Sarah Kate--23 months

Sarah Kate is almost two!  Her language continues to flourish, and she has a lot to say.  It's so fun now that we can actually understand most of it!  Whenever she gets hurt, she quickly says, "I'm okay!"  She's also said, "I'm a mess!"  She notices when her brothers are a mess, too, and tries to clean them up.  The other day, Will was meowing at her during lunch, and she turned into such a little mother.  She tried shushing him, and when that didn't work she said emphatically, "Eat!  Eat!"  We've also noticed that she calls herself something that sounds like "Kate Kate."  Too cute!

With the spring weather, Sarah Kate has enjoyed playing outside.  She loves to run around and draw on the driveway with sidewalk chalk.  I can't believe she is big enough to ride this little scooter that we got for Will a few years ago!

Famous Will Quotes

Will has a way of making us laugh non-stop.  But sometimes, one of his lines really cracks me up.  Here are some from the past few months . . .

"Christopher always loves me.  It's like Jesus loves me, except it's Christopher loves me."

In answer to the question, "What scares you?":  "Predators.  But not predators that are mammals.  If it were a predator that looked like a mouse, I would just step on it."

Reporting on his first tee-ball practice:  "I got to bat twice.  And I did short stop.  That's where you just stand there."

To his nanny, Penny:  "Will you marry me?" . . . she said yes! . . . "As long as you don't snap my underwear!"

From his PCCA entrance exam, answering the question, "Tell us three interesting things about you":  1. "My top jaw is way back there."  2.  "Your brain is a tiny bit smaller than your fists."  3.  "When I have coughs, they are really big."

Christopher's 7th Birthday!

Christopher turned 7 on February 18.  His Nana took brownies to school the day before, and on his birthday he went to lunch with Will and Nana and Granddad.  That afternoon, he had cupcakes with several friends at a friend's house.  Then for dinner, he went with Daddy, his siblings and Grandma to Catfish Hole.  He loves it that they play a happy birthday song and bring you a whole plate of tootsie roll pops!  Afterwards he had cake and opened presents at Grandma and Grandpa's house.  It was a full day of celebrating!

A week later, on the 26th, we had his official birthday party at Mad Pizza.  They have a party loft upstairs and make a huge party pizza!  Many of Christopher's friends joined us for pizza, cake and some games in the arcade room.  It was a blast!  Here's some photos:

 

Sarah Kate--22 months

This has been a big month for Sarah Kate!  She got her first haircut and did a great job being still.  I shouldn't have been surprised.  One thing that amazes me about her is that she loves for me to clip her fingernails.  When the boys were this age, it was such a chore.  But I pull out the clippers and she'll hold out her fingers for me, one by one.  Why shouldn't a princess enjoy a little pampering from time to time?

Sarah Kate also loves to clean and pick things up.  After meals, she will pick up food off the floor and put it in the trash.  In fact, sometimes she gets a little too eager and we find "trash" in the trash can that's not really trash!  Last week, she found a stray crayon on the floor and went and got the crayon box from the coloring table and brought them both to me so I could put it away.

Sarah Kate's language has really taken off this month.  She is saying lots of animal names (my favorite is fuff-fuff-fly), foods (gookie!), and what every girl with two older brothers needs in her vocabulary:  "Hey!  Stop it!"

We discovered a couple of weeks ago that Sarah Kate can identify several numbers.  After reading a numbers book, she pointed to a three on the cover and said "three!"  So I asked her the other numbers from 1-10, and she knew most of them.  Such a smart girl!  She also loves to sit at the coloring table and scribble.  I think she feels like a big girl sitting there like her brothers do.

Here are some photos Noel captured at dinner (looks like dessert!) a couple of weeks ago:

Sarah Kate's first haircut

I never thought, as bald as Sarah Kate was on her first birthday, that she'd need a haircut this soon!  Her hair had grown long enough to be in her eyes, and she was starting to sport the baby mullet, so we went for a haircut today.  I had no idea how she would do.  This morning, I told her she needed to sit still for her haircut, and she said, "okay!"  And she did!  She had a frown on her face the whole time and seemed pretty apprehensive.  But she held still and never fussed.  I was so proud of her!

Sarah Kate's singing

Yesterday, Christopher went to practice the piano, and Sarah Kate seemed to think he was there to accompany her beautiful vocal performance.  She stood at the piano and just sang and sang!  They both had a great time.

Sarah Kate--21 Months

Sarah Kate has experienced a lot of snow as a 21 month old!  She loves, loves, loves her brown snow boots.  But she is not a fan of walking in the snow, so they haven't gotten much use.  She has learned to call all of her grandparents by their grandparent-related names (Nana, Granddad, Grandma, Grandpa).  She is also speaking in sentences!  Well, mostly just one sentence.  "I wanna . . . "  I wanna cookie.  I wanna drink (ga-ga).  I wanna see.  I wanna go.  I wanna eat.

Sarah Kate has also used the potty!  But just once.  At mother's day out.  Her teacher told me that they checked her diaper a couple of times, and she was dry.  And then another child in the class was using the potty, and Sarah Kate said she wanted to go potty.  (I wanna potty.)  So they put her on the potty, and she peed!  I was ecstatic, thinking it couldn't be this easy.  (It wasn't.)  I pulled out the little plastic potty, cleaned it up, and put it in the kids' bathroom.  Sarah Kate will say "I wanna potty," but she doesn't want anything to do with actually sitting on the potty.  Oh, well--it was a good start!

Sarah Kate's teacher also told me another funny story about our sweet daughter.  Apparently, there is a chair in the play area of the room that serves as Sarah Kate's throne.  She sits in the chair, and the other kids bring her toys.  If someone else is sitting in the chair and Sarah Kate moves in that direction, the other child will get up and let Sarah Kate sit there.  The teacher said she isn't mean or rude about it, that's just how it is.  So I guess Sarah Kate is the queen bee of the toddler room.  It's too bad--no one around here is making her share her toys with them, so I was hoping she was learning some sharing at mother's day out!

Here's some video Noel caught on the video monitor of Sarah Kate when she was supposedly napping.  She's a fun little girl!