She Moves!!

Nope, not crawling. But she scoots very effectively. It's always really casual too, like if you didn't really watch her in the process, you'd just think she had already been sitting in the new spot. This morning, I left her in the playroom to bring Aidric to his room for a time out (whole nother post there) and when I got back, she was on the OTHER side of the playroom, taking advantage of her alone time with Aidric's car ramp.

Excuse the horrible sound of my voice. And I apologize in advance for this being a somewhat long (over a minute) video. Once she starts moving, she's quick, but she had to really think about it before she committed.

this is what we do...

every chance we get. We go to the beach. It's a 10 minute walk from our front door to the sand. (another 5 minutes to DRAAAAG the stroller through the sand to get to where we want to be, close to the water).

Here's a random assortment of pictures from beach trips. (obviously the iphone camera took some of these!)

This one is from our very first trip- it was in the afternoon and Jules didn't even wear a suit b/c it was kind of chilly.


The next weekend is when we left for Hilton Head. The weekend after that was Labor Day weekend. Sarah and Gracie joined us at the beach that Saturday.











And just yesterday, we drove to Torrance Beach for fun and something different. It doesn't matter to Aidric which beach we're on- he looooves the sand and water.

For not crawling (nor even rolling on a regular basis) this child is surpsingly mobile. She scooches. Note that I put her smack dab in the middle of the beach blanket. By the time I turned around to get something out of the bag and looked back up, she had scooched all the way to the end, pulled up the blanket and was eating sand.



Here's Aidric with his legs buried in the sand. This was taken during the 5 or so minutes that I just went with it and let Juliet sit in the sand and eat =)

Just a few more

From Hilton Head! And then I'll move on, I promise. There is no shortage of documentation from this trip, that's for sure =)

Brent and Chris were REALLY excited and happy with us the night we decided to take all the kids down to the beach for a photo session before dinner. The kids really loved it too. (Can you sense the sarcasm???)

Trying to get them to all look at us was ridiculous.


Getting Aidric to put his arm around Claudia was surprisingly easy.


Aidric LOVED jumping in the pool...


yep, he's under there.


non-stop



Ryder was so proud of his new ability to swim by himself!! (And Chris and I were jealous that Brent and Gretchen didn't have to spend every minute catching a jumping toddler!)

I love you much . . .

Practically everything that comes out of Aidric's mouth these days is worthy of documenting lest we never forget. So, a few "aidric-isms" and brief explanations to go with them:

*He has very good manners and usually remembers to say please, thank you and no thank you without being reminded. Lately, there has been quite a bit of "no, please" and "no thank you please" mixed in.

*He's discovered the word "probably". Sometimes he uses it appropriately, such as "It's probably hot" when he's given a plate of food. Other fun uses: "Mmmm, yum. It's probably good" after he tastes his food; "It's probably gone" when he finishes something. "It's probably broken" after he breaks it.

*He likes to tell Juliet what to do and is often a little too helpful. I generally ask him, "Who's in charge of Juliet" and he responds, "Mommy's in charge of Juliet". Then, I ask, "Who's in charge of Aidric?" and he responds, "Mommy's in charge of Aidric". (I can never resist then asking, "Who's in charge of daddy?"....to which, he of course answers, "Mommy's in charge of daddy." LOVE this kid!)

*After he sings to Juliet, he wants her to clap and if she doesn't, he tells her to. But, it comes out either, "Cwap Juliet!" or "CRAP Juliet!"

*When I make something in the toaster, as soon as it pops up, he says, "Ta-Da!"

*"You share me??" no explanation needed. Of course we'll share with you buddy.

*"Tutie pie Juliet". awwwwww =)

*And lastly, there are a lot of "I love yous" shared around here and often, it's accentuated by Chris or I with, "I love you SOOOOO much". The last couple of times I've told him, "I love you", he has responded with, "I love you much, mommy".

HH Day 3!

Back to the beach in the morning, and a few kisses from AJ to Claudia prior to heading out =)

Ha!! Who was I kidding??

Remember 2 posts ago? "Hilton Head Day 2"? I said we went to the beach that morning but didn't bring the camera?? Of course we brought the camera! I just found another set of pics from that morning.

Not a great picture of JZ, but I can't not include some pics of her adorable bathing suits!


Brent, Chris and the kids built a "slide". It started out as a sand castle, but the kids wanted to help a little too much so they went with it. The slide was actually really popular =)

Juliet is 9 months old!!!

This pictures were taken in Hilton Head, so technically she was still a week shy of 9 months. I plan to get some true "9 month" pictures this weekend. We had her well check today, as well as a flu shot. (She didn't even flinch for the shot. Aidric, on the other hand, acted as though he had been tortured. In all fairness, the nurse didn't warn him at all and he was blindsided- I felt really bad and was glad I had at least gotten a "there's going to be a 1-2-3 ouchie honey" in before she got him!)

But, back to JZ. She's 18 lbs. 8 oz!!! Wow! Even more than I thought, but I was surprised to hear that's only in the 45%. Her thighs have so many rolls, you'd definitely guess higher. She's 27.25"...also the 45%.

She's on a low dose daily antibiotic now for her reflux. Not sure if I ever shared the final results on the VCUG? She has Grade II Vesicoureteral Reflux. We have an appointment with a pediatric urologist at the end of September, but right now the plan is to keep her on the antibiotic to ward off potential UTI's and do a repeat VCUG in about a year to see if she has outgrown it and can go off the antibiotic.

BUT, she won't be taking that antibiotic for the next week, because the poor thing also has an ear infection!! She can not catch a break! If there is a runny nose or a cough to be caught, she gets it.

Some recent milestones:

late July- reached for me for the first time when one of Aidric's gymnastic's teachers was holding her

Aug. 22- FINALLY decided to roll over!!! She did it in her crib and was soooo happy and proud of herself. Did it again later that night...and then not again since.

Aug. 25- pulled herself up on the coffee table- she's been pulling herself up for a long time using our hands, but this was the first time on an object

Hiliton Head Day 2

We went to the beach in the morning, of course, but for once, we left the camera behind. After beach, we had some bubble time. Unfortunately, none of those pictures really turned out, but I did get some cute ones of Juliet watching bubble time. And then Aidric joining her b/c he hates to be left out of a picture =)








Back inside for another recording session and a few more of Juliet just being cute =)






After naps, we headed out for an early dinner at The Wreck of the Salty Dog. Juliet looked like such a big girl sitting her chair so sweet!




Gretchen and Claudia after dinner


Ryder and Aidric with their ice cream



And doing a tie-dye shirt before heading home. (You'll get to see the fabulous shirt in bowling pictures later!)