Park and Picnic = Happy Girl

Emma loves to swing and go down the slides.  We have spent the last several days eating lunch on our deck, "picnic" style and going to the local parks after dinner because the weather has been amazing.  Whenever Emma gets to the bottom of the slides, she says/signs "more" and goes running for the steps.

Last night there was an Asian family at the park...their daughter and Emma kept sizing one another up but wouldn't interact.  Emma kept running and hiding into my legs, but then peeking to see where the other little girl was.  I tried to get Emma to say 'hi" but she acted shy; the other little girl, looked to be about 4 years old, and was speaking in Chinese to her mom and Grandmother, so not much conversation was going to happen anyway.  The mom and grandma kept staring at us and chatting in Chinese...I would love to know what was being said!

I am really noticing how much of a little girl Emma has become in these pictures...there is no sign of the baby she was last year at this time.  Next September she will be getting ready for preschool.  *sigh*  It's going too fast!

"No" is the word of the week, with lots of sass in her "no"...especially when it's time for diaper changes.  Emma doesn't want to stop what she is doing to be changed and doesn't believe us when we tell her she can go back outside or to playing once we are done.  Our girl is busy, busy, busy.  This week she is burning so much energy, she is asking for more food after every meal and snack.  I swear she looks taller every week and the Mail Courier states the same.  Emma and the Mail Lady have forged a friendship...she will actually give us our mail, even when she isn't on our side of the road yet, just so she can interact with Emma.  She binds the mail with a rubber band, just so Emma can carry it all on heavier days.

If I had one word to describe Emma right now, it would be Octopus...that kids hands are everywhere and snatching things from us in a blink of an eye.  Keep your eyes on and your hands wrapped around drinks, cellphones, remotes, receipts and food when she is around!

Where's Waldo?

Growing

This is the time of the month we measure Emma's growth...she shot up a little more than a half inch this month.  The lightweight champ is 34 and 5/16th of an inch tall, 27lbs and in a 6.5 inch shoe.  Now if we could just get her hair to grow and fill out like the rest of her!

Bedtime must-haves

Elmo, three bears of various sizes, two babies, Minnie Mouse, Lassie the dog, Mr. Sock Monkey, 3 blankets, 2 character pillows and a bear hat...yes, a bear hat.  I had to carry a majority of these items in a laundry bag yesterday morning because Emma wants to be carried when she wakes up, but wants her friends to come too.  I will not willingly die on the stairs trying to carry 27lbs of toddler and a booty of stuffies, so the laundry bag is an excellent solution.  I could "just say no" and not be so indulgent, but carrying them down seems to start the day off on a high note, which is really important now that the terrible 2's are here and I have her for 11 hours of the day solo.

You are probably wondering how there is room for Emma in the crib, but I promise, the crib is plenty big enough for "everyone", no reason to call CPS.  One morning I climbed into the crib with Emma and her friends...still plenty of room and Emma thought mommy in the crib was hilarious...full of smiles that day.

This evening when I put Emma to bed, she screamed for about 10 seconds as I walked out the door and closed it, then I watched her from the monitor, rifling thru all her crib stuff, find the bear hat, put the bear hat on, adjust the bear hat into a few different positions, look around for a few seconds, throw the hat off, lay down, then pass out.  Video monitors are the greatest invention ever...I wish we had bought one that records, but I didn't know she was going to be this funny when purchasing.

Conversations with Emma

Emma's language is getting clearer by the week and I love that I can call home when I am at work now to talk to her...of course we are not really having a conversation, but she will say, "Hi", "Hello", "Yo", "What" and "I love you" as part of our "conversations"...sometimes she replies, "don't know" when I ask her questions.  She doesn't get that people can't see her on the other end of the phone, so she will show people her belly over the phone and do a lot of smiling/showing off when I am on the phone with people.  Emma really likes my friend Kim, so whenever I answer the phone, she will say, "Kim?" assuming it's Kim.

Yesterday we were hanging out after running a bunch of errands and I caught her putting her shoes back on.  When I asked, "Where are you going?", Emma replied, "Gamma's, dog-dog", which means Gramma Cheryl's house, her Grandma with the dog. I asked Emma a second time where she was going to see if the response would change and she replied, "Ice cream, dog-dog". 

Emma LOVES ice cream and gets very excited...we share a snack size McFlurry's at McDonalds about once a month and she goes nuts when the drive-thru hands the ice cream to me and I put it in the console to take home.  Her Dad has taught her to yell, "whaaaattt" in excitement, so I get shouts of "whaattt", "ice cream" and she sticks her tongue out really far, moving it around like she's going to reach the console with her tongue...hilarious.

She uses her "more" sign, a lot, everyday now..."more" is really helpful now that she is starting to talk but can't quite find the words she is looking for in her brain.  When we went to the Zoo this week, she was signing "more" at the monkey's, on the train and on the carousel.  It's nice that Emma can communicate when she really likes something or wants more food, water etc.  "More" seems to also be a replacement for "do it again", i.e. tickling, running, and piling her stuffed animals on top of her.

Stuffies and Dress up

Emma is all about her stuffed animals and baby dolls the last few weeks.  When she wakes in the morning, Emma wants every bit of her crib" friends" to come downstairs with her.  Yesterday, Doug took this desire to a whole new level after nap time...I love seeing her Fred Flintstone feet peeking out from all the stuffies in this pic.  I was in line at the grocery when I received this picture and was laughing like a loon all by myself...I was expecting the text to say, "pick up Pop-tarts", not our kid buried in stuffies.

Dress-up is also a fave lately.  Her Nana Karen showed up a few weeks ago with dress-up items and I posted a pic on Facebook of the getup.  Well, a co-worker saw the pic and donated his daughter's dress up items to us and Emma piles the clothes on everyday...she especially likes the faux heels, or click-clacks as we call them.  The other night, she had on about 3 layers of princess dresses, click-clacks and her winter hat...imagine stay-puff marshmallow man!

This weekend, we have all been under the weather and missed out on the gorgeous, cooler weather.  Emma developed a cold and passed it along, hitting her and Doug the worst.  I was ingesting loads of vitamin C, fruit smoothines and veggies all weekend, trying to stay one step healthier than the rest of them.  I made lots of soups and made sure lots of water was consumed.  Thank goodness Emma loves water...we still have issues with her drinking too much, but when an illness strikes, I am so happy she drinks this much. Fortunately, Emma is the happiest, sick kid, I have ever encountered.  Despite her "dripping faucet", she was singing her "ABC's" and "Hot Dog" songs plus dancing around, all weekend...I felt like a lead balloon, but not her.

"Mommy-daddy, daddy-mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy, daddy"....this has been Emma's script, constantly...by the end of yesterday, I wanted some duct tape for either my ears or her mouth.  I had to go outside to place a phone call because she was saying it so much, she was screwing up the automated connection; the computer kept kicking me back to the beginning menu.  Doug was inside with Emma and said she must have said this no less than 50x's.  I could hear her behind our wood front door, albeit muffled and Doug said she was also on her tippy-toes peering out the bay window trying to get my attention...which I knew, but was ignoring.  Our kiddo oozes determination!

Summer is almost gone

This summer is flying by and I cannot believe it is August!  We have had swim class and at least one play date every week this summer...adding weekly activities to the 2 days I work, plus house cleaning/laundry and the weeks are gone in a flash.   Most weeks we go to the zoo too, but the heat has been excruciating in July; heat causes Emma to get a bad diaper rash, so we have had to skip the zoo for 2 weeks...we went last Friday and the diaper rash returned with a vengeance, so we will wait until cooler temps to return.  The zoo visits we have made so far have more than paid for our pass prices and the pass doesn't expire until next June!

During the hot weeks, we have spent a lot of time at the mall play centers and letting Emma walk around at Home Depot in the evening.  The mosquitoes are killing us as well because of the humidity and Emma has really bad reactions to the bites, so being outside after 4pm is not worth the price of bad skin reactions  Yesterday we did some gardening at 4:30 and we both were eaten alive within 30 minutes and Emma was a ball of sweat...she looked like I had poured a bucket of water over head.  Our deck finished in early July and we have only used it a couple of times because of heat and bug issues, which is a bummer!

Swim class ends next week...YAY!  10 weeks is way too long in a class that your kiddo doesn't love.  For the month of August, we are going back to The Little Gym once a week, so Emma can burn energy.  We started class this week, in the next level up, which is called "Little Beasts".  They sing, run, tumble, walk on balance beams and swing from rings and uneven bars, but the skill level is bumped up a notch.  When Emma was a "bird" she was one of the older kids in the class and seemed too advanced, but at the Little Beast level, she seems "youngish" for most of the activities; the other kids seem to be 2.50 to 3 years old, which is a huge skill gap compared to an almost 2 year old.  I think after August, we won't return to class until January, which will give her time to "age up" a bit.

I can't believe Emma is going to be 2 years old in a month!  I found her birthday outfit today and purchased some party supplies.  We have a birthday decoration theme and here is your clue:  Mooooooooooo!