finally, we just wanted to say thank you to all of you who check on our princess and are thinking of her. At this special holiday time we truly feel blessed to have Emily and are glad that she is loved by so many people. Happy Thanksgiving! :)

Baby's First Steps!!!

Yep, it’s true! Tonight Emily took her first steps! I helped her stand up (she will pull up to standing but won’t stand up without pulling up on something first) and I had a toy penny in my mouth, like tempting her with it. She took 4-5 steps toward me and fell down, and then did it a few more times! Paul was right there with us too so it was AWESOME that we all got to have that moment together. I feel like a million bucks tonight!

A Stand Up Kind of Girl!

Emily is standing up! Starting this week she is standing without holding on to anything else! Also, Em has discovered how to turn on the faucet in our bathtub. Isn’t that a great trick? It’s not Mommy and Daddy’s fave, that’s for sure!

Emily is talking! She has already met the “requirements” for the 15 Month milestone-- she is supposed to have a vocabulary of 3-5 words and she already has learned that many! Here’s what she can say:

Eyes- this was her first word. She is starting to connect that everyone has eyes. She also likes to try to poke them out when examining them. Beware! :)

Hi- she says this on the phone and upon seeing someone. It is sooo cute! She is even holding her toy cell phones up now and saying, “hi” into the receiver. Wonder who she’s talking to?

Mama

Dada

Daddy

So there you have it- 5 words already at 12 months and 2 weeks old. She’s brilliant...she gets it all from her mommy. :)