Amelia ~Summer 2015~

Size
Weight:  25.4 lbs (down 1 lb since 2 year checkup)
Height:  ~36"

As you can see, Amelia is down 1 lb since her checkup in April.  I am not sure how much of that is from growing height but not weight, being active, or our nightly struggles at dinner.  I’m telling you… this kid does not like or eat dinner.  I am not sure which but either way we battle every. Single. Night.  It’s honestly very exhausting because it involves lots of crying, time away from the table at the quiet spot and wearing on our nerves.  She eats other meals usually very well but when we put a plate of food we know she likes or has eaten before in front of her at dinner the meltdown begins.

Amelia is wearing 2T shorts/pants/undies and a mixture of 2T and 3T shirts.  She wears a size 6 shoe and her nighttime diaper is a size 5. 

May

Favorite words, sayings and/or things: Amelia has been calling me “mom” more than “mommy” lately.  She adores my friend’s four year old daughter, Addie and talks about her constantly.  When she is done with something, she says “all done-y.”  She loves the book “Love you forever” right now and calls it the “potty book” because of the picture of a toilet and toddler on front. 

Funnies/Amelia-isms: Amelia says “kitty, kitty, kitty” and likes carrying Sasha around (poor, poor Sasha!).  Amelia likes when we write her name and our names and a favorite question lately is why. 

Observations:  Knows the tune to ABC's but cannot get the pronunciation of most of the letters yet  ~  we hear her counting items but usually out of order after 3  ~  getting much better at getting pants on by herself but she still has a hard time getting them over her butt  ~  has been refusing to wear any coat except for the one that Addie got her for her birthday  ~  likes coloring in circles vs scribbling  ~  she can follow our straight lines on paper  ~  goes down stairs walking and holding the railing and not on her tummy anymore  ~  both feet now leave the ground when she jumps

Monkey girl

Firsts/Adventures:  Amelia got a kitten for birthday and loves having “Sasha” sit on her lap.  She says “mom lap” and will pat her lap.

Sasha is so tolerant!

I went to Muffins with Mom at daycare and we celebrated Mother’s Day this month. 

Amelia was a dancing machine at my Grandma’s 90^th birthday party and we had a very nice visit with my parents who were in town for the occasion. 

Four Generations

Amelia moved up to the two year old classroom at daycare and has transitioned well. 

Illness/Owies:  None

Teeth:  Amelia’s upper left and right two year old molars popped through this month. 

 

June

Favorite words, sayings and/or things:  likes to sing “happy birthday” to anyone that we will fill in for the name blank  ~  likes to sing “you are my sunshine”  ~  reminds us daily that she is a “big girl” and doesn’t need our help

Funnies/Amelia-isms:  Insists on having her shirt off if Matt or Grant has theirs off.   Matt helped her take it off one afternoon and a couple minutes later she walked out of the garage and had taken her pants off as well.  She loves to be naked lately!   

Observations:  Amelia loves reading books and counting  ~  can hold up two or three fingers  ~  getting much better at putting two-four words together in a sentence 

Little water bug

Firsts/Adventures:  Met cousin Simon and adores him.  She has talked about him non-stop since we first saw him.  We recently went to a wedding and at first Amelia was tired and didn’t want to dance but once she snapped out of it she didn’t want to leave the dance floor. 

Illness/Owies:  None

Teeth:  Amelia’s lower right two year old molar made its appearance meaning all her teeth are now in for quite some time.

 

July

 
Favorite words, sayings and/or things:  Likes singing “Jesus loves me” and will do the motions along with you.  Lately, everything is “juicy” according to Amelia. 

Funnies/Amelia-isms: When you put a dress on her, she twirls in circles and dances.  We walked into Amelia’s room one afternoon when she was supposed to be napping only to discover she was actually awake and had gotten a hold of a tub of diaper cream.  We learned the hard way that Amelia can now unscrew caps and had smeared the entire tub of cream all over herself, her bed and floor.  Grant had a very similar story at about the same age. 

When playing in the sprinkler one afternoon, Amelia walked to the driveway, peed in the driveway and went right back to playing. 

She was as content as could be

Observations: Of our children, Amelia has never really been our cuddler.  However, lately she wants me to lay down and snuggle with her every night after a story.  While I don’t want it to become a habit, I have been enjoying those moments lately! 

Firsts/Adventures:  Amelia loved the fireworks this year both big (at my work) and smaller at home. 

Florida was a blast and you can read more here.  Amelia did amazing on the plane rides and slept both ways.  She was a little water bug and loved the water and beach.  She even curled up and took her nap in a lounge chair one day.  By the time we left, she was dunking and jumping in the pool and absolutely fearless in the waves.  At SeaWorld, she was scared of the dolphins and wouldn’t pet them but loved rides and other animals from a distance.

Amelia had her 1^st movie theater experience at the Minion movie.  Overall, she did really well but began to lose interest towards the last 30 minutes.

Illness/Owies:  Amelia at some point took it upon herself to put a bead in her right ear.  I probably would’ve never known had her ear not drained on vacation.  I suspected a possible infection or thought maybe too much swimming/dunking but then it stopped and she never seemed fussy or feverish over it.  When we got home, I took a look with our otoscope we have and couldn’t make out what it was but could tell something wasn’t right.  I scheduled the appointment with the ENT and sure enough he pulled a plastic bead out of her ear.  Otherwise, her ears looked great and no sign of damage.  Her right tube which the doctor thinks was already loose came out in a big wad of ear wax and bead. 

Potty Training: Amelia has still periodically had successes on the potty but she is very dramatic about it usually whining “pooooop” which really means potty.  We had a couple reluctant successes on vacation after a very stressful bath time in which she had to go potty but was refusing to go on the toilet.  Then it clicked and she went! 

When we returned from vacation, we decided it was past time for undies.  The 28^th was the first day of daycare in her undies and she had one potty accident and one poop in a diaper (at nap).  On day two, no potty accidents and one poop in undies.  Overall, it’s been very successful with only 1 accident if any on most days. 

August

Favorite words, sayings and/or things:  Amelia is very enthusiastic when she agrees to do something and says OK!  She really enjoys puzzles right now and if she gets so much as a bump she asks for more oil which sounds like “more eel.” 

Funnies/Amelia-isms: When Amelia is in timeout she says sorry mommy, daddy, Grant over and over because she thinks it will get her out sooner.  She also asks for a hug and kiss.  Another favorite tactic when she does something she knows she isn’t supposed and you scold her is to immediately say I love you mommy/daddy.

She has mommy's fashion sense

Amelia was sitting on Matt’s lap one afternoon when he let one rip.  Amelia said “stinky mouth daddy.”  Matt laughed and said “That wasn’t my mouth.”

Amelia does this silly thing where she bends over and puts her hands on the floor and sticks one foot in the air and says “watch me mommy/daddy!”

Amelia's "watch me" move

Observations:  Amelia’s spunkiness and independence is at an all-time high.  She goes non-stop and doesn’t want help with anything!

Firsts/Adventures:  This month we celebrated Simon’s baptism who Amelia absolutely adores.  We had a cookout with some of our daycare friends complete with slip n slide, sprinkler, water guns, and a kiddie pool.  The kids had a blast and the parents all had a chance to catch up.  I however dropped the ball royally on capturing pictures. 

We had our first camper camping excursion with some friends.  The kids had so much fun and were pretty well behaved for the most part.  We did some hiking and took a very short boat ride because the wind just didn’t cooperate.  The most exciting part for the kids was probably getting to sleep on upper bunk in the camper, using the camper toilet, and roasting marshmallows.

Silly selfie face



We went to Lakeside Park and rode the rides.  Amelia loved the train but wanted nothing to do with the animals on the carousel nor did she want to ride the whip.  She did love the animals though.    

We had a surprise 80th birthday party for Matt's grandma.  After Amelia got over her tiredness, she couldn't be slowed down. 

Amelia and 2nd cousin Aubrey

Illness/Owies:  None

Potty Training:  We are so incredibly proud of how well Amelia has done potty training.  On 8/5 she pooped on the potty for the first time and after some struggles going potty at home (not sure if it was fear of our big toilets or not having a good routine down) she finally went accident free all weekend.  She has also gone up to five hours holding her potty!

She got her pants on... well sort of

Even though Amelia has pooped on the toilet before, she doesn’t like to.  She will hold it up to three days sometimes (she used to poop at least once/day) and wait until she can go in her diaper at nighttime.   

Florida Family Vacation

Because I am busy catching up on blogs, I decided it was a must to do a short blog (with tons of pictures) on our vacation to Daytona Beach, FL.  We planned this vacation for about 8-10 months before we went and met my mom, stepdad, stepsister and her family, and my stepbrother in Daytona for a week long, carefree vacation.

It was by far one of the best vacation we've had to date.  The flights went smoothly.  The kids behaved, planes were on time and the biggest hiccup we had was when the rental car place tried to give us this tiny little puddle jumper of a rental car when we had a larger one reserved.  I'm telling you, it could only fit the stroller in the "trunk."  Big problem when we were travelling with not only a sit n' stand stroller but two pieces of luggage, two smaller carry-ons, and two car seats!  After a series of musical rental cars, we got settled in the correct car which was still on the small side but we made it work.

The first must on our list on our way from Orlando airport to Daytona was absolutely finding a Zaxby's.  Can you believe Daytona doesn't have a Zaxby's?  That meant I had to plan ahead of time and find a location along our route from Orlando to Daytona that I could get my Zaxby's fix.  I ordered a meal for that day and for lunch the next day. 

There was no agenda for the week other than plenty of beach time and a trip to SeaWorld to pet and train the dolphins in their "Up-close Dolphin Tour."  As you can see, we had a blast.  The kids were like fish and Matt and I even got to try our hand at paddle boarding and surfing.  I was able to get the hang of paddle boarding almost immediately but it took Matt just a little longer.  He made a valiant effort of trying surfing but we didn't really have the best waves for it.

Matt once he got the hang of it

 

Truly amazing... I could do this every. single. day.

Grant and I paddle boarding

Check out the dolphin in the background!!

As I mentioned, we thought a trip to SeaWorld would be a good way to break the week up.  We headed towards Orlando and got into the park where we had to wait for more information on our dolphin encounter when the most AWESOME thing happened.  A woman dressed in the crazy rainbow outfit walked up to Matt and said he was in the right place at the right time.  SeaWorld is celebrating their 50th birthday and he won a prize.  At this point, I am thinking yeah right!  What's the catch?  What do we have to buy? 

She handed him an envelope and told him to open it to see what he won.  Well low and behold, there was no catch!  Matt won our entire family (all 12 of us) VIP tickets which included personally guided tour, VIP seating at all animal shows, additional animal encounters, front of the line passes for all rides, and free food all day long!  It was amazing! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After a wonderful and exhausting day at SeaWorld complete with Grant finally getting to see and touch a real dolphin we headed back to the condo.  Lucky me we had to drive past Zaxby's again!

We rounded the week off with more beach time and a trip to the boardwalk. 

Nothing beats ice cream on the beach!

Looks like she was born to be a beach bum

Flying a kit on the beach

We left Florida feeling refreshed and renewed but wishing it could've lasted longer.  It was so nice seeing family that we don't get to see often enough and cousins playing together that unfortunately don't know each other very well.