Our baby girl is growing up before our eyes! She is a walking, discovering, communicating, sister-loving little girl. She brings smiles to all of us, especially Emily. Her six-tooth grin and giggles liven up our house. And her mother never grows tired of watching her little waddle as she moves from thing to thing.

Julia talks to us in lots of ways these days. She has a few words she uses: “wa” – water, “oh” – on or off, “ba-ba” – pacifier, “mama” – mommy, “da-da” – daddy; “mlk” – milk, “shoes”, and “more”. She also signs for please, more, eat, all-done, milk, and bath. We can’t forget the unmistakable nodding of her head yes and no.

It is hard to have a Julia story without the involvment of Emily in it. Emily runs to see Julia in the morning, she fetches her when Mommy needs both girls, she trades toys with Julia (whether Julia wants to or not), Emily shares bites of food with Julia across the high chair tray, Emily shows Julia all sorts of new tricks, and last for this short list she makes her cry and then tells her sorry and by the end of her breath makes Julia laugh. Julia knows to cry, scream, and holler when Emily has wronged her; she is capable of speaking up for herself.

The things that Julia loves: to play hide-n-seek from inside her closet, her blanket, her sister’s pooh bear, to imitate Emily, her bath, to take her hair bows out and chew on them, delivering mommy’s shoes to mommy’s feet, to ride down the slide at the park, sitting for her milk and blanket cuddles, a ladybug book, playing peek-a-book from under blankets, taking her shoes off, and seeing Daddy when he comes home from work.

The things that Julia doesn’t like: baby gates, being separated from Mommy, being forced to eat something once she sees something more desirable, laying still for a diaper change, having her finger nails cut, and being told no.

The most unique thing Julia does is to wave her arms with much exuberance when she is excited about something or someone.

We took advantage of a photography class needing models to get some free photos of the girls taken. Time will tell if the mix of busy kids and photographers in training can produce some good photos. The quality of the photos will not dampen what was a really fun evening of just spending time together.

Amazingly, we got there early, so the girls and I walked down to the excursion train to check it out. On the way down the sidewalk, we found lots of things to look at and discuss. Emily kept telling me how much she was enjoying our nature walk and thanking me for taking her on the nature walk. It was cute. We found etched stone with river names that Emily loved pointing out all the individual letters she knew.

Julia loved the swing by the fountains. She would walk back to them every time I got her out of it. Emily on the other hand figured out that she could take her shoes off and run around getting her toes wet in the fountains. There was a lot of happy giggles! We were just silly, let off steam from the days frustrations, and enjoyed each other’s company.

The humble photos that I have are just snapshots that I took while we were at play.

Emily was pushing Julia’s swing from the front. It is more fun when you can see the face of the one you are pushing.

We shared a fun morning of play among the tulips at Crescent Bend with our play-friends. The gardens are so much fun to enjoy with fountains and pretty flowers. Julia was pretty shy about leaving her mother’s arms, so we enjoyed a lot of watching Emily and the others play. The longer we were there the more Julia was willing to go on her own, but never far from her Mommy.

Emily enjoyed all of her freedom. There were scrapped legs that required a little attention and a photograph to heal. Also there were fountains to stick hands into. At one point Elena and Emily were carrying small amounts of water in their hands to water the tulips. Everyone chased bubbles, walked on flower bed edges pretending they are balance beams, smelled tulips, played under an umbrella, and had a lot of fun. Aiden did get his foot into the fountain at one point soaking his shoe and sock.

We ate a picnic lunch before we left the grounds and as usual the other kid’s food looked more interesting than what their own mama brought. This is such a funny, but consistent practice between the kids. After lunch the bigger kids ran, played with small rocks, rolled down a hill in the grass, and jumped off of one big rock. They were sad to go home and the weather and temperature had just been perfect. I hope we can have more days like that!

How does a parent entice or motivate a child to do something . . . anything. We are having to try some creative parenting sometimes to get the results we want, but tonight we lucked into one.

Our day was lovely and we postponed dinner to play at the park and take a walk together. Everyone was hungry and dinner seemed to be lingering. Julia was munching on goldfish after downing her pasta and Emily was eating her applesauce slowly. I suggested that Robby should go and start the bath water running for the girls.

Emily asked with much exuberance if she could take her bath first. Her animation was hilarious. I told her that she couldn’t get a bath until her applesauce was finished. She put her spoon to work and finished it right off. Julia was also listening. She had been signing ‘please’ after each goldfish so that she could get another. After the bath announcement she started, also with great exuberance, signing ‘all done’ followed with the sign for ‘bath’. Who knew dinner could be finished so quickly?

Now, two little sweet smelling girls are tucked in their beds sleeping soundly.

Sunny days are great for playdates. We had a picnic lunch and play time at a park with our friends. The kids are doing such sweet things with each other. Emily is making friends at the park with kids and doing things together on the equipment, they have cute moments of holding hands, Julia is wanting to follow Emily around, they all want to give each other a push on the swing, and they are happy together. This makes for some happy mommies.

I had to include a photo of the little one to join us soon. In just about a month, baby Loveday will join the fun playdates. It will be no time until a new one is toddling around the play equipment!