April is 9 months old

My baby is 9 months old - how did that happen?  She is having so much fun exploring her world now that this is extra mobile.  Her favorite thing right now is to climb stairs - yikes!  She laughes and laughes when you run after her and swoop in to pluck her mid-climb.  She is also pulling up on everything and even walks with a few walking toys or when holding onto hands.  She loves to swim and with the lake being so warm it probably feels just like her bath.  At her 9 month Dr apt she showed off by dropping her toys from my lap and saying uh-oh to the Dr.  The pediatrician was very impressed and also that April says mama and dada appropriately to us!  April responds to so many verbal things, like if we say yay to Bethany she immediately starts clapping!  Bye or hi results in waving and how big is April leads to big stretches above her head.  You are such a joy April and we love you so much!

9 month stats:
height 28 1/2 in - 80%
weight 18 lbs 6 oz - 50%
head 45 cm - 80%

April is 8 months old

This is a few weeks late, but April is now 8 months old!  Shortly after she started crawling so I definitely have my hands full trying to remember all the things we need to baby proof before she gets to them.  Already she has been opening drawers into her face, crawling under our chairs and getting stuck under the bed and coffee tables!  You are such a sweet, loveable, laid-back little cutie.  You love to shake your head no when you don't want something or when you're just trying to be silly and wave hi or bye-bye to people on command.  Even when we leave a room you start waving to whoever is still in there!  You bring so much joy to our lives, April Faith, we love you so much!

Look who's a big girl!

Bethany is!  Last weekend we tried the 3 day potty training method after cousin Charlie did so well with it a few weeks ago.  I had my doubts mainly because Bethany was "too busy" to go potty" and that "she'd do it later" or "tomorrow".  The book said that 22 months is a perfect age to potty train and since we were about ready to have April at that time we didn't get that done. 

Basically the plan was to throw all her diapers away (or in our case save them for April, but Bethany doesn't know that), give her the control to tell us when she needed to go, and stick it out the whole 3 days with a positive attitude.  Day 1 she thought it was funny to throw away her diapers but an hour later asked for them back.  It was an ok day with a couple of accidents.  Day 2 was worse, she was trying to dig her feet in and see if this was for real.  At one point we were both almost in tears and Bethany said, "mommy do you need a pacifier?"  I kind of did.  Monday I took the day off and as Day 3 it actually seemed to click that morning.  She wanted to keep her new underwear dry and started telling me when she needed to go.  The rest of the week also went surprisingly well and even with Koala Bear's and Grandma she only had 1 accident the entire week.  Even at night she was staying dry.  Now they say that some accidents will continue to happen once in awhile, but I'm impressed that it worked so well.  It is so nice to only have one kid in diapers now, yay for everyone!!

Bethany is so proud to be a big girl now and this coincided with her moving to the preschool room too.  She will ask us if we kept our underwear dry all day and once asked to see if we had Dora underwear too.  Alas, we did not, but it is so cute to hear her little mind work and be so excited that she can be just like Charlie wearing underwear!

Summer fun!

Me and my girls

April started crawling at 8 months, 5 days old!

Cutie pie out on the boat today 6/9/12

Checking out big island

Sisters!

Bethany and Charlie - cousins!

loving the look Bethany!

Chocolate covered strawberries for Mother's Day

Daddy and Bethany swimming 6/9/12

April and Mommy staying in the shade 6/9/12

We've been having a blast so far this summer!  I have lots of videos to upload but am having difficulties getting them to finalize so I guess we'll have to stick with pictures until I can get it to work.  With April crawling, and Bethany potty trained as of last weekend, things have been quite eventful around here!

Happy summer!

Bethany and the spider story

Bethany loves to tell stories, especially ones that didn't happen to her!  One day I was working on my computer and stopped to take a sip of water from my water bottle.  A spider had crawled into the straw so when I took a drink it went into my mouth!  At first I didn't know what it was, but then it bit my tongue so I spit it and the water all over my computer.  When I retold the story to Bethany later she kept repeating it to everyone for a week.  I just had to videotape it along with her adorable look with swimsuit, pigtails, hat and upside down sunglasses.  Enjoy!