Goodbye Ostbys!

Last weekend we hosted a goodbye party for the Ostbys.  Julia has been a sweet friend to me over the past (almost!) four years I've been living in Augusta.  I can probably safely say she was my first friend here :)

Due to Hubby's job, they are moving far, far away from us.  But we were glad to have them around us one last time to celebrate their friendship.  Julia's birthday was the day before (perfect timing!), so we got to sing happy birthday to her.

 

Friends!  (and the back of Lois' head)

Thomas -- one of Emma's good buddies.  She calls him:  "mas!"  This little rascal began walking on his own when he was 8 months old.

 

The chaos!

 

More friends!

Our little girl is a great host when people (especially children) are at her home.  Here she is with her trademark facial expression <3 p="">

 

Happy Half, Emma Girl!

Thanks to my MIL, a good Morris is now known for half birthdays :)  A fun excuse to do a little something special for someone.  Emma turned 18 months last Thursday, and Mommy couldn't resist buying her a bunny book at B&N to celebrate her half birthday.  

Emma's recent obsession are fish!  She actually says fish in Spanish:  PEZ!  Most books she loves to read these days have a fish in them.  Her favorite Bible story is the story of Jonah.  I quite sick of it now, but she isn't!

So anyway, all that to say is that on her half birthday I decided to take her to Goodwill to see if we could find a cheap stuffed fish.  SCORE!  We got the softest, most colorful stuffed fish in the world for only $2.  Well worth the big smile it brought my little girl.

And of course, Memma made her traditional half birthday delivery to our doorstep -- half a coffee cake!  So good :) 

 

Popo

My child is very aware of times when she using the bathroom.  It makes me wonder whether she is ready to be potty trained or not.  But no worries, I don't plan on tackling that beast yet... not until little brother/sister arrive.

She doesn't do this always, but many times when she has a dirty diaper, she'll let me know.  Often times she'll grab one of her diapers, come to me and repeatedly say:  "popo, popo."  Then she'll lay on the ground like a dead roach waiting for me to changer her diaper.

Today she did something similar.  Instead of taking a diaper out, she took one of her wipes out and began saying:  "popo, popo."  She had already had a dirty diaper this morning, so I thought she was just being silly, so I ignored her.  Few minutes later, I was in the kitchen and she was in the living room messing around.  Soon I heard her again:  "popo, popo" and there she was -- she had climbed on the sofa-chair waiting to get her diaper changed.  Silly girl***

Of course she did had a dirty diaper!

On a side note, please notice her new shoes.  I got these at a consignment sale two days ago for $3.  I have already made it known in this blog that she is obsessed with shoes.  She used to love her boots, but these krocs are her new favorite shoe, and will now even request to wear them over her PJs. 

Blue crayons

Emma is normally very good about following me around the house while I do some chores.  She really likes hangers, so one of her favorite things to do to "help" me when I am folding laundry is hand me the hangers.  She'll stand right next to me holding about half a dozen hangers at a time and hand them to me one by one:  "mowe, mowe," she'll say.

Earlier this week I was folding laundry in our bedroom, and Emma decided she would play with the bag of crayons instead.  We normally don't give it to her in fear that she'll make a big mess with them (she likes to chew on them, for example), but for the sake of keeping her busy, I let her play with them for a little to keep her occupied.  She was being very quiet behind me, and when I turned around, this is what I found:

My little girl was intentionally taking all the blue crayons out.  This is really the first time I've noticed her making any sort of associations with anything, especially noticing patterns in colors.  I am sure this is a milestone children hit right about now, so I decided to record it.

Sugar and spice...

... and everything nice, that's what little girls are made of.

Not sure life gets any sweeter than watching your little girl feed her zebra on the toy high chair.

Cousin McNeill passed a few of her little girl toys down to Emma last week, which included a kitchen set, a high chair, and a cash register, all of which have been enjoyed by our little girl.  

Emma loooooooves her cousin McNeill (let me say that again -- looooooves her cousin McNeill).  Though Mc is nine years older than Emma, she is already proving herself to be quite the friend and role model of our little girl, for which we are thankful.  

Both girls will play together.  Emma likes to sit on her lap a lot, which of course makes me smile.  Emma breaks down crying every time she needs to part away from her, and sometimes I literally need to peel her away from her cousin.

Valentine's Day 2013

We had a great time celebrating Valentine's Day with our little family last week.  I woke up early and ran to Krispy Kreme (in my PJs, must I add) to get us some sweet treats for breakfast.

We enjoyed each others company, opened our cards, and had some yummy heart-shaped doughnuts.  Later that evening, we opened some more cards and gifts that came in the mail that day.  Thanks to all for all the yummy cookies and candy!!!

Emma had more fun taking the sprinkles off the doughnut than actually eating eat.  No worries, though -- mommy ate anything and everything this little girl left behind.

Opening her card from daddy.

Emma LOVES stickers!  She enjoyed peeling the stickers off the envelopes to putting them all over her hands and face.  I have an old stash of stickers from which I take some out of every once in a while.  She loves sticking them on her face, hands and shirt.  After a while she'll realize they are no longer any good and say:  "trash" and walk over to the trash can and throw them away (Emma loves to throw things in the trash).

Videos

Emma has learned to use the spoon this week.  She likes to eat her "soop."  Here she is enjoying her oatmeal.

Emma is just like her daddy in that she looooooves a good neck massage.  She likes to have us use these fake credit cards to scratch her back.  She becomes mesmerized and in trance when she is getting her massage.  It was worth a video shoot.

Boots

Emma loves (I mean, is OBSESSED) with boots.  How does she calls them?  Boo (with heavy emphasis in on the "oo").  She loves to wear her booties her Memma gave her for her birthday, and gets very worked up when Mommy chooses a different pair to put on her for the day (boots are a little more of a hassle to put on than those with Velcro). 

It is safe to say that Emma loves shoes in general.  It is not unusual for her to go through three different pairs of shoes in one day.  I'll be in the kitchen minding my own business, and here comes Emma girl, with a different pair of shoes in hand, asking Mommy to put them on her:  "shwe, shwe."  

She is also very particular about Daddy's feet.  She gets very upset if she sees him barefoot (for some reason she does not feel like that with me).  In the mornings, when Byron comes to the kitchen for breakfast, she will many times go find a pair of shoes for him to wear.

Today she decided she would try on Daddy's boots.  They were not as comfortable to wear as she thought they would.

She says her name

Emma's vocabulary continues to expand.  English is still her language of choice, but Spanish continues to follow closely behind.

A neighbor of ours gave her a little stuffed lamb for Christmas that sings the "Jesus Loves Me" song.  Emma loves that song!  She will sing it:  "Babu so" ( in reference to:  "for the Bible tells me so").  She will also try to say "Jesu" for Jesus.  ** Melt.My.Heart**

But one of my favorite things she has begun saying is her name.  It makes me smile, and almost brings tears to my eyes, how she says Emmee. 

More of her babies

Emma's babies are an important part of her life.  It amazes me how she loves them so dearly.  She loves Bunny the best, but is also very particular about having all three (Monkey and The Other Bunny) with her as well, especially at night time.

She loves to put them in her grocery cart and give them a spin around the house.

She also likes to sit on her rocking chair and read them stories.

 

Emma is also very motherly around other children.  I nanny for a friend's daughter a few times a month, and last Thursday I kept her for the whole day.  As soon as J. walked in the door, Emma entered "mother-mode."  Although J. is five months older than her, Emma decided it was her duty to make sure she ate her entire snack.  She stood next to her high chair the entire time, giving her gold fish and water.  She also chased her around the house, pulling her pants out and "checking" her diaper.  She would then look at me, point at J. and say:  "popo, popo" and run to her changing table, indicating to me I should change her diaper.

PJs are off!

I have been really slacking on this blog lately.  *Sorry*  Although other than my mom, I cannot imagine anyone else at the edge of their seat waiting for pictures of our family to be uploaded onto the web.

But yesterday Emma learned how to remove her PJs all by herself.  She was quite proud of herself and I thought it was worth a picture (or two!) and a blog post.  Of course, the day she decided to learn how to strip down was the same day her cousin Ames was over.  Not sure what he all thought about his cousin's exposure :p

And of course, unless you've been living under a rock (aka -- are never on facebook or around us in person), the cat is out of the bag:  Emma is going to be a Big Sister!!!  That's right, we are expecting Baby Morris #2 on August 22nd.  May I note that this baby is due just a day after Emma's second birthday?  I am 10 weeks pregnant.  I am still working out like I used to, and aside from always being hungry and sleeping an average of 10 hours/night, I am feeling great!  For which I am very thankful.

 

Vocabulary

We are back from Mexico!  I am afraid to say that most of our pictures were taken with my mom's camera, and I forgot to download the pictures to my USB drive before returning to the States.  All that to say, whatever pictures I have from our trip (which are not many) were taken with my iPad and were uploaded onto facebook.

But anyway, that's not the purpose of this post.  The purpose of this post is to record a pretty significant gift my daughter apparently owns.

I think it's normal for every parent to believe his/her child is very smart and above average.  I of course think Emma is the smartest, most beautiful girl to have ever walked on Earth.  But I am biased.  Aren't we all?

So of course, when grandma would compliment her on her abilities, I would just brush it off thinking:  "biased."  When nursery workers and volunteers at church would say:  "Emma is the smartest child in that nursery" I would think to myself:  "well, they are just being nice.  They probably say this to every parent."

But being in Mexico these past two weeks made me realize that Emma was indeed above average.  The three most common compliments she received were:  1.  How well behaved she was (not perfect, but certainly much better than expected), 2.  How well she ate (I think she could be a better eater, but non the less this was said), and 3.  How verbal she is, and how well she responds and understands people.

I decided to make a list of all of her words and do a little investigating on the vocabulary of a 16.5 month old.  Given the informal research I made, it seems like an average 20 month old should be saying about 20 words.  Emma is 16.5 months old and says 48!!!  And uses them correctly.

For memory sake, the words are (S: Spanish, M: Maya):
1.  Hey
2.  Bye
3.  Nite nite
4.  Ca Ca (S) (Cacahuate = Peanut Butter)
5.  More
6.  Ya (S) (All done)
7.  Tic toc (clock)
8.  Moon (sounds more like mooo)
9.  Ho Ho (in reference to Santa)
10.  Flor (S) (flour)
11.  Pan (S) (bread)
12.  Pa (S) (pajaro = bird)
13.  Mama
14.  Dada
15.  Baby
16.  Memmee (for Memma)
17.  Poppa
18.  Jo Jo (for uncle Joseph)
19.  Ames
20.  La-la-la (S) (leche = milk)
21.  Za (S) (manzana = apple)
22.  Apple (she also says this in English)
23.  Dawg (for dog -- very southern :p)
24.  Cookee (for cookie)
25.  A-side (for outside)
26.  Shoes
27.  Shirt
28.  Socks
29.  Pants
30.  Boo (for boots)
31.  Yes
32.  No
33.  Popo (S) (poop)
34.  Eye
35.  Mouth
36.  Cheese
37.  Chi (for Cheerios)
38.  Ball
39.  Pom (S) (chupon = pacifier)
40.  Phone
41.  Nose
42.  Ta ta (for "rock rock" when pretending to rock on a rocking chair)
43.  Bath time
44.  Tuch (M) (bellybutton)
45.  Xux (M) (bee's nest)
46.  Oh oh
47.  Box
48.  Duck

She also has many gestures, sounds and signs she uses in reference to things such as fish, bunny, bear, sheep, monkey, cow, horse, cat, etc.  She can also identify many things on a book or puzzle that she cannot say or reference to, but recognizes and points out when asked about.

Though most of her words are in English, she understands Spanish perfectly.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the future.  Many people have warned me that raising Emma to be bilingual will delay her speaking.  It's been amazing for me to witness quite the contrary.

The Jesse Tree

In response to the advent season, and in preparation for Christmas, this year we began doing The Jesse Tree as a family devotional.  Our church opened it's doors and gave us the opportunity to build a Jesse Tree earlier this fall.  I had heard great things about this devotional, so I really wanted to give it a try.

This devotional is done in response to Isaiah 11:1-2a:  "A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.  The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him..."

This devotional walks you through the genealogy of Jesus.  From God and the creation of the world, to the patriarchs, to the prophets, to Jesus' parents, etc.  All 30 "leaves" (devotionals) pointed to Jesus.  It was a great way to remind us every day of "the the True Reason for the season."

We would have our devotionals in the morning.  Emma loved this family time and loved hearing about "the baby."  We used a children's Bible to help us go along the devotionals, and one of Emma's favorite things to do during this time was to find "the baby."  This picture shows her looking at "the baby", and the mama and the dada, and all the animals in the barn.

Christmas Day

We loved waking up in our home on Christmas Day.  It took Emma a little to catch onto opening gifts, but by the end of the day, she had become an expert, and would even snatch gifts away from others to open them -- oh oh!

We started off our morning reading the Christmas story and finishing our Jesse Tree (I will write a later post on this).  We then opened our stocking gifts.  Due on how expensive these puree-pouches are, and how quickly Emma can go through them, we never buy them.  Therefore, they were an immediate hit as soon as she opened them, and wanted to try one immediately.

Here she is opening her gift from mommy and daddy.  What can this be?????

A groceries cart!  What a great way to push her babies and milk around the house.

We then headed to the Morrises'.  It is Morris tradition to have all the kids sit at the steps right before coming down to open gifts.  I guess this is something that they learned to do while growing up -- anxiously awaiting for their parents to get all of their gifts sorted and ready to greet them downstairs. 

Here is Poppa helping EG open her stocking gifts.

 

After all the gifts were opened, some of Byron's extended family (cousins and aunts) came over for a family brunch.  Emma enjoyed playing with her second cousins, but also being held by her Aunt Re. 

After all the excitement was over, we had the great idea of taking her outside and play.  Of course, she got herself in the mud and made a big mess out of everything.  Good news was she got to take a bath in her Memma's kitchen sink, right next to where she was washing dishes.  Emma enjoyed getting ahold of the plastic cups and drink the dish water -- yuk!  

Christmas Eve

On the 24th, all three of us enjoyed a full day together as a little family.  After a slow start to our day, we headed out for coffee and doughnuts at Krispy Kreme (using free doughnut and coffee coupons given to us by friends), then headed out to Costco to sample all their food -- yum!

After an afternoon nap, we headed out to church.

Emma sure loves to use her legs to get around.  Look at that big smile!

After a chili dinner, we got Emma in her PJs and headed out the door to drive around town looking for Christmas lights. 

All in all, a wonderful day with the family!

Babies

One of Emma's favorite words to say these days is "babies."  She thinks anyone under the age of 7 is a baby.  It has been amazing for me to watch her develop such maternal instincts at such a young age.  She gets very distressed when she sees a child cry, and will gently go up to them and pat them (so sweet!).

Last Sunday a friend told me how when her daughter was crying in the nursery, Emma went up to her, gently patted her, and said:  "(gibrish gibrish -- something something) baby."  We think she was trying to tell her "it's okay, baby."

I have decided that Emma will not get her first doll until she becomes a big sister (whenever that may be...).  I want it so that when mommy comes home from the hospital with a baby, Emma does as well.

Until then, she enjoys the little dolls and stuffed animals we have around the house.

Here she is enjoying her two "mestizas."

 

Her new favorite place to play these days.  Not sure how she discovered that door.  We never open it.

 

These are her three faithful crib companions -- Monkey, Bunny, and The Other Bunny (yes, we are creative with names).

Once again, this mama bird sitting on her nest.

A few new words we've been hearing this week:  

"side" (for outside)

"sssssss" ("si" -- the word for "yes" in Spanish)

"flor" (for flower in Spanish, though I guess this can work for both languages)

"za" (for manZAna -- apple in Spanish)

"shirt"

 

Emma meets Santa

Though we don't do Santa at our home, we thought it'd be fun to take Emma to meet him this morning at Chick-fil-a.  We met some friends there for breakfast and enjoyed some time with each other, which is a luxury these days due to A's crazy resident schedule. 

Emma was very shy and would get very upset if we even attempted to sit her on Santa's lap, so this was the best we could do.

The daddies and their babies.

Emma can say one word in Maya (the native language from my hometown), and that is tuch (bellybutton).  She now enjoys pointing people's tuch, in particular, mommy and daddy's.  But today at breakfast we found Emma trying to find Thomas'.  (Notice her lips sticking out as she says it).

Ladies and gentlemen...

... we have a little walker in the house!

Though Emma's first steps were taken over one month ago, Emma is officially walking at 15.5 months of age.  Thought this day will never come.

Emma began walking with more confidence two days ago (Tuesday night) after bribing her with gummy vitamins.  This seemed to boost her confidence.  She then failed to walk all day yesterday, but then at night last night, this is what we got:

(notice Byron using his cell phone as bate.  Also notice how she says "phone").

 

 This is probably my favorite one.  Watch her pick up her ball (favorite toy) while holding daddy's cell phone.  Also notice how she repeats Byron and attempts to say "Christmas tree."  Also notice how she likes to stick her lips out.

Dryer

Wheeeeeeere is Emma girl??????

There she is!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, my child discovered how to climb into the drier all by herself today.  Couldn't resist photographing this moment!

knee walker

Here is the much promised video of Emma "knee walking."

At this rate, we don't expect Emma to be walking on her feet anytime soon.  She has taken a number of steps on her own, and of course can walk very well using her walker, but nothing consistent enough.

On her doctor's appointment last week, I asked her doctor if he'd ever heard of a baby "knee walking."  He gave me a grin and said:  "you know, my granddaughter (only 3 weeks younger than Emma) is also a knee walker."  So no worries... She is just taking her time.  Enjoy!