Self Feeding

Amelia looks cute in what we've decided is her pseudo Catholic school girl outfit. Didn't realize it until after she was dressed in it, but we both wound up thinking the same thing.

Apparently Amelia has decided that if she can't feed it to herself, she's just not interested. This came on rather suddenly and has taken Mommy by surprise. So we're trying to adjust and make sure she gets enough calories. She seems to really like table food so that helps. She had some burrito with melted cheese, some chicken, and some rice (made with salsa and melted cheese) which she really liked. Fortunately the cheese made the rice stick together in clumps so she could pick some up and shove it by the palm-ful in her mouth. Yes, it looks as lady-like as it sounds! She also had some home-made tiramasu leftover from a dinner party we had Thursday night with Livia and her parents. Livia's Daddy made it and Amelia thinks it is very yummy.

We took our tree down today. Amelia doesn't seem to miss it. We're enjoying have a little extra room and watching Amelia play with her toys. It's interesting how some are just her plain favorites! And she really does enjoy her books - she'll plop down and look through one for several minutes before moving onto one of her new or old noise-making toys.

More Pictures from Visiting Daddy at the Office

... because these are so darn cute! The outfit just makes her the cutest Little Miss Clause ever (not that I am biased or anything, I'm just her Mommy!) .


[photos dated 12/21/06]

Merry Christmas!

This will be a post in parts because Amelia just woke up from her Christmas nap.

About ten days ago we all came down with something and it was looking like Merry Sickmas. It's amazing how things just can't get done when you're dealing with a sick toddler and you're also sick.

Amelia came down with her first ear infection. Her eyes got watery and then gummy like they always do right before she gets sick. Turns out that this is the way a virus shows itself for her (whereas I always get a sore throat). When the doctor told me this, I had this awful vision of her waking up one morning to go to a proming job interview to find her eyes glued shut and oozing all day. Whereas I could medicate and hide a sore throat, I don't think gummy eyes (or rescheduling) would make a good first impression. Her doctor thinks the ear infection is viral and not the result of anything else. I just pray it responds to the antibiotics (which thankfully Amelia enjoys taking) and doesn't recur. This other Amelia who is also tres adorable just had tubes in her ears, poor thing!

We did not go see Santa this year since Amelia is at an age where she loves people - but only from a safe distance if she doesn't know them. We did get her picture taken at JC Penney along with two of her cousins. I was terrified she was going to go head first off the table and she wouldn't sit or stand still. We got one shot of her by herself and it was great. There were a few shots of the three of them and one of them came out pretty good. She wore this dress yesterday for Christmas Eve and it's the same dress in her JC Penney picture.

We went to the candlelight service last night and Amelia did pretty good for being held (at times against her will) in my lap the entire time. She was fascinated by the hymnal for a while - turning pages without bending or tasting any. I took her "Baby's First" Christmas stocking, pinned (will sew later) some muslin leftover from our wedding several years ago over the top and then did the glitter and glue thing with her name. I really liked the stocking Grandma sent her last year and this way she will truly be able to use the same stocking for as many years there are until she decides on her own she needs a different one. She wasn't so sure about hanging it up, though.

She had fun opening her presents - until she got overstimulated and walked to her room, came back with an old, familiar book, plopped down and proceeded to read it to herself with no interest in any more present opening. And that was fine - we took a break and finished later in the day.

Here she is enjoying Christmas Day. She immediately got the lion toy to sing and kept going back to him, but it didn't take her long to get into discovering new things - and she wanted to try everything out, including her new sippy cup which I had to remove from its packaging, wash and fill before moving onto anything else!
















And then we wanted to try our new shoes on, too!
















Last Thursday we visited Daddy at work. Amelia had lots of fun!
















And here she is patting the reindeer on its bottom after putting it on her shoulder. I can't help but wonder if she is imitating me!

Sleeping Beauty

A few minutes later ....



[pictures dated 12/13/06]

Christmas Tree Time

Daddy (aka Proud Papa) wrote this on behalf of Amelia and sent this picture to his coworkers and some friends. It's reprinted here without permission.

It's been a great weekend at my house. Kentucky finally managed to beat a solid rival (Indiana) instead of some old mid-major Southern Conference school in a basketball game on Saturday. That made my dad happy and when he's happy.....well....then he's happy.

Later that day I went to my friend Livia's birthday party. That was cool until the boys came and took all the toys away from us.

Then on Sunday after church, as usual, I took a nap. When I woke up I walked out to the living room and found that this tree had grown RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FLOOR! Wow! What do you nice people think of that? Then we put these lights and ornaments on it and it was really cool because some of the ornaments look just like my toy balls. It was fun to just go pluck them right off the branch. I think EVERYBODY ought to have a tree in their house.

[picture dated 12/10/06]

8th Tooth!

The weekend after Thanksgiving her eighth tooth appeared! She'd been having a few nights of being up every couple of hours (oh, the fun!) and a little drooling during the day, but nothing like when tooth #7 was coming in and she drooled so much she wound up with thrush. She was putting a lot of things in her mouth again and then lo and behold the new tooth came through. So she now has four up and four down. More importantly, she's back to sleeping through the night. Yippee!

She also has had a growth spurt which makes dressing her a little more time consuming since all of a sudden some things don't fit anymore. I noticed that her sleeper was a bit snug one night but thought, hmmm, we'll get one more night's use out of it before we wash it and throw it in the outgrown pile. But that happened to be one of the restless nights and she peed through her sleeper. I think the only reason it happened was, because of its snugness, in the process of dressing her for bed her diaper shifted. So it was the middle of the night and her sleeper and her sheets and her blankets were all wet, but her diaper wasn't! So much for being lazy and trying to get an extra night out of that sleeper. So yes, I was tired and a little frustrated at myself while I started to strip the baby girl and as she is standing and facing me, she points to my pajama top and says something that sounds very close to "kitty cat". I stopped and thought, nah, there's no way. So I pointed to the cat and said, "Yes, kitty cat!" And she repeated it! I said "cat?" and she said pointed and said "Dat!" It was just so sweet that I didn't care that it was 3 am and I hadn't gotten any real sleep and that I still had to deal with wrestling with the crib mattress to change the sheet. (Our mattress is really heavy and like most is really flush to the crib rails and so with the crib tent to keep out the cats and the aquarium crib toy to soothe the baby to sleep, it's almost impossible to get the fitted sheet on properly, especially at 3 am with a fussy baby.)

Anyway, the point is, she is mostly babbling these days and so anytime there is some kind of recognition or connection verbally, I just melt. What mom doesn't?

Now that the tooth has broken through the gums she plays with it with her tongue but her mouth is closed. Since it's her bottom left tooth, it makes it look like she is chewing tobacco! Way to fit in with the locals, Amelia!

And I don't know if this is related to teething or just her growing awareness of things, but if I put a sweater or shirt on her that has buttons down the front, she immediately puts them in her mouth and starts chewing on them. So of course I'm terrified one will pop off and she'll swallow it. And the drool factory she is, by the time I can try to cover the top buttons with a bib, she has absolutely soaked the front of her top. Luckily she doesn't have many things that are button front since apparently they're going to be off limits for now.

Today's Thought

Sometimes it's so hard to believe she's mine, that I get to be her mommy.

[picture dated 11/25/06]

Babyproofing - picture added

Amelia learned a while ago how to open the cabinet doors and that there are wondrous and fascinating things behind them. At first, she was content with the novelty that she could actually open the doors. Once she became interested in what was actually stored inside, it was time to finally baby proof. I was prepared in the sense that I had already purchased those "fun" baby proof locks for cabinets, but I was dreading having to install them. [What is it about anything baby related that just seems like there's not enough time to figure out, install, disinfect etc.?] Fortunately this time the task was not as complicated or as time consuming as I thought it would be. Granted, I only did the cabinets under the sink that house the garbage and household cleaners, but that was my goal. I am so grateful that (1) there were no disasters [read here: holes all the way through cabinet doors; and (2) they work! [I was worried that I would miss the matching piece and they would be completely ineffective.]

I let her play in the other cabinets since she can't hurt herself with the boxes of ziploc bags or the sifter, empty cookie tins and other things stored away but within her reach.

The cutest thing she does in the kitchen right now is toddle over to the stove, pull down the kitchen towel hanging from the oven's handle, then open the drawer under the stove and pull out the apron, the package of burner covers (because Mommy is too stupid to turn on the correct burner, she has burned through an entire package of them and is loathe to do it to another, so in the package they've stayed until we buy a stove with a more sensible key for showing which burner you are actually turning on), and one kitchen towel. The reason I find this little routine so cute is because there are usually two more kitchen towels and a complete set of placemats for the kitchen table, but she always stops with just the things I've listed. She will either play with them or move onto something else. It's like she has done her duty there, things are as they should be and let's move on because there are soooo many things to keep this toddler verrry busy!!!! (and her momma just a little worn out from keeping up with her!)

[picture dated 12/6/06]

Dogs and Cats

Amelia is making these little barking noises. "oof! oof!" It's so cute! She does it mostly when she's playing with her toys, especially when she has something kind of small that she's holding in her hand. We're not sure what it means or where she got it from. We think it's an expression of happiness or at least contentment.

She loves, loves, loves the cats. She will chase after them and they usually only move fast enough to stay a few steps ahead of her. When she comes upon one in its tube or on the bed or somewhere else, she just squeals (and I mean *squeals!!*) with delight. The cats are never flattered or amused by this. Our male cat will often hiss and spit at her, but she doesn't get it. The key is for one of us to get to her before the cat decides to take a swipe.