The Emry Board: September 2012

2 years, 3 months and 5 days. That is how long it takes to raise a human being from an infant into a fully independent person. Emry has been wanting to do almost everything "all by self" lately, but on this particular day she didn't want to talk to mom and dad or answer any questions. She was totally engrossed in her world of play and mischief. Her world no longer revolved around mom and dad and the things we tried to say or do. Emry truly has developed her own likes, dislikes, interests and favorites. And on her 828th day of life, Emry ignored everything mom and dad tried to do with her the entire evening. We wondered if she was mad about something. We set the table for dinner and went in to get our bowls of soup from the kitchen. When we walked back into the dining room Emry was sitting in her chair, getting a cracker out of the box. She pointed to our places at the table and said "cracker for mommy, cracker for daddy." She had already put a cracker on each of our plates before she got one for herself...she hadn't forgotten about us after all! Its funny how one second she can have you completely frustrated, then one second later do the cutest thing that melts your heart. That story describes Emry in a nutshell at this point in her life...miss independent.

She looks like she's got something devious on her mind...

But how can you be mad at a face like that?

Besides being miss independent, Emry has been busy this month doing a lot of dancing and singing songs. Maren picked her up from daycare one day and found her dancing around the living room and singing "at Miss Laura's house..."(Miss Laura is what she calls the babysitter). She likes to make up her own words and just sing random things that she's doing - kind of like Marshall on How I Met Your Mother. Emry started singing her ABC's back in June, and now she has them pretty well mastered(QRS get left out on occasion, but those letters are overrated anyway).

She's a one-woman band

A lefty, just like mom and dad!

Hmm...maybe some more orange?

Emry can also count to 20 now. Her favorite book this month was "The Three Bears", although she still likes her peacock books and Curious George books a lot. Emry is gradually learning her colors. Its almost like she has a 3 color limit, where she can only accurately identify 3 colors at a given time. She knows orange and grey for sure. She's hit or miss on yellow and red. Often times she'll confuse purple and pink, blue and green, yellow and green, or white and brown. But she's getting better and better with them as the weeks go by.

Emry's favorite saying this month was "that's kinda crazy." She uses it all the time, like "Whitney take pants off! That's kinda crazy!" or "Mommy drop her fork, that's kinda crazy!" Apparently she heard her uncle say it one day and it just stuck in her head. So this is a warning for anyone who feels the need to curse if Emry is around...make sure you use the "earmuffs" technique!

Whitney got to go on her first camping trip in Sept. The girls both had a lot of fun. Emry showed Whitney how to throw sticks in the fire, eat s'mores and get really dirty. Whitney just watched and learned from the comfort of her stroller, but both girls seemed to enjoy spending the weekend outdoors

Helping build the fire

Just a couple more sticks should do the trick

Taking it all in

Fall is coming...time to bust out the cute hats!

"Whitney, I hope your taking notes"

Pinky up...the most refined way to eat a s'more.

You know its a good s'more when you get
chocolate all the way down to your shins.

Whitney is rolling all over the place, and its still her main mode of transportation. She is trying really hard to scoot. She can scoot backwards, just not forward. She'll probably be moving all over the place in just a couple of weeks.

Just chillin' under the coffee table

Practicing our earthquake preparedness plan

Yes, its a chick-fil-a ball...its not a social statement,
its just a ball, so relax people.

Whitney sat up for the first time early this month, and by the end of the month she was a pro at it...

Happiest baby in the whole wide room

Multitasking...sitting up and holding a ball.

"Hey look, no hands!"

Whitney had some "real food" for the first time this month. She had some homemade baby sweet potatoes and homemade baby peas. She seemed to enjoy them both, just need to work on our table manners....

Yum Yum!

Hmm, not sure what to think yet...

"Whit you got a little something...nevermind"

Apparently Whit was taking notes when Emry ate the s'more!

Whitney had to take some meds for the first time this month. Luckily it wasn't anything too serious, she just couldn't get rid of a cough and a runny nose. Whit also had two more teeth break through...the top two middle teeth are now visible!

Whitney has started making some phonetic sounds in addition to the normal baby-babble. On the last day of the month she kept saying da-da-da-da. She's just been a really happy baby!

Yep, happy!

Bath time makes her very happy

The girls interact more and more as the weeks go by. A couple of weeks ago Emry taught Whitney how to play baseball. She didn't cover the infield fly rule or the importance of hitting the cutoff man, but there's still plenty of time to learn all that...

In addition to coaching Whitney, Emry still shows her plenty of love, although she needs to learn to be a little more gentle...