Several Posts...

January 5th- My First Molar
JoElle's first molar broke through, finally! It has been working it's way out for the past month, but now she has her ninth tooth, the top left molar. The other three are budding, they will be out soon, too.
JoElle visited her cousin, Isaiah, today on his 8th birthday. She had fun playing with him and his sister, Elena's toys. JoElle really enjoyed the cake; she gave Isaiah a book of jokes called Critter Giggles, so he amused us with animal jokes all night!

January 2, 2006 JoElle had her first "accident" at home....
JoElle was walking around outside with me, Tandi, and Uncle Aaron, she got WAY too excited and she fell face first onto the driveway; she scraped up her nose and bumped her forehead. She didn't cry that long, I held her, comforted her, and cleaned her up. Then I gave her a blanket, she got happy. It looks a bit nasty, Daddy was a little upset with me, but I told him she's gonna fall....so he is ok with it now.
Tandi spent the night, JoElle just loved and loved on her. It was adorable! She really loves Tandi! She didn't even want mommy or daddy...!
We got a seat for our bikes for JoElle to ride with us, and a helmet of course! She loved it! While we were riding around, Tim told me that JoElle was looking at his bike curiously, and the JoElle said "bike!" It was really funny!!
Needless to say, she went to bed a little early tonight; I also tried to substitute her bottle of milk for a cup with a straw, but she wasn't having that! She is trying to SAY milk as she signs milk. Earlier today, we were cheering her on for setting her cup down on the table and not throwing it down. She thrives on the positive reinforcement. But then she threw her cup on the ground, looked at each on of us, saw our faces and her face scrunched up, she started bawling!!!! She knew she shouldn't have done it!

January 1, 2006 HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
Cousin Peyton got to spend the night with us for the first time on New Year's Eve! We had a lot of fun (both were down by 7:30, we can do this two kid thing someday... :)
In the morning, I got up at 8:00 to go see if they were both awake and sure enough, I can see Peyton standing in his playpen/bed waiting for me, blanket in hand, paci in his mouth! But he didn't make a peep! Then I peeked in at JoElle and she heard the door, so she started to look around, I closed it real quickly so that Peyton and I could go make her bottle. So, I gave Peyton a bottle with apple juice and water and changed JoElle, then I put her down on a quilt on the floor with him and changed his diaper! It worked really well.
I put both of them in a chair at JoElle's new little Nemo table, and they both sat so sweetly and ate waffles. Peyton ate at least 6 mini-waffles AND a fruit cup!! JoElle ate her normal amount, around 3-4, no fruit of course, she is a veggie girl, but Peyton loves fruit! Every once in a while she will eat fruit when she sees him eating it! He still won't eat veggies (I tried to put a pea in his mouth the night before, but he refused!) It was SO CUTE to see them sitting there like big kids, eating away!! Tim sang some VeggieTale songs to them and they thought it was hilarous, they were grooving back and forth to the music while they ate!
Then we took both of them to church, they got to be in the same class for Sunday School. Peyton had really wide open eyes when we rode the shuttle to church from the parking lot. He was taking it all in! he did great there for his first time!
Again, they sat so nicely at their table and ate lunch! Peyton and JoElle chowed down on some leftover flautas from On The Border, some green beans (JoElle only of course), bread, and I made them some mini-eggrolls (I made up the inside, lots of ginger and garlic!) They tore them up! They were kicking each other's feet under the table and JoElle giggled as she thought it was funny!!

Dec 28, 2005 JoElle makes me laugh so much! We were in the bathroom and she likes to pull the toilet paper off the roll, but this time she walked up to it, pointed and shook her head "no, no" over and over with a serious look on her face! It was so cute!
One of her teachers, Ms. Stacy, asked me last week if JoElle is testing us at home. I asked her "What do you mean?" and she told me JoElle will start to cry and scream right as Ms. Stacy is making her bottle or is about to give her snack or lunch, then Ms. Stacy will tell her "JoElle, you have to be patient, your food is coming" and JoElle will look at her with a knowing look, she will stop and think, oh I am not at home, I am at school and I can't get everything right away!! She is comprehending so much that everyone says these days!
Also, JoElle threw all her cheese puffs on the ground, then she started fussing, so Ms. Stacy made her look at the mess she made and told her that when she does this she has nothing left to eat. JoElle just listening and got a sad look on her face. Then, Ms. Stacy told her that she would give her some of her snacks, but she had to eat them, and JoElle did eat them!
We are working on this, JoElle learning not to throw her food on the ground. She thinks it is funny or she will throw it down and say "Uh-oh"
Daddy told her to stop throwing her food on the ground at dinner time and he used his Daddy tone, JoElle's face scrunched up and she started bawling! She doesn't want to disappoint Daddy!

December 27, 2005
I took an extra day off so we got to relax and play today. JoElle figure out how to climb onto her little Finding Nemo chair all by herself, she was so proud of herself! She also got down by herself, too. Grandma came over and we went to the park, we had fun on the slides and swing. We also at at Don Pablos, JoElle ate some chips with a little bit of salsa :)
I fell asleep on the couch around 5:00, so JoElle learned how to play football on Daddy's playstation. JoElle ran 20 yards all by herself. She likes to imitate everything Daddy does. Then JoElle played with Daddy in her play kitchen, then she got into our kitchen and threw around some stainless steel measuring cups and kept laughing about it. Then JoElle tried to climb up into the kitchen table all by herself, but of course she fell over because the chair is a little bit too high! JoElle also went over to the front door and started banging on it and waving bye-bye. Thn she went over to her sandals and started staring at them like "OK pt the on so that we can go outside!" Daddy couldn't figure out what she needed later because she kept crying, so he asked her "what do you want" What do you need?" She paused, thought about it, then she told him (in sign language) "Milk!" We are really loving this sign language!
Every once in a while I would feel a little cold hand on my foot. Daddy says she was blowing me kisses but got a lttle upset that I wouldn't blow any kisses back (I was still sleeping).
Yesterday, our friends Natalie and Anthony brought their daughter Trinity over, she is 3 months younger than JoElle. JoElle was unhappy before they got to our house, but as soon as they showed up, she was all smiles and giggles! Her and Trinity had fun together.
Later, after Trinity went home, we rented March of the Penguins for JoElle and we sat around and ate popcorn. JoElle loved the popcorn! She sat on my lap and would stick her hand in the bowl and stuff 4 or 5 pieces in her mouth at a time! We couldn't help but laugh!!
I CAN'T BELIEVE MY BABY IS GROWING UP SO FAST! She is so mature now!!! It goes by way too quickly...

Christmas Day 2005
Wow what a busy day! We started the morning with presents, we helped JoElle open her presents, she got a play kitchen from Santa and we gave her a ton of plastic food. Tim gave me a much desired Day Spa Package, yay!! I gave Tim several study Bibles since his old one fell apart.
We went to church, the nursery was pretty empty. When I picked JoElle up, the lady holding her asked me "Do I have to give her back now!?"
JoElle got a short nap, then Granny and Grandad came bearing gifts. JoElle got a little doll that giggles like her, a train and a little bitty wagon she can pull her toys around in. Then Grandad took her on a wagon ride with his cap on her, she had a ball, she loves being outside, especially in her wagon.
Then we spent the afternoon and evening with Granmda, Aunt Ana, Uncle Dan, Cousin Peyton and Uncle Aaron at cousin Peyton's house. It was crazy with all the wrapping paper and toys! JoElle got a Strawberry Shortcake CD player, a jack in the box, some really cute clothes from Aunt Ana, diapers!!, that little ball hopper that you push around, and a cute homemade blanket from Great Aunt Mary.
JoElle and Peyton were so overwhelmed from all the excitment! They both devoured some of Grandma's chocolate chip cookies and then went to bed early at 7:00 p.m.

Christmas Eve 2005
We had a wonderful holiday! On Christmas Eve we visited Santa at Santaland in Arlington at Lincoln Square. We both expected her to bawl when we handed her to Santa, but she didn't! What a brave girl! I had Tim hand her to Santa, that worked well. Also, before she went up there, she sat on Daddy's lap and pointed at Santa, so she kinda got used to the idea of kids sitting on Santa's lap.
Then Uncle Aaron went with us to our candlelight Christmas Eve service at church. JoElle did great!! She wore her little Santa outfit, Uncle Aaron kept telling me, everyone keeps saying how cute she is...she was blowing kisses to me during service and the people behind us were commenting "Oh how cute, did you see that?" then the lady behind us started waving at JoElle and JoElle giggled at her, it was really cute.
She did great through the whole service, watched Pastor give his sermon and enjoyed the singing. When pastor said "Jesus died and rose from the dead" JoElle started clapping really excitedly!
Afterwards we ate at I-Hop since everything else was closed, JoElle did great there too (it has become rather difficult to go out to eat because she wants to be mobile). For the first time we bought her her own plate to eat, she had sausage rolled up in pancakes. Halfway though dinner she started grinning and giggling, I looked around and the lady next to us was waving at her, and JoElle loved it!
When we got home, JoElle gave Daddy a fVeggietales family devotional and we gave JoElle a Veggietale DVD, some music CD's and a silver spoon (of course she loved the spoon the best!)

Dec. 16, 2005
JoElle had a Christmas party at school on Friday at 2:00 (she moved up to the toddler room right after Thanksgiving); I went up to have some fun with them. They all ate some yummy sugar cookies that Ms. Carol made, along with some juice (which is a treat for them since they usually only drink water or milk); they sang some cute songs; some of JoElle's friends are several months older and when their teacher, Ms. Stacy asks what they want to sing they say "Row row row" so that they can sing "Row Row Row Your Boat", it's so cute!!
They exchanged Christmas presents and JoElle got a yellow Care Bear from her friend Megan. JoElle played with the bag for about 10 minutes because it had animals on it. Megan played with JoElle Care Bear for her at first because she loves Care Bears, then JoElle finally got interested in the bear.

December 9, 2005 JoElle made her first sign this evening!
I didn't know what she needed and she kept signing to me "Milk, milk" and after a few times I got it! We have been teaching her for several weeks how to sign "milk" in baby sign language (it looks like you are milking a cow), but I didn't really expect her to start using it already! I am so glad she did though because I didn't know what she needed! When I was preparing her milk, she kept signing "milk,milk,milk" over and over telling me, hurry up momma I want my milk!!

November 24, 2005
Thanksgiving Day- 10 Months, 1 week: JoElle started walking! JoElle has been taking several step at a time for the past week weeks, but on Thanksgiving she took off and walked around the kitchen (although still wobbly, she keeps standing back up when she falls and walks some more!)
I can't believe JoElle started walking today! This morning she took several steps, and then several more, and several more, all without falling and all by herself (in the kitchen). Now when she falls down, she gets right back up to walk some more!
She used to get lazy and start crawling when she fell down. She has been taking 8 or so steps at a time for several weeks, but now she is really walking! I have been warned that she will soon be running all over the place!!
We got to spend time with all the grandparents and all the (first) cousins today. See pics of cousin Elena (7 months) and cousin Isaiah. No new pics of cousin Peyton, but we did get to see him along with Uncle Aaron and Aunt Ana.
JoElle is sleeping in these days when I don't have to wake her up early to go to work/school. Yesterday, she fell alseep in the car after shopping at Wal-Mart, it was around 6:00 p.m.; then I transferred her to her bed and she never woke up until the morning, not even to eat dinner! wow was she a tired little girl from learning her new skill of walking!
This week at her school they had a Thanksgiving lunch for the kids an parents; we got to go to it along with my mom. It was fun and the little ones were dressed as pilgrims,how cute! Ms. Carol made great food for all of us, parents included; she cooks great! JoElle loves to eat the breakfast and lunch she cooks each day.