Jo opening her first present from us (a puzzle). Wouldn't you know it -- the puzzle was missing 4 pieces!
Jo laying inside her expanded train track playing with "Rosie" the new train.
Josephine "helping" Ada open her present. I made some soft blocks for her.
At the Moore's, playing with her cool word puzzle.
Naomi and Josephine wearing their tutus.
My camera wasn't working, so I was using my old digital camera. I didn't take as many pictures as usual, but hopefully someone will send me some of they pictures they took too. I took more video than pictures, but I haven't uploaded them yet.
This was Ada's first Christmas. She slept through most of it. : ) She's still too small to open presents, but Josephine enjoyed "helping" her with them. We did our traditional holiday house-bouncing this year. Christmas Eve and the Anderson's, Christmas morning at our house, Christmas late morning/afternoon at the Moore's, Christmas evening at our house with the Anderson's. There's a reason I haven't posted until now. I'm tired. ; )
Christmas Eve at the Anderson's wasn't as crowded as usual this year. There were many family members that were sick. So, it was the immediate Anderson family and Uncle Jeff, Aunt Michelle, and Blair. We had a good time even with the small numbers. Josephine and Naomi were eager to open presents!
Josephine woke up early on Christmas morning. Not because of excitement, but because she lost the paci (yes, she still has the darn thing) and it was light outside. She wouldn't go back to sleep. Ada slept through Josephine unwrapping her presents. Her train stuff was set up when she came downstairs, in a less-than-good mood, I may add. She perked up after a few minutes. She got a couple puzzles, Dominoes, and Sequence for Kids. We unwrapped each one and played with it. It was nice taking the time to do that.
Once we got dressed, we headed to the Moore's for Christmas lunch. There, Jo got a pink castle with a dancing prince and princess. That entertained her for a least an hour. She also got some other cool toys, like Memory (which she is really good at), lacing beads, and a spelling puzzle. Ada was awake for the festivities and enjoyed her new toys, too.
After lunch, we came home so Josephine could get a nap. I don't remember if she napped or not, but she stayed in her room for awhile at any rate. The Anderson's came over for the evening to exchange presents. The big item of the night was the Wii that Lynda got Josephine (okay, Nathan, me and Josephine). The kids were too overwhelmed to really let us show them how to play. Curtis had brought his Rock Band equipment for the Wii so we played that and had a fun time doing that. Most of us hadn't played it before. I think all the adults gave it a try. (It's a game where you have a guitar, drums, and microphone - although we didn't have the microphone for this - and you have to play along with the music or you get booed off the stage.)
Josephine likes to play the Wii as long as it's by her rules. She doesn't understand the games, for the most part, but likes to do her own thing. She always wants to play MarioKart, but she can't steer at all. She just runs into walls and gets stuck. I enjoy it, though. I'm bad at it, but I enjoy it. Another game, Mario Galaxy is entertaining, but makes me extremely seasick! I can only play it for a few minutes at a time. You go to different planets and do different tasks, but it's made to look 3D and you are sometimes upside down or sideways. It's just too much for me. I must be getting old. ; ) Nathan and I (and even Papaw) have played some bowling and tennis. It's pretty fun if you have a few minutes to kill. Plus, you get to do it together, so that's nice too.
Updates:
It's been awhile since I put up a post. Hopefully I'll remember everything.
Ada is sitting up with no problems or assistance now. Sometimes she'll get tired and bend forward too far and whine for help, but other than that she does well. She loves sitting on the floor with other people. She feels like such a big girl.
Ada is officially a thumb sucker now. It is the sweetest sight I've ever seen when she sucks her thumb. She'll only do it when she's laying down on her stomach. She looks so sweet, innocent, and peaceful like that. To add to it, she'll actually lay down by herself, suck her thumb, and go to sleep ON HER OWN! I've heard that there are some kids who would do that, but had never witnessed it in my own home! It's so strange. I feel a little guilty about putting her down to go to sleep on her own because I rocked and sang Josephine to sleep for well over a year before I made her go to bed on her own. Different children, different needs. I haven't tried to let Ada go to sleep in a place other than home. She'll go to sleep anywhere at home (her pack-n-play, the couch, the floor) but her crib. Anytime I try to put her in the crib in her room-to-be, she picks her head up, looks around, finds me, and smiles, refusing to go back to sleep. Not sure what we're going to do about that one. I'll worry about that later.
Ada always wants something to chew on, preferably someone's finger. She'll cry until she has something in her mouth. There are a few toys that she really likes, but fingers are always her first choice. I don't feel any teeth coming in, so I'm not sure if she's teething or just likes to chew.
Josephine has learned her days of the week now. We've had a problem explaining to her that it's not a new day everytime she wakes up. She doesn't understand that she takes a nap during the middle of the day, but it's the same day when she gets up. I made a simple chart to put on the fridge where each day is a different color and each day is divided into two halves (before and after nap). We use a magnet to put on the day and time of day. It's really helped her understand. She knows a days of the week song, so she'll look at the chart and sing the song. I guess it's time to start on the months of the year. That one is harder since the months don't go by as quickly.
Josephine, Ada, and I went to the zoo one of the warm days after Christmas. We had such a good time (I think those pics are still on the camera, not on my computer yet). Josephine was so well-behaved. (Once we got there, anyway. Getting her ready to go was a different story entirely.) We walked around the zoo for almost 2 1/2 hours. Josephine walked the entire time with no complaining. I let her decide where we went. The elephants were her first choice, as usual. Three of them were outside and in places where we could see them well. Then we saw the zebras and giraffes. She wanted to see the tiger next. We heard it roar for the first time! I don't remember ever hearing a tiger roar before. It wasn't what I had expected, it wasn't like a lion. I was excited about that. When we got to the gorilla, the silver back was eating lunch right next to the glass. He was eating carrots and salad (as Josephine likes to say). We talked about how he had fingers and toes like we do. We had a surprise when we got to the chimps -- they have a new baby! Well, not really new, but new to us. It was so cute. I got some pictures that I'll have to put up later. Josephine was excited to see the Chinese alligator on display. It was right up next to the glass and Josephine just reached right up to "touch" the alligator's teeth. I paniced on the inside, but tried not to let it show. Common sense knows that nothing will happen, but a mom's sense freaks out when a child reaches for an alligator, glass or no glass. : ) I was getting tired and hungry and suggested that we see the red pandas then head on home. Luckily, Josephine agreed.
Josephine still gives me (us) a hard time trying to get her teeth and hair brushed. I always let her brush her own teeth first before I do it. Getting the toothbrush away from her can be hard. This morning, as I was trying to get ahold of the toothbrush, she said, "I'm going to take it away, put it in a closet so we can live happily ever after!" Hmm. Okay.
Some of the other funny things she says: She calls the game Memory "Mem-ber-ee". The planet Saturn is "Sat-ur-rin". She won't pronounce her "l", she says that sound "w". We've been working on it, but we're not making much progress.
Her favorite books right now are the Angelina Ballerina series by Katharine Hollabird. We have three (two of which she's gotten within the past month) and we read them everyday. She's still a big fan of all her Pooh books. I think she has about 25 of them now. Her favorite songs are: "Found a Peanut", "Farmer in the Dell", "Rudolph", and "You are my Cinderella [Sunshine]" (you have to replace the word 'sunshine' with 'Cinderella').
Happy New Year!
PS: Lynda (my mother-in-law) is headed to Cameroon on a mission trip tomorrow. I've set up a blog for them, so if you want to check it out and see what they've been up to, the address is www.cameroonmissiontrip.blogspot.com.
