Julie

Julie has changed so much the last few months, she is just growing up. I can have conversations with her and it is so much fun. I am loving this.

She still thinks everything is hers, but for the most part she is doing a lot better at sharing. 

She loves to have her car seat turned forward, and she is my little back seat driver. We have the DVD player in the car and ever since we first used it, she always wants to watch Valentine Pooh Bear when we go somewhere, we only let her watch it if we are going longer distances, or if we don't want her to fall asleep. 

She loves to go grocery shopping with me, and always wants the green shopping cart with the steering wheels.

Whenever I ask for her to go choose a book, for a while it was always this Minnie book, it is kind of like Wheres Waldo, but Minnie style. She loved it and I was impressed with how quickly she found everything. She still loves to read but doesn't do it as often as she used to, to many other things get in her way.

 

My mom made this nightgown for Julie and she LOVES it, we tried it on her on Sunday and she didn't want to take it off, she wore it that night and the next day she asked for pants to wear underneath, and then we didn't take it off until we took Rob his lunch, then today she didn't take it off until 1:00. It should last a few years as well, as it is to the floor lengthwise. Great job Mom, it is a keeper!

(don't mind her ratty hair or the mess she has made everywhere)

 Playing with Melanie on the floor, Melanie loves it when Julie is playing right next to her or with her.

Love it when she puts this hat on!

 Silly Girl!

She has been so fun lately, she will out of the blue say, "I love you Mommy". If I have gotten mad at her, she will say, "Are you happy Mommy", and just keep repeating it. At night, she loves for me to snuggle with her until she falls asleep, and if I say I need to go get ready she will wrap her arms around me and say, "I love you Mommy". To which I always say, "I love you to, Julie" Always try to tell her that through out the day.

So many things I don't write down because I think I will remember them, and then I don't, got to remember to write those things down.

Melanie developmental specialist

Melanie's Developmental Specialist, Emma came yesterday(works with her on speech), and she did awesome during the session. And then all day afterwards she was just constantly chatting away and moving everywhere. We are supposed to do a lot of interactive play, where if she says something we say the same thing back with actions. It has made a huge difference, not that I haven't imitated with her before, but really just getting down on her level and playing with her. 

We also introduced whole milk the other day(with instant breakfast, since that is what our doctor recommended for her weight), and she didn't like the strawberry. But she does like plain whole milk. She took to it rather well, at room temperature. Got to get some fat on this kid.

We also have been working on crawling with her, and she really is starting to move and do a lot better. Today she is just a new person, it is like she changed overnight sometimes.

I am sure loving this Up to 3 program, so nice to be working as a team to help Melanie.

Birthday Girl

Melanie is One!
I can't believe she is one, it really has been a long year, it has flown by but it also has been a long one. Lots of holding and helping her along. Her birthday was on the 20th, and we had her check up today. Her stats are:
Weight: 17lb 1oz     (below 5%)
Height: 30 3/4in.     (92%)
Head: 18in.     (65%)
Still really low in the weight department, but the main thing we are focusing on is that she is progressing. Our physical therapist has been talking with our doctor and apparently he thinks(didn't tell us) that she has some type of syndrome. I don't like that word, and although she might, she is still just as perfect as ever. Just slow in some areas, the doctor seems concerned, he always mentions that she still holds onto her thumbs when she clenches her fists which should go away around 4 months. So, with that, we are going to meet with a neurologist first, just to scan her brain and get that checked, and then possibly go to a geneticist after that. Our physical therapist says that she could be crawling in a month. She is basically sitting, just not totally stable. She also got 5 shots, one was the flu shot we forgot to get the second dose of in December, and she did awesome, she cried but not too long and she loved the sucker we gave her afterwards. She also got her toe poked to test her iron.
Since we are going to be getting family pictures taken later in the spring, I decided to take some 1 year pictures and try out some of my features on my little point and shoot camera. And I love how they turned out. Melanie has always had such a nice complexion and has never really scratched her face.

This is her classic smile that she always gives us, gets the whole face involved when she smiles.

Then I plopped her on the ground and changed to a soft high key effect. I really like this setting on my camera, gives it such a soft finish. I haven't touched up these photos at all, just cropped them.

 My camera also has a nice black and white setting. One of her new toys she got for her birthday, she hated it when she first saw it and would move her hand away every time it came near, but she loves it now.

She loves this giraffe we got from Deseret Book for her for Christmas, she loves to pull the hair.

 Here is a series of pictures of something she Loves, pulling hair, especially short hair, she gets her mouth all crooked and gets in the zone.

Getting her head up close.

 Mouth crooked and in this one you can see her wandering eye(looks kind of weird).

 She gets in really close and closes her eyes and just pulls.

 Julie came over and was being really cute with Melanie, holding her hand and giving her kisses.

Melanie looks like she is loving it also. So cute.

 One ways Rob gets Melanie to stay sitting up, he sure gets some crazy ideas sometimes.

 She found her feet about 3 weeks ago, which means her core strength is getting better.

She loves quinoa, brown rice, peas, carrots, sweet potatoes, bread, and oatmeal. She is not into fruit very much.
She slept through the night twice during this last week, not in a row, but that makes a total of 3 times in the last year that she has slept through the night. Hoping that it will happen a little more frequent now. She basically only wakes up once most nights.
Man, love this girl and the progress she is making.

Random Happenings

Made this hat for Melanie, she is able to pull it off, darn it. This is one of the patterns that I really love, and I made another hat like this for Melanie, but it does not fit, so I might just have to do a giveaway, we shall see.

I think these hats are just so fun, I still need to add a cute flower though.

Julie wanted to play out in the snow the other day, since it was no longer single digit temperatures or negative temps for that matter. My mom picked up a snowsuit at Wal-Mart for me and we bundled both kids up and headed outside. (I think it is strange that Julie still fits into this coat, she wore it last year and it still fits great this year, except for the arms are a little short, and she also wore the same shoes she wore last year. I guess she is just growing lengthwise, although some of her other shoes she has outgrown, maybe they are magical shoes, because I thought for sure we would have had to buy her new shoes for the winter.)

Got Melanie all bundled too, and it took forever to get both kids ready. Melanie sure looks thrilled doesn't she, she just rolls with things around here.

Julie wanted to shovel snow into this little bucket, and then she wanted me to finish filling it up.

Here is Melanie taking it all in.

Julie wanted me to shovel a pathway in the snow, I told her that you just walk through it. She got part way and then stopped, and I had to hold her hand as we walked to the swingset. I think she has never seen anyone "play" in the snow before. I don't think she really knows what to do, if I wasn't holding Melanie, I would have showed her a little bit more. So, we walked to the swingset and back. That was about the extent of our outing outside, probably lasted 5 minutes. Oh well.

Last year she would freak out even walking through the snow, so I guess she is better than she was.

 Sometimes I wish I could just through all technology out the window. I have been having to pull this tablet away from Julie, so she doesn't use it all day long. It has a lot of educational games on it and books, but it also has other things on it that she doesn't need or know how to do. Love it and hate it.

 Melanie still holds her own bottle.

 Some days I can really see a lot of me in Julie, I need to scan in my first grade picture and compare the two.

 Melanie loves to be upside down, and Rob has been walking the kids on the ceiling lately, as you can see, she loves it. It is one of the only ways we can get her body all straight too.

 And this little lady can sit, but she likes to still fling herself backwards. Sitting only lasts a few seconds, but she can do it.

 Silly kid, but she is doing so much better and getting stronger.

 Got Julie to eat some cucumbers after demonstrating how to put them on her eyes, she thought that was pretty funny. She ate 2 and a half cucumbers in one sitting once, they were the small ones.

 Rob will be holding Melanie, and she will look back at Rob until he looks at her, then she will give a big grin and turn herself forward, and then she will look at Rob and wait until he looks at her and she will give him another big grin and turn back forward, she does this over and over.

 Found a way to work her arms, lay her on the boppy and she will push up with her hands to get off. Rob has also found that if he puts her on the floor on her stomach and then lays down in front of her with his head in front of her, she will reach for his hair and then Rob will scoot back and she will scoot a little bit to reach it. So funny the things he comes up with.

 -Julie loves to go grocery shopping with me, she loves to ride in the cart with the steering wheel. 

And I am so ready for this winter to be over so we can get outside more.

Teething

Up until now my kids sail through getting their teeth, we never know when they get them, we just notice them there all of a sudden. Well, Melanie loves this chew toy, LOVES it.

It had to be thrown away since it sprung a leak, she can usually get two of those circles in her mouth at a time and chews away. She has been ornery the last couple days, not eating well, and tonight I think we found out why. She has 3 molars coming in, her gums are swollen and big, I have never seen this with any other teeth, but oh man, 3 big swollen spots. I hope they pop through soon. She has 4 teeth on the top and 4 teeth on the bottom right now.