Fall Fun

Sorry it's been so long since we've posted anything. I've been quite busy with work and my administration internship. Elizabeth is growing up fast! She makes us laugh all the time with the things she does. We've done many fun things with her this fall. We took her to the county fair where she got to see all the animals and even pet a couple. She just finished swim lessons at the indoor pool. Mommy and Daddy really liked swim lessons because they wore her out and she slept very well those nights! She does not like her face to go underwater and she lets you know that she's angry if you put her under! We hope to go to the pumpkin patch sometime this weekend.

Elizabeth eats just about anything. She walks/runs around everywhere and it seems that she would rather play with anything she's not supposed to play with than her toys! In fact, just now I was uploading some photos from the camera and she pulled the camera off the desk, interrupting the process. She's also chewing some address labels (everybody can use a little extra fiber, I guess).

Elizabeth is going to be a pumpkin for Halloween. We'll probably make our rounds to a few neighbor friends and grandma's house. New pictures are here!

Walking!

We knew she'd be an early walker--Jason walked at 8 1/2 months and she's always been very strong. Yesterday, she took about 4 steps. Today, she took about 7 or 8 steps at a time. Unfortunately, along with this new milestone, she has also learned to climb. She's been climbing up Grandma and Papa's fireplace step. However, she has no concept of the step going down, so we have to be right on top of her all the time.

As always, she's a lot of fun! We'll post pictures when we can!

A Summer of Fun

Although my goal was to update our blog more frequently this summer, it didn't seem to happen! We did have quite a busy summer and it went very fast. Elizabeth and I joined Grandma and Papa Updegrave and Grandmama for a vacation in VA Beach at the end of July. Elizabeth especially loved swimming in the pool at the hotel. She kicks her legs and paddles her arms when you say "kick, kick, kick". She had fun relaxing and getting into everything. Less than a week later, we met up with Grammy and Papaw Cline in Myrtle Beach. Elizabeth's cousins, Olivia and Lauren, were there too. The three of them had a good time together. Olivia and Lauren enjoyed "helping" with Elizabeth, including feeding her, changing her diapers (well they didn't exactly change them, but they watched), and helping her "walk". When cousin Lauren (4 yrs. old) fed her, she tended to shove the spoon all the way back in Elizabeth's throat! She also liked to hold Elizabeth. Unfortunately, Elizabeth is quite squirmy most of the time and "holding" her meant holding her down (as you'll see in some of their pictures).

Elizabeth says "hi", "daddy", "kitty", and we think she actually said "organic" in the grocery store last week! Sometimes she just "talks" and we're not sure if she's preaching or cussing us out (arms and hands go flying and she tends to get a serious look on her face).

She'll be walking soon, but we're not encouraging it too much! More to come....

What were we thinking???

We wanted her to crawl? We encouraged her to crawl? What were we thinking? Imagine this: There's a cute little baby sitting in the middle of the floor, surrounded by lots of cool toys--some that sing, some that light up, some that are made of wood, and all with lots of colors. You would think that this cute little baby would be entertained by all these neat, expensive toys, right? What does she actually want to play with? The gum wrapper that fell out of daddy's pocket.

She's keeping us busy! We had her pictures taken this week at Picture People.
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Enjoy!

Lots of New Tricks!

New tricks in the past couple of weeks include:

* waving bye-bye (grandma-ma taught her)
* clapping (favorite song is “If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands”
* singing in the car
* kicking while she’s swinging
* eating finger food
* writing her first name (just kidding)
* blowing raspberries with a mouth full of food

We're glad to have daddy back home (he was out of town for work last week). Mommy already knows what she wants for Christmas--a full night's sleep, coupled with sleeping in until about 7:30. Keep an eye out for that in the stores, I hear it can be hard to come by!

A Summer of Firsts

The past few weeks have been full of firsts for Elizabeth. We’ve found that, unlike some babies, she seems to just take in any new experiences and does not let new things scare her. Our neighborhood has a beach and playground close to our house. Elizabeth sat in the sand in her bathing suit for the first time. As she sat in the sand and felt around a little, mommy started “burying” her legs. Several other kids were around and one little girl asked if she could help me. Before we knew it there were 4 or 5 other kids helping to “bury” Elizabeth up to her waist. She ate it up! (Unfortunately, I mean that literally and figuratively—there were several mouthfuls of sand ingested that day.) She also sat in the water and enjoyed it. She enjoys the baby swing at the playground, too.

Friday night, we all went to a minor league baseball game in Waldorf. Elizabeth wasn’t too interested in the baseball game, but had fun listening to Uncle Cody’s iPod and eating a snowcone (we held the syrup—just shaved ice). After the game, there were fireworks. We were curious as to how she’d react to them—she did fine.

Elizabeth has also recently begun to eat Cheerios. Her favorite thing to do with them is to have Mommy throw them at Luther (grandma and grandpa’s dog). She cracks up laughing every time Luther catches a Cheerio in his mouth! She has developed a sudden interest in Luther as she stands at the door of his kennel and talks to him. He’s not sure what to think about her, but he’s just keeping a low profile.

Finally, our little busy-body is crawling—well, kind of. I guess you could call it crawling. She gets up on her hands and knees and ends up moving forward, somehow. I have a feeling that in the next couple of days I’ll be regretting ever trying to get her to crawl.

Wild Woman!

She’s a wild woman! Elizabeth has been so much fun the past couple of months. She’s been on the move—almost crawling. She get’s around, though. She rolls and scootches to get to where she needs to go. She’s also been enjoying getting around in her walker. Mommy introduced Elizabeth to some measuring cups the other day and they seem to be her new favorite toy. Two of her other favorite toys include her Leapster Learning Table that was a hand-me-down from her cousins, Olivia and Lauren. We think she likes it so much because she likes to show off that she can stand by “herself”. She also likes her “Exploration Station” that Olivia and Lauren (and Aunt Danielle and Uncle Curtis) got her for Christmas. She will play for long periods of time by herself. Her babysitter, Maria, says that she plays much better independently than most babies her age.

Mommy is finished with work for the summer. She’s looking forward to spending the summer with Elizabeth. Maria is insisting that Elizabeth come visit her at least once a week during the summer so that Elizabeth doesn’t forget her.

A few weeks ago, Grammy and Papaw came to visit from Ohio. Elizabeth enjoyed being spoiled by them. This past weekend, Becca’s Godmother, Jan, came for a quick visit. It was great to see her and for “Aunt Jan” to meet Elizabeth. Yesterday was Daddy’s first Father’s Day. The neighbors are going to think that mommy is a slave-driver because Daddy was out mowing the lawn in the heat on his first Father’s Day! (He likes his yard to look nice.)

Elizabeth is eating solids three times a day. Yesterday she tried guacamole and refried beans for the first time. Last night, grandma, grandpa, grandma-ma, and Cody came over for dessert. Grandma and Grandma-ma brought some berry cobbler, which Elizabeth tried. It wasn’t until afterward that we realized that the cobbler may not have been a great idea. She was very hyper. . . I didn’t think about all the sugar in the cobbler!

Right now, she’s watching her Daddy wash the deck from the sliding glass doors in the living room. He’s “playing” with her by squirting the hose on the sliding door.

I will try to update the site a little more often, now that I’m off for the summer.

New pictures are here