Santa

I took Bella to see Santa before Thanksgiving and as you can see from the photos she wasn't very keen on the idea. The only way she would go anywhere near him was if I was holding her. I was not planning on being in the photo. I love the progression! Today though, we were at the mall and when we got back to the car she asked to go sit on Santa's lap. I don't know where that came from, but I didn't test her to see if she really meant it. It was too close to nap time. :)

Baylor-Tech Game

So Ann took Grant, Melinda, her boyfriend Eric, and me to the Baylor-Tech game, Saturday. Imagine being a Tech fan, in between two Baylor alumni, on the Baylor side and that was me. It was brutal! Grant was very composed, but Ann was just down right giddy! I guess I don't blame her. It has been a long time since Baylor has had a winning season and they did play well. Here is a picture of our awesome seats. Thank you Ann!

Potty!

Monday, Bella and I went to get her a potty chair and yesterday she actually told me she had to go potty and then went! What a great birthday present! Then she went again today! We aren't consistent yet, but it's a start. I may have to go to Pull Ups instead of diapers because getting her diapers back on her after is a battle of the wills. Of course it doesn't help that we have to put her potty in our bathroom because there isn't room for it in the guest bathroom, next to her room. I have to lay her down on our bathroom floor or bring her changing pad into our bedroom. I don't think we're ready to go cold turkey and use panties. That may be just me, but I don't think she's that aware all the time. Wow! I hope I'm ready for this!

Bunny Band-aid

Our beloved bunny is definitely showing his age. He had a hole in his ear, but Aunt Melinda came to the rescue with a bunny band-aid. Note that the fabric matches Bella's bedding.

Hair Pictures

Here is a picture of what Bella's hair looks like after the haircut. Not that much different, we just evened up the layers a bit. I haven't tried to put her hair in pigtails yet it might be just a tad too short for that.

 

 This picture was just too cute not to post.

First Haircut

Bella got her first haircut today. I am really bummed that I didn't get any pictures! It wasn't very much, just a little off the back to try and even up the layers. I did save some of the hair so I at least have that. She sat in my lap and did such a good job! She hardly squirmed at all.

Grandpa's Birthday

Today was Grandpa's birthday and we got to celebrate with him! I wish I could say that I made this delicious cherry pie, but I bought it at Central Market. I highly recomend it!

 Bella helped Grandpa blow out his candle, but...

 I didn't get a very good picture so here is the retake.:)

Happy birthday, Daddy/Grandpa! So glad we got to spend it with you! Love you!

Halloween 2011

Halloween was a really fun time for us this year. Our friends the Thomases came to celebrate with us and Bella was old enough to actually trick-or-treat. That was so cute to watch, but first she had to fight Daddy for her costume!

 I couldn't believe I got Bella to actually wear the hood to her costume. She did start taking it off about half way through the trick-or-treating, but every time I told her she had to put it back on to go to a door and she would.

 In her defense the hood was a little big. Where's Bella?

 There she is!

 Sorry for the butt shot, but here is Bella at one of the first houses. She never actually said "Trick-or-Treat", but she did hoot like and owl and say "Thank you".

 Bella has never really had candy before so she was fascinated by it. She knew exactly what to do with the lollipops though.

 Bella loved these little pumpkins. She kept moving them around one by one. I think we have four of them.

 We did actually let her open one of the lollipops to eat, boy what a mess. I'm sure you experienced parents are laughing right now knowing exactly what I'm talking about. I couldn't get her costume off of her fast enough to save it from the sticky saliva. Poor thing that ended up being all the candy she had because we ran out of candy and had to use hers to supplement. Before you start feeling sorry for her and think we are horrible parents let me just say that she hasn't even missed it and Daddy and I probably would have eaten most of it anyway!:)

Pumpkin Patch

We made our annual trip to the Pumpkin Patch yesterday and had all kinds of fun! First we had to measure how much Bella had grown from last year. Wow, doesn't she look different!

 Then she had to take pictures too!

And then we needed to meet the scarecrow!

 Daddy and Bella needed to be pumpkins, after all we are at a pumpkin patch!

 Picking pumpkins with Strawberry Shortcake. Little does Bella know that she was one of her mother's favorite characters growing up.

 Then there was the straw maze. Good thing it was open on top since Daddy had to go too. You can see a little bit of his green shirt in the top right corner of the picture.

 Bella has just started being interested in trains. Here she really is saying "All Aboard!"

 Bella's first experience in a bounce house. I think you can tell from these pictures how much she liked it. We had to drag her out.

 Finally, we have found our perfect pumpkin friend to take home!

Water Bug

Gran put in a pool this summer. We got to enjoy it this weekend even though it was pretty cold. Bella all of a sudden just decided she didn't want Daddy's help and struck out on her own. Here is a video of her be-bopping along. She did actually move around the pool although you can't really tell from the video. She liked to go over to the side so she could play in the waterfalls. We got her out and put her in the warm hot tub periodically to warm her up. We're not really sure what gave her the desire for independence in the water, but we hope it's still there next summer!

Physical Therapy

When we met with the speech therapist she noticed Bella being physically unstable and out of balance so she recommended that we get a PT evaluation done. During her evaluation I thought we were going to here the same thing that we heard during her speech evaluation that everything was fine, she was just a little delayed, but catching up nicely. That was not the case. The therapist had many things that she was concerned about and after scoring Bella's diagnostic test found her to be at the level of a 16-18 month old. So we are going going to therapy once a week and getting some orthodic braces to correct her flat footedness and the turning in of her feet which should turn her knees out to their correct position. A lot of the exercises the therapist is having us do at home can be done on the playground so we are going almost every night much to Bella's delight. We are also making tunnels out of boxes for her to crawl through and what kid doesn't like to play in boxes?! :) Bella absolutely loves therapy! I'm going to have to get creative in finding a way to get her to leave without pitching a fit. She doesn't want to leave when it is time to go. I'm taking that as a good sign.

Catching Up

It's been so long since I blogged I've got several cute pictures to talk about. This first one is of Bella sitting in a rocker that my dad made in shop class in high school! It has survived all of my siblings and me using it all through our childhood. The  other great thing about this picture is her choice of reading material. Bella is reading one of my scrapbooking magazines instead of watching TV!

 Bella has a fascination with my shoes and on this day with my hat as well. Any time I take off my shoes I have to immediately put them away if I don't want Bella to put them on. She's getting pretty good at walking around in them. Of course she has the ever present bunny with her.

 Grandpa took Bella to the playground today and sent me this picture of Bella "Taming the Bronc". She learned this trick from a four year old friend of ours who went with us to the playground this weekend. He's been to a lot of Rodeos!

Speech

Today I took Bella to Cook Children's Rehab Services to have her speech evaluated. Of course as she is being tested she says 10 new words that I've never heard her say before. It ended up that she is in the 16th %, but she is picking up new words so quickly that the speech pathologist decided to give us information on things we could be doing at home to help Bella with her language development and then suggested we come back in six months if we were still concerned. I feel good about it. I really liked the speech pathologist and I was amazed at how quickly Bella was picking up words just by phrasing questions a certain way.

So Smart!

Today I got a glimpse into just how smart my little girl is getting. Three things happened.

1. I was working in the kitchen and she came up to me and put her arm out with her hand up and said "Stop" (she has not been forming words yet) then she took me by the hand and lead me to the living room rug and pointed to where she wanted me to sit down so we could play together.
2. After we played for a while I asked if I could go change my clothes. She sat there and thought for a minute. You could see the wheels churning in her head. Then she stood up, took me by the hand again and walked me directly to my closet so I could change.
3. Then Bella rolled some of her toys under a piece of furniture. I asked her what she was going to do now. How was she going to get them out? She went over and got one of her golf clubs, took it to the piece of furniture and started fishing for it!

She is just changing so fast! I know everyone says that, but it is so true!

Dentist

Bella went for her first dentist appointment today. She was a typical, active two year old, but she did really well. She didn't like having people looking in her mouth, so I had to help, but the dentist was quick and it was painless and then she was off to play with the animal puzzle again (It made sounds!)! I think the overall exprience was positive for her.

Dr. Visit

I took Bella to the Doctor this AM and she checked out just fine. She is 35-1/4" tall and 29.4 lbs. That puts her in the 75% for both height and weight. Dr. Tom said that is great especially since she started out so little. He wasn't overly concerned about her speech, but did go ahead and order some speech therapy just for our peace of mind.

Cherries!

We've finally found a new food that Bella will eat! Cherries! Her cousins had ordered drinks that had cherries in them the other night at dinner and one of them asked if he could give her one. After the first one she was hooked! All the rest of the cousins then started digging out cherries in their drinks to give to her. So when we went to the grocery store the next time I thought I'd get some fresh cherries. I just grabbed a bag, Grant looked at me kind of funny and went on. We get home and that is when Grant asks me if I realized these cherries would have seeds in them! Bummer! We improvised that day, but ended up wasting a lot of the cherry cutting out the pits. So, today I got a Cherry Pitter! Yes I am a kitchen gadget nerd! I couldn't help it, but this thing is so cool! It punches those seeds right out, leaves the cherries whole, doesn't even smash them and it has a splash guard so you don't get cherry juice on you when you use it! Obviously it takes little to impress me!

Port Aransas

Week before last we went to Port Aransas with Grant's family for a vacation. We had a wonderful time! Bella LOVED the water! She giggled every time a wave hit her and would go about chest deep with her life jacket on. The sand, not so much! She preferred to sit in the Dora chair. At one point she had even conned Grant's cousin's, daughter to bring the sand to her in a bucket to play in. :) Quite the charmer isn't she?

Here is a picture of her with her dad and Aunt Melinda on a boogie board.

 Here is a picture of Gran, Grant's cousin and her daughter looking for shrimp with the kids. They used that PVC pipe thing to suck out the sand from the hole the shrimp had made and then they would look through the sand they had brought up or put their hand down in the hole looking for them. After they caught a bunch they would feed them to the seagulls

 Bella in her Dora chair trying to brush off some sand.

 Giving Dora a drink of water from her cup.

 Here is our little strawberry. Once again in the Dora chair! :)

 Giving kisses!

 Tuckered out! I am actually awake and just basking in the moment! Bella is not really a cuddler and if she does she wants her daddy so I was savoring every moment! You know she was tired if she was letting me cuddle with her like that!

Child Study Center

Sorry this is out of order, but we went to the Child Study Center on Friday for Bella's 2 year check up. Bella was great! She "performed" well and was very out going so they were really able to see all that she is able to do like stack blocks, name body parts on a doll, do shape puzzles, run, kick a ball, point to pictures etc.

The one area that she is lacking in and they are concerned about is in her speech. So they have recommended putting her in speech therapy. Since Bella was a preemie she qualifies for some free services and then we are going to have her pediatrician order some therapy so we can get some private therapy as well. They didn't seem overly concerned about it, but said it was better to get a jump on it so it doesn't become a hindrance.

Grant and I feel that if this is all that we have to deal with considering her beginnings, then we are doing great! What a blessing!

Happy Birthday Lady Isabella Grace!

Bella's birthday party was on Saturday and we had a lot of fun!

 I posted last year that there is a tradition in my family that the children get a different figurine candle to display in honor of each birthday until their 18th birthday. This year's candle was an owl to represent the owl theme we did for her birthday.

 One of the favorite gifts was the backpack with the dolly holder on the back. As you can see this allows her to keep Bunny with her even easier. Now she still has her hands free to carry her books around.

 One of the crafts I had for the kids to make was sock puppets so we were entertained with a puppet show before everyone left.

 Here are our puppeteers.

Here is a picture of the cake I made with the party supplies and candles. I wished for my mother as I was making the cake. She made our cakes growing up and I was having trouble with the icing, but thankfully my Mother-in-Law, Ann and my niece Henley were there to help and give moral support. I have to say the cake turned out pretty well after all!

A few other neat things about the party were that my sister, Rebekah was able to be in town from Lubbock for the party and my dad and our friend Susan got home from a mission trip to India the night before and were able to be here as well.