Our Happy Kiddo

I've been rather lax at updating the blog lately. I'm working on trying to be more consistant about uploading pictures and information.

Read at the bottom of this post for an update on Taeya. It's mostly for me to remember these days but you can read it if you'd like.

Want some corn Mama?
Taeya LOVES going to the park...any park. Whenever we drive past a park that Taeya sees, she starts laughing, pointing and saying "park!"

Sliding with Daddy.

My what big feet you have!!

Running into church a few Sunday's ago.

One of Taeya's favorite styles...multiple headbands.

Why so happy? We're at the park of course!

Here we were playing in the leaves outside the Doctor's office.

What a very sweet girl we have.

Taeya has been growing so much lately. Friends keep commenting at how big she's getting. Her language is developing everday although she is still a very quiet little girl. She doesn't talk a lot unless she wants something but when she does want something, Taeya will usually repeat whatever she's trying to say until she gets the response she's hoping for. Some of the things she can say are: Mama, Daddy, Cereal, More of dis (this), No, es (yes), cookie, cracker, mik (milk), yes eas (yes please), ruff ruff (what a dog says), Moo, baa, meow, bankie (blanket), bunny. There are many other words in her vocabulary and she understands much of what I say to her.

Taeya LOVES her sleep! She generally goes to bed between 7 and 8 pm. When she starts getting tired, she sucks on her two first fingers on her right hand and often covers her right hand with her left. If she gets ahold of one of her many "bankies" she tends to immediately put her fingers in her mouth. Taeya goes to bed so easily at night. She doesn't enjoy getting her jammies or diaper on but once they're on, she snuggles with me for a minute, I lay her on her bed and she puts her fingers in her mouth and is ready to sleep. I generally pray with her and turn her music on then shut off the lights and leave the room. We transitioned her from her crib to her open-sided bed on Oct. 31, 2009. I told her to stay in bed and when I went to get her up from her nap, she was still in bed. She's done extremely well in her new sleeping arrangement. She almost always stays in bed for both naptime and bedtime. Occassionally, she'll get up to get a toy but then returns to her bed. I always check on her before I go to bed at night and a few times I've found her on the floor. I'm not sure if she's fallen out of bed or if she climbed out. A few mornings or after naptime, I sometimes find her with all of her bedding stripped off the bed and placed on the floor by the door. She definitely has a Type A personality. She will pull off every blanket and stuffed animal and put them just where she wants them to go.

Speaking of her type A personality, she always closes doors or drawers if they've been left open. She likes everything to be very orderly (except her toys!). She leaves her toys spread out all over the place. Taeya loves to climb. She climbs on everything she's able to. She's a little monkey just like her mommy was when she was little. I love my sweet little girl and her sweet little personality. Everyday is special with my Taeya and I love seeing her grow and change little by little every day. In just under a month, my baby will be two. I can't believe that we've already had nearly two sweet years together.

The Zoo

In mid-October, we headed out to Denver to take Taeya to the Zoo. She enjoyed seeing many of the animals that she often sees in her books. While we were there we were able to stay with our friends, Derek and Amanda, and also visit Brian, Keturah and Bella. We had a wonderful trip and I can't wait until we're able to do it again someday!

(The pictures are pretty-much in backwords order but it doesn't really matter much.)

Daddy and Taeya enjoyed watching the chefs making Crepes at the crepe place we went to. It was oh so yummy! Us with our friends, Derek, Amanda and soon-to-arrive Baby. (Amanda's due at the beginning of December. Can't wait to see the little one!)

Our family at the Denver Zoo

Brian, Keturah and Bella. We hung out at their house during Taeya's nap time so we could take her back to the zoo for a little while. They live just a few minutes from the zoo. It was great seeing Keturah again and meeting her family. Bella is about 6 months younger than Taeya.

As proof that we really did see animals...The Red Panda was one of Phil's and my favorite animals.

Trying to get a picture of Phil and me with the camels in the background. They're there. Just look close. Taeya had fun playing around at the BBQ place we went to for lunch. She has a crayon in her mouth in case you were wondering.

What a sweet little 21 month old we have! (She's now almost 23 months!)

She was watching the anteater here. He was HUGE!

While at the zoo, we thought it would be fun to take Taeya on the carousel and the little train. We bought tokens and were excited about her enjoying her first rides. Needless to say, it didn't quite turn out as planned.

Once the carousel started, Taeya cried the entire time and clung to me with a death grip.

However, when we were done, she happily waved to the "kitty" we rode on and gave it a great big kiss goodbye. We ended up not taking her on the train. Maybe next time.

Altogether, we had a fabulous time as a family on our little get-a-way trip and can't wait to do it again!

Please Vote

Hey friends, can you do me a quick favor and vote for our photo on my friends photography blog? We had family pictures done and whoever gets the most votes will get a prize...and we'd love to win!!! I'd post the picture here but I don't own the rights to it so bop on over to Cerise Photography and vote for #7 The Camps! I'd appreciate it!!

http://marciacerisephotography.blogspot.com/2009/10/october-photo-contest.html


Thanks, Megan

PS. I LOVE Marcia's photography and if you're local and are looking to have your pictures done professionally, please stop by for a preview of her work. You'll be happy you did!

Camping

The weekend after Labor Day, we went camping at a park nearby with two other families. We had a great time, great weather and the kids all got plenty dirty...especially Taeya. She was about 3x's as dirty as each of the other kids. Enjoy the pics.
Our little family right before we headed home.

See what I mean by dirty? She LOVED it.

Sliding down the dirt hill.

Taeya had fun dipping her hands into the creek. She wanted to do it over and over again.

A little dirt make-up.

The three "babies" had fun playing together.

Taeya watched the big kids and learned how to slide. She had fun climbing as high as she could and sliding down on her bum.

The big hill.

Taeya enjoyed riding on daddy.

Oh I Wish I Was An Oscar Myer Wiener

Oh I wish I were an Os-car Mayer Wie - ner

That is what I'd tru-ly like to be

'cause if I were an Os-car May-er Wie - ner

Ev-ery one would be in love with me.

Today, after Bible Study I had to stop at the grocery store for milk. When I parked, I noticed that there was an unusual, yet recognizable vehicle across the parking lot. After I got my milk, we went and took a few pictures of and with it. How funny is this?? It was just parked in the back of the lot. There were no workers around passing out free wieners or cute little kiddos singing the Oscar Myer song. However, I'm glad I stopped to enjoy the moment because how often do you see the Weinermobile?!

Note the license plate. Becca, Taeya and Amanda

Our friend Amanda was with us so she joined in the fun.

Life

Lately, things have been challenging in my life to say the least. I have been clinging tightly to the promises in Scripture. One verse that has been encouraging is Deut. 31:8 "The Lord Himself goes before you and will be with you; He will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged."

Life is often hard and I am so thankful for a loving God who not only cares about the sparrows but cares so much more about those He created in his own image. I am truly blessed to have a personal relationship with my Creator and know that He is trustworthy through the good and the bad and that nothing is out of his control.

Phil and I have been dealing with a property manager at our last place who has been difficult to deal with and has made it very difficult for us to be released from our lease, even though we spent a great deal of time and money finding new renters that she approved. As of this morning, it seems that we will be allowed out of our lease provided that they sign a new lease in the next day or so.

On a happier note, we are loving our new house and are definitely settling in at this point. We had a busy few days two weekends ago as I had some women friends over on Friday while our husbands played poker together, we had a family of six over on Saturday and our pastor's family of nine over on Sunday. I love fellowshipping with others and am so thankful for friends with whom we can share God's blessings. I neglected to take any pictures because we were having such a good time. I had fun planning and cooking the meals. We enjoyed eating Javanese, Thai and Indian food. I really like ethnic dishes :) I have fallen in love with homemade Naan because it's so quick and easy to make. If requested, perhaps I can put the recipe on a future blog post. Let me know if you'd like to try it.

I'll be working on a picture post next with pictures from our first ever camping trip since Phil and I got married 4 1/2 years ago! For now, enjoy some misc. pictures from the past month.

We took Taeya out to Sonic after taking her to the fair. She REALLY enjoyed eating the icecream...all by herself!


This picture was taken prior to the previous one. She's wearing a little less icecream in it.

Photo at the fair while she was playing peek-a-boo

Here she's eating a snack in our empty condo while I did a last minute touch-up cleaning.

Outside the condo with a flower she found on a beautiful Colorado day.

All Moved In

Well, we have finally moved into our new house after waiting for a few months for it to be completed. We closed on the house and moved in during the first week of August. Since then, I've been busy unpacking and getting things organized. We are loving the house and Taeya's having a lot of fun exploring all over the house. Everything is not quite finished throughout the house. There's still some trim that needs repainting, a mirror to hang in the master bathroom and some little odds and ends that need to be finished...including the whole outside yard and fence. Those will come but for now, we're enjoying being in our very first house! I haven't lived in a house since the one we rented in PA when I was 15. Since then, I've lived in apartments or condos so it is wonderful not having to share any walls with any neighbors and having a yard to call our own (even if it's not yet finished).

I took these pictures a few days ago so things have progressed even more since then. I will try to repost pictures in a couple more weeks when everything is more finished. We're nearly done decorating but I'm still needing to get some bookshelves so I can unpack my tutoring room.

Our master bedroom.

One side of Taeya's room. I love her room. It's exactly what I was hoping for. Now I just need to figure out how to make curtains for it.
Our front entryway and dining room. Excuse the messy table please. We chose to make the front room our dining room and move the living room next to the kitchen because our couch would fit better and it worked better with our furniture overall.

My bright and lovely kitchen. I am loving having an island!!! I've already used it for baking cookies, muffins and brownies. I love the dark granite and dark tile as well.

Our livingroom.

I still need to take/share pictures of the basement, laundry room, guest room, back patio and tutoring room. Oh, and the front of the house when it's finished.

Visiting the Animals

We went to visit some ducks, lamas and horses that live near us. Taeya loves seeing all of the animals, especially the ducks. She didn't mind getting splashed by them. She loved pointing at them and saying "quack, quack."

Taeya with her friends Annie and Bethie.
Bethie, Taeya and Becca.

I love this one.

There's the duckies taking there bath.

A Little Busy, Okay, A LOT Busy

Okay, so I know it's been absolutely forever since I last posted. I've definitely been keeping busy though. We are living in "box city" right now and Taeya is loving it. She has discovered the joy of playing in boxes. I have some pictures and a video of her playing in her box but alas, they are still on the camera. I would say I have our house probably 75% boxed and ready to go.

Moving day is coming up. Not exactly sure when it is still although it is probably within a week. The house is nearly done (on the inside). They were rushing like crazy to get the garage sheetrocked today and some of the last minute things done. The inspector is supposed to come tomorrow to issue the certificate of occupancy (CO). Loan paperwork is well underway and our lender said closing is probably set for Monday, August 3. WE CAN'T WAIT! This has been a long and sometimes challenging process. We have enjoyed many parts of it and Phil and I did really well working together and making choices that fit both of our styles. We definitely love the finished product and will love our new home. I for one am looking forward to getting reorganized. I'm also excited to have a tutoring room where I can put up bookshelves and pull out all/most of my teaching stuff. I told Phil, I don't know what I'm going to do when we're in the house and we don't have any more building/design decisions to make and we don't have to visit Lowe's three times a week. It was a fun process and I'm glad we did it but I'm really looking forward to being done with all of that though and focusing on other things.

We have been doing some fun things lately. We went on a family walk down by the river one evening last week. We also stopped by the biggest wave in CO and watched the surfers (yes it's true! you can surf in CO) and kayakers practice their skills on it.

I took Taeya and a little boy I was babysitting to our local parade a couple weeks ago. Taeya received a paper nurses hat which she proudly put on her head. Her friend and babysitter, Annie, joined her for another future nurse picture.

Strawberry Shortcut-Race #2

On Father's Day, I ran the Strawberry Shortcut 5K with 2 of my friends, Tracy & Joy. Phil graciously got up extra early to cheer me on and watch Taeya during the race. Since this race was only a 5K (3.1 miles) I tried to push myself on my time. I averaged about a 10 minute mile. My goal was to finish around 30 minutes and I came in at 31:10. Not too bad. Tracy finished about 45 seconds ahead of me and Joy was just behind me (AND she's 3+ months pregnant!) Joy's husband, John, ran the 10K and finished about 58 minutes I think. We had a lot of fun and all went to a pancake breakfast that the Kwanis club puts on every year after the run.

Taeya and Melanie enjoying a snack together. Melanie's going to be two houses away from us once we move and I'm sure the girls will be spending lots of time together. :)

John & Joy. These are our friends who got us into our new home. We always have a great time hanging out with them. Joy, Megan & Tracy

We run quite often on Sunday afternoons. We might continue in the evenings as the days have been getting too warm to run.

Right before I finished the race.

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