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Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Happy 11 month Birthday Julia



New words:

Ball (clearly now)
HOT! (I say this when cooling her food off and when she gets near the
stove)
Hello (been working on this one pretty hard)
ruff ruff (she does this now when she sees a dog passing by or hears one
barking off in the distance)
Dada (she says this now after working on it for a long time. DH is pretty
proud she says it when she is looking for him now)
Another word we think she is saying is "Purdy",, who is my sisters dog. If
not Purdy then she is saying "Pretty". We are trying to figure that one
out. When she sees me wearing earrings or a necklace and points to it , I
always say "Pretty", so maybe that is what she is saying.
She loves to point at everything. I then say what I think she is pointing
at and ask her to repeat the word.

Her favorite toy right now is the see & say. I have one with the Lion King
characters on it and also another one that has a duck, dog, cat, cow,
etc... on it and when I say "Julia, point to the duck", she will point to
it. This is so much fun to see how much she is absorbing and learning now.


Boooboooo's this week. YOUCH.

Sunday she was outside with Dh and I while I was vac'in the car out of dog
hair from a camping trip we went on. Julia and DH were playing roll the
ball back and forth (on the concrete) and she took a face dive forward
trying to pick up the ball. She has a nice scrape on her forehead now. I
then suggested DH take her over into the grass. hehe

She is growing a black eye. Later on Sunday evening, while DH and I were
sitting watching the closing ceremonies of the Olympics, she tried to step
past Dh's foot and didn't do so well. She did a face plant on the wood
floor with her nose taking the brunt of the fall. She now has a shadow of a
black eye creeping from the nose where it meets the eye socket. Youch. The
worst part of it for us was trying to get her to take a breath after she
fell. I hate trying to watch her cry so hard and not take a breath for what
feels like a whole minute and her looking at you like "Help me momma".

This week she started walking over to me (walking has been going on for
nearly 3 weeks now) and she grabs my leg and HUGS it. So sweet.
If she is playing in the living room, we walk near her and tell her we are
going to her her "I'm going to get you", she turns around and nearly runs
over to the couch trying to get away from us and is laughing so hard with
excitement that it cracks us all up.

....

Swimming lessons.

My SIL and niece are going to take a swimming lesson session with us. The
local YMCA (South City) has a new session for Saturday mornings starting in
early September. I know we will miss a few sessions with camping and her
birthday party, but I can't wait to get her started. She knows how to kick
when we are holding her in the pool, but we need to get her use to dipping
under the water and floating on her back. I can't wait to get in to the
pool with her and start the lessons. I have been swimming since I was 6
months old (my mom has a picture of me in the pool when I was that old)
with water wings until I was 2 and then I was on my own after that. We have
always had a swimming pool in my backyard so it was important to my parents
that I learn to swim at the earliest age possible. I want to do the same
with Julia. She won't let me put the wings on her arms yet so I need to
really work with her this winter in the big ymca pool. I want her to enjoy
the water, unlike some of my relatives and neighbors that won't set foot in
water outside of a shower!

First Birthday party prep
I have some of the party decorations for Julia's first Birthday party ready
to go. I bought an elmo pinata (pull string). Now I just need to buy some
of the snacks / fun toys to go in the pinata for the young kids to have.
Any ideas?
DH made the invitation on the computer at home and it is so cute. I'll try
and get a picture of it later.

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

just because



I love these two wonderful people in my life!

our zoo rocks!

I can't wait to go to the zoo again. I remember going there at least 3-5 times a month when I was a kid with either a school field trip or always in the summer with my grandma and aunts

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

ok, that is it, I give up.... summer colds are horrible

yet again I am dealing with the loverly summer head cold. Sinus pressure so much so that I think I could use a straight pin and pop my sinus cavity and make me fly away from all that pressure in there like a hot air balloon. Crazy painful. My teeth feel as though they are being jolted into my upper gums and coming out my upper cheeks. One nostril is closed with congestion and the other running to go catch the next greyhound buss out of town for the ongoing snot convention. Every time I cough or sneeze, my daughter jumps and turns towards me with a look of disgust that I disturbed her much needed play time tonight. Ha. Dh has some of the zicam swabs so I grabbed one when I got home, read the instructions (yes, unlike some men I know who won't read them) and in 5 minutes my previously wall of china closed off breathing pathway opened right up as if it were letting hundreds of gallons of fresh air in for a party. My throat, we will see how that feels in the morning after I get a few winks and my snoring causes my throat to swell. I am going to do another zicam now before bed. Between the zicam, ambien, and yummy ice cream I am about to eat, I hope to sleep tight

but she makes me feel so much better too.....


Sorry for the fuzzy photo, but she kept leaning in towards me when she was cracking this big smile, like she does every time I get the camera out. BIG camera HAM she is.

I promise to get a short video of her walking. She is taking between 15-20 steps at a time now and usually does this when she is playing with her toys not really paying attention to herself walking. LOL

Saturday, August 16, 2008

first it went 1..2... plop... then this week 2..3...4... plop

can you guess what that represents? 1...2... plop then this week 2...3...4.. plop and giggle and clapping for herself.

That would be my little beautiful daughter taking her first stride steps. She got up to 1...2...3...4....5.....6....plop today while grandma was watching her all day. I love it.

I'll try my hardest to get some video of that to post soon. Heck, by time I unload all the pictures of her trying to walk and recharge the battery, I'll have missed her first FULL walk hands free across the living room. As least this past weekend we really worked with her on the floor to try and build up that leg strength to take more than 2 steps and it has paid off.

She now barks with the dogs
She now runs away from daddy when he says he is going to come tickle her. she runs towards me (holding onto the couch) as fast as she can and giggles up a storm.

I LOVE THIS.

busy weekend ahead.. (maybe some yard sale shopping in the wee early AM while J sleeps in with Daddy). BIL's teamster picnic, that should be fun if it does not rain. BBQ and Swim pool.

Saturday night is dinner out with our friends who miss seeing us, (no really they admit they miss seeing J more so... hehe).

Sunday is a bbq at another local mom after IF family and more friends .. Hope to have several kiddos there for J to play with.

I wish I could take J out to Festival of the Little Hills in St. Charles MO... I was so looking forward to that this weekend but we could not pass up these other plans today. I should have begged DH to go with me tonight (Friday night) instead. oh well!

Monday, August 11, 2008

two for tea .. tea for two... or at least teeth

Ok, before you roll your eyes at just another mother posting her daughters first teeth, but I waited for a long long many years since my first ectopic pgcy in July 1999 to boast about this.


I know, I can't manage to take a good picture of my daughters two bottom teeth, but here they are so far. She has 3 teeth so far and is insisting on grinding them together. Oh that hurts my ears like fingers down a chalk board.

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Enjoying too much tv

Man, I love the Olympics, but dang it takes up so much of my time. Bahahaha. No, I am not neglecting my child. I have several hours a night after she goes to sleep that I am awake (thanks to the insomniac I am) to catch up on my tivo'd hours of the Olympics. Big Brother is also on that tivo list!

GO USA!

Phelps ROCKS.

GO USA!

I must ask though.. Don't you think that smog in the air plays havoc on the athletes games

Friday, August 08, 2008

Freaky Friday Foto



I was at an adoption support group meeting last night and when left there, This was the photo that showed up on my first text message to read.

Now THAT is a face to love. hehe

My niece of 15 yrs old spread a little chocolate Syrup on her tray that evening while watching her until DH go there. Julia didn't eat but a little taste of it, instead she did some much loved Finger Painting all over the tray and herself. bahahahaha

Thursday, August 07, 2008

Thankful Thursday



My Thankful Thursday Thirteen
1) My husband
2) my daughter
3) our famlies
4) Julia's birthmother and birthsiblings, birth family who made this all possible for us to become the parents we are so enjoying being.
5) our jobs (which will be changing eventually for DH, but still glad he has a job)
6) our friends online and locally
7) our doggies (they are so good with our daughter even when she pulls their hair
8) my sister for babysitting J full time now!!!
9) Our adoption support group in town. WOW, tears were flowing with Joy for others last night
10) Friends that "GET IT"
11) DH's drive to get his degree in school
12) having the ability to deal with ignorant "well now that you adopted, you'll get pregant" comments
13) My HUSBAND and DAUGHTER (see pic)



(I did get tagged with an award so I'll do blog that tonight, FUN)

Sunday, August 03, 2008

some of the rewards of becoming a parent. Milestones

A few weeks ago we finally have J's birth certificate (thanks to DH for his hard work). We finalized in April so it took a while longer than expected.

He got the birth certificate, after we paid our final bill to the adoption lawyer, and he immediately went to the SSA office and applied for J's new social security card.

We got her ss card in the mail this past week so we went to the bank on Saturday and opened J's first bank savings account. YEAH. Fun. I took the cash out of her piggy bank and we used that to open her account.

We bought J her first tooth brush and tooth paste. I took about 10 minutes tonight to show her how I brush my teeth and she immediately took her brush and rubbed it on her TWO NEW teeth on the bottom gum. LOL (yes, she did get two teeth a few months back on the bottom that were coming out all wonky wrong, but they went back in and are now back out through the gum like normal. YEAH).

I saw J take a full step yesterday. We went to a party at our friends house and were playing in a washers tournament. While Daddy was pitching his washers I turned around to watch J. She took one foot and put it in front of the other while standing and then lifted her other foot and moved it out another step. Previously she was only taking 1 foot forward and then plopping down to the ground. This time she did both feet and just stood there. FUN.

I must watch her in the cart at the store now. Tonight we went to the local retail store to pick up some sundries. I had pushed the cart (with J strapped in) to the right side of the isle while I was looking at some dental floss. I turned back around to find her grabbing for some hand lotion on the shelf right next to her. I forgot she could reach out so far. I know one day she will be that kid reaching for the candy in the check out lane, right? I'll be saying "No, J, you can't have that kit-kat bar!" (then I will hear her throw a fit, right?)

I could swear I heard her say "Hannah" tonight. Hannah is our blond lab mix dog. It was more like "HanHan" coming from J, but she had also pointed her finger right at Hannah so that made me believe she is trying to say her name.

these milestones, my friends, are what we have all been waiting for since the day we were ttc!