I shouldn't be surprised since we're living in Minnesota, but it does seem a little early for snow. But, alas, winter appears to be well on it's way. We've now woken up to snow 2 mornings in the last week. It not terribly cold yet, but it's such a shock to the system and it's making it tough to want to be outside much. Plus Erin is refusing mittens, blankets in the stroller and often times the hat goes as well. It might be a chilly winter for her.
Otherwise Erin is doing great. She's getting better and better every day with one nap. Evenings are still a struggle and out bedtime routine is often accompanied by lots of tears. Tonight sitting in the bath sent her into hysterics and it was just downhill from there. Strangely enough, even when she is upset she doesn't really fight anything, she's just unhappy. We've found that the song that will temporarily calm her lately is the "abc" song. She loves it and will stop crying to here me sing it. Silly girl.
She's learning new words and sounds on a regular basis now. She now knows that the ghost says "boo" and the wolf says "howl." Her favorite new word is "go" and she loves to repeat it endlessly whenever she hears it in conversation. I'm not sure that she knows what it means and can't use it herself yet, but I'm sure it's coming. She's stringing more words together and will often say "night- night Duncan," or "bye-bye Dada."
At home she's quiet excited about playing with her tea set at her little table. She loves to have people sit with her and have them drink from the cups. She also gets a thrill out of chasing Duncan around the house with her stroller, kissing him and hugging him. Poor Duncan. He loves the attention, but we have to put him in his kennel to get a break from her because he gets really stressed being chased by a maniac with a little pink stroller. Man, I'm never gonna let this kid drive, she's going to be a terror. She also gets a kick out of sitting on Oscar. Man he is one patient dog. Between Erin and Duncan, I think that his golden years are shot.
Other than the trouble at bedtime, testing the limits and some short lived tantrums, Erin is still a really easy kid. We had dinner with a bunch of friends from Grinnell last night. There were 3 other toddler there, all born within 6 weeks of each other. It was interesting to see the differences in temperament and I was reminded repeatedly about what a mild tempered child Erin is. I certainly agree, but part of me is just waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Erin has had some great times in her highchair lately. She is very into feeding herself and always wants a spoon to feed herself with. This is getting very messy, with lots of yogurt mustaches and beards. The messiest, however, was the couscous. She managed to fling it everywhere. The dogs loved it, but I found couscous between her toes, in her ears and all over the house for days. I think that we'll stick to bigger pasta for a while. She's also gotten very interested in the newspaper. She loves to grab a section to read while Matt and I read. Today she was very taken by a picture of a man skiing and carried that section of the newspaper around the house all morning.
As you can tell from the pictures, Erin is starting to ham it up for photos. She'll look blankly at the camera unless you say "laugh Erin," and then this crazy smile is what you get. She's also developing quite the social laugh. If the adults are laughing about something, Erin chimes in and laughs so hard, totally oblivious to what is funny. It's hysterical.
We're starting to get excited about Halloween. Mom was nice enough to make Erin a fantastic lion costume. We got it in the mail this week. She's a little reluctant to wear it, but we're working on it. Just as a sneak peak, here's Erin in the hat. Thank you so much Mom.
I think that's about it. Matt and I are counting down the days until vacation starts next week. I've got 4 more days of clinic and 3 day of back-up call (cross your fingers I don't get called in) and Matt works for the next 6 days. But then it will be sweet vacation. We're planning to fly out to Portland, see everyone out there and then head out to Hawaii sans Erin for a week. I can't wait.
We have eagerly been awaiting Halloween. We've had Erin's costume for a few weeks, but she's been refusing to wear it at since we got it. That it, until yesterday. After her bath, I convinced her to try it on. I figure that getting her to wear the body wouldn't be a huge fight since it's just like pajamas with a tail. The head is a little more involved. In any case, she agreed to wear the head. Imagine a scrawny, pale little girl with a huge lion head on... it was awesome. She didn't want to take it off and we only got it off with promises that we would wear it again in the morning. This morning, I walk into her room and the first words out of her mouth are "more roar." So funny.
