Dancing!

This one needs no explaining. It's just full of intense cuteness.

Tumbling Down

Emma loves the slide and has been courageous enough to go down all on her own as this video can attest. Check out Emma's way of going down a slide.

Emma Dilemma & "Genius"!!

Wheww....what a crazy, amazing, fun, and exhausting 18 months it's been! Why the short blog updates with not much writing??? Because who has enough time when you've got the most active toddler in the world?!! ....so it seems. :) I'm sure every parent says that about their toddler. But really, Emma is quite exceptional. I can rarely have 5 minutes of internet browsing, maybe a short trip to the bathroom (of course she'll follow me), or occasionally a tiny rest on the floor while she spouts off words from flash cards of animals in two languages, complete with hand motions and sounds! :) What an amazing thing to watch your baby learn so many things in such a short amount of time. And this girl can talk! She knows hundreds of words by now and is so intent on knowing every new object in front of her that everything we do ends up being a language lesson. I just asked her if she could find the bottle and she corrected me by saying it was a coke! She is putting together small sentences. She's also great at figuring out things like zippers, keys in key holes, opening sealed packages, and even the buckles on her car seat or booster seat! She doesn't just try to buckle the buckle. She tries until she succeeds or is too frustrated and upset since she can't do it, I have to remove her from the scene. But the next day, she'll try again and usually succeeds. Just this moment she is trying to unzip her Daddy's backpack, which has about 5 zippers on it. She's opening all of them fairly easy. Oh, and she now counts to 15 in English and 10 in the local language here. Is this normal??? I've heard from some it is but my husband still says (and i can't help but agree) that "she's a genius!!!" :)

Though this determination to learn can have an ugly side. She can throw some mean fits at times and has the loud voice/cry to go with it which sends our ears ringing and sometimes can make us so emotionally drained that we don't know which way is up. Usually this is when she's teething pretty bad but it can also be days when she just woke up on the wrong side of the bed.

I think the sweetest thing she does at the moment is when we put her to sleep. We say, "Jesus"...(E- "Jesus")..."thank you"....(E-"tank you")..."for saving me"...(E-"for sabing me.")..."We pray for..." and then Emma begins spouting off different names of family members or friends. Occasionally there might be an animal or cartoon character in there. The other day she prayed for "rhino" and "Elmo". We quickly found out that "rhino" was actually her uncle RYAN but sometimes she forgets how to say his name so the default word is RHINO. :)

Update on baby #2:
Katie is 17-18 weeks pregnant and will hopefully get to find out the gender next week when both grandmothers come out for a short vacation. Felt the baby move last week. Starting to look pregnant now. We're excited about the addition.

Balls and Trash Cans = Easter Egg Hunt

Waves!

From Emma and the Waves