We were enjoying our taco dinner at Jolie’s and Julia decided that her olives needed to dance. She put one on each finger and then started waving them around. It was so funny! Who knows if they were to dance or if they were little people who were having a conversation. Whatever it was she was thrilled with them and her little activity.

We hope everyone’s Thanksgiving celebration was wonderful. We spent ours with extended family and great food!

Julia had her two year checkup. She was a little apprehensive about the visit and despite our talking about it before hand, I knew she was going to be a handful. To add to the busyness of the day we also had Emily with us.

Julia did well despite quite a few tears. She has increased in the percentiles and the doctor was very pleased. Her length of 33 3/4 inches places her in the 50th percentile. Her weight at 23 lb. 11 oz measures her around the 12th percentile. In 6 months she has grown 3 lb. 11 oz and 3 1/2 inches. Good job, Julia!

Other highlights are the Doctor’s new beard, princess stickers, and lots of shots. Julia had three and Emily two. I guess they shared in the experience. They both did really well.

Julia’s next checkup is at 2 1/2.

I was folding laundry with my little Julia helper. She was pretty good about leaving the folded laundry piles together. After a while she started pulling out socks and informing me to whom they belonged. Then she tried on one of Robby’s. His ankle socks were knee-high socks on her. She was so proud to wear them around the house for about an hour. Cute stuff! They didn’t stay on for his homecoming.

Maybe one day these stories might be a little embarrassing, but they are so much fun now. Julia is quite capable of doing things for herself and some of those things have to do with diapers. First, she likes to go and fetch her own diapers from the diaper bin. The characters found on the brand of diaper we are getting are all Sesame Street characters. Julia has her favorite. She will take the diapers out of the bin and hunt for Ernie. Who knew that he would be her favorite character? If she can’t find one she will settle with a Cookie Monster or Big Bird. Her least favorite is Elmo, who is the most common character.

Julia is also able to take her diaper off by herself. She will “help” us in the morning by taking her jammies off and her diaper. She can reach the trash can from her crib and will deposit it for us. The other evening she decided she needed to “help” us after we put her to bed. The details aren’t necessary, but she required a jammie and bedding change because of her helpfulness. She is so sweet to help us!

There is nothing better than going out to play in unexpected places on beautiful days. Fall is a perfect time to find hidden corners of gardens to play in. The girls played with their friends Elena and Maeve at the Knoxville Botanical Garden for a morning play date. There were trails to follow, stone buildings to discover, bushes to hide between, and sweet faces to be photographed. I think Ashley and my favorite thing about the gardens were the stone walls that gave our girls a safe and fun place to run around in. The garden volunteers were planting bulbs for the spring flower beds and they offered for the girls to help them with the planting. Emily and Elena both volunteered to help. Next spring we will have to go back and see the Narcissa that they helped plant. We will return for more play dates on warm days. There are so many more places I want to go and see in the garden.

This is a classic pose for Julia these days. While she doesn’t have many words she choose to share with us, she does say our names. She loves to put her hands to the side of her mouth and yell a persons name to have them come and play. This time she was yelling for “Eeeeee” to come her way.