Children's Museum

Today we went to the Children's Museum, and Mikaela had an absolute blast! It was definitely right up her alley. And they even had an area for infants where Elijah got to play! I was hoping to get lots of really good pictures of my cuties, but Mikaela moves a little too fast for the really slow flash on my camera, so here's what I was able to capture :)

Mikaela being pulled up on the pulley chair



Elijah in the infant play area



put me on my back fast--I don't want to be on my tummy!



Mikaela stepping on the cylindrical mat



Mikaela weighing her veggies

Half-Eaten Apples

Yesterday we went to Wal-Mart and stocked up on some food, one of which was apples. After our nap Mikaela wanted a snack, so I offered her a banana. She declined and did a little whining, so I started eating the banana and continued on with some housework. A few minutes later Mikaela walked into the living room with an apple that already had little bites all the way around it--she was all smiles (and no, it hadn't been rinsed off yet). Now I know she can reach into the fruit bowl :) When she was finished with what she wanted she put the half-eaten apple back in the fruit bowl! :) When I was making dinner she was about 2 seconds away from biting into another apple that she pulled out!

yes--those are my tennis shoes :)

Picture Reading

Ok--sorry, but I just couldn't help myself. This totally makes up for all the sleepless nights :) I know that pretty much all kids picture read at some point, but Mikaela just cracks me and Eric up, so I had to share :) Right now Mikaela's favorite book is called "The True Princess." She wants to read this book practically from the time she gets up until she goes to bed (thus a number of the pages have been patched up with tape :) ). And many times we find that she sleeps with it (yes, that means she disobeyed us by getting out of bed to get it :) ) I have to catch her for her very first reading of the day in order to get the best one. So I had to video two days worth in order to catch almost all the things she will normally say when "reading." She will only let me read it to her for bedtime--any other time she wants to read it herself. And when we do read it, she's looking at my facial expressions the entire time so she can mimic them later :) If you're not familiar with the book, here are some things to listen for in each of the videos (the things in purple are what she gets out--some of the things she only did in one of the videos and then others she did in both) :)

1. Her deep voice with puckered lips represents the voice of the king.
2. Her soft voice represents the voice of the princess.
3. Towards the beginning the king is saying that the princess must be kept safe.
4. After that, it talks about the princess being worried. Then the princess asks a list of questions, the last of which is, "Who will make me laugh?"
5. On one of the pages, the princess and Nana are baking, and the princess put too much yeast in the loaf of bread, and it went POP. The princess said she need jokers to make her laugh, and Nana told her to just look in the mirror (and Mikaela is laughing with them).
6. When the king returns he goes to his palace, and the guards announce, "The princess is here!" Also, notice her point at the true princess in the back of the room.
7. When the king sees the posing princesses, he asks, "So many princesses?"
8. The first girl responds, "She has maids to do that," to the king's question to her.
9. At the end, the king picks his daughter up and hugs her, so that's why MJ is hugging herself in the second video.
10. At the very end of the second video, she says, "Read princess more--last time." :)

Hopefully that will help you catch some of the words that she says. Most of it is jibberish, but I have a feeling she has even more of it memorized than we can catch :)

Sleepless & Diaperless Nights

Well, I've been sort of "foggy" the past couple of days b/c the past few nights have been rather sleepless. Around 3 am Monday morning I woke up to, "Uhu, uhu, uhu (Mikaela half crying, half whining)--I nee chay (I need to be changed)." So I got up to see what the problem was. I figured she had just peed through her diaper again. Well, when I went to pick her up, she was sopping wet, and there was no diaper! Looking back, I thought I had heard her doing something before she went to sleep, but when I went into her room she laid back down in her bed really fast, so I just let it go. It turns out that our little sweetie-cakes decided she didn't want to wear her diaper, so she took it off and put it up on the changing table! The little mat on the floor next to her bed was sopping wet, but at least her bed was dry :) Thus she has started a trend of saying that her diaper hurts when we put it on her, and she looks pitiful enough that we've been letting her go to bed without one. I've been trying to tell her if she has to go, to get up and go in her potty which we've been putting in her room. That hasn't really worked out though--Tuesday morning she woke up at 1 am saying, "I go potty pease (which translates into, 'I WENT potty in my pants.')." That time her bed was soaked. And at 11 pm last night, she had already gone in her pants and soaked her bed again! The good thing is that she's only wetting once. After that, she's been fine until she wakes up. The bad thing is that I've had to wash her bedclothes for 2 days in a row now. So I think she may be getting a diaper tonight!!

Then, poor little Elijah had 2 nights of restless sleeping--on top of me already having dealt with Mikaela! I think one of the nights he may have just been cold--it's gotten down into the 40's and 50's the past few nights. So last night I bundled him up real good and even put a night cap on him; we bumped the heater up slightly, and he did much better :) So, I do feel a little more rested today, but it's ok if I don't sleep at night, b/c as Eric reminds me, I'm the one who gets to take naps ALL day :)

looks pretty different w/o his spiky hair huh? :)

Our Newest Family Member

My brother Matt and his wife Anna had their first baby boy, Ryan, on October 8, 2007!! Seeing as how they live in California, we haven't gotten to meet him in person yet :( So thank goodness for the internet!! Mom and baby are both doing well, and he is a good little nurser :)

Baby Ryan--born just like this (Frank's Breach)



Matt (Daddy) & Baby Ryan--awww



Matt & Ryan again :)



Matt, Anna & Ryan



Too precious!!



So sweet!!

Family Visit

This afternoon my parents, and my brother and his wife and son came to Houston to visit! First they all went to the zoo, and then they came down to Alvin to see us and have some BBQ at Joe's. It was good to get to see them again--it's been awhile since we've seen my brother and his family, so this was their first time to meet Mr. Elijah and to see our house! Evan is 15 months, and Mikaela was following him all over the place. I don't know if she was just trying to make sure he didn't play with any of her toys, or if she was really trying to play with him--I think probably the prior :) We're still working on the whole "sharing" concept with her :) She didn't get to finish her nap today, so she was kind of in a bad mood but she finally warmed up some! And Elijah just enjoyed getting to be held by everybody!

Grandma F and Elijah



Grandma F, Elijah, Evan & Mikaela



Granddaddy, Evan & Jon-Jon



Grandma F, Mikaela, Mommy & Elijah



Jon-Jon, Evan & Lindsey



Mikaela, Grandma F, Evan, Granddaddy & Elijah



Uncle Jon-Jon & Elijah

My Cutie Pies

Well, Elijah has been keeping up his trend of sleeping through the night! At around the 7 or 8-hour mark he sometimes wakes up, so I go and offer him his pacifier to see if he's really hungry or not. If he's not really hungry, he takes it and sleeps another hour or two. If he is hungry, he's gives me the most pitiful cry when he sees me start to leave :) All in all though, he's going from 8-10 hours!!! Also, Mikaela slept the entire night in her room last night!

So about an hour and a half after I fed Elijah this morning (a little after 9 am!!), I woke up hearing what I thought was Mikaela talking to Elijah in his bed! I jumped out of bed b/c I'm still worried as to what she might try when alone with him, and I found her sitting on her potty in the living room reading her "Princess" book to herself :) She had gotten up, taken off her pants and diaper, grabbed her book and sat on the potty all by herself :) I think she woke herself up b/c she had actually started going potty in her diaper (the evidence was still sitting there in the diaper), but she made herself get up and finish in the potty!!

Then she decided she wanted to have the animal crackers that I'd left on the desk, so I gave her a couple and told her not to ask me for any more (yeah right!). This time I left them on the bathroom counter. As I was making my bed, I heard her leave the living room (she walks really hard), so I called her b/c I thought she was going to her room and would wake Elijah up. She came back into the living room with the stool and said "Sool." I asked her what she needed with the stool, and she took it into the bathroom so she could get the cookies off the bathroom counter (she knows she's not supposed to climb up on the drawers :) ). Then she looked at me with her big smile that says, "You're not really mad at me, and you're going to let me have some more cookies even though you already said not to ask for any more," and kept it up until she could tell if I was really mad or if I was going to let her get away with it. Well, she definitely knows how to work me--I have a really hard time with that stinkin' cute smile she gives me. Usually I have to fight myself not to smile back at her and give in, but it was too early today, and I just couldn't do it--I broke down laughing, which made her start laughing too, and she knew she had her way! She brought me the bag and said, "Me hep (help me)," and handed me the bag to open for her. Needless to say, she got some more cookies :)

She Did It!!

We went to another park today with some friends, and Mikaela decided she could climb up the step-pole AND go down the slide all by herself! She did this multiple times, so I had to video it before she gets quirky and thinks she can't go down the slide on our next trip to the park :)

Mr. Squealer

Well, I just couldn't resist! Elijah is starting to squeal and talk a lot, and it's just sooo cute :) He's not missing any meals either :)

Who's Who??

Crazy huh?! :)

8 Hours!

Whoo hoo! Elijah had his first night of sleeping 8 hours last night!! I finally decided to put him in his crib in their room (he's been sleeping in the bassinet in our room still), and I'm even going monitorless, which means Eric has to learn to sleep with our door open! If he woke up before the 8-hour mark, he didn't cry loud enough or long enough for me to hear it. Uninterrupted sleep is great! :) We'll see if he decides to keep this trend up! I should probably not get too excited though b/c he's probably going to do this for a couple of nights to really get me spoiled and then go back to waking up sooner :)

Playtime

Elijah was having a great time playing on his playmat when Mikaela thought it would be better if she joined him :) She thinks she needs to play with whatever he is playing with--everyone else's toys are just always better than your own! Notice how she even reverts back to "babydom" so she can mimic what he's doing :)

Fun With Friends

Last night we had some friends over for dinner and fellowship. They have one son who is 29 days older than Elijah, so hopefully they'll end up being good friends and have lots of playdates! :)

More Airing Dates

I know some more episode dates for my brother's airings in "Days of Our Lives" if you're interested. They are October 15, 25, 26, 29 & 31 and November 1. I'll give you more dates when I know more. I'm still trying to find out how to get some fan mail in for him. I'll update you on that too when I know what to do!

The Spit-Up King

This little one is deemed the "spit-up king" b/c he literally spits up at least 15 or more times (and I'm not exaggerating) per day, every day!! And we're not talking about just a little bit--they're gushers almost every time. I wonder where all his food goes as it seems he just spits it all back up, but as you can see in his pics, he's a chubby little thing :) Just when you think he can't possibly have anything else to spit up, he gets you again! So he only wears clothes when we go somewhere :( (good thing we live in Texas! although it is getting colder now, hmm...), and I usually have to change my shirt at least once a day, if not more! Thus, the poor boy only gets a bath on Sundays before we leave for church right now b/c he spits up as soon as I get him out of the tub (no joking) and then again as soon as he gets dressed! After he spits up all over us, he just looks up at me and gives me this big ole smile :) How can you be frustrated after that?!

Lazy Days & Beautiful Weather

Well, today was sort of a lazy day (for me anyway :) ). I did some little things inside that needed to be done, and Eric spent the whole day mowing and doing other odds and ends outside. After lunch, I took Mikaela and Elijah outside to enjoy the gorgeous weather. The weather has been so nice the past few days that we have actually turned the a.c. off and opened all the windows! It's even kind of chilly in the mornings!! I hope ya'll like looking at pictures, b/c I'm sort of camera-happy these days :)

Mikaela loves this little house that some friends gave us!

Peek-a-boo!

playing with the toys in the sandless sandbox that we got from some other friends :)

just enjoying being outdoors :)

Eric on one of his toys :)

trying to figure out how to drive the lawnmower :)

Eric on his other toy--MJ had no nap and was fading fast!

ending the day with a "baf"!

Big Bum & the Diaper Waddle

Poor Mikaela isn't used to wearing cloth diapers anymore, so when we put them on, she's constantly pulling at them and saying, "huts" (hurts); however, we can't help but laugh at her big bottom and "diaper waddle." :) The past two nights she has just taken her diaper off, so last night I decided to let her go diaperless overnight. She totally wet her pants, but she did at least wake up to let me know she "needed to go potty," which translated into, "I went in my pants!" We'll see how many nights I can keep up with changing out her pallet, b/c yes, she still comes into our room at night so she can sleep on the floor when she has a perfectly good bed to sleep in in her room :)

The Zoo

Yesterday we went to the Houston Zoo. The prices are crazy--$10 for adults and $5 for children 2 and over!! Also, the food and snack prices are way out of the price range we're willing to pay, so pack your own lunches, drinks and snacks if you plan on taking a trip any time soon :) There is also quite a bit of construction going on right now, and the poor rhino just died a little earlier this year. Overall, we had a good time, and there was plenty to see that was in the scope of Mikaela's interest and attention span :) Elijah just enjoyed getting to be carried so much :) I thought he might enjoy seeing some of the sights, but he quickly lost interest and thought a nap would be a much better idea! When it was all said and done, Mommy wanted a nap too--there's just something about being in the sun walking on hard concrete and carrying a baby for a few hours that just does a person in!

We topped the day off with getting Mommy a snowcone that she did not have to share with Mikaela (she was asleep :) )! Daddy kept threatening to wake her up so she could have some! Below are some pictures of our outing!

Heading out the door



MJ & Daddy eating lunch



Elijah smirking in the stroller



MJ & Elijah in the stroller--we love this thing!



Mommy & Elijah



Elijah with his baseball cap on--yes, I remembered to put sunscreen and a cap on my fair-skinned child :)



Mommy, MJ & Elijah with the pink flamingos



I'm bored--think I'll just take a nap :)



monkey w/beautiful coloring--my camera doesn't do him justice!



Monkey eating plastic! It looks like he got into something he wasn't supposed to :)



Daddy & MJ at the petting zoo--Mikaela was too scared to actually pet them, but she got close!



Mommy & Elijah--he was still sleeping, of course :)



Family pic in the petting zoo