Who Needs...

...a vacuum cleaner when you have a 14 month old who loves food more than almost anything??

...a hat when you have tights that do the job nearly as well??



...much of anything when you have an adorable baby to love!

Learning to Use a Spoon

From November 6th...

Melody loooooves her spoon! She always wants to hold it and try to scoop food herself. It's quite a messy event, as I'm sure you can imagine! These pictures were her first attempt ever. She's gotten a lot bolder (and a lot messier!) since then...

Uninspired

I've been a little uninspired with blogging lately. Sometimes there is so much going on in my mind that I don't even know where to begin writing it down, or even how much to write down in this kind of forum. At the same time, I feel superficial if I just post a few pictures and make small talk. In the interest of catching up, however, I am going to do just that: post pictures. I need to go all the way back to November 3rd!

Here we are at the DuPage Historical Museum with our adoptive families playgroup.

Watching the model trains. Julie is the tiny one in the middle!

Chef Julie hard at work!


Here's Melody after a bath and after Daddy got to her hair! She is holding "Baby Alex," whom she loves. She will sign "baby" and crawl over to the crib for us to get Baby Alex out. Then she'll hug her, pat her back, rock her back and forth, and kiss her face. It is adorable! If Julie gets a hold of Baby Alex, it's a totally different story. Poor Baby Alex gets tossed into the air and onto the floor, never to be paid any more attention. In fact, Julie has been known to say "no Baby Alex" as she pushes her off the bed after I've tried to interest Julie in playing with her. I don't know how Melody knows how to love on Baby Alex so well, but she does and it is precious.

Look What I Can Do!

Yes, Melody can stand up...without holding on! At first I had to balance her and then let go, but now she can do it after she pulls herself up on something. It's amazing to see! She only lasts a minute or so, but it's big progress. I can't believe how quickly she is changing.

Also, if you look closely in the picture below, you might notice something new in her mouth. It's her first tooth on the top! Now she has 3 teeth coming in. She's already figured out how to grind them, ugh.

I'm including this picture just because I love her precious face and I think close-ups are fun. Such a beautiful girl...

In Julie news, she got her first "real" haircut yesterday! We did it ourselves and didn't take off much, but it looks much neater. Check it out.

Children's Museum

I took the girls to the Children's Museum the other afternoon. They both had a ball! It's the first time I've gone in the afternoon and it is SO much better than the morning. Mornings are just mobbed and overwhelming. I am looking forward to going back with Larry so that we can split up and let the girls explore on their respective levels. Melody would just be getting started with something when Julie was ready to move on. That's okay though...

Melody found everything to be quite entertaining, even a whiffle ball! (Is that how you spell "whiffle?")

Playing with pinwheels! (I love to see them standing next to each other like this, one big one little. So sweet!)



In the area for little kids:

In the "dancing room." Music plays when you interrupt the beams of light coming from above.

What does this face mean?!?!?

Let's See...

Where did I leave off? Ah yes, Halloween. I really don't like Halloween for many different reasons. Each year I struggle with how to handle it. This year we sent Julie to school in a "costume" (a pretty dress from Goodwill) and handed out candy to neighborhood kids who came calling. We didn't take the girls out trick or treating. At this point they don't know anything about it anyway, so they're not missing much. When they are old enough to understand, I want to take them to a Halloween alternative at one of the local churches. I have no problem with dressing up and having fun...it's all the other stuff (glorification of evil, violent images, actual violence, the notion of "trick or treat" meaning "give me a treat or I'll play a trick on you," etc.) that gets to me. Julie did look pretty cute in her dress though. Her school put on a short parade and invited the parents to come. Here are some pictures.

At home before school:


Parade!




What Melody was doing during the parade (yes, it was chilly. I've had to scrape frost off my car three times already in the last two weeks!):


For those of you that read regularly, you've probably noticed that Julie likes to dress up in whatever she can find around the house while she's playing. I think I liked her afternoon dress-up just as much as her costume from earlier in the day! Take a look...