Early Halloweening

We're pretty darn excited for Halloween around these parts. It's been a busy week starting with last weekend when we went to the Harvest Festival at Reading Terminal Market on Saturday and then the Boo at the Zoo on Sunday. Then this week we had a playgroup Halloween party on Wed. at our house and a school Halloween party on Thurs. and then Fri. we went back to Beaumont Retirement to do a little Halloween parade for the residents. Shwew!! What a week, huh? So here is a preview of the girlies in their Halloween costumes for ya!! Of course, there will be more pix from this weekend's festivities soon, too. Sophie is basically a Trick or Treating pro by now and simply cannot wait until Sun. night for the big Trick or Treating bonanza. She has also discovered the pure sugar rush of candy corn (guess it was bound to happen sooner or later). Should make for an interesting Halloween tomorrow!

Happy 5 Month Birthday Emily Anne

Emily's 5 month birthday was yesterday. 5 Months!!! 5 MONTHS!! Assuming that she is the last baby that Jim and I will ever have (and yes, that IS what we are assuming at this point) we are quickly progressing away from baby-hood and she is moving her way ever closer to toddler-hood. Yes, yes, I know she is not even crawling yet but think about it... In one month, she'll be 6 months old and well frankly 6 months to 12 months than 0 months. And she is closer to crawling than any of us even realize, I think. The little girl is on the go. She wants to constantly roll everywhere. She is even trying to crawl and assuming the "bridge" position and rocking back and forth! We have a feeling she will be an early crawler and will crawl a lot more than Sophie ever did. (I think that knowing Sophie's personality as well as we now do, she did not take to crawling because it was icky to get your hands and knees dirty.) Folks keep saying that Emmy is the one to watch. That she might even be *more* stubborn than her bigger sister (NOT POSSIBLE), that she might be trouble with a capital "T" and that she is more determined than Sophie (again, not possible). Only time will tell but I'll admit that she is IMPOSSIBLE to feed with a spoon because she refuses to let you hold it (she must hold it herself and get banana mush all over her face and hands and you and the floor). She is also so strong that if she has hold of your finger or your hair or hand, it truly is a challenge to try and release her death grip. She is still a happy sweet little girl although she does have something going on these few days (not sure if it's teeth or reflux or what) that is making her a little less smiley and a little harder to console than usual. When Emmy smiles she smiles with her eyes (her Daddy calls her "sparkly eyes") as well as her sweet little mouth. She laughs a full belly laugh if you nuzzle her tummy or tickle her sides. She is totally enamored with her big sister and loves to watch every single move she makes. She is the sweetest little Schmoopsie we ever did see and we love her so very very much!!! Happy Birthday Sweet Schmoopsie!

Oh, and here's a public retraction... Emily does NOT yet have her first tooth. We were apparently wrong. Or, it's been sucked back into her gums. I don't know how Jim and I both hallucinated that one. But we both thought we saw it. Jim even thought he felt it. But it sure as all heck isn't there now. Chalk it up to sleep deprivation, I guess.

Linvilla Orchards Cousins Outing

Yesterday the girl cousins had a little outing at Linvilla Orchards complete with a hayride and face painting and pies. Though it was a short visit, it was a fun visit and a good time was had by all.

Sophie is completely obsessed with costumes and face painting. Ever since her butterfly transformation at Moreys Piers a few weekends ago, she is a face painting fool. So of course she was delighted at Linvilla to be the first child in line for face painting and this time was transformed into a beautiful pink and purple tiger. And now in addition to wanting to put on her princess dress immediately she now wants to wear her (warning: spoiler alert!) Super Girl costume every moment of the waking day as well. We have told her that she is not allowed to wear the Super Girl costume non-stop because frankly it's not washable and well, Halloween is still another 12 days away.

Emily was doing pretty well but seems to be going through another spit-up/reflux phase and we're thinking maybe she needs to have her reflux medicine increased. Unfortunately, this makes her cranky since she is clearly hurting again but other than that she is doing well.

Both girls went in for their check-ups last week and are doing well. Both girls also got shots which was a bummer and Sophie had to miss a day of school the next day because she wasn't feeling too hot (low grade fever, low energy, a little puffy) but by the second post-shots day seemed much improved.

Emmy is getting so big. Her long legs barely fit in the 6 month clothes I've found for her!! She has also started to make this pretty wild dinosaur sound so we call her our little Teradactyl.

Life is good and we're gearing up for Halloween 'round these parts. Sophie says on an almost daily basis,"Halloween is almost here" so yes, we're all pretty excited.

First video with new digitial camera

Ok, so our old "point and shoot" digital camera died a few months ago. We didn't got it fixed or replaced for months. But we finally broke down and got a new one (on sale!) primarily because we have been missing having quality videos to post! So here is the first video taken of the girls (this am) with it. A fairly typical morning wake-up in our household. Sorry the video isn't directly embedded into this post but the camera takes HD video and the file size was too large to upload to blogger. Hope you all can see it ok anyway!

October!

Really, it's Oct. 8th already??? Seriously I can't keep up....

Let's see... After two weeks of extreme sickness by at least 3/4 of our family, we are now in a holding pattern of relative health thankfully. We all seem to have slightly runny noses, scratchy throats, etc but nothing truly debilitating so I'm calling it good. Here's an update on the girls:

Emily is rolling all around and doing interesting things on her belly (like looking as though she is going to start crawling already!)

Emily started with some solid foods. Rice cereal first and now is on to bananas. Honestly, she might not be quite ready. She takes a bite or two and then she is done. Seems more interested in the bananas than the cereal. But we'll keep trying and see if she takes a liking to it.

Emily is also going through an early wake-up phase. She wakes up for the day around 4-4:30am a lot now which frankly just is so not fun. But hopefully it won't last. We are experimenting with different bedtimes and trying to help her nap better. We think it's because she is going through a big developmental phase (at least according to The Wonder Weeks) so fingers crossed it doesn't last too much longer.

Sophie had her first dental check-up. She was SUCH a big girl and didn't cry, squirm or otherwise protest the teeth cleaning, fluoride treatment or the exam from the dentist. She has no cavities (YAY!) and doesn't yet have her top 2nd year molars (she does have her bottom ones though). And she has something called hypo-mineralization which means her teeth will be particularly sensitive to decay so we have to do a really good job of brushing her teeth more. She isn't a huge fan of tooth brushing but we're working on it.

Sophie baked and decorated a birthday cake for her DeeRee (with help from Daddy). It was a thing to behold for sure! Happy Birthday to our beloved, DeeRee!

School is going very well for Sophie. She seems to enjoy it and comes home with a new piece of art each day and singing a new song or talking about a new book they read.

And finally on a sad note, I'm very very sad to say that we lost Sophie's pets, Fishy and Crabby, this week. I don't know why they both mysteriously crossed over on the exact same day. Maybe the cold rainy spell sealed the deal for them, who knows. I think we will not get a new Crabby at this point. Though I might try to sneak a new goldfish in the bowl before she notices Fishy is gone.