"Pumpkin" the pumpkin & 2 year check-up

Our little girl turned 2 years old yesterday. How have 2 years gone by so quickly? We are so proud of her, and we love her more than anything. Happy birthday, sweet girl!

Monday night we carved our pumpkin to make a jack-o-lantern that we will put out on Halloween night. I asked Emma what she thought would be inside before we cut it open, and she said, "Toys!" When we opened the top and she saw a bunch of gooey seeds, she said, "Ew. Not touch it." So she supervised and "helped" me scoop out the seeds with a spoon (meaning she kept pushing the seeds from my spoon back into the pumpkin before I could get them out). She instructed me to make triangle eyes, a triangle nose, and happy mouth. When I asked her what his name was, she looked at me like it was a ridiculous question and said, "Pumpkin," like, of course his name is Pumpkin, Mommy! He's a pumpkin!

So here they are...Emma & Pumpkin:

Today we saw Dr. Dewling for Emma's 2-year check-up. The official 2-year stats: She weighs 23 lbs 6.8 oz and is 33.5" tall. Both are near the 25th percentile. So again, she is small but proportionate. The doctor was very impressed that she is potty trained and said that her communication abilities are closer to those of a typical 3-year old. We've got a smart cookie on our hands. (Not that we didn't already know...how could she be anything less with her brilliant parents?) Dr. Dewling asked if she knew 100 words. I said, "Oh definitely." She said, "Is she speaking sentences with more than 2 words?" I said, "Did you say two words? Hers are usually about 6 or 7!" That's when Emma started saying, "I want to go out the door!" and the doctor said, "Okay, okay...we'll try to hurry and finish!"

She got a flu shot, a hep A shot, and a finger stick to check her iron. She didn't even make a peep for the finger stick. She watched the nurse fill up the little tube and said, "Oooh, that's pretty red." I realized that she has no concept of blood because she's never really had a big cut or anything. The shots made her cry, but only for a few seconds, and then she was so captivated by the "stickers" (band-aids) that she forgot she was upset.

Aside from the inevitable visits for sore throats, coughs, etc., we don't have to go back again for another year, and she doesn't have to get any shots at that one. We're all happy about that!

Emma's 2nd Annual Birthday Extravaganza!

We've had an exciting (and exhausting) weekend of birthday celebration. It all started on Friday, when Emma & I put together her big gift from Mommy & Daddy -- a 2-seater wagon! We took her on a walk in it yesterday, and she had lots of fun...I think she likes being able to see all around her without having a stroller block her view.

Friday night we picked up the balloons for the party. She absolutely loves balloons, so she was beside herself when we brought them home. Even during the party, one of her favorite things was to go see the balloons!We picked up the cake on Saturday morning, which was done just like we'd ordered it -- thank goodness! Emma was highly disappointed when she realized that we weren't going to eat it right there in the store. She was yelling, "I want to eat cake NOW!"We were concerned about the state of the backyard, after it rained ALL DAY on Friday, but fortunately the sun came out Saturday morning and dried everything. Aside from an occasional strong wind, we had a beautiful day for an outdoor party.

The bouncy house was a big hit for most of the kids.
Emma wasn't so sure about it at first...But after most of the kids left, she had a blast running across it and going down the slide.

Here she is admiring the balloons, as mentioned above:Time to refuel!Emma Sr. came over to help her fellow "Emma" celebrate.These two guys look like they are up to no good...Jackson was nice enough to let us borrow his rollercoaster, and the kids loved it!
Asher pushes the car with his mommy, while Nathan is deep in thought...Finally, it was time to open presents. As usual, Emma was so enthralled with the first couple of gifts that she was sort of oblivious to the fact that there were more!

The birthday girl holding court:
Those of you who remember last year's tearfest with the cake will be happy to know that Emma enjoyed her cake much more this year! And after all of the times Emma told me she wanted hats at her party, I completely forgot about them until the party was over! Oops!

What about the Topless Twos?

In an increasingly common show of independence, Emma decided that she did not want to wear a shirt last night. She squirmed and struggled to get her pj top off, but every time I tried to help, she screamed, "No, Mommy! Not help!" Once she finally worked her way out of it, she was happy as a clam, running around topless and giggling like mad.

At one point, she went over to the front door so that she could show the pumpkin (which is sitting just on the other side of the window) how to make a letter "i" in sign language -- it's the letter of the week at Sarah's house. This picture cracks me up:
The Terrible Twos are definitely here. She does NOT want help when she is having trouble, and she changes her decisions constantly. She'll say she wants to eat a certain food, and then after you get it ready, she says she doesn't want it anymore. If you ask her a yes or no question, she will sometimes actually answer, "Yes. No. Yes. No." But we are super-awesome parents and never get frustrated. I swear...

We ordered Emma's birthday cake this morning, and she was very bummed that we didn't actually get to take it home today. I have my doubts about the lady who wrote down our order on the ticket, so everyone cross your fingers that Emma's cake doesn't end up on the Cake Wrecks website! (Which, by the way, you should visit if you haven't yet. It's hilarious! Here's a link.)

Pumpkin picking

We stopped by the pumpkin patch again this morning to find it open for business, so Emma finally got her pumpkin. She watched it in the backseat of the car the whole way home, to make sure that it didn't tip over. Once we got home, we put it on the front porch and went into the house to look at it through the front windows. She's really excited about having one, but I don't think she has a clue that we are eventually going to cut it open, scoop out the insides, and carve a face on it...I think she'll be so giddy that she won't even know what to do with herself!
There were some little ponies at the pumpkin patch, so Emma got to pet them. It was her first time being close to anything other than a dog or cat, so I was impressed that she actually reached out and touched them.

Rain delay

Daddy took the day off today, so we decided to head over to our local pumpkin patch this morning and pick through this year's crop. Emma got all decked out in her Halloween gear and told the "squarecrow" in the front yard that we were going out to pick a pumpkin. Unfortunately, we learned upon arriving that they are only open from 4pm - 8pm on weekdays, so no one was there.

We set out to try again this evening before dinner, but apparently they aren't open when it's slightly raining either, so we struck out twice. Hopefully we'll have better luck tomorrow, when they are open all day, although we probably won't look quite as festive since Emma only has the one Halloween shirt!

We took a walk the other day so that Emma could go play with some little boys down the street, and she loved looking at all of the houses decorated with ghosts and pumpkins and spiders. She's got her "trick or treat" line down, and she's been working on making the best bumblebee "buzz" you've ever heard. Two more weeks until she gets to wear her costume, and just one more week until the big birthday party extravaganza!

Potty pro!

Well, somewhere between our last post and this one, Emma mastered the art of going to the potty! All of a sudden late last week, something clicked and she just got it. We've had very few accidents since, she can hold it during naps and long car rides, and we have been able to get rid of the monthly expense of diapers. Even Emma is doing what she can to help keep costs down in this time of economic crisis!

She's collected so many reward stickers from sitting on the potty that we had to expand to a second page. She studies carefully to find the perfect spot to stick each new sticker, and then she looks at the page and declares, "I wuv it!"

We decorated the house for fall last week. Maybe we will go out and take some pictures soon. Emma has to go out and say hi to the scarecrow every single day. We found some Halloween windsocks for $1, and she loves watching them blow in the tree out front. And every time we go through the front door, she points and says, "Pretty wreath!" Between Halloween and her birthday, I think fall just might be her favorite time of the year.

Breakfast of champions

A few weeks ago, we had a minor crisis on our hands. Emma all of a sudden decided that she no longer liked to eat waffles for breakfast. This was a huge problem for those mornings when she goes to Sarah's house because there's no time to sit at the kitchen table and spend 20 minutes eating a bowl of cereal...breakfast has to be road-friendly. We tried french toast sticks, which were a good substitute for one day, and then those were kicked to the curb as well. Lo and behold, we have found our new breakfast on the go -- pancakes! Thankfully, she likes to eat them plain and straight out of the microwave. One of the older girls at Sarah's house eats them every morning, so Emma feels like she is a big girl because she is eating pancakes too!

By the way, please note Emma's new Elmo shirt. She got to wear it for the first time today, and she was lovin' it. Heaven forbid you try and push up the sleeves for her if you think she might be hot. I was told this morning, "No, Mommy. Sleeves down." Yes ma'am.

We appear to have made a little bit of headway in potty training today. We started yesterday afternoon with real, big girl underwear...no pull ups except at night and naptime. Yesterday we went through I think 4 pairs in 4 hours. This morning, she was on her 3rd pair by 9:45am. I was ready to quit the whole thing and go back to diapers. And then, all of a sudden the planets aligned, and she started holding it until it was time to go on the potty (which is about every 20 minutes...it's not like she has to hold it for hours!). She only had one accident from noon until 7:30 tonight. Hopefully the trend will continue tomorrow. We don't mind taking her to the bathroom every 20-30 minutes, as long as we're not having to clean up wet pants and puddles on the floor in between!

We obviously make a big celebration when she sits on the potty and actually goes, so today, I threw my arms up and said, "YES!" when she peed one time. Well, usually, we do that kind of cheer when we are watching a football game. So Emma, sitting on the potty, threw her arms up in the air like me and said, "YESSS! TOUCHDOWN!" Now that's what we say when we have a successful trip to the potty. A bit silly, but it works!

Potty training update

Well, here we are at the start of Day 4 of potty training. Over the past 3 days, we've had our ups and downs, our joys and our disappointments, but overall, things seem to be heading in the right direction. We'll spare you the details. I can tell you this: our family has spent ALOT of quality time together in the bathroom over the past few days!

I'm a little weirded out by the idea of posting a picture of my kid sitting on the potty on here, so instead, here is Emma's sticker page. She gets a sticker every time she sits on the potty and an m&m every time she actually uses the potty. This was taken yesterday afternoon and doesn't include the ones she got while we were out on Saturday night. So as I said, you can see now that we have spent PLENTY of time in the bathroom this weekend!Speaking of the m&m's, Friday was her first time trying one, that I know of. She kept asking for more, and I had to give her the unfortunate news that she was only going to get more if she went pee pee on the potty. Every time she gets one, 30 seconds later she is saying, "I want more chwocate!" Don't we all, sweetheart?

Since we don't have any new pictures of Emma, here's one from a couple of weeks ago and a cute story to tide you over. Saturday evening, we went out to run some errands and eat dinner. Our first stop was to go to the bank and make a deposit. We must have told Emma at some point where we were headed because she informed us from the backseat, "We're going to the piggy bank!"

Congrats to Emma's buddy Jackson on becoming a big brother last week! Emma can't wait to go over and meet little miss Carley!

Many monkey jammies

Most of you already know that Emma is a big fan of monkeys. Just to demonstrate, now that it's getting a little cooler at night, we've been able to get into the nice warm jammies that were too big last spring. Yesterday, she was all excited to wear her flannel "monkey and manna" (banana) pj pants. Tonight, she got to put on the new monkey jammies that Grandma & Grandpa K gave her last weekend. She was thrilled! Don't know if you can read it, but it says "I'm not tired" on the little decal. As soon as I told Emma what it said, as she was already up past her bedtime, she ran around saying, "I'm not tired!"
Emma has been fascinated by watching herself on video clips from the digital camera. I took a few the other day, but I only have time to post one tonight. This is her doing her ABC's, although not her best rendition. You'll hear after G, she comes up and says, "I want to see it." I got her to finish, but you'll see that her ending gets her distracted sometimes. She always says, "Now I know my ABCsong, next time blah blah blah..." -- we can't figure out what the heck she is saying, but she gets stuck in a loop! Once you get her back on track, she can finish it out. But she is definitely starting to learn some songs!

Some of her other favorites are Wheels On The Bus and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. We'll have to see if we can catch one of those on video next time.

We had busy day of shopping this morning, where we picked up some things for Emma's birthday party and got her Halloween costume. She is so excited for both her birthday and Halloween...it's too cute. Tonight, we taught her what to say when you ring someone's doorbell on Halloween. After that, she kept shouting "Chicka treat! Chicka treat!"

The rest of our shopping today revolved around a big event taking place this weekend -- POTTY TRAINING. (Cue the dramatic music.) We're going to start on Friday, so keep us in your thoughts! We've been talking about the potty, and she's been practicing for a few weeks, but she has yet to actually do anything when she sits on it. She knows that in 2 more days, she is going to start using the big girl potty and wearing big girl underwear. So today she got to pick out her own big girl underwear (Minnie Mouse). I sure hope she catches on quickly because I have a feeling we won't be doing much else this weekend besides making trips to the bathroom!

And just when we thought it might be going away, the snarl makes another appearance:
She was actually really proud here and asked me to take her picture because she managed to fit all 8 crayons into the little cup all by herself!