All In A Day's Work

True story. I promise. Not embellished at all by a proud mama. I promise.

In 24 hours this weekend, Charlotte:

(1) ...finally cut her first tooth. Her bottom middle left one. Now she's found it, and she spends much of her day looking like a lizard, feeling her newest form of entertainment.

(2) ...learned to crawl. She woke up from nap yesterday, and just started doing it. She never went through a stage of army crawling or scooting or anything. She just woke up and started crawling. She's much more peaceful now. It was clear that the inability to get around was causing her much frustration.

(3) This is the one that I'm gonna sound crazy about, but its true. We've started doing her baby signs with her, not really expecting her to do any of them for another month or so. We mostly focus on it at meal times. She has gotten into a habit of letting out this bossy-sounding frustrated squeal when the food isn't coming fast enough, and I've been saying, "no, how do you ask kindly?" And then I say "more, please" while showing her the sign, and then doing it with her hands. Well, Friday night, we were going through this whole scenario, and I said "how do you ask kindly?", and she totally looked me square in the eye and said "Mo." And then she did it after every bite. And she's done it every meal since. Even when we don't switch fast enough during nursing.

This is after her father came home from work and was kissing the girls hello, and she said "hi da da." Its possible that was coincidence. Possible.

But the rest is 100% true.

I promise.

Elizabeth's Travels

Here are a few of the highlights from her trip across the country without her mama. I'm still trying to decide if I was crazy in letting her do such a thing at 3 years of age, or if it means I just have that much confidence in her as a strong, independent young woman... She did great, but I'm starting to miss her so much it almost hurts! Can't wait till she's back safe and sound in our home tomorrow.


She made "play-doh" out of the chocolate icing on her piece of my uncle's 50th birthday cake.

She and Pa hiding in a pool toy together.

Playing with my cousin's guitar.

The highlight of the whole trip..."Mama...I got to drive the plane! But for pretend, not for real..." Brought to you by the nice folks at Southwest Airlines. (And you'll notice he's wearing an Aggie ring...nice Aggies.)

7 Months

Elizabeth has been in Illinois with her Amma and Pa for the past week visiting my grandfather and cousins. The rest of the family has used this time for a mini "stay-cation", so I've been away from the computer. Nevertheless, Charlotte did turn 7 months this weekend, so here's the post, even if a little late.

- She now sits wonderfully without any support indefinitely.
- She can even get herself from her tummy to sitting and back to her tummy.
- She's starting to get mobile, as she persistently utilizes any combination of sit up/move to tummy/roll over a few times/sit up again/reach/move to tummy/reeeaaaccchh to get whatever she wants within a several foot radius. She'll throw in a bear crawl or an army crawl every now and then too.
- No teeth yet, but I swear any day. Her middle bottom gums are swollen, and every week or so she has a run of several days where she's just plain cranky about it.
- She plays really well by herself. Rusty and I were just commenting this morning that we think we probably take that for granted. Elizabeth certainly wasn't that way (I think it probably goes with the territory of being the first child). But Charlotte will sit and play with her toys all by herself for 20 or 30 minutes, depending upon the time of day.
- She's loving her solid foods. I mean loving. She now eats peas, carrots, green beans, sweet potatoes, and squash. I've kind of stalled out on introducing a new food each week because my freezer is full of these foods that she needs to eat up first. I need to call the GI to see if she's allowed to start fruit before we have our next appointment at 8 1/2 months, or if we need to stick with the veggies.
- She's learned how to do this high-pitched squeal/yell that she thinks is so funny but every adult in her life finds highly disturbing. I know it will pass as soon as she finds something new, but for now its her "thing" and we're just trying to live with it without reinforcing it too much. (Plus, I have to admit that as long as it doesn't stick around too long, I actually find it to be kind of cute.)
- She seems to have fallen into a consistent night time sleep/wake pattern, falling asleep by 6:45 or 7:00 and waking at 5:30 or 5:45. I'm not too excited about the 5:45, but it actually works out well for our family's morning routine, and it could be worse. Just her body's natural rhythms, I suppose.
- She's still as sweet as ever! Lots of talking and babbling, with "da da da" being her favorite syllable for now.

Dance Class

I can't believe that she's really old enough to do this, but Elizabeth starts a dance and gymnastics class on Thursday. Its an all-in-one kind of survey course, where they spend the first half hour doing 10-15 minutes each of tap, ballet, and creative movement, and then they spend the last half hour doing gymnastics.

Mostly, my hope for her is that she learns to have control over her body, starts to appreciate music and fine arts, and learns that moving your body and being physically active is a fun thing.

Here she is, modeling her new leotard (with sparkles!) and tights, and her ballet shoes...



...and with her tap shoes. ("Mom! I can make a lot - A LOT! - of noise in these shoes!!")
Let the fun begin.

Scary Monster!

Oh no! What's the scary, scary green monster hiding under Elizabeth's bed???


Peek-a-boo! It's Charlotte!!!

And here's the monster and her partner in crime just happily lovin' on each other before their school day....