Octopus

All summer Elise has been learning about the ocean at daycare and last week they talked about Octopi and made hats with eight arms - she wore it long enough for me to get this shot.

More Late Summer Fun

Elise has been enjoying the playground at the Weymouth library as well as the toy kitchen inside the library.

A Little More Cuteness

Not sure I am up for the challenge but I would love to try a couple of these out for Elise and see if decorating her food like this would encourage her to eat her vegitables. Leave it to the Japanese to come up with this kind of cuteness and Cuteoverload.com to find it and share.

Cuteness News

I'm in love with these teapots! I first saw them in May in Los Angeles at the Hammer Museum gift shop and then there was a link to them on lamadesigns.com. The arms are great and I love they come with their own amazing tea cozy. The artist is from Argentina and makes the cutest kitchenware.

In other cuteness news, Elise is doing great. We had a low-key weekend but enjoyed exploring Bare Cove Park in Hingham on Saturday along with most of the blond and chocolate labs in Hingham, who were having a great time swimming. Just within the past two weeks Elise has started playing pretend, which is amazingly cute - she makes us dinner and cookies and gives the kitty treats, especially when we are sitting out on the balcony. She has also started to give us hugs and kisses, which is new to us as in the past she would just turn her head away from us when we asked. She loves sleeping in her big bed, but keeping her there in the morning is a challenge as she is still waking so early. She is doing great with her words and is stringing sentences along pretty well, at least we can understand her. She even answered questions from her grandma on the phone the other day, which is a change from the running away from the phone. Our bedtime routine now includes reading stories AND singing songs and I must say my repertoire is limited, but she likes Winnie the Pooh and She'll be Coming Around the Mountain, and any songs I can remember from Sesame Street. Oh and the biggest news is that the binkies have gone away. She had just been using them at bedtime, but we decided they needed to go away since she was chewing them and we didn't want them to become a choking hazard. Aside from a meltdown episode on Saturday, for which there didn't seem to be a trigger, she has not had them in over a week and while she asks after them, it doesn't really seem to bother her that they aren't there. We'll see if that changes.

Late Summer Fun

Kurt and Elise throwing stones into the water at Bare Cove Park in Hingham. This has quickly become one of her favorite activities.

Happy Golden Anniversary

It was Bill and Louise's 50th anniversary and we had a family dinner at Bob and Erika's to celebrate. Poor Sue and Erika spent countless hours putting together a memory book as a gift, which included notes and pictures from friends and family over the years. They seemed delighted by it. Elise managed a great nap after doing some swimming and eating an early lunch.

Old Sturbridge Village

Elise joined her cousins, Nanny and Grandpa, and Kurt on an outing to Old Sturbridge Village. I was working so can't effectively comment on the action in the pictures, but heard it was a fun day, other than Elise not wanting to walk or ride in a stroller (e.g. "Daddy Carry" "Daddy Carry"). She liked playing the Graces with the hoop and stick and seeing all of the funny animals. Elise also liked hangning out with cousin Julia, who we don't get to see very often.

Birthday Party!

Our little friend, Emerson turned ONE today (congratulations!) and we were invited to her party (thanks Meredith and Cody!) and had a great time, we can't wait to see how much she changes in the coming year. I was happy about how her card turned out, so I am including a picture here.

Whose potty?

Well at least Elise isn't scared of her potty, she just doesn't want to use it (yet!), instead her gold teddy bear is now transitioning out of his diapers and using the potty. Cute, but not exactly our goal. Oh well, no hurry at least she knows what it is and she loves watching both the Elmo Pottytime DVD and Bear in the Big Blue House Potty video, so we are on the right track.

Visiting friends

We had a great visit with the Brewers on Sunday down at the Cape. Here is Elise with Megan and Lynn on our short walk near a pond in Dennisport.

Playground Fun

We had a nice outing at the playground on Saturday, though Elise was being shy and decided not to go down the slide.

Our Little Toddler(s)

It looks like Elise has transitioned out of her crib and Hiro has transitioned into it. Last week Elise took a nap on her "big" bed and then last Friday night she slept in it all night. Kurt and I were expecting her to have a rough night, but she slept straight through and has been sleeping in it every night since. The going to bed part has been rough (and late) but she is doing better, now if we can just keep her from waking before six and coming in our room with her books for me to read. It is adorable, but I miss my extra 40 minutes of sleep in the morning. I have to say that so far I am glad we didn't invest in a toddler bed as she seems to like the twin trundle bed from our day bed just fine. We're not in a rush to dismantle the crib, but it will be nice to re-arrange her room again once we do.