Julia had her three year checkup. All looked good from the doctor with all the standard questions. He was interested to hear about her current speech therapy sessions and my assessment on her improvement. Lucky girl didn’t need any shots except her flu shot. She was very brave and took it with just a few whimpers.

Her current height is 37-1/2 inches and weight is 28.6 lbs. This places her in the 50th percentile for height and 25th percentile for weight. In the last three months she has grown one inch and gained almost one pound more. She still loves for us to lug her around any chance she can get. That is definitely going to be impacted by her getting bigger.

Mommy’s favorite thing from the visit was Julia’s eye exam. The chart is a picture chart. We stopped and reviewed the shapes before starting the exam. There was the standard- star, o, heart, and flag. Then there were the more creative answers of a “t” instead of plus and “teapot” instead of cup. The cup did look like a tea cup, it was so sweet neither the nurse or I corrected her. She did great with the test holding her hand over each eye and giving answers. The nurse picked all the “teacups” on the chart for her to say.

We now have a three year old and she was excited about having a birthday. We recently went shopping and Julia got to pick out a new hair bow. She picked a Hello Kitty one and that also picked her party theme.

She has been changing a lot these past few months. She has been doing some fun things these days. She is increasing her speech slowly, but comes out with sentences at excited moments. We have started potty training and she is showing some promise of figuring it out. She is still napping really well in a pack ‘n play. She likes to play with Emily, but also by herself. She pretty much names everything she can a repeat sound – Ma-ma, Da-da, E-e (Emily), May-May (Maeve), Me-me (favorite blanket), wolf-wolf (stuffed puppy).

A few things that haven’t changed yet. She still gets her ultra-excited face and shakes with excitement. She also has her variety of facial expressions. She has added quite a frown/pout to her collection of facial expressions. She also likes to tease her Daddy by sticking her tongue out at him, to encourage him to chase her around the house.

Julia has developed her own little sister play with Emily. She will give her big hugs and kisses. She is sad when Emily is not around and asks about her as soon as she gets up from her nap. Julia can also be the pesky sister. She knows Emily’s buttons and isn’t afraid to push them. Most of them at this point are verbal buttons. She will word things in ways that irritates Emily. For instance, Emily likes to say the "Eney, meny, miny, mo" rhyme. When Emily proudly finishes saying it, Julia will say "Me, my, mo" and stop. Emily can’t handle the rhyme not being completed so corrects Julia. Then Julia will repeat the "Me, my, mo" abbreviated version. Then the whole things repeats over and over again.

Some of her favorites are:

• favorite color – pink
• favorite color to say – yellow said "yeah-l-low". She likes the "l" sound
• favorite phrases – "me do", "help me", "pick up", and "let go"
• favorite clothes to wear – dresses, specifically a dress with fun flower tights
• favorite stuffed animals – Hello Kitty, finger puppet chicken named "Bawk Bawk", and a puppy
• favorite toy to play with – Thomas train mostly using curved train track pieces
• favorite food – mac & cheese
• favorite movie – Mary Poppins, called "Mary Pop"

We were checking out a new local market in town, it is October, and Emily finds Santa. There wasn’t a sleigh, there wasn’t a red suit, or a reindeer in sight. Forgive the backlit photo, but I didn’t want to miss the moment in an effort to pose a photo. This gentleman was sitting in a booth talking with a woman and Emily announced that he was Santa. I asked her how she knew he was Santa and she couldn’t really tell me, but she knew it was Santa. He got up and came out to talk to her. Sure enough it was Santa. I guess Santa sports a Santa apron when not in the red suit. They talked for a while and Emily put in her request for her stocking this year. She was so excited about seeing him that she visited him several times while we were there; fascinated with talking to him. Fun memories to remember!

A Cowgirl and her trusty Cow.

Our friend, Sarah, invited us to join her neighborhood & church Harvest Party they have every fall. She has two children just a couple of months younger than both of Emily and Julia. We dressed up in our Halloween costumes for the party. Some years we have had costume issues when we went to put them on, but not this year. They loved them and loved being in them.

At the party there was a scavenger hunt, pumpkin decorating, yummy food, a story, and a pumpkin seed spitting contest. The girls enjoyed running around with the other kids finding the baskets of treats. Emily stuck pretty close to Grace the whole time and Julia wanted to be with Mama. Therefore, Mama saw a lot of Julia and not much of Emily.

Emily had a very serious face and wind blown hair.

We got to practice the word “lollypop” a lot, because it seemed to be Julia’s favorite candy in her basket.

When it was time to decorate the pumpkins they were very serious and content to stick their stickers on the pumpkin. It was fun to watch the serious work. There is so much to learn about kids and how they approach tasks.

The lollypop stick kind of reminded Mama of the toothpick or strand to hay a cowboy might chew on while on the range.

It was surprising that so many kids would sit for a story and be quiet, but they did.

The pumpkin seed spitting contest was funny. Julia didn’t want to try until the third spit. Emily gave it her best try, but she had some bad bounces that brought her seed back to her.

The only sad faces I saw were at the end when it was time to go home with our tummies full of lunch and sweets. We had so much fun in the warm sunshine playing with others. Mama even met some new mamas. Fall is so much fun with nice weather and fun activities.

Julia “moo-ed” for Mama. If you asked her what her costume was she would tell you, “Moo-Cow”. She was very happy to moo anytime you asked her what a cow says. She didn’t keep the cow hat on much, but loved the costume so much she didn’t even take it off for nap when she got home.

We visited the Museum of Appalachia for their annual homecoming. It has been years since Mama has visited the Museum and it was a great day to visit. The weather was another wonderful fall day here in East Tennessee.

We met our friends and explored. We enjoyed the tractor corner, visiting the knitting machine, listening to some of the music, eating curled potato fries, checking out vendor booths, finding old cabins to explore, and enjoying the sunshine. The girls enjoyed playing with Elena, Maeve, and Lincoln. The girls started to wind down as we got close to naptime and we headed home.

Emily helped “Fancy Nancy” run her knitting machine. They were making hats, but it looked like a really long sock. Both girls enjoyed turning the machine crank.

Our normally shy Julia would have stood there all day turning the crank if we hadn’t moved on.

Emily liked the tiny pumpkin.

One really happy Lincoln enjoying his ride.

She looks pretty comfortable up there.

Friends just hanging out and taking in the sights.

A beautiful Fall morning took us to the Knoxville Botanical Gardens for a playdate. It was perfect. The kids had fun exploring and running around with each other. It is tough to get great photos of moving kids, but I got a few. We are looking forward to the next fun Fall playdate.

Hey, look we got all seven kids to look the same direction at the same time . . . kinda.

As a reward we asked them to make silly faces. It seemed to be a hit for the over-two crowd.

A great and hard-to-photograph genuine Emily smile.

Sweet Elena

Grins from the sun-kissed Julia.

An almost smile from McKenzie.

A pixie smile from the pixie Maeve.