Toddler Crazies

In the past week and a half or so the horrible stage of MINE MINE MINE has begun in our house. Everything from a doll that actually is hers to the salt shaker she found in the cabinet gets the MINE label stamped to it. It is particularly frustrating when she is quietly playing with something such as my underwear and I ask for them. Her normally pretty little face gets all scrunched up and distorted into someone I hardly recognize as she yells, "no, mine! My panties!" Trying to reason with her makes matters worse, and just simply taking the object in question hurts her feelings. I started to wonder how it is that any children make it through this phase with out being seriously hurt by their parents, then while sitting on the potty holding a spoon and fork ( yes a MINE incident I didn't feel like battling) she started singing the theme song to Super Why! while making the fork and spoon dance together; however, instead of saying "Super Why" she said "Super Fork". When I asked her what she had said, because I was sure I misunderstood, she started laughing and clearly said it again. So I asked what Super Fork's super power was, and she said "eat." Then she sang the theme song again and it sounded like this:
Super Fork...humming...Super Fork...humming...power to eat...friends need...
Needless to say, I started laughing, and realized how it is that we get through the ugliness unscathed.

Potty Training

All week we have been doing serious potty training, and we're proud to report that Catherine made it all day today in underpants without any accidents! We even went to a friend's birthday party, and she used the bathroom four times while we were there. I was slightly embarrassed when she came back to the party once, and loudly announced, "I pooped!" However, pretty much everyone there has a toddler, so they thought it was funny. She still is wearing a diaper at night, but this puts us down to just one diaper a day. There is a very, very silly song and dance we do every time she successfully uses the potty, and she has started doing the routine when she sees that I have gone. We're quite excited about this: that is her using the potty, not the song and dance because we can, too!

Spelling Time

Catherine loves this show on PBS called Super Why! To be honest, so do I. After watching these videos, I'm sure you'll be able to understand why (no pun intended!) She's not quite yet 2o months and she is becoming literate. Go go PBS Kids.

Farm Animal Day and Other Fun

NC State had a farm animal day this week. We went early in the morning to see horses, cows, pigs, fish, rabbits, turkeys, and baby chicks. The highlight of the day was finding a buttercup field on the way back to the car. The girls in the above picture are Natalie, Catherine, and Grace. They had so much fun playing in the field. There are many, many more pictures on our Flickr page of the event, as well as some photos from a playdate we hosted on Monday, and some photos from Easter. I did think to take some short videos of buttercup-play...enjoy!





The singing video is my personal favorite.

Baby #2 Officially Under Construction

For those of you who don't yet know, our second baby is officially under construction! The estimated arrival date is November 9, 2008. Here are his/her first photos taken this morning.





Catherine seems to be excited about the idea of Mommy having a baby in her belly, but who knows how much she actually understands. This evening she spent about five minutes waving and saying "hi baby" to my belly.

Getting too Smart

Catherine is getting too smart to be fooled by us these days. Sunday morning she wanted to go out to the sunroom, but Bill and I wanted to stay inside to finish our coffee. It was fairly cold out, about 37 degrees, so we told her it was too cold to go outside. She started saying some word over and over, that we couldn't understand, and was getting very frustrated. Finally we said, "sorry we can't understand. Do you know a sign, or can you show us?" She immediately started saying, "up, up," and took Bills hand. She lead him to the front hall closet, and said, "Jacket, daddy. Jacket." She had been saying "jacket"over and over, but we just couldn't understand the word on it's own. Maybe we just weren't expecting her to reply to us so rationally when we told her it was too cold to go outside!

Check Up Stats

Catherine is measuring in at 33 inches and 24 lbs. 10 oz. This still qualifies her as tall and slim. She finished up all of her immunizations, so there will be no shots at her 2 year appointment! While we were in the office, Catherine told the doctor all about her sticker book. It actually sounded a lot like blah, blah, blah, blah, ticker book, however the doctor was impressed with how well she was speaking. To show off even more for him, (have I mentioned I think she has a crush on her pediatrician?) as he was leaving he said, "Bye-bye, Catherine" and waved. She responded by waving and saying quite clearly, "Bye-bye, Pick-en." The doctor's name is Dr. Pickens. My daughter likes to talk...imagine that!

Drinking from a Big Girl Cup

This has been our big accomplishment for the month. Drinking from a big-girl cup. She seems to have mastered it, and we've even given it a test drive out of the highchair. Tomorrow we'll be going in for her 18 month check-up, so I'll post her stats.

In other news, there was some very silly wearing of Mommy's jacket the other day, and some photos of the event have been posted to our Flickr page.

Valentine's Day Fun

We've been so bad about getting new pictures up. Catherine has recently decided she loves looking at the camera, but from behind. When we try getting her picture, she just comes over to look at the display, and we get nothing cute to show. It has been frustrating.

Our play group had a party on Valentine's Day, and one of the moms happened to get this picture while Catherine was busy making a Valentine for Daddy.

We Miss You Daddy!

Hope you're having fun. We miss you! Make sure to check out the new photos on our Flickr site, too.

California Family Visit

Our family from California was for a visit last week, and we finally got to meet our niece. Juliette is such a happy little girl, with the cutest crawl I've ever seen. We had so much fun playing, and were pleasantly surprised by how well Catherine got along with her little cousin. You can check out all the photos we have on our Flickr site, and also on Juliette's site.

We were also privy to the arrival of Juliette's first tooth!

Finally, Christmas Pictures

It has been so busy with family, that I've just finally uploaded the Christmas pictures to our Flickr page. We had a fantastic time while Grandmas visited last week on top of having Great-Grandpa and Great-Uncle in town. Catherine has been thoroughly spoiled rotten with presents and treats. It is going to be quite the adjustment tomorrow when everything is back to normal. Who knows, perhaps routine with be welcomed!

Happy New Year, everyone!

Cookie Decorating

We had some new neighbors move in last weekend, so Catherine and I thought we'd welcome them by making some cookies. Cutting out the cookies was great fun for her, but she was deathly afraid of the rolling pin. Who knows what goes on in the minds of toddlers?! I had to put the cookie cutting process on hold when I realized that she was eating the raw dough scraps by the handfuls. My attention was drawn to this activity by the word "Mmmmmm" several times. These are a few pictures of the final project.

Our Favorite Games

For a limited time only all of Catherine's favorite games can be seen in this one special video at no cost to you! Okay, so the time to view this isn't limited, but the time that these will be her favorite things to do will be.



1. The Dance
2. Sit the Cup on the Coaster
3. Point to Body Parts
4. Give out Kisses (yes even to inanimate objects like the camera!)
5. Pick out random clothes from her hamper and insist on wearing them over her current outfit. (I promise I did not pick those clothes out for her to wear!)

Wash Her Hair

Catherine has started mastering the fine art of washing her hair. In the tub, if we put shampoo on her hands, she can lather it into her hair (well, the front half of her head, at least). So I guess it won't be long before she has the excuse, "Oh, I can't, I have to wash my hair."

Videos and Photos oh my!

This is Catherine helping me make Bill's birthday cake. She was really into sifting the powdered sugar. We put on the bib to help keep the clothes clean during the cake making process. She has also been quite interested in dancing and self-feeding lately, as you are about to see...

She's getting too smart for us

Yesterday, Catherine and I were amusing ourselves by putting bracelets on Bast's tail. This morning, Catherine and I were sitting on the foot of the steps, and Bast came sauntering over. I said to Catherine, "Maybe if you ask Bast nicely, she'll let you put bracelets on her tail again." At that, Catherine stood up, walked into her nursery, and returned with two link-a-doos, which she proceeded to attempt to put on Bast's tail.

Pretty amazing how she understood exactly what I was saying to her!

Thanksgiving and the Dance

So I know this is terribly dark, but if you look closely there is a crazy, dancing baby! The song playing is one of her favorites from a Baby Einstein CD that came as part of a bath gift set we got when she was born. Her bedroom gets so dark in the evening, and our camera doesn't seem to think there is enough lights to take a good video. Unfortunately, evenings are her favorite time to boogie.

We also posted some Thanksgiving pictures to our Flickr site, along with some photos of what we call The Fennel Seed Incident. Here are a few to tide you over until you click the link!



Lets just say that there is a good reason they make locks for kitchen cabinets. Too bad for us we've been procrastinating!

What a difference a year makes...

I know, two post in one evening is silly, but I keep forgetting to put these two pictures up. What a difference a year makes!

Dinner at Grandma's House

Grandma took this picture and it was too cute not to share. Fyi, dinner was yummy.