I know...I am a slacker...

(Note: So, it is actually January 2008 and I am finally getting around to updating our blog. I logged on and found this post that I had started in October. So, even though it is outdated, I am posting it. I am hoping to get some more current content up this week....check back soon!)

I am sorry I have let my blog become so stale. But it has been for a good cause...too busy hanging out with Isabel. :-) Things are going great and every day we fall more in love with our little girl.

Let me update you on the latest goings-on:

She has been walking well since we first brought her home...but now she is more adventurous and doesn't hesitate at all. I bought her first pair of tennis shoes....Nike Shox for babies no less. She can crawl up the stairs pretty well, but still is a little iffy about coming down the stairs. She especially loves to try climbing up the outside ledge of the stairs in the entryway....we are obviously not big fans of that skill. Recently Isabel has discovered that she can push the kitchen chair out a bit, climb up on it, and reach things on the table or the counters...yikes!

Isabel is still not saying any words yet. Pretty much everything is "da" ... I am Da, Jeff is Da, her toys are Da, and Da can also be used as a verb or exclamation. :-) But she does change her inflection and her tone. She has started to babble a bit more and we have been working on more consonant sounds...so, words shouldn't be too far away. We have been teaching her baby sign language. I am a bit biased as my degree is in speech pathology/audiology and I took various courses on sign. But it truly is a remarkable tool and she knows how to sign milk, drink, done, father, more, and we are working on the sign for mother.

She is doing much better in regards to eating. Although she still loves her rice and noodles with soy sauce....she has found that chicken nuggets are pretty darned tasty. She does pretty well with most meats and veggies, but she is still not a big fan of fruits. Thankfully, she has also realized that cheese is yummy (I consider it a food group of its own, so was happy when the day came that she finally ate cheese).

Jeff and I are both back at work full time and so she is attending daycare with her cousin Carter. It really stinks that we have to leave her at daycare and we can't be independently wealthy and spend our days at home with her going to play groups and story time at the library. However, I think that daycare is very important to a kiddo's social skills and I know that she enjoys the teachers and the other kids in her class. And, we are so lucky that Carter and Isabel are so close in age and can be in the same class. They are really cute together. Sometimes when I see them playing together I feel like I am looking 10-15 years into the future and I know they will still be just as close as they are now sitting next to each other at snack time eating an orange wedge.

Let's face it...I could go on and on about random stuff, but most of y'all tune in to check out the latest photos. So, the rest of the updates from these past few weeks I now present to you in picture format:

We live in the town I grew up in and it just happens to be the home of the "longest parade in the State of Kansas." I have been to the Old Settlers' Parade every year since I was itty-bitty, either as an observer or a participant. So, as odd as this may sound...I had been long awaiting the day Jeff and I could take our daughter to the parade.



Another activity I had been waiting to share with Izzy was going to pick out a pumpkin and getting a doughnut and cider at a nearby cider mill. We went on a hay ride out into the patch and Izzy helped pick out pumpkins.


She loved finding the pumpkins in the field.


Izzy has been working out...she was pushing our cart full of pumpkins and was a great source of amusement for the workers at the pumpkin patch.


Izzy's first sip of cider...it was a bit windy out.


Isabel eating her doughnut....did I mention it was a bit windy?


Here we are at her first high school football game. Jeff is a band director at the high school and so we were most interested in seeing the band's half-time show.

The cousins at their first game together....there will be many more to come...

Daddy and his little girl...


We went to a Funky Mama music concert with Carter and a good friend of ours and her daughter. The three of them had a blast, but trying to get a picture of them together was almost impossible. This was the best one of the bunch.


You have to love a good spaghetti photo.


We are very fortunate to have a wonderful park and petting zoo near our home. Izzy loved feeding the goats and pointing at all the animals and barking (currently she thinks almost all animals go "woof-woof").


Anymore, she rarely lets us mess with her hair, but I was able to get her all decked out in her KU outfit along with her KU hair bows one day:




I love this photo...