Catching up to 2005

So I'm trying to remember what happened over all these months and nothing big comes to mind...lots of eating, dancing, singing, running,climbing... We did take a music class in January and Grace wasn't that into the class but she loved the music. Everyone else politely sat on their moms laps and sat, sang and played instruments. Grace doesn't like to sit on her mom's lap...she likes to run. I almost think she doesn't like loud noises because it seemed to bother her during the instrument songs. She was curious about the instruments but not really into playing. We took a Valentine's trip to Maui in Feb. with Nanny Glee. It was beautiful and relaxing and Grace did great on the flight. She was excited about airplanes and liked the pool but she wouldn't let me hold her and swim. She liked to stand on the steps and walk down a few at a time. Her favorite part of the trip was visiting a friend's flower farm and seeing the cows. The beach was another story. She fell apart the instant we stepped foot on the beach crying until we left. Luckily the pool was close to the ocean so I could at least watch the whales go by from a distance.

The biggest change for us was our basement remodel which we have slowly been finishing. Now Grace has a big playroom and we built her a little playhouse. Dad built a little fireplace and I'm painting a little window scene. Grandma and Granddad visited in April for Grace's second birthday. I baked her a caterpillar cake with 2 candles for antennae. She loved the party and "cake cake."
Here's some cute words she says now: Klie Klie=blankie; way cie=gracie; shu shu=shoes, fly fly=butterfly, daddy home=the studio. At bedtime now she jumps up and down and screams "baby wok." Which means she wants me to rock her and hold her like a baby and sing a little song I made up called "Husha my Gracie." I let her fill in the blanks about what we did and saw that day. Lately we just go outside a lot and stalk the neighbor cats and bat at leaves. Today she is practicing her jumping like a frog.

Oops I forgot to write for 7 months

So I realize that I missed writing down so much as my baby rapidly turned toddler on us. So a brief synopsis of August to May is as follows: 1) We took a family trip to Cape Hatteras NC in September. Grace's first trip to Grandparents beachhouse and a sunny warm beach. She loved the trip but hated the beach and sand specifically. My Dad got her a little tent that she sat in and she would stick her little arm out and scoop of sand but none could touch her. Lots of crying and a general scowl. After a few trips we got her to walk around and she got a little interested in the birds on the beach. She just seems to freak out if sand touches her. But overall it was a blast. A powerwheels jeep washed up at my parents house in the last hurricane and my Dad put a tractor battery in it. So we had a lot of fun holding down the accelerator and steering for her. Dave had a blast fishing and sailing with my Dad and was thrilled when they almost died in a freak mimi-tsunami event in the boat. 2)Aunt Sharon and Eileen visited us as well and we went hiking and Eileen taught me to knit. 3) November we went to Texas for a family visit to see Mema, Nanny, Poppy, Eileen and Sharon. Grace saw her big cousins: Hunter, Montana, Noah and Savannah and only broke one crystal vase. 4) December Grace and I took a trip to NC and saw Great-Granny and my folks. We had a funny adventure coming back when we had a mechanical on our plane and got stuck overnight in Detroit. This was all fine and dandy except for my back having gone out earlier that week and having no diapers. Luckily I was resourceful enough to check into the Westin in the terminal and only had to make 4 trips down to the baggage claim area with Grace. The final straw was when Grace disappeared behind the Christmas tree in the NWA baggage office and took a big dump. We finally got the bag and the night ended with Grace and I eating $20 chicken strips in the middle of our king size bed and watching Sex and the City. Luckily we got back home the next afternoon and we were able to celebrate our Christmas at home. 5) Christmas was happily spent at home with Aunt April and Dave and we had Fiona, Alex and Gemma over for Christmas Eve. Santa brought Grace a train set and lots of cars and books.

Rain

Well it's August now, almost September and the first rains of fall are upon us. The dog hasn't gone out to pee in 24hours because she doesn't like getting wet. The baby still cries,squirms and shreiks went it's time to change a diaper. I think the two of them have a conspiracy to drive me to tears. The rain makes me sad because Grace so loves to go outside and I realize how hard fall and winter are going to be in this rainy rainy place we chose to live. Maybe I'll shop for some galoshes this afternoon. Over and Out.

My baby ate my homework

We stand on the edge of a mouth full of teeth-baby teeth. Ever so slowly they enter the arena and cry out for something to gnaw, chew,slobber.."anything, anything at all will do. Just get us something out of the trash" they shreik at her.

She went through my wallet today and removed all the major credit cards tossing them aside. Then she located the receipts seemingly going through them until she came upon a business-related expense which she promptly shoved in her mouth, ripped off a big hunk of it and chewed it up as she ran into the next room. The new skill of running is coming in handy these days.

Almost everyday she has a new little object that she carries around all day. She will take it and place it on a shelf then take it over to the dog usually placing it right infront of the dog's nose so she can check out her new find. She will even let me change her diaper if I place this object on the bathroom window seal where she can practice moving it around. Today's object was a pair of dice from an old backgammon set. But she bit one it half and fun time with dice was over.

Emergency room visits today:0

We're hilarious

licky attack Originally uploaded by dailygrace.

There's no place like home

Another month has gone by and we are 15 months old now. She's learned a few new tricks. if she hears music now she starts to dance by rocking back and forth. She is saying doggy, daddy, mama-most of which are said only as a high pitched screams as she runs by so it's a little hard to know for sure. Oh and she is running now.

She seems to have picked up on the concept of "this". She knows she can point to almost anything and say "this?" She points to pictures, vases, pillows, mirrors, books and pretty much everything and says "this." How did "this" happen. Well to the best of my recollection I've been saying "this is a ball" this is a picture" etc. and she's skipping the name of the object. I guess I've been asking her what's she's pointing at by pointing at things and saying "is this what you want?" She is right. This is this.

She's starting to play and interact with other kids. Especially if they have food. At the park the other day she just went up and stared at a family with necterines. I think she learned this from Muggs. We did take her and Muggs on a camping trip at a place called Lost Lake. We packed all our camping gear, baby gear and dog gear into the truck and drove the 2 hrs up. The lake was beautiful and there were rowboats and paddleboats but we ended up swimming since we had our two troublemakers. Grace wouldn't go in the water and Muggs wouldn't come out. So David and I took turns playing in the water and picking up rocks on the beach with Grace. We had renting a little cabin but it was kind of gross and buggy and Grace wouldn't go in it either. After about three hours of keeping the dog and baby entertained and alive, David and I decided that it was too stressfull. So after we cooked our camp dinner of hotdogs (baby hated;dog loved) we packed up the show and drove home. Lessons learned: Camp in the backyard.

Monday Monday

Well we made it through the weekend with little to show for it. We've been practicing going into the kitchen through the swinging door over and over again...hum? we cut a few new teeth.

We met up with a few other babies at various parks and playgrounds. Grace seems to like boys alot and will stand and gawk at big boys. It all started when we took her to a restaurant and a 5-year old boy sitting next to us jumped up and started entertaining her. He grabbed both sides of his mouth and stuck out his tongue, jumped up and down, spun around made funny fart sounds with his armpit and needless to say this was the funniest thing Grace had ever seen and the best meal I've eaten in a restaurant in a year. So now I think she expects this from all boys and most will oblige her with some type of antic if she just stares long enough. Most kids are alarmed when she comes up and want to know what she wants? I guess toddlers are the big party poopers for many older kids and I noticed they are constanly being told to share with her and not step on her and to give their beloved toy to her. Mostly she just wants to watch them play.

day 1

Hi everyone. This is the place to come see what Grace is up to. Dad has been in Brazil this week and we're trying to keep it interesting around here. So last night we had naked spaghetti night which should save us some money in stain removers. Although the dog still got some on her left ear despite her nakedness.