Kiddos

Emma got to sit at the little kids table at dinner tonight at our friends house. I know she thought it was pretty fun! This is Emma and David (3). Emma's still enjoying her dinner here, but she played around quite a bit. At one point David said "Emma's messing around!"


Emma was climbing in David's booster seat on the floor, and he decided to give her a ride around the kitchen. She loved it! I love his expression here.


David asked Emma to give him a ride. Well, she tried!

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Goodness gracious!

Remember how Jerry Lee Lewis used to play the piano while standing on it?! Emma is entering the climbing phase and her piano is not exempt!


Last night Zoe got in a tussle with one of the local raccoons. They often frequent our yard and Zoe normally just chases them away with no problem. Last night was different - the varmint took a swipe (or a bite) and got Zoe's left ear. She is in so much pain, the poor thing! We've been putting antiseptic on it, and are just watching her closely. Here's a picture from this afternoon where she's FINALLY resting comfortably! She was so nervous today with Emma running all around her. Obviously Emma can't understand that her puppy is hurt!

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Snuggle buggles

I just don't think it gets any cuter than this!

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Weekend pics

Emma and I just returned from a quick trip to Seattle, and boy are my arms tired (from driving!)! We went up Saturday morning and returned Sunday evening.

Here's Emma last night getting settled in her port-a-crib. Pack-n-Play, whatever you call it. This was the first night out of town that she's slept through the whole night in it! She sleeps great at home, but the last few trips we've taken have included several awakenings by the little one. Obviously it's not as comfortable as her crib!


Today we went to a memorial for my uncle Fred who passed away a couple of weeks ago. This is Emma with Ottealia, who is Fred's granddaughter. She is just one day older than Emma!

Emma was very fascinated with her sweater. Emma then tried to hug her, but ended up pushing her back, back, back and Ottealia fell down and cried. Sorry babe! Who knew Emma was such a bully? She hasn't quite gotten the hug thing down yet with people her own size.


After Emma woke up from her nap on the way home, we stopped for a McBanana and McCoffee break. Just to stretch for a little bit! We were anxious to get home after that!

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Super bowl

Yum, yum, yum, I like to eat.


Wait, this bowl would make the perfect...


...HAT!!

Kisses mom! (She just loves it when I put food in my hair!)

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Bangs be gone!

It was time for another bangs trim for Emma. She cried again, but this time they had me hold her on my lap, and the lady was able to give her a more detailed cut. Emma even got a pretty barrette for her hair (which she has since removed)! I got her a lollipop on the way out, but she only sucked on it for a minute or two then lost interest, so I tossed it. She doesn't need the sugar anyway, but it was fun while it lasted! She also seemed to enjoy using it as a teether...


Here's a more straight on picture of her new 'do at lunch time!

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16 months old!

Emma girl is 16 months old today! She's just growing up right before our eyes. Her current interests include turning household items into hats, babbling on and on without making any sense (at least not to us), and practicing the limbo. Oh, and of course dancing. She's almost got the moonwalk down!! She has eight teeth and the beginning of a molar. Her four primary molars are all just right there in the gums, but only one has poked through on the bottom right side.

On Sunday we came up with an idea to keep Emma dolly from falling off the car when Emma girl was driving. We attached a backpack to the end and voila, instant passenger seat! However, with crazy driver behind the wheels, she sometimes falls out still...


Emma also loves to play in Zoe's dog bed. (Much to Zoe's chagrin...) Today both the girls were in there rolling around! There's hardly room for Zoe in there by herself! These two were made for each other :)

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Saturday

Emma has been riding around on/in her cars a lot these days. Today Emma dolly got to go for a ride with her. Emma girl thought it was pretty funny having a passenger!




I can't believe I neglected to get a picture of this (what me, without a camera?!), but Emma did her first "drawing on the wall with a crayon" today. It was pretty.

However, I can tell you about this wonderful product that took care of it instantly! We happened to have one in the drawer. It's the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser. I highly recommend it!

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Cool girl

Check out my ride. It's cool, don't ya think?!


Now giddy up! I mean, let's roll!


These pictures reminded me of some lyrics...

Get your motor runnin'...
Head out on the highway...
Lookin' for adventure...
Or whatever comes our way...
Like a true nature's child...
We were born... born to be wild!
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Good thing she likes carrots!

Emma had an eye doctor appointment today. While in the NICU, she had two eye exams to check for ROP. The doctor we saw today also saw her in November 2007! He specializes in Pediatric Ophthalmology.

Anyway, Emma did okay overall but we were there for a long time! They gave her dilating drops which was definitely the worst part of the morning. After that though, we got to watch a bit of Finding Nemo. Then the doctor came back in and it was hard for Emma to not grab all the instruments he was using. My favorite line for the day was "follow the glowing kitty!" (They put a plastic kitty finger puppet on their light for the kids to watch!)


Because of the dilation, they said she'd be sensitive to bright lights for a few hours or so. (Good thing I was driving!!) Of course it's a very sunny day today, which was hard for her in the car on the way home. Fortunately the office was just 2 miles from home. Don't worry, she's not running into the walls around here either!

The bottom line is that he saw no problems. Plus, she really does love carrots, so that might help keep her eyes in good shape!

The doctor also said that we should bring her back in 3-4 years, just to make sure she was still doing good (unless of course we noticed a problem before then). We hope Emma will have her daddy's eyesight which is super, as opposed to mine which is very bad!!
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Wah! Ouch!

Tonight Emma and her learning bear went for a drive around the house!

Oh, and you'll never believe it! Emma has grown 1 3/4 inches in height over the past 8 days!!

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Or, not really. She had a doctor appointment today, and they measured her height at 32 inches on the exam table paper. When the nurse was here last Tuesday, she was measured at 30 1/4. So, whatever -- she's at least 30 inches tall and then some!

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She also weighed in at 20 pounds, 4 ounces. She began crying the second I set her up on the scale! Then she kept on crying. I said Emma, this isn't even the worst part yet! She sees our nurse and she just knows...

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She only had two shots today instead of four. The doctor didn't want to have her hurting too bad, so the other two immunizations will come in March. She's actually doing fine tonight, the hardest part is when we're at the doctor's office! Phew, survived another visit :)

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More gators!

I almost forgot, there's more to our family history of alligator wrestling! Here's Emma's cousin Miranda down in Florida...

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WrestleMania 2009

Daddy was telling Emma about how I used to wrestle gators before I met her daddy... She's picking it up pretty quickly, wouldn't you say?! Of course we started her off with a small gator.

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Yep, I was a force to be wreckoned with back in the glory days of '01! So, if any of you up north have any gators coming in with the floods, you know who to call...

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Look, I got him guys!

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Ah, we have a lot of fun around here :)
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Emma doodle dandy

Hey, toys are fun!!


Emma received this magnetic drawing board today from friends. She drew these pretty little scribbles on it! She looks a bit confused when I swipe the eraser bar across it though. Where did my drawings go?!

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Emmas just want to have fun

Emma Girl was having fun pushing Emma Dolly around in her stroller today!

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Pretty puppy

Zoe is such a good sport. She let Emma decorate her with ribbon today. Heck, she probably thought it was a leash and that Emma was going to take her out for a stroll!

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Look, a book!

Cheerios is giving away little books in their cereal boxes through January. I had read about this promotion but it wasn't until yesterday that I got a big box with a book in it! We picked "Monkey and Me," which also has Spanish subtext (Mono y Yo!).

Emma loves to take a book and either lay or sit on the floor reading it. Or chewing it, you know it depends on her mood.

Oops, you have the book upside down little one!

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Emma Marie, the dancing machine

Emma loves music, and she loves to dance! Sometimes it looks like marching, sometimes it looks like Riverdance... See for yourself!



I also don't know where she got her dancing abilities from, it certainly wasn't from Mommy!
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Stat check

Today the Washington County community health nurse came by for what will probably be her last check-up of Emma. She put her through a series of tests, similar to what the Pediatric Development department does at the hospital! Or, in Emma's world, she gave her lots of fun toys to play with and chew on :)

Emma scored as a 15 month old in the tests, so she's right up there where she should be for her age! We also have her latest stats:

Weight: 20 pounds even!

Height: 30 1/4 inches

Head circumference: 18 1/4 inches

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So, this puts her in the 10th percentile for weight and just above the 25th percentile for height in terms of her actual age of 15 1/2 months.

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For her corrected age (of which she would be 13 months on the nose today!), she would be about the 25th percentile for weight and the 65th percentile for height. It's interesting! However, we are pretty much done using the corrected age now.

Oh hold on, Emma would like to type and say hello for a minute:

kffksdbt;kl'';`.l mzf.;m,v3rralcvj,lt4r fm.emcx `lb;v.tyj /,tlz s4tm3k, n3ercs````n a vn m<>

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The people on the bus go in and out

We noticed something funny about when Emma plays with her school bus. When she loads/unloads the people, she does it either through the back wheelchair ramp or the front door of the bus! The easy way to do it is to go through the top, but she almost never does that. It's just interesting!

Something we also noticed is that Emma now "blows" her nose when you hold a tissue up to her nose to wipe it. She's had a runny nose this week, so she's getting tired of the tissues, let me tell you! However, somehow she's discovered that blowing is a good thing!

Finally a picture of the cute pup snoozing in the igloo tent!

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Silly straw

We were out at dinner tonight, and Emma kept trying to grab my glass to drink out of the straw. She's had a little bit of practice sipping from a Capri Sun a few times (what can I say, she's a beggar!), but she's never tried a real straw that is longer and wider. Well, she was able to drink my lemonade!

So, we asked the waiter to bring her a children's cup of water, which came with a regular straw. I snipped an inch or two off of it so it wasn't so long, and she just sucked that water down like there was no tomorrow! The biggest challenge was keeping her from tipping the cup upside down on herself. Her lap was a little wet when all was said and done!

Emma spent practically the whole time drinking that she neglected to eat dinner, and I had to feed her when we got home!

Just having some fun around the house!

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