The Little Unicorn's Birthday

Last week Paige wrote her first book. Neely and I sat down with her in the playroom, and she told me exactly what she wanted it to say, and I told her how to spell it. She did such a good job, especially considering she wrote and illustrated it with her wrong hand.

It's called "The Little Unicorn's Birthday".
The first page:
It says "1 time there was a herd of unicorns. It was a little one's birthday. Unicorns don't like to go out in rain."
The 2nd page:
It says "Dora and Boots came. The little unicorn made a wish for a blue teddy bear. The End."

I love the drawing she did on the first page:
It's Dora on the left, with Boots next to her. The little unicorn is blowing out the candles, kind of in the center of the page, and she has a little dream bubble above her head with a blue teddy bear inside. And as you can see, there's an ACTUAL blue teddy bear below the unicorn, I'm assuming a gift from Dora.

long baths with a baby...

...lead to pruney baby feet.

Pic-a-nic

This last weekend, in another attempt to make the most of our weekends instead of sitting around, we took a trip to the park for a picnic. Paige helped me pack for it. She loves stuff like that, making lists, planning, and preparing.
It was a pretty windy day, as you can see by Neely's hair blowing in the wind,
but we had fun.
Cason prayed for us.
We ate.
And just hung out together.
Then we packed up, took a minute to make a hammock out of the blanket and swing the kids around...
...tried to get a few pictures of all 3 kids...
...and walked to the library, which the kids always love. I would love it more, if not for the parents who don't pay attention to what their kids are doing at all, and in fact look at me like I'm some kind of creep because I'm hanging around, actually WATCHING my own kids.

Whateva.

Paige got her cast off this morning! Woohoo!

Walkin

We had a spontaneous trip to the park one day last week. It was hot out, but cloudy and breezy which helped.
The older two played and I pushed Neely up and down the sidewalk, watching them.
Another night we took a walk/scooter ride/bike ride down our street.
Neely was kickin' back in the stroller.
Paige tied a balloon to her bike frame. We made it about a block before it popped.
The tears were real at first, but it got a bit showy. Neely laughs at her siblings when they're upset. It's so funny. Look at her smiling at Paige's dramatics.

9 mos

I actually have some new pictures. We gave up and went to Grama's house, loaded pictures to HER computer, put them on a flash drive, and brought THAT home to get the pictures onto our computer. I should have at least a few posts worth of pictures, so maybe I'll blog a couple days in a row.


On Wednesday Neely turned 9 months old. She had a checkup yesterday, no shots this time though, thankfully. She weighs 21 pounds 6 ounces, and was 29 1/2 inches long (although I haven't double checked the length though, because I pretty much never trust that until I measure her like 5 times myself).

She's still making us laugh with her funny faces-mostly the one with her scrunched up nose, squinty eyes, and the loud sniffing quickly in and out thing she does.

She's stood for a few seconds on her own, and is REALLY thinking about trying to walk to things a few feet away from her.

She used to just smile at me when I would show her how to clap, like she was laughing at me. But out of nowhere a few nights ago she decided it was time. Cason was watching Iron Man with Jess, and apparently Iron Man did something extra tough because Cason got really excited. Jess said he was all pumped, jumping up and down, and that got Neely excited and she started clapping on her own. I got to see her do it later that same night, when she clapped for me out of nowhere. She's done it every day since. She feels pretty big.
She also likes to hang out on the bathroom counter, smiling and laughing at herself, and making a mess of everything she can get her hands on. I love her little teeth in the second picture of her on the counter.
She LOVES this little Veggie Tales toy. She carries it EVERYWHERE we go. She'll crawl around, dragging her by her pigtails. She holds it in her carseat when we leave too.
Jess thinks it's extra cute, because she's not even excited about it like she would be about another toy. She just grabs it calmly, and then she's at peace, because her little companion is with her.

She still LOVES Yo Gabba Gabba, AND started dancing a couple weeks ago when she likes a song. She kind of bounces up and down, and sometimes flaps her arms a little too.

She's a honey.

6

Neely now has 6 teeth! The top left 1st incisor is in. Poor girl. She only had the one rough night though, she's gotten a couple more teeth now without acting fussy.

"Babe"

Poor Neely woke up within an hour or two of going to sleep last night. She seemed happy, just wide awake, but pretty soon I noticed she felt a little warm, and she was restless. We went out to the living room once I figured out she wasn't going back to sleep.

She started to get a little sad, and nursing didn't soothe her like usual, so I pulled out the big guns, Yo Gabba Gabba. Haha. It made her mostly happy, although every once in a while she'd kind of whimper, and squirm a little bit. (So this post will have some pictures, here's one of her relaxing with Paige, and watching Yo Gabba Gabba a few days ago)
We dozed on and off, but neither of us slept too well last night. And lo and behold, this morning she has yet another new tooth, top right 2nd incisor, and a bunch of other swollen areas on her gums. Paige and Caso both had 12 teeth at 12 months old, so maybe she's trying to get caught up to them. Poor thing.

Cason calls her "babe" lately. He'll come up and cuddle her and say "Hey babe." It cracks me up.