Friday, August 31, 2012

Baby Steps

Grace is walking now!  I've attached a video of course, but these aren't her first steps, nowhere close.  She has actually been walking for a little while, but we've had trouble catching it on camera.  Every time I get out the camera, she drops to her knees so she can get over to me quickly, because she LOVES watching herself on video!  She has been taking one or two tiny steps for over a month now, but on August 24th she finally took 5 big steps, right in front of both Mom and Dad.  Ever since then, it has been a mission to capture the elusive walking on video.  Every day, she gets a little bolder.  Finally, some proof for the blog!  


Thursday, August 30, 2012

Fourth of July Parade

On the Fourth of July, we were staying at my parent's house at the beach.  Their town has an annual parade.


Grace's first parade!  


Grace took it all in thoughtfully.  


The parade mostly consisted of sparsely decorated midlife crisis convertibles and families riding bikes.  This is one of the few floats we saw.  It is a vehicle masquerading as an aquarium, I guess?


What is a parade without a band?  This one had a lady "playing" a recorder and a man banging on a bowl with a wooden spoon.  Retired hippies I'm guessing?


I'm not sure how this lady's black angel bug face costume is patriotic, but she was giving away free balloons so that was cool.


I'm not sure if there were more people in the parade or watching the parade, but it was a charming small town tradition!

Monday, August 27, 2012

Clamming 2012

Last time we visited my parents, my Dad took us clamming.  It was such a neat experience and I wanted to go again!  So we did.


Then of course we enjoyed the clams on the barbecue.  We put some on the barbecue just as is, and that was quite wonderful.  After cleaning, soaking, peeling, pounding and chopping the necks, we also had tasty clam steaks to devour. 


We had plenty for a massive batch of clam chowder as well! 

Friday, August 24, 2012

Kitty Snuggles

It finally happened.  Tosca let Grace snuggle her!  It is like a big, warm stuffed animal.  


Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Going to the Park

We went to a park one day while visiting Jason's brother's family.  


Grace experienced swings for the first time and she really enjoyed it!  For a short time.  


Grace also played in a sandbox for the first time.  The brothers observed the play.


I think you can see that she was loving that!  


She took her role as ship Captain very seriously.  


This is my 201st posting.  Congratulations to me that I have so many good things to share!

Sunday, August 19, 2012

Hugging Cousins

Hello all!  I'm slowly going through all of our summer trip photos, of which there are MANY.  I especially have a ton from our visit with Jason's brother's family.  The cousins were so adorable together!   


This is one of my favorites.  Sophia is showing off her stuffed kitty to Grace.  Ella made it her mission to hug Grace as many times as possible.  Grace tolerated it most of the time.


These two are only 9 months apart and seemed to hit it off really well.  It was such a blast watching the three cousins play together!  I think it is safe to say that meeting her cousins was Grace's favorite part of the vacation.  She loves to hang out with other children.


Jason went on a downhill mountain bike ride with his brother that resulted in some nasty flesh wounds, but luckily no broken bones.  Other than that, it was a pretty low key visit.  We ate a lot of good food, went for walks, but mostly just played with the girls.  It was a very enjoyable time.


Well, most of the time!



*Jason was being silly and just pretending to be distressed in this picture.  There is no way that 3 screaming girls would shake his rock solid nerves.*

Monday, August 13, 2012

A Little Reorganizing

I don't think you all would want to miss out on this cuteness.  She does this whole body hug that I love!


This is a video of her reorganizing her changing table.  It isn't the most exciting video we've ever done, but watching her put something AWAY is worth it to me!  I love how she announces she is "done" after putting each diaper on the shelf.  I think this is her most recently acquired word.  


Wednesday, August 8, 2012

A Ray of Sunshine

We have been super sick this week.  We had fevers and much worse, we won't get into it.  First Grace came down with it on Saturday, then I was sick on Monday, and now Jason is sick on Wednesday.  Grace is feeling better, thankfully, and she has been our ray of sunshine as we wallow in our nauseous pain.  


Earlier today she systematically picked up all her stuffed animals and snuggled them one by one.  I think she shares a love of stuffed animals with her Aunt Sam!  This is her very favorite, and we just call her Kitty.  The tail is always gross from her chewing on it.  


She was so sweet while we were sick.  When I was sick, I was lying on the floor with her because I couldn't do much else, and she put her head on my belly to comfort me.  She was also on her best behavior while Jason was on baby duty this afternoon and I was at work.  She has been getting more affectionate; she hugs all the time and if she kisses one of us, she leans over to kiss the other to make it even apparently!  


She really is the sweetest baby ever!  We are so lucky.  

Friday, August 3, 2012

One Year Old!

Jason's mother's new husband Michael is an excellent photographer and just sent me the pictures he took at Grace's first birthday party!  


Totally excited about birthday cake!


Hooray for birthday cake!


My high school friend Karen came with her daughter Roslyn.  She along with our nieces Sophia and Ella were highly entertaining!


My Uncle Steve and Aunt Christi gave us booze and a sippy cup, which I was obviously very excited about!


She looked super adorable in this little white dress before she smeared cake all over it.


My parents worked hard to put the party on.  The food was really fantastic!


Thank you so much to Michael for taking these pictures!  We were all so busy entertaining and socializing that we didn't have time to take our own.  Plus I'm in a lot of them, which is not usually the case!  Some people met Grace for the first time and some people traveled many miles.  Thank you to everyone who helped make it the special day I envisioned for our baby girl.  The party was a big success and we all had great fun!  

Thursday, August 2, 2012

Utilizing Utensils

Grace loves using a fork!  She hasn't figured out how to get the food on the fork herself, but she enjoys it when we load it up for her.  She does especially well with food that sticks to the fork such as this Dirty Rice and Beans recipe.