Trick-or-Treat

We had soooooo much fun tonight! Our 1st ever trick-or-treat night was a huge success. And I can't decide if Sophie had more fun going door to door filling her pumpkin with candy or standing in our driveway giving out candy with GiGi. She'd scream "kiz kiz" (kids) and "HERE" and run to put candy in their bags. We have such a great neighborhood for trick-or-treating. It's all flat with over 100 houses crammed in. So we get a lot of outsiders looking to cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time. But I don't mind buying 10 bags of candy one bit. I LOVE seeing everyone dressed up. As you'll see in these pics, Steve-o is not dressed up as Captain Jack. Next year.

Getting ready to hit the streets

A woman on a mission

Gag-o-lanterns

Never in a million years could I have guessed that my daughter would get totally grossed out carving pumpkins. We're taking making gagging noises (like the kind I had the other night while watching survivor as the contestants choked down chicken embryos and raw eels) and saying "EW EW EW" the entire time. I guess even 1 year olds have a gag reflex. Once she realized how "gross" and "disgusting", not to mention "messy", carving pumpkins can be she wanted no part of the yearly tradition. So Steven and I continued on poking our patterns onto our pumpkins and sawing away until our thumbs were sore. During this time our daughter decided that it was more fun to throw rocks. Can't say I blame her.

It started out good....

...that is until she touched pumpkin
guts for the 1st time

Notice the paper towel in hand

Definitely more fun to bring dad rocks

The finished product...we were over it by the time we got to the little pumpkin and decided to go old school on it. And I personally like how we just sawed off the bottom of the pumpkins to make scooping easier.

A Monster Bash

Saturday Sophie attended her very first Halloween party at Gracie's house. There were 5 little ghouls there between 19-20 months, 2 baby goblins that were 8-9 months, and one 6 week old tiny newt. Sophie and Gracie got to hang out with Noah and George who they use to go to daycare with. Even their old day care teacher, Ms. Lynn, came over to see everyone dressed up. Stephanie was brave enough (or crazy enought) to let the kids paint pumpkins and eat cupcakes in her house. Without a doubt, Sophie ate her weight in Jello jiggles! She was so tired Saturday night that once the water was drained out of the bathtub, she curled up in the bottom of the tub and said "night night. If you could get diabets from eating sugar, Sophie would have developed it yesterday. So here some pics...excuse the bad photography.

George the crab

Gracie the little witch

Noah, oops I didn't mean to give away his ID

The Captain

Bring It On

Remember that cheerleader movie? My old roommate Josh loooooved that movie. Anyway, like the new blue and gold digs? Don't mind the fact that she's flashing the camera. She's just practicing for spring break down in Panama City. Lately every time the girl sees a football game on TV she shouts "LETS GO." As in "Lets go...Mountaineers." It doesn't matter if it's pro, college, or high school. It's all "LETS GO" to Little Bit.

Tee Time

Lesson One:

Always keep your head down.

Our meal ticket baby. Start 'em young and push push push. That's what Tiger's padre did anyway. Do you think he had a horrible childhood? Or do you think he happily practiced everyday for hours upon hours? But today, as he sits on his yacht with his model wife I'm sure he thinks it wasn't all that bad. Besides, Saturday morning cartoons are crap these days so why not practice.

What's better than one paci?

Why two of course. S-T-R-A-N-G-E or just 19 months. As previously mentioned, it is going to be a BLAST taking that sucker away. Even though she only gets it in the car and in bed it's gonna be like taking crack from a crackhead.

And I'm on a mission. My mission is to find a red dress coat and/or xmas coat. Similar to this little number from Gymboree but without a the huge price tag.

I've got an idea cookin' and it involves a red coat! I guess if I ordered it big enough to wear for two seasons $70 wouldn't be too bad. Oh who am I kidding, it's bad. Of course I could not tell you the last time I bought a $70 coat for myself! So if any of you know where I can locate such an item, I'm all ears.

Shooter

For the life of me I can't figure out where she learned how to operate a camera. Couldn't possible be because she's had one in her face since the day she was born! But you know what really cracks me up about this pic? Notice how she's holding the camera and looking through the eye hole. Just like her mama. None of this looking through the LCD screen. Looks like I'll have to add toy camera to the Xmas list. Of course like the toy phone, she probably won't want anything to do with it unless it's the real deal!

For 19 Months

Sophia,

Once again it's that time of the month where I say "wow, I can't believe you are "blank" months old." Well today I can fill in the blank with a big 19. I thought that I would change things up and write you a letter. So humor me.

Every day your personality is coming out more and more. You are one spunky kid. Your personality truly unfolds when I stand back and watch you play at daycare. You are bold and show no fear. You are also bossy. A leader? Perhaps. But from what I've seen that's going to take some fine tuning. Leaders aren't suppose to force people into doing things. That is a dictator, not a leader. I can guarantee you that your little friends wish that you would not force them into games of "ring-around-the rosie." Trust me Little Bit, no one likes to be thrown to the floor against their will (well at least not until they are happily married).

Everyone seems to know who you are. I've concluded that can mean one of two things, you are well liked or you are notorious. Hmmm. Because I'm your mother who wants to think the best I'm going to go with the former. You are a child who doesn't know a stranger. And you take offense when someone doesn't return a "hi." This we will have to fine tune as well. We don't want you to be too nice and end up on the back of a milk carton.

Even at 19 months you seem to be aware of other people's feelings. I've watched you pat another child on the back who is crying for their mommy. You have a true gentleness about you and an undying love of cats and dogs. But you would never think of waking a sleeping cat because that just wouldn't be nice. On the other hand, you can make us blow our tops. When you get older, you won't ever remember being 19 months old. But trust me kiddo, we'll remember. We'll remember how you threw yourself down in the middle of the street because you wanted to walk an 80 pound dog by yourself. Your daddy and I will remember looking at one another and instantly thinking that we were failures. We'll also remember how you try to clean up drops of juice that you have spilled in the floor without us telling you. Or how we'll find you reading a book to your baby doll. And we see the good we are instilling in you. Recently you've started patting us on the back when we hold you. It's like your own special little way of telling us that we are doing a good job.

You make everyday new and different. We'll never put you on a pedestal and say that you are the most perfect child that god has ever created. But what we will say is that you are ours. Our one and only and we love every quirk about you. The past 19 months have been one crazy ride and we sometimes lay awake at night talking about what you have in store for us next!

Love, Your mama

And because you "crack" us up, this one's for you. In a sad saggy diaper b/c you refuse to do anything on the potty but make a "psssssss" sound.

Just say NO...

to CHEESE!

Someone is in BIG TROUBLE. See this crazy wacko expression on my child's face. It is the result of someone teaching her to say cheese when she sees a camera. Allow me to stand on my soap box and preach for a few. First, I must say that I myself have yelled "cheese" when a photo is about to be snapped. And I have told countless children to say "cheese" and "smile for the camera." BUT I have seen the errors of my way. Saying cheese makes photos look dumb. Period. Trust me on this one people. I have a feeling that my daycare is the "cheese" culprit. Stepping off my box now.

Upside Down

Here's Little Bit and Daddy goofing around outside before we headed off to the corn maze and Little Bit headed off to GiGi and PaPa's for the evening. If you guys have a corn maze around and haven't tried it out yet, I highly suggest that you check it out. But go early, by the grace of god we beat 10 bus loads of church groups by a mere 5 minutes. And take a flashlight! By the time it was our turn it was almost pitch black and we had to use the light of a cell phone to read the clues! Next year Sophia will be able to tag along but there was no way in this world that we were going to chase her around a 7 acre corn maze at the ripe old age of one.

Quiet Time

It's a rare phenomenon around here. But sometimes when you least expect it you hear silence. And you walk into her room and see this:

Meanwhile, at this very minute she's upstairs screaming at the top of her lungs because she does not want to go to bed. I'm thinking that her head is going to spin completely around any second now. Anyone know a good Exorcist?

And on a side note, I'll be out of town for a few days with work so I'll catch up with you guys this weekend! And I may need an Exorcist for Steven come Friday.

Cooperation

This is latest look of cooperation. Nice huh? I know that I haven't been posting much lately. One of the reasons (aside from sheer laziness) has to do with the fact that Sophia has other things to do besides smile for the camera. Her current obsession is to point at the million and one bug bites on her legs and shout "Oh NO, bug bite!" She is CONSTANTLY on the go. And this weekend she felt that a one hour nap would be PLENTY of rest. Maybe for her, but I can't say the same for the rest of us. Stinker.

Movin' on Up

Tonight we said bye bye to the highchair and hello to the big person table! The highchair has been some what of an issue lately. Actually, it comes down to the fact that I'm tired of scrubbing dried on, nasty, disgusting, old food off the wall. Sitting at the big table is a super big deal. You aren't allowed to dump over your plate, throw food to the dog, or launch peas across the room. It's serious people. Breaking any of of these rules results in the immediate return to the highchair. And trust me, the result ain't pretty when that happens. Wow, it won't be long until we are saying bye bye to all of the baby things. Great, now I've went and made myself all teary eyed!

Blurry hands, but you can see how thrilled she is with her new seat! Or that could be excitement from the nutritious meal of a hot dog and peas placed in front of her. We cook it up gourmet style up in here!

And thank you Missy for the booster seat!

Avast Me Hearties!!

I'm probably breaking some serious pirate code for posting these before Halloween but I couldn't resist! Have you ever in your life seen a cuter pirate? Of course she flat out refused to look at the camera. And I was even trying to bribe her with grapes! Alas, pirates do what they want, when they want, and how they want. These pics are missing her sword. That pansy pirate Capt. Feathersword might carry a "feather" instead of a sword but not Little Bit, she has a felt blade. Oh and one more thing, ye scallywags who fail to comment be warned. Capt. Little Bit may make ye walk the plank we know who ye are! She means business.