The Sand Covered Pickle

We spent a lovely, relaxing week at Edisto last week. It was fabulous to be at the beach! Meredith came down the night before and we managed to cram all four of us (Charles, Emmy, Mer and me) in the car along with all our stuff. Hooo boy, did we have stuff! We thought the car was packed full on the way home from Ohio (we brought home the bride and groom's extra stuff, wedding clothes, and their canine), but we were just as crammed, if not more so, this time. We had planned to eat in most of the week so we took a lot of food stuffs, which of course takes up lots of space! I wish we'd taken a picture of the car, but alas, there is not photographic evidence. There are, however, lots more photos of the week in the new August Picasa Album, so check them out!

People keep asking "what did you do?!?!" Um, well, we went to the beach, we went to the pool, and we watched TV. That really about sums it up. Edisto is quite remote, there isn't a lot to do there, which is partly why we like it! We didn't go shopping, we went out to eat only once (although we did get takeout the last night because we didn't want leftovers and we had to get pizza on our pizza night because the crust we brought along wouldn't rise), we didn't take boat tours or rent bikes, although those are surely lovely things to do. No, we went to relax, and relax we did!

Emmy of course spent some time at the "lake beach" on Lake Eerie, as I shared with y'all earlier, so we knew she'd enjoy being back at the ocean. We took her down to the beach every day but one, and we also took advantage of the condo's pool area every day. She got quite good at walking on the sand and she was okay with us taking her in the water, although she didn't love putting on her life jacket. She really preferred to be on the shore, splashing in the water at the edge, or playing in the sand.

Speaking of sand, oh my, was there sand. Those of you who frequent the Carolina coasts know this type of sand: teeny tiny shells. It's larger than "regular" sand and it sticks.to.everything. We found a delightful sunblock called Super Goop that I have been happily applying to Emmy's fair skin every day. It's light weight, not super greasy, but as it turns out when combined with sand it's like GLUE. We've been home, what, 6 days? And I'm still finding flecks of sand in her hair. Plus, when you pick up the sand covered pickle, you then get more sand on you in places you didn't mean to get sand. Especially if she likes to hang onto your bathing suit and oh, say see if she can find that shell she dropped down your front! Thanks Emmy! Charles, Meredith, and I all had to scrub ourselves down hard with a washcloth every day to remove said sand!

Emmy added "bird" (BRRRRIIRRR) and "peaches" (chuz) to her vocabulary while we were there. She loves birds and the beach was of course full of sea gulls and pelicans. I think it was our first full day that she was suddenly hollering "BRRIRRR" and pointing and I realized indeed, there were several sea gulls nearby. She loved walking along and trying to get close to them!

While Emmy was napping or down for the night, Mer, Charles, and I watched trashy TV. Well, some of it was Trashy (True Blood, Season 1, thanks Mer!) and some of it was a bit less trashy (The West Wing, Season 1). Mer is now in search of the 2nd season of The West Wing and we have already had Netflix deliver the first disc of the 2nd season of True Blood to our home.

The condo we stayed in was very nice (loved the decorations!) but pretty small. Definitely only a place for 4 people! We were on the marina, so we had a nice view of the water, but we had to walk to the beach. The walk was not so hospitable, so we ended up driving. We all agreed that in the future we'd rather be closer to the beach and definitely not in a condo. There's just too much noise if you have sleeping children. The first night there were a gaggle of drunk rednecks hollering at each other from one of the boats to the balcony next to us, and Charles had to ask them to keep it down. It was pretty nice and quiet (the complex was very empty) for much of the rest of the week, until people started showing up closer to the weekend and a herd of elephants who bowled all day/evening moved in upstairs from us on Wednesday night. This affected Emmy's napping on both Thursday and Friday, but we are just grateful that it was quieter early in the week and that she slept through the night all week. She did wake up a little earlier than usual each day because we were unable to completely block the light so when the sun came up, she was up not long after!

Mer and I were glad to visit Edisto again. We hadn't been in, oh 15 or 16 years. We grew up going with Dad's family every year and we had lots of good memories. Of course it has changed a lot...a lot of houses have been torn down and replaced with much bigger ones, the road has been widened (we think), there are new restaurants and shops, but overall it still has the same feel...it's small, quiet, and there aren't any high rises or lots of commercialism to it. We were a little taken aback at how much the beach is sloping from erosion, and one family we talked to said that they had noticed a big change even in the last 2 years.

So now we are home, still a little sandy, a little more relaxed, and a little more tan. Well, Emmy is tan (how did I give birth to a child who tans??), Charles' tan is peeling and mine never really existed except for on my feet. :) We had a great week and can't wait to go back!

Home again, home again

We are home and settling back in after a week away in Vermilion, OH on Lake Eerie. Our best Augusta friends were married there on Saturday in a lovely, small ceremony in a chapel of the park where the bride, Mary Ann, has vacationed all her life. Her parents continue to rent a cottage there each summer and graciously invited us to stay with them for the wedding festivities.

We headed up last Monday, the 26th, caravan-ing with Mary Ann and Joel and their dog Lucy. 4 adults, 2 dogs, one toddler (there's no doubt about it, folks, Emmy is walking. She has made a lot of progress in the last 10 days...more on that later) and a LOT of stuff! We took two days to get there because the notion of driving 12 hours with Emmy in one day made me want to stab my eyes out. It was a wise decision because by the end of Day 1, we were all ready to be out of the car! We stopped in Charleston, WV, which made the next day's drive much shorter, so we were at the lake by 3:00. Yay!

Tuesday evening before supper we took Emmy down for a quick walk on the beach (I call it the beach because they call it the beach and while it often does resemble the ocean, in my heart it will never be the beach!) and when we put her down so she could feel the water on her feet, she promptly sat herself down in the surf and started playing in the sand. Whoops! It was hilarious, but it was clear that the excitement she showed back in May at Ocean Isle when she saw the water had not waned.



We spent the next few days doing lots of wedding stuff (okay, Mary Ann and I mostly), eating delicious food, playing in the water and on the beach, and visiting with Joel and Mary Ann's families and friends. It was so much fun to spend time with Mary Ann's parents and see friends from her hometown that we'd met on our first trip up there three years ago. The wedding was small and simple and so, so perfect. Vermilion is a cute down and we ate pastries from their favorite bakery, yummy fudge and chocolates from the candy store (who also did the wedding favors!) and just enjoying being away. Here's a photo of the arrangements we made for the rehearsal dinner, with mostly flowers we cut growing in or near the park!

By the time the wedding was over on Saturday and everyone had gone home and the bride and groom were at their hotel, we dreaded the thought of having to pack up and leave the next morning! While it was a fun few days, it was also tiring because we were on the go, and when we were home at the cottage there were usually extra people around. I think her parents were going to be sad to see us go, too and encouraged us to stay an extra night, but, alas, we had appointments and things to get back to at home. So, on Sunday morning we loaded up and headed to Bay Village, just outside of Cleveland, to have brunch with one of my friends from, well, forever. His parents and my parents became friends while in a Lamaze refresher class while expecting his younger brother and my sister, so I can't remember a time he wasn't a part of my life! We spent countless weekends, vacations, etc. with them and of course as we've all moved and spread out I don't get to see them much any more. We had a fun time with Christopher (okay, he goes by Chris now, but see above statement about knowing him forever, I just can't call him that!) and his lovely girlfriend Anne Marie before we hit the road again.

We stopped in Charleston again, this time early enough to venture out a bit for a nice dinner in the hills of WV in an area known as South Hills. We found a specialty pizza place that was open on a Sunday evening and had a delicious meal. Traveling with 2 dogs (Joel and Mary Ann's dog came back home with us while they are on their honeymoon) and Emmy and just the two of us was a little challenging at times, but it all worked out. Plus, we were loaded down with extra baggage since we brought home the bride and groom's wedding clothes, leftover wedding supplies, and everything else they didn't want to take with them to Germany. You should have seen our car!

Finally, we made it home about 5:45 Monday evening and boy we were glad to be home! However, we were sad to leave the cooler OH weather behind!

Emmy did as well as we could have hoped on the trip. She had her moments while we were in the car, but who doesn't? Over all with four full days of travel, I can't complain too much. We hooked up the DVD player a couple of times and since she was a captive audience, she seemed to enjoy it. We'd bought a few things we wouldn't mind having to listen to or watch with her, like the Muppets' Follow That Bird and Finding Nemo. If I remember correctly, Meredith loved Follow That Bird, so we'll have to watch it with her when we see her soon.

It was a great trip and we're so thankful to the Turners for hosting us again. We were up there in 2007 and it was so nice to be back, particularly for such a special occasion. Mary Ann and Joel are so important to Charles, Emmy, and me and we are SO glad we were able to be there to celebrate with them. We love you guys!! We are missing them while they are on their honeymoon, but they will be home soon so we can resume our weekly Mexifeast, plus all the other "trouble" we get ourselves into on a regular basis.

Here are a few more fun pictures from the week, and lots more are in Picasa.

Emmy fell asleep in "Aunt" Mary Ann's arms one morning before her nap. So sweet!

Here Emmy and I are with Tiz and Emily "Emmy". Tiz is one of Mary Ann's best friends from high school and Emmy was born May 24th, so she and our Emmy are just a few days apart! Isn't she adorable?

A rare moment when I could catch Emmy looking up AND smiling! She LOVED the sand!


P.S. FYI, I will always try to post after we get back from a trip with fun pictures and details, but I don't like to publish on the internet (or even on Facebook) when we'll be away, just for safety reasons.

Stupid Spammers

I have recently been getting a lot of spam in the comments. Stupid spammers, don't you know that I (and I'm sure a lot of other bloggers) monitor their comments and delete your messages as soon as possible, and then we report you??

If you see a comment that looks suspicious, do not click on any link in the comment. Most of the ones I have been experiencing list the name as a number of Asian language characters (Chinese? I have no idea) and then the comments are short and pointless and have a bunch of periods after them. The comments are links to some sites (who knows what...I don't want to know) and they want you, dear readers, to click on them and give their sites traffic. And if you click on the name it takes you to their blog where more links will take you to these sites.

So, be careful, don't click on these links!

In the meantime, I think I will go ahead open up comments so that anyone (not just registered blogger users) can comment, but I will require that they be approved before they post publicly. So from now on anyone can comment, but just be aware your comments won't appear until I approve them.

Thanks!

And I promise pictures of what we've been up to the last little while are coming soon. We've been having so much fun!!!

Of course she's brilliant

Here are some fun things Emmy is up to these days...

1. She says "Daddy/Dada", "Rags/Ragsie", "hey", "Big DaDa", "doggie" (or Lucy, we're not quite sure which since she was referring to Lucy-dog) and finally "MAMA" very clearly. Plus, several other things that we can't quite distinguish but often sound a lot like Daddy and Ragsie. Obviously, Emmy loves Rags!

2. She can tell you what a whale, a dog, a cow, a monkey and a lion say. For the record, she has lots of bath toys, to include whales, so I told her that whale says "Pffff" (like when he blows water out of his blow hole." Much to my surprise, she started blowing raspberries back to me and when you ask her what a whale says, she will blow you a raspberry. Well, most of the time. Charles just taught her how to roar like a lion, and it is probably the cutest. All the others she manages to do with her mouth closed, but her roar involves her moving her mouth, and then grinning at you. I love it!

3. She likes to feed herself with the spoon/fork. She's been reaching for the spoon and helping us feed her yogurt, oatmeal, etc. for a while, but when she grabs it and we let go, she likes to sling it about. Of course this means oatmeal winds up on the floor, high chair, or one of us. She's starting to do a better job of just putting the spoon in her mouth, and now she's using the fork, too and there's a lot less food flying with the fork. She cannot put the food on the fork or spoon herself yet, but that's okay. It's very cute to see her using her fork, and sometimes when she is in mood and won't eat, the fork is the best way to get a little more food in her!

4. Speaking of food, she is still quite the good eater. She likes lots of vegetables and fruits, though peaches, watermelon, bananas, figs, applesauce, carrots, pickles, and squash (particularly Su-Su's squash casserole) are some of her favorites. She has quite a fondness for spaghetti, chicken salad (one of the few meats she really likes eating), black beans, and shrimp. Oh, and peanut butter. Man, this kid loves peanut butter! Here she is two fisting a PB&J.

5. No more bottles or formula! I mentioned that she stopped using bottles a couple of weeks ago. We found a sippy she'd finally drink more than a few sips from, and so after a couple of days we just stopped giving her bottles and she's never looked back! Yay! It's nice not to have to put all the parts together. We also finished our last can of formula on Sunday. Dr. J. wanted her to stay on formula until she was at least 14 months for the extra calories. Hopefully, we're safe in stopping now, so it feels like we got a raise! It's nice not to have to worry about mixing anything any more, too. I really hope that with a future baby I will have better success nursing exclusively. Formula is really expensive! Here are Emmy and Will taking a sippy cup break.

6. We have been doing the Kindermusik Sign and Sing class this summer, so we've all been learning some sign language. We had been doing a few signs with her before we signed up for the class, like for Mama, Daddy, milk, bath, and a couple of others. I think she recognized them, but milk was the only one she'd done back to us. Since we started class, she has learned a couple more. She will occasionally sign "more", "all done", "night-night" and "eat/food", but her favorites are "fan" and "light". She is always looking up at the ceiling and signing one or the other. If you ask her where the fan is, she will point and do the sign, and you ask her here the light is, and she will sign light. She's so smart. :) Supposedly teaching young children sign language helps with their language development and they tend to talk sooner. I don't know if it's true, but it sure is fun to watch! Here she is signing "fan".

7. She is still a dancin' fool! She's added this little shoulder shimmy occasionally which if you can catch it is hysterical. She dances in her car seat. She dances while she's playing. The other day we were trying to get her to walk to us from the den to her room. "Stayin' Alive" was on the radio and she was holding onto the wall, walking to us, and every few steps she'd stop and bounce and dance. So funny! She'll also push buttons on her musical toys, clap as the music starts, then dance.

8. We call her the DESTROYER. Man, she can destroy a room in no time flat! Fortunately, she is also interested in putting things in buckets/containers, so occasionally she will put blocks back in buckets. She has gotten quite good at stacking her rings, too, so maybe one day she'll work toward helping clean up more than destroy. If only we can get her to stop pulling my cookbooks off the bookshelf...

That's all the really interesting (okay, interesting to some people, maybe) things I can think of right now, but I'm sure there will be more to come!

Some photos are courtesy Su-Su (from Emmy's Greenville trip) and some came from Aunt Lisa (from the 4th of July). Thanks, y'all! I've not been as good about taking photos lately.

She's Walking!

So, Emmy has finally started taking some steps! She's been walking around holding onto things (walls, the sofa, the ottopersons, Charles and me, etc. etc.) for a while now. She's often acted like she wanted to let go and walk on her own, but every time she did, she would take one step and sit down. We decided we'd call it walking on her own when there were at least two steps in succession.

Emmy spent most of last week at Su-Su and Big Daddy's. Su-Su reported that she took two steps on Friday (so Emmy was 14 months and 1 day old!). We went up Sunday to spend a couple of days and bring her home, and on Monday she took four steps in a row. Woohoo!!

Since then she is getting braver. She will try to walk short distances unprompted. She still doesn't do more than 5 or 6 steps max, but she's getting there!

Here she is above walking from me to her Daddy at church. Then, here she is after she was done clapping because the crowd of friends standing around here yelled and clapped. She was a little alarmed at first by the whooping, but then she was excited and started clapping, too. So cute!

Photos from the last few weeks

Here is a quick recap of some photos from the month of June. They are in reverse order. You can view more in the Picasa album. (For our less tech savvy readers, when it's underlined and blue like this, it is a link...click on it, and it will take you to the album!)

Emmy and Will on our first visit to their new house. We had not seen Will since his first birthday, so we gave him his present. He didn't seem all that interested, so Emmy promptly took it and I could just hear her saying "here, let me show you how you should play with this."

Enjoying some peanut butter crackers. What a great face for Daddy!

Playing with birthday presents from Dee-Dee and Granddaddy. I just love this look!

Sitting in the sprinklers while watering the garden. She crawled over here and just sat and loved the water hitting her every few seconds. Hysterical!
Emmy likes to "unload" the dishwasher, clean or dirty. So, um, helpful? Here you see she's reaching for parts of her bottles. I'm happy to report that as of Tuesday 6/29 we are bottle free! We FINALLY found a sippy cup she would use for more than just a teething toy, and once she seemed to like it, we just tried only giving her the sippy, and it's worked! It's much easier not having to wash all the bottle pieces!

Hey, Dad, I can help you get those boxes up in the attic!

Such a big helper!

Trying on Mama's sunglasses.

Catching up

Hello faithful readers!

I'm sorry it's been a long time since I've updated. Needless to say having a very active toddler who loves to play on the computer does not lend itself to a lot of time for blogging. Or taking pictures, for that matter. I realized that I have woefully neglected to take a lot of pictures the last few weeks, particularly over the 4th of July weekend. Alas!

I hope everyone had a great 4th. Charles' parents came for a visit and we a had a good time having them here! Of course Emmy loved getting extra attention. We spent time just cooking and eating and hanging around the house. Sunday morning we all went to church, of course. Charles had to be there extra early to sing the National Anthem with a men's quintet (annual tradition) 9:00 service, and then of course we heard them at the 11:00 service and they did a lovely job. Emmy looked super cute in her red, white, and blue dress that Dee-Dee gave her...and no, I have no photos. But Granddaddy (photographer extraordinaire!) took plenty and promised to send me a cd, which I will share when I can.

Lucas, Lisa, and Will, newly settled into their new home in Greenwood, came down to spend the evening with us, too. We were all invited to Mary Ann and Joel's for ribs and chicken so we packed up our food contributions and headed over to spend the evening with them. We had a great time, although of course having two toddlers makes for a wild evening. Not that we're biased, but Will and Emmy are so cute! I can't wait until they are really playing (and probably making mischief) together.

The grandparents headed home early Monday to beat the traffic (and said they were super glad they did because even then it was heavy) and we packed up and picked up Mary Ann and Joel for a trip to the lake. Our church has a 4th of July picnic every year at the church's fabulous lake property. Since the 4th was on a Sunday this year, they decided to hold the picnic Monday. It was a great day at the lake, not too hot. Charles and Joel we in charge of the grill, so they spent much of their time cooking burgers and hot dogs for 50+ people. Mary Ann and I took Emmy swimming. That girl loves the water and she loved watching the other kids playing. After I fed her lunch, Ms. Luanne kept her entertained so Charles and I could relax and eat lunch in peace, too. Very nice!

Tuesday we packed Emmy for her first trip to "camp". At least, as Charles noted, that's what it felt like we were doing! Su-Su had said she wanted to come get Emmy and keep her for a few days sometime this summer, and this week turned out to be the best week. So we packed Emmy's stuff and meet Mom in Greenwood. We had lunch together (and Emmy seemed shocked and thrilled to see her Su-Su when we walked into the restaurant!) and then went over to Lucas and Lisa's to do the transfer of car seat and luggage, and give Emmy some play time out of the car for a bit. Lucas' parents were in town and we hadn't seen them in a long time, so we got to visit while Charles helped Lucas and his dad load up some furniture left over from the previous owners. Their house is looking great! They'd spent all day Monday with Mr. Sam's help trimming up the overgrown yard and it made a big difference! They were, of course, much more unpacked and settled since we'd first visited just three days after they moved in and it's such a great house for them. We're excited to have them closer to us!

So, Charles and I have been spending the last few days ALONE. Yes, we miss Emmy terribly, but we have enjoyed some downtime. We've gone out to eat with friends and cooked dinner with those same friends (you'll never guess who). We've slept late and watched copious amounts of TV (USA has marathons...a dangerous thing). We've also done our usual activities like errands, going running, yoga...but we've been able to either do them together and without a loud one-year-old on our hands! Charles has also been spending lots of time studying for finals. He had one final last night and another tomorrow morning. The we are going to the movies to celebrate!

We're looking forward to having our little Pickle back home with us, but we're thankful for times like these to renew us and remind us how much we love and miss her.