The Princess And Her Peas

So, this evening, we stopped by Grandma & Grandpa Bellock's house for dinner. This is not unusual, but the fact that they were serving peas was. My mother (Grandma B), as long as I have known her, has always HATED peas, in fact, she frequently describes them as "pithy." My father (Grandpa B), on the other hand, likes peas. Which probably explains why they were on the table, as he does the cooking & menu selections these days. You may be asking yourself, "self, what does this have to do with Emily?" Well I have an answer for that question, so there is no need to internalize it.

Emily has been eating peas at day care recently, so we took this opportunity to give her a couple of spoonfuls during the course of the meal and let her play with/eat them. This was keeping her occupied while the rest of us enjoyed the delicious meal that my father had prepared. Emily was having a great time, picking up peas in both hands, squishing them & smashing them on her tray; she even ate a few. All in all Emily was enjoying her peas.

Once dinner was over, there was still a little bowl full of peas. My mother, who if you'll remember from the previous paragraph HATES peas, often describing them as "pithy," thought it would be interesting to see what Emily would do with the peas in the bowl. Since Christa & I are always up to something funny (and since Christa is also not a fan of peas), we immediately gave Emily the bowl. She was really enjoying playing with HAND FULLS of peas. She was eating some of them and squishing even more of them. This went on for a little while, I am sure she got more peas on and around her than in her, but she was having LOTS of fun. We were also having fun watching what she did with the peas and LOTS of photos were being taken. Sadly, as all things must, the fun did come to an end, albeit a fantastic dramatic one. Emily seized the bowl and with great flourish, FLUNG it off of the table! This dramatic ending was met with a chorus of laughter from everyone, except Grandpa B, whose job it will be to clean up the peas. (Remember, Grandma B HATES peas.) It was the end of the fun, the end of the peas, and thankfully happened at someone else's house.

"Okay, peas, prepare to be squished . . ."

"1, 2, 47, 89, 3, 10, 11, 126, 34 . . .Wow, this counting stuff is pretty easy."

"Grandma, what do you mean I missed a few numbers?"

"But Daddy taught me how to count!"

"So many peas, so little time."

"I just need a quick snack before I torture some more peas."

"I'll just nibble a few more . . ."

"Oops! How did that happen?"

"Grandma, why are you laughing so hard? I just spilled peas all over the floor."

"Daddy, I spilled peas on the floor and Grandma is cracking up. What's with that?"

"Daddy, Daddy, DADDY!!"

"Daddy, you've got to check out the mess I made. Sorry, Grandpa."

How Big Is Emily? . . . Soooooo Big!

Once again it is time to discuss how big our little girl is getting. Her doctors appointments, at least the scheduled ones, are getting further apart as she gets older, so we don't have that monthly update anymore. On the upside, she only had one shot & a little blood test this time, and there were NO TEARS!!

Also on the no tears front, she also stopped crying when she gets dropped off at daycare this week (only the occasional whimper, but her heart just isn't in it anymore); which shows growth as well, and is much easier on Christa. I am guessing by now that you are thinking that I will give you a long list of things that are smaller and/or larger than Emily before I tell you the news you are looking for, and guess what you are RIGHT!, imagine that. So here we go, what is bigger, heavier, smaller, and lighter than Emily?

Things that are lighter than Emily: 5 lb bag of flour, 10 lbs of feathers, and Nadezhda Khalina (a recent Russian newborn) 17 lbs, 1 oz. Things that are heavier than Emily: the largest ball of twine in Minnesota 17,400 lbs; the Airbus A380 1,300,000 lbs. On Thursday night, Emily weighed in at 17 lbs, 15 oz (just a hair under 18 lbs). She is just under the 50% for weight.

Things that are shorter than Emily: an inchworm, 1 inch; a q-tip, 7.6 cm; a sugar snap pea pod, 3 inches; and a ruler, 12 inches. Things that are longer/taller than Emily: a yardstick, 36 inches; the famous "dot" painting . . . A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, by Georges Seurat, 6.81 ft x 10.11 ft; Michelangelo's David, 17 ft; Auntie Mandy's feet, ?; and the Airbus A380, 239.5 ft. On Thursday night, Emily's official height was measured at a whopping 29 inches!! This puts her in the 90% for her height.

With us as parents, who knows where she gets these tall/skinny genes, but we're really glad for her sake that she has them; at least she has them for now.

"Hey Daddy, why did the piece of gum cross the road . . . it was stuck to the chicken's foot!"

"Hee, hee, hee . . . I crack myself up."

"Hey, Little Lady, what are you doing down there?"

"Will anyone out there let me try some chocolate cake? My Daddy still says I need more teeth first."

If You Build It, She Will Come

This past weekend, Grandpa Jerry made the trip all the way from St. Louis for a visit. Emily was very excited about this, since she hadn't seen her Grandpa since her baptism. Grandpa Jerry was also excited, because let's face it, who isn't excited about seeing Emily?

Grandpa Jerry was having a lot of fun playing on the floor with Emily. He was looking for blocks, cups, basically anything that would stack, to build towers for Emily to knock over. Emily was having a lot of fun knocking over the towers that Grandpa was building for her. We would all cheer when she knocked down the tower, and who doesn't like applause? In fact, she was also having fun toying with Grandpa Jerry . . . she didn't always knock down the tower after he finished building it. Sometimes, she would "read" a book first, or play with some other toys, before going over to knock over Grandpa's tower. Other times she would pretend that she was getting ready to knock down the tower. She would reach her arm out, touch the tower, wait for us to cheer, and then would pull her hand away and go do something else. What a little bugger!

Another exciting thing happened this weekend . . . Emily got 2 new teeth!!! This brings the grand total to 5 teeth!!!!!!! She has 4 on the bottom and 1 on the top. Now her mouth is a very dangerous place for fingers. It is not recommended to let her get a hold on your finger for any reason. You never know when it may end up in that mouth.

"I want to play with this block, this one right here."

"Grandpa, I just got that block out of the last tower. Don't you remember that I want to play with this one?"

"Let me just finish this chapter, Grandpa, then I'll knock that tower over."

"Hi, Auntie Mandy! Look, I just knocked another tower over!!"

"Grandpa, don't you want to build anymore towers?"

This video is titled "The Tower Tipper-Over."

Emily indulged Grandpa Jerry just long enough to tip over the tower he had built, and then she went back to her book. The video run time is 6 seconds.

This video is titled "The Tower Tipping Tease."

Grandpa Jerry continued to build towers for Emily to knock down. Sometimes she did, and sometimes she just pretended that she was going to. Tricky little girl!! The video run time is 2 minutes, 3 seconds. We would like to add that no Emilys were harmed in the making of this video.

Emily wanted to send all of her fans a message:

ghn bg5 bb443de3e e 45r`, 7655txa4FGRTF 041.c xwZZJVVNvxz

(Don't ask us, she never tells us what she's writing.)

Hey, What's This Stuff?

Well, it finally happened . . . Emily has discovered the shelves! We knew that this day was coming, we just didn't know when.

Up until last week, she had been crawling around, only concerned with trying to get the things that were left on the floor, like our shoes, her diaper bag, her toys, the odd newspaper now and again, etc. She was perfectly happy scoping out the carpet for every little microscopic spec of something, anything, that she's not supposed to be playing with, but we somehow miss and don't notice. I've nicknamed her the "human vacuum" because she always manages to find the smallest little pieces of fuzz and paper that you never realized existed.

Then she began pulling herself up on the couch. She started playing with whatever was in arms reach, like my magazines, today's mail, or Daddy's comics from the Sunday paper. We had to watch what we would put on the ottoman and the end tables, because she would eventually make her way over there to check those things out to see what she could get her hands on.

All of this time has gone by. She has crawled past our shelves countless times on her way to her room, or to go near the front door to attack my shoes (she loves Mommy's shoes!). She has never noticed they were there . . . or at least she had never noticed that there is stuff on those shelves. Those shelves are filled with fun stuff . . . books, maps, DVDs . . . Woo-Hoo, DVDs!!! Then finally, last week one day, she discovered that there is fun stuff on those shelves. She had a field day with our DVDs!! They are big fun, let me tell you.

Here is some photographic evidence of all the fun that she was having with those exciting DVDs.

If you haven't had a chance yet, or didn't see our last post . . . Click on our Cafepress link and see the changes to our shop.

OK, Emily fans . . . Now's your chance to get the new 2008 Emily calendar!!!

9 Months Old!

Now that we are all caught up, it seems anti-climatic to stay that way. This means there won't be any more seven blog blitzes to get caught up. If we did lots of exciting things on a daily basis maybe it could happen again, but I don't think that is likely. We don't do a lot of exciting things during the school year. So here we are, all caught up and blogging about what happened THIS weekend! So . . . let's begin.

Not much happened in the last week. Emily got up in the morning, went to daycare, came home, played, went to sleep (lather, rinse, repeat...). That was really the bulk of our week. On Thursday, Christa had curriculum night at her school and Emily & I went with her. I was there to help the librarian with the Book Fair, Christa was there because she has to be, and Emily was there to look cute. I think we all managed to do our respective jobs pretty well. The music teacher brought his baby, who is just a week or so younger than Emily and the two of them seemed to get along pretty well.

The real big day for Emily was Friday, as those of you in the know will realize, it was her 9 Month "Birthday"! Emily is now 3/4's of a year old!! It seems weird that she is already that old, time sure does fly. She is getting very big these days, she has three teeth now and what looks like two more on the way. She is starting to "cruise" just a little bit, she is still working on the mechanics of this . . . she is only able to take one or two steps along the couch before her feet get tangled up on themselves and gravity takes over. Her crawling has come a long way, she is pretty quick, especially if she realizes that you are behind her and she is on her way to something you don't want her to have. She is becoming more and more vocal, and laughs all the time. All in all, she is getting to be more fun everyday.

On Saturday, we took Emily to a bridal shower for our friend Jackie, and then to the mall to get her pictures taken. Getting these pictures is becoming more and more difficult, as she gets more and more mobile. I give lots of credit to the photographer for being quick on the shutter. As soon as you got Emily where you wanted her, she was off and on the go!! It is a miracle that we got any good shots. Thanks to Amy Z being good at what she does, we did get good shots--LOTS of good shots!

On Sunday, Emily & I hung out together watching football. Christa, Grandma Kathy & Auntie Mandy went to their cousin Chase's baptism. We decided that Emily & I should stay at home because Emily may still be contagious from the Hand, Foot & Mouth Disease and we didn't want to get the other kids sick. So, Emily & I watched football and played with her new house and all her other toys. We had a great time.

So there you have it. Things seem a lot more exciting when we wait a month to do this, don't ya think?

"Hey!! Check it out; I have a HUGE rubber ducky!"

"That big rubber ducky is fun, but it's hard to nibble on."

"Daddy, don't you even think about taking my duck while my back is turned..."

The reluctant flower . . . Emily did not let us get a picture of her in this sunflower hat. We got to see her in it, but then she was done!

Make sure you check out our Cafepress store . . . we have a few updated products and a brand new 2008 Emily calendar!!!!

All proceeds go to the Ronald McDonald House.

Little House In The Living Room

Hello again everyone, let's all take a deep breath together. This has been an exhausting string of blogs for us to write in such a short amount of time. I'm sure you're all just as exhausted after reading all of these blogs, since you're all out of practice with the blog hiatus that we had been on. We are now up to this past Saturday (Yes, Saturday, September 8th!!) We are all caught up!! WOO_HOO!!!!!


Saturday began bright and early as Emily & I were going "shopping" with Grandma Kathy & Auntie Mandy. We were heading out to the Dupage County Fairgrounds for the semi-annual Mothers' Clubs resale extravaganza. There are 3 Mothers' Clubs that all get together at the fairgrounds and have a HUGE garage sale/flea market with gently used baby, toddler, and children's items. We learned about these sales when Steve & I discovered we were pregnant. Some friends of Grandma Kathy's told her about them; so did some of Auntie Mandy's co-workers now that I'm thinking about it. Anyway, we started going to them last September. Since Auntie Mandy is no longer working weekends, this was going to be her first time coming with us to one of these events, and she was really looking forward to it after hearing all about them this whole time. Daddy usually went in her place, but decided to opt out this time and took advantage of the day to do some napping, organizing, cleaning, and then went to Grandma Kathy's to make us all dinner for when we got home!! Yay, Daddy!!


Grandma Kathy & Auntie Mandy pulled into our driveway early in the morning. The sale started at 8:00 a.m. and the longer you wait to get there, the lower the quality of stuff there is to choose from. We were hoping to find some decent gently used clothing items for fall/winter and some new toys for Emily. When we got to the sale, Emily decided to spend her time in the Snugli (TM) so that Mommy could have her hands free and Emily could still see what was happening around her. We checked out all 3 buildings and found some really great deals. Emily was very excited about what she saw us carrying and couldn't wait until she had the opportunity to explore our purchases a little closer. She was especially excited about one particular item, a really awesome Fisher Price "playhouse" that Mommy spotted under a table . . .


. . . it is here that we need to back track a few months. One day this past spring, Steve & I brought Emily to visit her Great Grandpa Ray. When we got there, we discovered Steve's cousin Sharon, her husband Brett & their little boy Charlie. It was really fun to get to see them and do some catching up. Charlie got to see Emily and get more used to the idea of having a little girl around since Sharon was due in July with a little baby girl (Jane Elizabeth joined our extended family in July!!). During our conversation, Sharon described a really great toy that she had bought for Charlie at a resale shop. She told us that one of her friends had one and thought it was the best thing ever. Sharon found one for Charlie at a resale shop later on and bought it. Charlie still plays with his, and he is 2 years old now. She told us that if we ever saw one, to snatch it up because it is the BEST!!!! . . .


. . . OK, back to the present. I remembered what Sharon had told us and had been keeping my eyes open for something that looked like what she had described. Every time we went to one of these sales, whenever we drove past a garage sale, or whenever we went into a resale store, I kept looking. On Saturday, I finally saw it!!! I called Grandma Kathy & Auntie Mandy over to see it and told them about what Sharon had said. It became unanimous, this little "house" was coming home with us. Since I had Emily on my back (who was now straining to get to the house), and an armful of clothes & a couple of other toys, and Grandma Kathy had her arms full, it was Auntie Mandy's job to carry our new discovery. Emily would not let Auntie Mandy out of her sight! She wanted to play with that toy!!! She was sooooo excited!!


This little "house" is merely a freestanding doorway. There is one side that represents the exterior of a house. On this side there is a mailbox, doorbell, door knob, house numbers, a weather wheel, a window, a porch light, a flower box, and a rain gutter that doubles as a ball shoot. On the other side of the doorway is the interior of the house. On this side there is the inside of the mailbox, a lamp, door knob, light switch, radio, phone book, dog dish, and a clock. When the sound is turned "on" all of these things are interactive. When the door opens, it says "hello, goodbye, or who's there". When the doorbell rings, you hear the doorbell chime (there are 2 or 3 different chimes). When the radio is played, it gives traffic reports for the Rainbow Bridge and sings the alphabet song. When you change the house numbers, the voice says the new number. When you change the weather wheel from day to night or night to day, there are appropriate sound effects. If you turn on the lights, the voice says "lights on." When you turn the lights off, the voices says "lights off". When you open or close the door, it makes a creaking sound. Sometimes when you ring the doorbell, you will hear a dog bark. When you open the mailbox, it tells you that you have a letter. The flower in the flower pot spins like a pinwheel. The porch light turns on whenever the doorbell rings. The window opens and shuts, and of course makes the appropriate sound effects, plus the voice says either "up" or "down." This house is sooooo neat!! Emily has already spent HOURS playing with it.


After we were done at the Mothers' Clubs sale, we went to the Dupage County Convalescence Center to visit Grandma Kathy's friend, Donna. Donna's birthday is this week and since her family all lives far away, we brought a Birthday Party in a Bag to help her celebrate. She was very excited to see all of us, especially Emily of course. We had treats, chatted, and enjoyed the sunshine for a few hours and then it was time for Donna to go back upstairs and for us to be on our way. We had a few more stops to make before we went home to eat Daddy's dinner.


When we were finished with our errands, we went back to Grandma Kathy's house and began to clean all of the new toys that we bought for Emily. She sat on Daddy's lap and kept trying her best to get away from him and come over by us to play with all of the neat stuff she was seeing us with. Daddy did a great job of holding onto her, which is quite the challenge these days as she gets more and more able to control her body. When we were done cleaning, Daddy let her go, and boy did she go!! She had the best time exploring and trying all of her new toys. She was so excited, she didn't know what to play with first or which way to go. This was quite amusing to watch. She did tend to gravitate towards her beloved house, but would get distracted by some of the other new things, too.


It's safe to say that despite how Emily's weekend began (remember our last post about her illnesses), it sure had a quick upswing on Saturday. With this, we will leave you until next time. This weekend is looking quite busy, more for Mommy than for Emily, but she will be involved in most of this weekend's activities. We'll fill you all in later, well, hopefully sooner than later.

Visiting with Donna at her birthday party.

"Hey, what does this door do?"

"Wow, this is fun!"

"OK, now I'm out, I need to close the door so the mosquitoes don't get in."

"What a pretty flower!"

"Hey, does this window open?"

"OK, now I have to go back inside to see what is going on in there."

"Wow, I have mail!! I wonder who put this in there. I'm going to have to call Uncle Ron to see if he knows anything about this. Wait a minute, did someone just ring my doorbell?"

"Auntie Mandy, is that you out there ringing my doorbell?"

"Hey, I can see my flower from inside the window!"

"This house is so much fun!"

"Grandma, night time is over, I need to change this to daytime."

"The clock is not keeping time very well, I better fix it."

One of our other finds for the day was this xylophone.





" Is there anything that I'm forgetting to play with?"










"I'm soo excited, Grandma. Did you see all of this new stuff. I'm so happy, I could just clap!"

" Daddy, did you see all of my new toys?"

Here she is with her new drum (blue) and a large bug pull toy that lights up, plays music, and talks (the red toy filled with shapes).

"I am such a lucky girl. Look at all of this neat stuff!"