"Z Goes Home"

Mia and I picked up a few new books from the library today, and this one caught my eye because I thought it would be fun to work on some letters together. Each page of the book has a giant illustration of a letter looking like a word that also starts with that letter. (I.e., the first page is an "A" drawn to look like an alien.) One the very first page, the letter "Z" climbs down from a sign at the zoo and walks past all of the letters illustrated in the book on its way home. On the last page, it walks into its living room and announces that it's home, and its family (several other letters) is sitting around the living room like one might expect to find any family when arriving home.

So when we got to that page, I pointed to the letter "O" sitting on the sofa and asked Mia if she knew what letter it was. And she responded as if that were the most obvious thing in the world: "O." I was sure this was a fluke. Maybe she meant, "oh..." So I pointed to the "W", and then the "E", and the "I" and asked her about each one. And she got each one right!! This kid continues to amaze me everyday.

Nap - Day 2...

So... Mia apparently got out of bed one last time after I checked on her today:



It only took a couple of minutes to get her to stay in bed today, so I thought we were all set. Then at one point I heard soft noises coming from her room, and when I peeked in, I saw that she had smuggled PlayDoh into bed! So I took that and put her back down. She seemed settled again, and when I peeked back later, this is what I found. Hey, at least she's sleeping! ;o) (And I love that she and the Sleep Sheep are sleeping in the same position!)

Mia's 2nd Birthday Party

So here they finally are -- the photos from Mia's 2nd birthday party:



There are a ton of pictures in this slideshow, so you can click on the show itself to see all the thumbnails and pick & choose which you'd like to see. You can also see a larger version of the slideshow here.

Obviously, Mia had a great time at her party, and we really enjoyed having all of her friends over for the afternoon. The kids & parents alike devoured pizza, PB&J, snacks, and cake. The kids took over our house inside & out! :o) Indoors they played with balls & toys and colored in Elmo coloring pages. Outdoors, they played on the slide, crawled through tents & tunnels, and rode the bouncy horse. After all this excitement, Mia opened her presents and then went down for a four-hour nap! :o)

Heather made the super-amazing cake, and my friend Amber took the photos. (If you're looking for a photographer in the LA area for events or portraits, check Amber out here.)

Sophie's Last Pre-Birth Photo

I had my 6-month check up today, and I'm happy to report that Sophie and I are doing well. We are both gaining weight appropriately, and my glucose test last week was normal. My doctor commented during the ultrasound that Sophie has a "beautiful heart", a "big tummy", and that she's about 4 pounds already. (That's apparently totally right on schedule, but to me it seems early to be that big already.) I also go back for my next appointment in two weeks instead of four, and I really can't believe that. It seemed like it took forever to get to that point with Mia, but here we are!

Oh, and I asked the doctor to check that Sophie is in fact still a girl, and she apparently is. ;o)

Napping in the Big Girl Bed

So last night in the big girl bed went really, really well. Mia stayed asleep and in bed all night long. I put a baby gate up just outside her door just in case she tried to wander the house during the night, but she didn't wake up until 7am. :-D

As I predicted, getting her down for a nap in the bed was a tiny bit trickier, but I have to say that I *heart* Jo Frost. I've been a Super Nanny addict for a while now, and I decided to try out her techniques for putting kids to bed. I did Mia's regular nap time routine, including singing her a couple of songs. The first time she hopped out of bed (which was immediately), I just placed her back and said, "It's bed time, Mia." The next time (also immediately) I placed her back and said only, "Good night." Then I spent the next 10 minutes putting her back into bed while saying nothing and avoiding eye contact. Each time, I walked out of the room and peaked through the door to watch. After 10-12 minutes she gave up on getting out of bed and rolled around for a little while in bed. And within 20 minutes of starting the whole process, she was asleep!! Now I'm crossing my fingers that we can keep this up!

Big Girl Bed!

It looks like this is shaping up to be a big day all around. After our first trip to the soccer field, we wrapped up our day w/ Mia's first night in the big girl bed! Jeff and I tucked her in, gave her a stuffed sheep, and sang her a couple of bed time songs. She seemed like she was going to jump right out of bed at first, but it's been a half hour, and we haven't heard any noise from her room. The night is young, though, so I may update this later... ;o) At any rate, I'm more nervous about putting her down for a nap tomorrow while it's still light out...

Mia's 1st Day of Soccer

I signed Mia up for a "Mommy/Daddy and Me" soccer class through our rec center, and we went for our first day today. Besides the fact that we were entirely too close to Mia's nap time, she seemed to have a good time. The coach set up a circle of 8 differently colored flags, and the kids practiced "little kicks" by dribbling their ball over to each color. The hardest part was keeping them from using their hands to just pick up the ball and run it over. The last few minutes were "goal time," and each kid got to kick in a goal. It was pretty fun!

Mia's 1st Paintings

Mia received an art kit for her birthday, and she really enjoyed producing her first few paintings yesterday afternoon. Here are her very first water color and finger paintings. Enjoy!

Done with School for about 6 Months!

I just submitted my final paper for the summer quarter via email, and I'm done with school until the spring 2009 quarter starts up. I had originally planned to enroll for fall and only take off the winter quarter until two things dawned on me. Since Sophie's due date is 12/14, she could come any time between Thanksgiving and New Year's and still be considered "on time". I decided I could live w/o that variable hanging over my head while trying to study for finals and write term papers next quarter. Probably more importantly, I asked myself why on earth I'd want to have a 100% packed scheduled leading right up to Sophie's due date, even if we assume she came safely after the quarter's end. I already know first hand that having a newborn = getting no sleep. I decided not to go into that already run down from school. So now I'm excited that I get to focus the next few months on the end of my pregnancy, preparing the house for Sophie's arrival, preparing Mia for Sophie's arrival, and wrapping up things with the business before I take my leave.

Jeff and I bought furniture, bedding, and decorations for Mia's big-girl room, and I'm looking forward to starting the project of getting it all assembled next week. We'd like to have her room (including the big-girl bed!) all ready to go so that we can starting setting up all of the nursery furniture in Sophie's new room. And I'd really like have that done well before Sophie actually gets here so that Mia doesn't feel like the baby is kicking her out of the crib. My hope is that by the time she sees Sophie in the crib, she's long forgotten she ever used to sleep there!

Mia Speaks Out

Mia has been interested in the phone for a while now, but she's recently starting imitating the way I hold the phone w/ my shoulder and say "uh huh" when I'm walking around and talking. Yesterday she made several phone calls, but she called Papa nonstop for several minutes. Oh, and please don't feel like you need to watch the whole video. I'll never know! ;-)

Third Trimester!

I've officially entered the 3rd trimester! Jeff & I can't wait to meet Sophie and to see what our family of four is going to look like. We've *finally* gotten Mia a set of big-girl furniture, so we can start moving the crib & the rest of the nursery furniture into Sophie's room. (Hey, Mom! It looks like Sophie might escape the sock drawer after all.) I remember how strange it was to walk by Mia's room before she was born, and now I'm imagining what it will be like to have two kids' rooms at the end of our hall. Since we moved in back in January, Sophie's room has been mostly empty and is just serving as an extra storage room. It's going to be weird actually getting that room ready for her arrival. :o) Can't wait!

Clumsy, clumsy toddler.

I don't know what is going on with Mia this week, but she is suddenly the clumsiest person I know. In the last 48 hours, she has taken 5 really good falls that have lead to tears, scrapes, and even blood.

Twice she got overly eager and face planted off a play structure at the park. (After the second of these falls, she got so much sand in between her front teeth that it was the first time in my life that I thought while looking at an injured person, "Wow, that's going to need some floss...")

Twice she ate it while running. The first time she scraped up two elbows and one knee on the sidewalk, and the second time she tumbled (again) face first into the sand.

In the midst of her own falling spree (and the resulting cranky mood), another child accidentally pinched her inner thigh in a buckle while "helping" her get into a swing. The resulting raspberry required two ice packs (one shaped like a kitty head and the other like Spiderman's head) to calm her down.

The grand finale was this morning when she tripped over her own feet and landed face first (yet again) into one of the legs of our dining room table. The result was Mia's very first bloody nose... She was so upset after that one that she settled for a plain old bag of ice and a paper towel, since we don't (yet) own kid-friendly ice packs.

I'm seriously hoping she's just going through a growth spurt or something and is just having trouble figuring out where the ends of her legs are now! Otherwise the neighbors are going to be sending CPS our way...

Dancing Queen

These are some awesome shots of Mia partying hard at her auntie's wedding over the weekend. Much love to Kassel for sharing these with us!!

From Heather's Wedding

Mia seriously danced until about 10:30pm when we finally dragged her back to the hotel!

From Heather's Wedding

Sneaking a peak at the corsages before heading off to the ceremony.

From Heather's Wedding

Mom trying to get Mia's hair pinned back after Mia broke her headband before we even left the hotel...

From Heather's Wedding

Perhaps we should have known she was going to take this party very seriously?

From Heather's Wedding

And...she's done! ;-)

100 Days

Only 100 days to go!

It still sounds like sort of a lot, but there seems to be a never-ending list of things that have to happen between now and then. For the first time I began to worry this week that I won't be ready for Sophie when she comes. With Mia, I had the first-timer paranoia to help get everything together. I'm sort of worried that because we've done this once before, we won't get Sophie's room done in time and she'll have to sleep in the sock drawer when she gets home. (Mostly kidding, Mom!)

I haven't posted a belly picture in while, so I thought I would post one from Regina & Mike's wedding almost two weeks ago. If this wedding had been one week later, I'd have had to hold my breath in this dress!! :o) For the rest of the girls, the sash sat on the natural waistline. (See Robin to the left...) But Sophie moved mine right on up. Enjoy!