Week 75

Dear Jorie,

Pink eye! Again!

What a week! You had pink-eye again and were out from daycare Thursday and Friday, and you've been fighting some sort of cold, which I'm sure your father caught from you. Your father has been sick the past few days, Monday he was sick enough to stay home from work! Needless to say, that's thrown our lives into quite the frenzy.

Dinner at Wegmans is serious!

Mostly this week has been just hanging on, making sure we got your eye drops in (you really hate those!) and trying to keep things running as smoothly as we can.

The only thing we did this weekend that was unusual is we had brunch at your Aunt Becky and Uncle Michael's new house. It really is a great house, and it was really nice and relaxing to have brunch there with them (and not to have to worry about clean up was great!) We think we're going to do it again this weekend.

nap time for "baby"

Things you've started saying lately: "Boo!" (after pulling a sheet off your head), And all the time "What is this?" or "That is there." Of course it doesn't sound that clear, more like "At it is?" or "At it air." But we get the gist of it. And always "Eat" "Bottle" (which right now sounds like "Bah-ol") and Recently, "Da." which we think is you saying yes.

You are so full of energy these days, you've stopped taking more than one nap a day. You refuse to acknowledge the time change too, so you're ready for bed around 7:30 no matter what we do, and up early. Nap time has slipped earlier too, you want to nap around 10, instead of the usual 11. It's made for some frustration on my part, since we've been trying to get you settled back into a normal schedule, and you really don't want any part of it. You get really crabby when we keep you up past when you want to sleep!

Most of the time you're a blur of happy activity, tearing through your toys and "reading" books. You love running around the living room at my parents house, and riding the stuffed monkey rocker we named Mocha.

You're getting really good at feeding yourself, you even use a fork and spoon (mostly successfully) now. It's really nice to be able to let you feed yourself your breakfast while we get ready, although yesterday that ended up requiring a bath after breakfast, you were so covered in oatmeal!

I love you so much baby girl.

Weeks 73 & 74

Dear Jorie,

Oh my! Somehow I forgot to write you a letter last week! I'm not sure how that happened. I'm so sorry! My only excuse is that the time is flying by!

Eating at the Table

We've moved your high chair into the dining room, and are having meals in there now. It's really nice being able to spend the time sitting at the table with you and your Father. For our first dinner at the table, I made a really yummie frittata. Your father likes having you at the table for breakfast, he told me it feels more relaxing to be able to sit with you at the table while he eats his cereal and you eat your oatmeal.

Reading on the couch
with Nannie and Grandpa

Oh yeah! You've been feeding yourself (mostly) with a spoon lately. We give you the spoon and your oatmeal and you go to town. Most of it actually gets in your mouth too!

The weekend before last, you managed to get yourself out of your crib. Your father went to get you up on Saturday morning, and you met him at the door! It was a good thing we had managed to get the gate up at the top of the stairs already!

Who wore it better?

You have so many words now, it's hard to remember which ones are new. Your new thing is to call everything a baby. You point at everything and say "Baby?" Me and your Father spend a lot of time correcting you. This morning we were working on "Blueberry" which kinda sounded like "booboooie."

You're still teething something fierce right now. I haven't been able to coax you to open your mouth long enough for me to get a good look at what's coming in, but you've been chewing on everything you can get your hands on.

You went through a brief hitting phase last week, where you would slap and kick people. It wasn't malicious, but just because you thought it was funny. Luckily that seems to have subsided. You still slap every now and then, but you get a swift "time out" and a stern "no." Now it only seems to happen when you're over tired.

Trying to get your shoe
on Daddy's Foot

You're still a handfull. You love to test the boundaries and I think we're getting a preview of how the "terrible twos" are going to play out. I'm still holding out hope that this is the worst of it, you really like to ignore us when we tell you not to do things, but based on feedback from other parents, it's looking like it's going to be a rough couple of years.

Teething...so much teething

You are totally worth it, though. No matter how frustrated I am, or how many times I tell you not to feed your food to the dog and then watch you do just that, Your smile melts my heart.

The other night at Nannie and Grandpa O's, my mom jokingly said "Soon she'll be saying 'Why?'", to which you instantly piped up "Why?" which made us all burst out laughing. You now think "why" must be a really funny word!

I'm sorry this is such a scattered letter. I'm having a hard time remembering any stand out moments to relay to you. Most of the past two weeks were made up of those tiny awesome moments, like giving you a bath this morning and playing with you in the living room.

I love you so much baby girl.

In your "indian hat" from
daycare