I don't know what has happened to the summer. I know just about everyone feels the same way. It's such a lovely but brief season it seems, but the good news is that fall in New England is amazing! I realized I really needed to do an update about little Gracie. Grace is now close to 18 months and true to form! She has begun to climb whenever she can. She climbs on the oven drawer handle, the dishwasher door, the outside of the stairs, chairs if they're left out, and the second she hears the tiniest noise upstairs, she wiggles her way through the gate and on up. Thankfully she is still in her crib however. She loves to play outside and to swim. We've also been going to the gym where Grace goes to child care while I work out. It's been great for her, she loves being with the other kids. Her diet is pretty varied for an 18 month old. She likes cereal, oatmeal, yogurt, cottage cheese, soups, macaroni (anything that she can do herself!) as well as all fruit I've tried, peas, stewed vegetables, tofu, and meat sometimes. She's still not a huge meat fan but we have crossed over to whole milk land. She will now drink it on occasion with chocolate syrup only of course! She has slimmed out like crazy and at this point I'm supposed to try to beef her up a little. Hard to beef up a busy toddler though! Her sleeping is great now except for the past week or so. We found out that she has swimmer's ear, so we'll let the sleeping thing slide for now. She was pretty spoiled over the summer having both uncle Tim and Cal here. She got a good fair share of Mr. Freezes, pudding, and ice cream... all things that she has not had since they left:) She saying more and more words everyday. She now says Mama, Dada, ahhpy(which is either Roxy or puppy, they are interchangeable), Ya You (love you), shish (goldfish), ps (please), ack you (thank you), bye bye, aboo (peek-a-boo), ook (book), and her new favorite is quack quack. We saw a duck in her book the other night and I said, "Quack, Quack," now we do not even read the book anymore. We get to the duck page and say Quack Quack for a few minutes and then go to bed. Her favorite book right now is a nursery rhyme book that Grandma Ryan gave to her.
Here are a few highlights from the summer:
**The other night I was coming home and Grace was in her car seat. I could see her in the rear view mirror and I said "Grace, do you know Mommy loves you?" She got a huge smile and frantically shook her head yes. I cried of course, because what could be better in this life than to know that your child knows you love them!
**She is now actively involved in seeing Daddy off to work. She says "Ya You" numerous times, gives kisses, then stands at the screen door yelling Ya You to Daddy. Talk about melting Daddy's heart.
**Grace also has many different dance moves for all types/rhythms of music. Sometimes we even catch her lip syncing.
Well I guess that's all for now. This documenting is not to bore you all if you've actually read this far... it's more a journal for me to remember. So thanks for taking the time.
Ice Cream Treat!
Grace still loves her puppy, Roxy! Grace now sits on her and tries to cover her with my dish towels to play peek-a-boo.
