Fun time at the zoo

Emily and I spent a few days in Birmingham to visit my sister and her 3 children. Emily called them SaySay (Sarah), Sa (Sam), and Saucer (Sawyer). We went to the zoo and had a great time. There is a section at the zoo where the kids can run around in the water sprinklers and I wondered what Emily was going to do when we got there . . . well . . . she had a ball! After running around the perimeter for a little bit and coming back to check in with me a few times, she got right in the middle of it and loved it. Here's our picture from our trip:

Here's Sarah and Sam riding a camel:

Here's the baby camel:

The tiger kept walking back and forth in front of the glass. He was very intimidating:

A baby giraffe had been born recently:

This turtle was huge!!!:

Here are the water pictures:

18 Months Old!

Emily is 18 months old today!!!

We went to a park this morning that has a duck pond. We had a great time feeding the ducks. They patiently waited their turn for their piece of bread . . . kinda : )



Check out this video of Emily feeding the ducks:

First visit to the GA Aquarium

Emily went to the GA Aquarium for the first time today! Joe had off work so we decided at 8:30 that we were going to go and were out the door at 9:30 to head that way . . . I was proud of us!!! We FINALLY turned Emily's car seat around so I took this picture of her chilling in the back seat with her sunglasses on on our way to the aquarium:

She kept saying "Fiiiii" for fish

I wanted to get a picture of Joe and Emily in the penguin tank but the picture didn't turn out . . . but Emily had fun waiting in line with Joe:

I don't remember alligators being here last time . . .are they new??? They were cool looking:

Bed Head again

Emily looks like she had a great nap yesterday! Here's what she looked like when she got up. As you can see she was still holding on to all of her pacifiers that she sleeps with : ) She looks like the little baby off of the Addams Family Values movie . . . (great movie by the way!)

Visiting Grandma

We hope everyone had a great 4th of July weekend! For the first time EVER Joe actually got a 3 day weekend when the rest of America celebrated a holiday! We wanted to post pictures of Emily's first trip to see fireworks but Joe spent the day in bed Friday with his head spinning from taking some pain pills for the first time for his back . . . lesson learned . . . don't take 2 pain pills the first time you try them : ) Once they left his system he was doing much better.

On Saturday we drove to Auburn to see Joe's mom. We had a great visit. Joe's brother was in town so Emily really enjoyed playing with her cousin Sidney. He showed her all his cool toys which she loved! Joe's sister and husband also stopped thru on their way home from the beach so we enjoyed lunch with them on Sunday.

Aside from being stuck in traffic on the way home Sunday and Emily having a meltdown in the car we had a great trip!

Helping in the kitchen . . .

. . . well not really . . . but Emily did enjoy putting these oven mits on while I was trying to clean up after dinner tonight. I was proud of her for getting them on all by herself!

Her bottom two teeth broke thru this week next to her 4 front teeth so she now has 18 teeth . . . all that's left to come in of her baby teeth are her 2 year molars!!!

I got excited the other day because Emily finally pointed to me in a picture and said, "mama" . . . she's been saying daddy for weeks and now finally mama!!! However, my excitement was a little deflated when she pointed to a picture of Christie Brinkley in my People Magazine the other day and said, mama . . . . I know I should be flattered . . . but hello . . . we don't look ANYTHING alike! So then I thought . . . well maybe she thinks all girl pictures are mama and all guy pictures are daddy . . . so I pointed to a picture of Tiger Woods and asked Emily who that was . . . and she said, "mama". Then I pointed to a dark haired man on the front of the Parents Magazine thinking she might say Daddy since he looked more like Joe . . . but she said "Mama" again in her sweet little voice. . .oh well!!!

Emily and Bud and more accomplishments . . .

I know this looks really gross but Emily loves sitting on Bud's pallet. Here they are hanging out together:



I also have to tell a really gross story . . . if you are squeamish then don't read this paragraph : ) Emily LOVES being outside to the point where I think we spend more of her waking hours outside than inside now. If we are inside she constantly follows me around saying "outside" over and over (but with a big southern drawl). Well the other day she was walking around in the yard as I was going thru the mail. I saw her walk towards me with something in her hand other than her normal sticks and leaves. She was bringing it to me . . . guess what it was!!!! It was Bud's poop . . . AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! I just about died. I had her throw it on the ground and we went inside and I washed her hands about 5 times and kept digging under all her fingernails in case some was in there . . . that is so gross!!!! My mom said, "at least she didn't put it in her mouth" . . . which is so true.

Her poor little knees are so scuffed up where she keeps falling on the driveway . . . but she gets up and keeps going. She has also figured out how to get in her chair herself so she spends most of her time now getting in and out of the chair. The second she finally gets turned around and sitting correctly she hops down to do it all over again.

She has been saying several new words as well instead of just grunting for what she wants . . . which I'm very pleased with! She says: milk, up, grapes, hon-bees (for honey bees snack), fiiii (for goldfish snack), doggie, phone, and she can say the sounds for these animals that we point out to her: pig, cow, duck, sheep, dog, cat, lion, snake, and elephant. She likes to point to our nose, eyes, teeth, mouth, ears, hair, hands, and toes and say each one. Bud hasn't figured out yet when she says "eyes" and sticks her fingers at him that he's supposed to close his eyes . . . she's poked his eyes a few times . . . he'll catch on eventually : ) She also said her own name for the first time last week: "Emy". It's so fun to hear her! She tries to say anything you ask her to which can be fun : ) She also loves to give us high fives. When it's time for bed she lays her head on my shoulder and rubs my arm and pats it . . . I guess because I rub and pat her back . . . it's so sweet!

She has also discovered her belly button after reading the belly button book over and over and now wants me to take off her shirt most of the time so she can see her belly button. She pulls on her shirt and says "off" and keeps looking down to try to find it . . . what a hoot!