Sing Along With Elmo

Grace usually watches about 20 minutes of tv a day. She really is not very interested in it. She IS interested in Elmo, so she usually watches Elmo's world in the morning or watches Elmo video's on You Tube at Mrs. Terri's office. These videos are from before Halloween. Sometimes she sings every word and other times she just sits completely still and is entranced by the Elmo wonder :) She is so funny!

Hop, Skip, Jump, Dance

I thought about uploading all the videos from the last couple of months to the computer tonight. I still might do it, but first I need to catch up on posting some that I have neglected. Here is a funny little video of Grace hopping and skipping and jumping and dancing one morning after we got home from the store. She is so much bigger now even though this video is only from a couple of months ago!

18 Months Old

Tomorrow, my sweet little Grace Elizabeth, you will be 18 months old. I can't believe it has been a whole year and a half already! I really can't believe how wonderful it has been or how much you have grown already! Here are a few things that I don't want to forget about you now that you are 18 months old....

• You talk talk talk talk all the time!
• At times you repeat every single word that comes out of my mouth!
• Most of the time you leave off the beginning sound of every word.
• You love cookies and whenever you see one you say "ookie? ookie? ookie?". Your favorite cookies are the plain sugar cookies that we get when we walk down to the bakery. On days when we have to go to the bank we stop by the bakery first and get you a cookie to eat while I wait in line at the bank.
• You still love to sit on the counter top and help me cook. When I step foot in the kitchen you are right there saying "elp you? elp you?".
• One of the sweetest things you do in the morning is help me unload the dishwasher. You hand me each piece of silverware and then each plate from the bottom drawer and say "sans-you" (thank you) as you hand each to me. I have to work very hard to keep up with your quick pace, but I enjoy your help!
• When it is time to put the dirty dishes in you now know how to stay back from the dishwasher. You say "dirty, dirty" and "back, back" and you try so hard not to touch the dishes, but sometimes it is just too much temptation for you.
• You also say "hot, hot" "back, back" every time you go near the stove. I am thankful for this.
• In the morning you go to computer and say "usic" (music) and "ing" (sing) to tell me you want to put on our cooking music.
• You prefer juice "uice" but will drink your milk if it is what I give you.
• You really like sprite and tea, but have only had them a few times.
• You will eat meat now! Up till now you have eaten just about anything but meat.
• We usually get BBQ on Sundays after church, and you always eat the macaroni and cheese. You say "eese peese" (cheese please!)
• You also love cake! You call it "bake". We have books with pictures of cupcakes in them and when you see the pictures you say "bake! bake! bake!" till I say "yes, grace, that is a cupcake."

• You are still a very happy kiddo.
• You used to be very very shy and not want to be around anyone but mommy when you were a baby, but now you will talk to everyone and go to most people! Sometimes you don't realize that not EVERYONE wants to talk to you and be entertained by you. You like to be the center of attention.
• You say "ello" (hello) or "hi" or "bye" or "bye bye" to most people that you see... especially in walmart. I am always surprised at how many people don't talk back to you. Sometimes when people do actually respond you get shy and won't talk. But once they leave you continue the conversation.
• You love our college friends.
• Meggie babysits you most times when daddy and I go on dates.
• You always have fun with the girls and then enjoy practicing their names when we are not around them. You have been looking for Babbs for days now, but she is busy studying for finals.
• One of your (and my) favorite times of the day is when we go visit Mrs. Terri (Owie) in her office at the BCM. She is very sweet to you and lets you sit in her lap and play in her desk and watch Elmo on her computer.
• Every day you ask "Emo own?" (is elmo on?) Some days he is and some days he isn't depending on if you watched sesame street that morning.
• You also like to wander into Mitch's office and get into things. You really like to look out his front window and play with the little water gun that is always lying there.
• You also like to pretend to drink out of all the BCM water bottles in mrs. terri's office.
• The past few days you have gotten in trouble because you want to take more than one sheet of paper to color "uh-ler" on. I know you will learn to take less soon.
• I think Mrs. Terri really enjoys your visits, and I am very thankful for this.

• You like church!
• You did not like church till you got to know Mrs. Janet and Mrs. Rosemary. They keep you most every week in the nursery and they love on you there.
• Mrs. Janet called daddy the other week to let him know that you were singing they hymns in big church! She said (in a very southern accent) that that was the most precocious thing that she had ever seen! I agree that precocious might be a good way to describe you.
• You can try to say anything you want.
• You can count to 10 all by yourself. Sometimes you do get stuck on the number seven and I have to help you remember what's next. You say "ive, ix, even, even, even". Eight used to be your favorite number, but I guess now it's seven!
• You can also sing your ABC's.
• You really really love to sing (ing) and read books (eed ooks).
• You can sing more songs than I can think of, but currently some of your favorites are ... Praise Him Praise Him (aise im - aise im), Special Special (esial esial), Jesus Loves Me (you call it "is I know" or bible ell me oh"), This is My Father's World ("ahdders-urld"), jingle bells, and Elmo had 4 Ducks.
• Some of you most favorite books are... The Ladybug book (bugs), The rainbow book (ainbow), Your nursery rhyme books (your favorites are the 3 little kittens and humpty dumpty (umpy dumpy :), going on a bear hunt (you LOVE to say the part "OH NO!". it is just about the cutest thing I have ever heard), Good night moon, Down by the bay (you sing down by the "baaaaay" and where the watermelons "oooow" back to my "ooooome" I dare not "ooooh!"), and any book with animals or counting or abc's.
• You have also been doing a great job learning your first Bible verses. We learn one a week and put them on a big sheet of paper on the kitchen table and then go over them at every meal. Your first verse was "I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Psalm 139:14". One day at the bakery you started saying "I praise you! I praise you!" This is how I know you are learning even though you can't say the whole verse yet... i mean you are only just now 18 months old.

• I have never spent a night away from you.
• I could not have ever imagined how that could be 18 months ago.
• I rock you every night, and it is my favorite part of the day. We read a book, say prayers, turn on your fan, I wrap you in your "anket" (blanket), give you your favorite orange paci and I hum to you and rock you until you get sleepy.
• I always pray for you at this time.
• Your favorite song for me to hum is the overture to "Little Women". You calm right down and snuggle your head into my chest and we both relax and enjoy our time together.
• You usually won't go to sleep until I lay you down in your crib. You roll over onto your side or tummy, still wrapped tight, and go to sleep. Later I come into your room and cover you up with a heavier blanket.
• I can not imagine a sweeter time in my life than these days I get to spend with you and our little family. What a blessing you are!

Pumpkins and Chickens

It is December and I have not posted about our fun pumpkin carving yet! How could I have forgotten this! I realized when we went to Chick-fil-a today for our traditional "it's a fun seasonal family event so lets go eat at chick-fil-a after whatever we are doing and get ice cream" and I realized that the last time we went to chick-fil-a was the afternoon that we picked out our family pumpkin at Halloween! So here is your belated pumpkin post!

After we chose our pumpkin at the patch we participated in the BCM pumpkin carving contest that night. The winner was based on how much money was given to the pumpkin. All of the funds raised went to our summer missions goal! I think our pumpkin came in 2nd place! Something tells me that people may have just voted for it because it was Grace's :)

Grace dipped her french fries in bbq sauce ALL BY HERSELF for the first (and last till she gets a little older) time!!!

Mmmmmm :) She also enjoyed her favorite desert other than cookies ice cream or "eam" as she says.

At the pumpkin patch she went for the unique white pumpkin first off.

She looked at each pumpkin, exclaimed "OH, WOW!", tried to pick the pumpkin up and then moved on to the next pumpkin and did the same thing. It was absolutely hilarious!

She had to stop and say "Hi, Baby!" and wave to each scarecrow. We had to teach her that it was called a scarecrow and not Baby. Now she says "air-cowe".

She got so excited when she saw the little ones that she RAN through them and stepped on most of them before I grabbed her. Then she just wanted to pick them ALL up.

She wasn't quite so happy about having to sit still to get a picture.

At home with all of her "unkins". We learned about small, medium and large and counting to 3. I don't think she understood the size thing, and she would only count to 10 not just 3! We had a great time and made great memories!

Next to come... our Christmas decorating fun... Hopefully before February :)

You Are REALLY Welcome

I feel it my duty to share wonderful online deals I find with you all. This one came via Lindsey and I thought I would pass on the incredible news.

Go on over to http://www.remembernguyen.com/ to get 50% off of all merchandise (including 50% off the clearance items... taken off after you put the items in your cart). Please don't pass up this awesome sale! The company is based out of Bogalusa, too, so you will be supporting a home state business :)

Me and My Shadow and More

Happy Thanksgiving!

We let Grace run around on campus after church a couple of Sundays ago, and I took a lot of pictures. Here are several of them.

"Daddy!"

She found leaves and grass.

Many times Grace leaves of the first sound of the word she is trying to say. For instance leaves are pronounced "eaves". In the above picture she is running through the yard screaming the word grass over and over but leaving off the gr sound at the beginning of the word :)

I think this is the cutest shadow ever... especially with the pigtails.

Grace's Shadow... "Acies Ah-doo"

Got to take a rest.

She really likes to dance on the storm drains.

Peekaboo... "Pee-Boo"

Hello!..."ello!"

Grace and her Daddy :)

Oh, your so funny.

"OOOH, WOOOOOW!"... to the fountain.

Getting tired.

What's up, Mommy?

She's got her juice... "uice"... and is all ready to go some more.

The Great Search for the Eea-at

We have been spending at least an hour or two outside every day here lately since it's been so beautiful. A lot of afternoons Grace will take Baby on a walk to the front yard. On this particular afternoon things started out as usual...

"Come on, Baby. Let's get going!"


"Ooh! The front porch is such a good place to watch things happen. What do you see, Baby?"


"OOOOH, WOOOOOW!!!!"
(yes, grace does say this about 100x a day)


"It's a Eea-at!!!" (that's kitty cat for all of those who don't speak Grace language yet)


"Eea-at! Where are you? Come here please!"


"I hear a doogie (doggy) but no eea-at?!?"


"Come on, Baby, let's find that eea-at! Maybe he is around the side of the house."


"Oh well, I guess he went home to his mommy."


After two long weeks of looking every single time we went outside and only brief glimpses of our furry friend at long last we found his brother, Eea-at :)

Where is that Grace Girl?

Fun With Family

Last month we were so glad to have visits from both Jonathan's family and my family!

At the beginning of the month Granny, Papa and Uncle Andrew came. Uncle Andrew had a whole month off from medical school and was able to visit all his nieces and nephews during the break. I think Grace really enjoyed hanging out with Uncle Andrew since she hasn't gotten to spend much time with him before.

We went to our church's fall festival, and Uncle Andrew walked around with Grace and showed her everything.

Grace, Papa and I rode the hayride!

Grace and Papa read books. Grace LOVES to read books. It was nice for me to have a break from reading for a weekend :)

Grace and "annie"... they love each other.

We let Grace run around at the fountain.

And of course we had to walk downtown for some Pig in a Pit and Ice Cream... "Nummy! Nummy!" as Grace would say.

I slacked a little bit on the picture taking when my folks were here, but I did get these two GREAT pictures of Grace with Nana and Paw Paw. We are spending Christmas in Arkansas this year, so there will be many more opportunities to get pictures with the Milfords.

We had a blast with my family while they were there though. MA came a couple of days early and was our babysitter so Jonathan and I could go on a date for my birthday. Then we had a little birthday party with 2 cakes! Jonathan got me one and my parents brought one too! We did a lot of eating out (you know the Milfords) and a lot of football watching and relaxing and playing with the baby. Dad even cooked us a whole weeks worth of food... jumbalaya and an entire ham. I did not have to buy many groceries at all this week, and I have barely had to cook anything! Talk about a great birthday gift... you can come watch my kid and cook my meals any day of the week :)

It's always super hard to have our family go home (Grace is still asking for MA every single time she wakes up), but we know we will see them again in the not too distant future!