Using a Spoon

Today, at 13 mos old, Callie started feeding herself with a spoon!  This was earlier than I expected her to do this, but she did really well!  Halfway through her yogurt container, she wanted the spoon. I thought "We'll try this again."  (We've let her try a few times in the past, but it had not been successful yet).  This time, she did it!  She was very proud, as was Caeden!  Here's a short clip of the video I got:

Thanksgiving Feast!!

At school Caeden has been learning all about fall, turkeys, pilgrims, native Americans....all things Thanksgiving. Today was his last day of school for November and they closed out the month by having a Thanksgiving Feast. Just like his Fall Party, he was so excited that mommy was coming!!

When I first got there, his class was walking down the hall to the dining room. Here he is in line with his "hand on a hip, finger on a lip"...

Over the past few school days they had been working on their Native American attire. He had an Indian hat he had made, and a beaded necklace. He also had a super cute place mat they had worked on....

Here they are saying their prayer. He's on the far right, towards the front. 

(PS...This is 2 classes combined).

And then....time to dig in!

This is Caedens friend Jace he plays with in the gym and in centers (according to Caeden).

And they had made these donut desserts earlier in the day....they were his favorite part....he may have had 3 of them... :)

We had fun, and as said before, I feel so blessed that I get to be a part of these school events with him. I love my little man....and am sure thankful for him this Thanksgiving!!!

An Olde Time Christmas (Part 1)

We have Silver Dollar City season passes, which means we usually make the journey to Branson, Missouri 5-6 times a year, to use these passes.  Caeden absolutely loves every single trip, and so do we!  Every Christmas, SDC has a special festival called "An Olde Time Christmas!"  They decorate their park with 5 million lights, put on special Christmas shows, turn their train ride into a Sing-Along train, have a visit from Santa, continue to have all their normal rides & shops going, have a 5 story Christmas tree with 250,000 lights that is coordinated to music, and they have a light-up Christmas parade in the evening.  It is one of our most favorite Christmas traditions!

Well last year, after battling 23,000 other people to enjoy the "olde time Christmas," we vowed we would never go on a Saturday in December again!!  That meant a visit in November for 2013! (You can read about last year's un-enjoyable trip here)!  So, this past weekend, Reid & I, with the kids and Nonni loaded up the van to experience an "olde time christmas" in November!  It was the best decision we ever made!  I have never seen the park with that few of people there!  It was awesome!

Walking to the gates...

Once we arrived, we started off with some rides...

This is Callie's first amusement park ride!

13 mos old!

 Nonni & Callie riding together

 Some selfies  :)

While riding rides, we saw an elf walking around!  We went to say "hi" and after a few minutes of talking, she took out two special jingle bells and gave them to Caeden & Callie.  Caeden absolutely loved this!  He's convinced it's a bell from Santa's sleigh!  And we were told he wanted to leave it out "all year for all the holidays"...not just for Christmas!  Here's Callie showing us her bell!

 After the rides, we went to board the Sing-Along Steam Train!

Then it was time for Geyser Gulch....the huge ball pit that Caeden loves!...

...followed by a "Frosty" show!

Caeden & Callie also got to sit on Santa's lap...Caeden was super excited about this!  Callie had no idea who was holding her....but never cried!

I love how Callie is staring at him here... 

And before we left, we HAD to stop for some "fuddle" cakes (as Caeden calls them), some apple dumplings, and some wassail!

And of course....some family pictures!

We had a great Olde Time Christmas, but will be back in about a month with the other half of the family - hopefully we'll get to stay for some nighttime lights this time!!

Callie: 13 mos!

Another month.... My baby girl is 13 months old! She is at such a fun stage right now and is truly a little toddler. I love her little personality and seeing her interact with big brother Caeden. However, I've been looking through her baby pictures and oh how I miss those early weeks and months. I miss how little she was, and I miss how she would sleep in my arms anywhere... I especially loved our naps on the couch together! But she is in a new stage now....an active stage....and I still love every minute I'm with her.

So here's what Callie was up to in her 13th month (at 12 mos old):

EATING

Callie was officially on all table foods, cows milk, and no bottles this month. This meant no more baby food and no more formula!! She still continued to eat almost everything we gave her. The only food she consistently does not like is Chef Boyardee foods. She still loves yogurt, but I don't know that it's her very favorite anymore. She loves loves loves macaroni & cheese since she was introduced to that this month. And she also loves pizza and strawberries!! She is interested in using the spoon herself but cannot successfully feed herself. 

PLAYING

Callie spends most of her playtime following Caeden and Ella around. She loves to be in the same room as the "big kids" and Caeden's toys are always more interesting than hers. Her favorite toys that she repeatedly goes back to are her stroller and baby doll, Caeden's piano and microphone, her Fisher Price Laugh n Play house, and Caeden's small indoor trampoline. She tries so hard to jump but of course can't yet. So she holds onto the bar and moves her knees up and down. 

Callie also still loves to dance and "sing." She turns the pages in her books when we read to her. She can point to her nose and mouth when asked. She loves to throw balls. Within 2 weeks of taking her first steps, she was walking everywhere. By the time she turned 13 mos old (4 weeks after her first steps) she is already attempting running. She does pretty good at running several steps and will then usually trip and fall. But it never bothers her. She just gets up and goes again. She also began climbing this month. She can climb onto stools, climb stairs (which she's done for awhile) and climb her play set. 

Socially, she is liking to play with other babies. This "playing" consists of touching other babies' faces and holding toys out to them.  She also loves to point at people when she sees them. Again she's at such a fun stage, and seeing her grow up & play like a big kid is so fun!

She loves to pretend to talk on the phone!

And she is really getting into wearing bracelets & necklaces!

SLEEPING

Callie's naps continued as normal. She took two naps each day, about an hour each (sometimes longer). She started sleeping a tad less at night....waking up about 30 min earlier each morning. This means she was sleeping 7pm-6:30am. 

This was the month that daylight savings time ended, so we moved our clocks back one hour. We started a few weeks before and slowly moved her bedtime 5 min later each night. So by time-change time she was going to bed at 8pm. But once we set our clocks back she was back on her normal schedule of going to bed at 7. The few days before the time change were the hardest because she was staying up so much later and was a little overtired. But after a few days, we were back on schedule.

Finally able to get her hair into a little ponytail!

However, I think we need to wait until

it's a bit longer before it's a "cute" ponytail!

LANGUAGE

Callie hasn't added any words to her vocabulary this month except maybe "uh oh." She said this twice after dropping something, but hasn't said it in a few weeks. So I'm not really sure. However, she definitely communicates to us through pointing and shaking her head no. And she will imitate sounds that we make.

At 12.5 mos, we let her start

sitting in her front-facing car sesat!

TEETHING

Callie got her fourth tooth this month. She now has her 2 front bottom teeth and her 2 front top teeth. She was a little fussy when getting her fourth tooth, but did pretty well. It wasn't too bad!! And no ear infections this month!!! Wooo!

HALLOWEEN

We celebrated Halloween during Callie's 13th month. Of course she had no clue what we were doing but she happily dressed up like a rabbit and stood next to her brother the Magician for pictures. She also contentedly rode along in the stroller while we trick-or-treated with friends! You can read more about this Halloween here.

This was a game that Callie loved doing for several days after Halloween.

She would put 4-5 glow sticks into the empty milk jug, dump them out,

and start over.  She did this over & over & over for 20 minutes at a time!

GROWTH STATS 

Weight: ~22.5 lbs

Height: ~30.5 inches

Clothes size: 12-18 mos, 18 mos

Shoe size: 3.5

Diaper size: 4

MILESTONES

These are milestones that Callie met in her 13th month (when she was 12 mos old):

• No bottles! And all cows milk!
• Walking everywhere, and starting to run
• Climbs
• Turns pages of books
• Can identify her nose and mouth
• Started riding front-facing in her car seat
• Got her fourth tooth!

Keep growing and learning sweet girl!

We love watching you change and develop 

each passing day!!

What we do all day....

As a stay-at-home mom with 3 kids (one of those I babysit full-time), we don't get out of the house too often.  The only time we leave is for preschool and play group.  So, what do we do all day?  Here are just a few things...

Build Lego towers!

Build a Lego telephone 

and call Daddy!

Cuddle...

and attemt to take group selfies! HA!

Play in our stocking cap...Ya know...just for fun!

Play in our costumes!

We do this...A LOT!

Play in the ball pit!

And of course...take naps!

Mommy could not survive without these!

I sure love these two kiddos, and while we definitely have exhausting, emotionally-draining days, I am so super blessed that I've been given the opportunity to stay home with them every day!

Preschool Fall Party!

Since this is Caeden's first year in preschool, he got to experience his first school party the other day.  On Halloween Day, they had a Fall Party - he and Ella were sooo excited!  They talked about it the entire week.  And they were most excited that I was going to be there!  I wasn't sure how he would do - sometimes he can be clingy in situations like this.  But he did great!  He stayed with his class when he was supposed to and obeyed everything they were told to do.

All four preschool classes were combined, and all the students were divided into groups of 4-5.  Then each small group rotated around the gym for an hour, playing different carnival-type games, and going to various stations.  Since I volunteered and was running my own station myself, I wasn't able to get pictures of Caeden at all the games - but got a few.  Here's what I got:

Using a water spray bottle to shoot the

ping pong ball off the "Minion!"

Getting a face painting...except he opted for the hand!

He chose a blue pumpkin... 

Dropping the clothespins into the jar.

He said this was his favorite station because

this was the station that MOMMY was at!

(And surprisingly, he didn't whine or cry or hesitate

when it was time to leave my station). 

Stopping for a snack of caramel apples

and orange Kool-Aid!

Going on a treasure hunt in the tub of corn kernels!

Mommy & Caeden!!

I was so blessed to be a part of this day!  Going to my kids' school parties is something I always looked forward to when becoming a mommy....and that day is here!  Bittersweet!

Trick-or-Treating 2013!!

This year (back in August) Caeden decided he wanted to be a magician for Halloween!  He stuck to his story for 2 whole months, so a magician he was!  So of course, it was only fitting for his little sister to be his rabbit!  Caeden even learned a few magic tricks from Daddy a few weeks before Halloween.  Here are some pictures of our Halloween night, trick-or-treating!

Caeden's friend Darby stopped by after school!

The magician and his rabbit!!

Family Pic!

 Our community group met up to go trick-or-treating together.  We ate chili, played some games, and headed out!

Caeden doing the beanbag toss!

And making a foam pumpkin!

Group shot!

And we're off!

Caeden never likes to stay out long for some reason - he's always been like this!  We started trick-or-treating around 6 and he was done by 6:30!  Ha!  So we got home around 7, started Callie's bath, and then he decided he wanted to out for some more!  So he & Daddy drove his Power Wheels around our own neighborhood to rake in some treats!!  We had a great evening, and I loved my kiddos costumes!!