Samantha: 15 Months, Week 4

This week was a nice shortened week for me because Monday was Labor Day and Friday I took off so we could head up to Chicago for Christy and Matt's wedding.

A few new developments this week are Samantha saying and signing "thank you."  She is continuing to be quite the little mimicker.  She is now moving on to trying to say two syllable words or two words strung together.  It used to be in the past when we tried to get her to sign thank you, she would just put her hand up to her mouth like she is blowing kisses.  Now, she will move her hand from her mouth down, and she'll even try to say the words in her own little way.

The next thing Samantha has been doing is wanting to sit on our laps to read stories.  I think Ben put it best in a post he put on Facebook:  "Samantha has never been much of a cuddler.  The world is too interesting, and there are too many things to go play with.  Lately, however, Jenny and I have been experiencing cuddle time with Samantha.  She really enjoys having books read to her.  She will pick out a book, walk over to us, turn around and shuffle back until she sits on our lap.  It is incredibly adorable, especially for a non-cuddler like her."

Samantha enjoys climbing these days, climbing up and down on the couch, climbing on chairs, or, as you can see in this picture, taking everything out of her toy basket and climbing into the basket.

Samantha loves bath time, she always has ever since she was newborn.  Now, when we ask her if she wants to take a bath, she will smile from ear to ear, head for the stairs, climb up, and go straight into the bathroom.  One of her favorite things to do in the bathtub is to lay down like this with her ears in the water.  I don't know if it's because she likes to hear the sounds through the water or what, but she especially likes to kick her legs up and down and splash us!

Samantha has been enjoying playing with Ainsley during the day.  Oftentimes when Ben drops her off, she will play hesitantly, then after a few minutes, she will turn to Ben and say "bye bye."  He takes that as his cue to leave.  Samantha got to spend some time playing with Thomas and Elijah on Thursday this week.  She was very excited about seeing Thomas and being able to play with cars and trains again.  She fit right into their schedule again, played hard and napped well, just like her time being watched there last year.

Then, on Friday we left for the wedding weekend in Chicago.  We stayed with some good friends who have two little girls, one preschooler and one in fourth grade.  They have a finished basement with a very comfortable pull-out couch and full bathroom.  We were very comfortable and so grateful that they opened their home to us.  

Friday night there was a rehearsal and rehearsal dinner at Lilacia Park, the park where my sister, Christy, and her fiance, Matt, are getting married.  A cold front came through this day, so it was a bit windy and chilly that night, but things went well and the park area where they were to be married was beautiful.  The weather was going to cooperate with our outdoor wedding plans, so that was a relief.  After the rehearsak, we had some pizza and then went back to the house to put our little girl to sleep.  She attempted to take her afternoon nap in the car, which hasn't gone as well lately, so she didn't sleep nearly as long as she should have.  Plus, we knew a busy day was ahead of us on Saturday.

Saturday morning I had to be up early to go get my hair done with Christy, so Ben was on Samantha duty all day.  We wanted to try and get her to take a nap in the morning, since the wedding started at 1 p.m., right when Samantha normally takes her nap.  She did sleep for a little while, which was extremely helpful in her making it through the wedding and reception without getting too grumpy.  It was a beautiful day; there wasn't a cloud in the sky.  Samantha had a blast walking around the park and playing.  She even got to be a flower girl in the wedding.  The two other little flower girls (the ones we were staying with), walked on either side of Samantha, holding her hand, and walking all the way down the aisle with her.  They all did a great job, and it was so fun watching Samantha from the front.  She even wore a pretty flower in her hair just like the other flower girls.  Daddy then got her and took her away to walk around in the back during the ceremony.  It was wonderful seeing extended family members and getting to know Christy's other bridesmaids, but it was most wonderful to see my little sister get married, looking beautiful in her wedding dress.  Here are some pictures for the wedding.  I hope to post more in the future once I get some from other family members that were there.  

Samantha: 15 Months, Week 3

Samantha is a very active little girl, just like a toddler should be.  Lately, she has taken to doing laps around the house after dinnertime.  We have a couple of push toys, one in particular is a car that plays music as you push it around, and that seems to be her favorite right now.

We love to play with her in the evenings when we both get home from work.  It's amazing, however much stress you have during the day, when you get around your little girl, everything melts away and nothing is as important in the light of spending time with your family.

Another development of this week is Samantha learning the word "no".  Now she says it quite often.  She doesn't really know what it means yet, she just says it, mostly not in response to anything, but oh, it's just the beginning!  Yay toddlerhood!  Samantha has been pretty easygoing so far and doesn't really have "temper tantrums" yet, and to be honest with you, Ben and I really aren't looking forward to that stage.

Samantha has also learned how to dance and whenever she hears music, she moves her feet and wiggles her body.  One time we went to Best Buy to look at laptop computers, and Samantha walked around until she found the TV that was playing music.  She then stood in front of the TV on the little mat and danced around to the music.  She was so cute.  Well, later in the week, we tried to capture it on camera.  Isn't she adorable?

Samantha loves to spin around and to be spun around by us.  She will hold her hand up in the air and spin around in circles.  (Sorry the video is sideways.  That's how I recorded it, and I'm not sure how to rotate it.  You'll have to turn your head sideways.)

This weekend, on Friday we had a get together with our old small group at Bryan Park to meet up and catch up after our long summer break.  It was good for the kids to see each other again, and we had great weather.  Samantha loves playing on the playground, except she's at the point where she want to climb around on all the play equipment, but can't quite do it unsupervised yet.  Samantha was pretty tired this evening, and she tends to overreact more when she's tired.  She was climbing in a yellow tube when a boy at the other end yelled very loudly at his friend.  Well, this must have startled Samantha because she started crying very loud, and I actually had to take her off the playground for awhile to calm her down before she could play again.  Then, there was one time Samantha crawled through the yellow tube from one side of the playground to the other, so I had to climb down and meet her on the other side.  However, by the time I got over there, she was standing at the top of the slide about ready to plunge over the side walking!  I told her no and pulled her back from the edge of the slide.  Samantha is very sensitive, and immediately started crying because of being corrected.  It will be interesting to see if her sensitivity to correction continues as she grows up.  In some ways it would be nice if it did because then I don't think we will have to do much discipline with her.  Just give her a sideways glance and she'll melt to pieces!

On Saturday my parents came down for a visit.  They got here while Samantha was taking a nap and left on Monday afternoon since it was Labor Day.  Unfortunately, it was a rather rainy weekend so we weren't able to go out and do anything, but we had a fun time playing together and interacting with Samantha.  Samantha loves her grandparents.  On Sunday we put her in a cute new (hand me down) dress and took some pictures of her playing with Grandpa and Grandma before we went out to dinner at Mother Bear's Pizza.

Here is Grandma reading Samantha a book.  It's a soft book that came with a teddy bear (you can see the bear in the above picture).  The bear has a button you can push and he will recite the prayer, "Now I lay me down to sleep.  I pray the Lord my soul to keep.  May angels watch me through the night, and wake me with the morning light.  Amen."  She really likes the bear, but especially likes us to read the book to her.

Here is Grandpa showing Samantha the pictures he took of her on his camera.  She's s a pretty big fan of her Grandpa.  He's very good with her.

Ben and I go back and forth on how many kids we might want to have.  I've always thought a family of four sounded good.  Ben is more in the two to three range.  However, we've made several comments to each other lately that if all our kids turn out like Samantha, with her sweet personality and laid back demeanor, maybe we will have four or five!

Samantha: 15 Months, Week 2

This week started with having some friends over to our house while their parents went to a preschool meeting.  Elam and Jude came over on Monday night while Ben was at class.  We played inside for awhile, then went to play down at the swings and climbing gym, before coming back to the house.  When Samantha saw Elam and Jude inside, she looked at me with this smirk on her face, almost like she was thinking, "Did they come to play with me?  Great!"  But then, she just stands back and observes for awhile.  The boys starting playing right away, and Samantha just watched them for quite some time before joining in and playing herself.  The kids had a great time going on the swings and running around in the sand on the defunct volleyball court.  Samantha is definitely in the mimicking stage, so she loves to watch other kids and try to copy their actions and words.  Here are some pictures from our evening play session.

Samantha is blowing kisses in this picture.

What a sweet smile on a sweet little girl!

The rest of the week was just keeping our heads above water with school and preparing for Christy and Matt's wedding shower in Chicago this weekend.  I took a half day off on Friday so that we could travel up to Chicago during Samantha's nap time.  We stayed with my Uncle Bob and Aunt Diane in McHenry since that's where we were having the shower on Sunday.  We met my family for dinner on Friday night.  On Saturday we played at the park and my cousin Brian and his children Camryn and Logan came over for the afternoon and evening.  It was cute to see Samantha with Cami particularly.  Cami played with Samantha and took her around places, giving her different toys to play with and even trying to play hide and seek with her!

Here are Logan and Samantha climbing the hill in the backyard. 

Samantha LOVES looking at flowers, whether in the ground or in planters.

You can't tell too much from this picture, but Samantha will scrunch up her nose and smell things, almost like they are stinky.  She mostly does it with her socks, but in this picture she was smelling some grass, making her "stinky" face, and I tried to capture it on camera.

Here are the three afternoon playmates posing on the hill for a picture.  I think it's so adorable how Samantha has her hand resting on Cami's leg.  They really bonded today! 

On Sunday, Samantha woke up very tired, so we actually ended up laying her down for a morning nap before the shower started at 11:00 because we knew she wasn't going to make it through the shower happily if she didn't get some rest.  The shower went well, and there were so many kids there, that Samantha had plenty of activity to entertain herself.

Here are the cakes I made for the wedding shower.  They turned out pretty well.

After the shower was over, we headed out pretty quickly since we had a five hour drive ahead of us.  Samantha only slept about an hour in the car, so that was rough, but after stopping for some dinner and a walking break, she did pretty well the rest of the way in the car.  As long as I kept the toys and books coming and interacted with her constantly, she was a happy camper.  It was a long, busy weekend, and we were glad to get back home, even though it was fairly late at night, right at Samantha's bed time.  I wanted to share a funny story about when we got back Sunday night.  We were putting some things away in Samantha's room and getting her ready for bed.  Then, she grabbed her blankie and the nursing pillow and walked toward the rocking chair, very clearly showing me that she was ready for me to nurse her and put her to bed!  What an adorable little girl we have!