8 Months!...two weeks late

I know I need to do a Weekly Photo, and it was Elanor's birthday last week, but Alice turned 8 months at the end of November and I need to update before she's 9 months old!

{Phone picture, sent to Tyler at work, as he misses us when he is gone.}

I love this sweet, smiley baby so much and I am so glad she joined our family. I also love the baby stage and am so enjoying our baby each day.

This is a pretty horrible, early morning picture, but I love it! It shows how Alice is so sweet and loving. She loves to hug, cuddle and can kiss upon occasion. She loves to reach up and touch my face.

 Alice giving me a kiss. 

When I think of Alice, I think bright. She a little light of a person and brings so much joy through her huge smile and sometimes very loud sounds. She absolutely loves music and seems to already have good rhythm and taps her hand to the beat or moves her body to the beat. She is always right on with the music and I am thinking it will be something that she will always love.

Alice seems to be generally a little less social and not as talkative as Elanor was at this age (and still is), but is also sometimes very loud and does enjoy the company of other babies or children. She is also getting so much better with the whole stranger or even going to people she knows thing. She will often smile at strangers and lets people hold her quite often. She often still looks at me to make sure I or Tyler are there. Speaking of Tyler, she lights up so much when he gets home!  

Two weeks ago, Alice was just starting to army crawl around and could get places. She is even better now and gets up on her knees all the time and has taken a few knees and hands "steps".  She often will get frustrated with herself, but is very determined to get where she wants to go.

Alice also loves to eat and will eat anything. Smoked blue cheese, yep. A scone, of course. Soup broth, definitely. Brussel sprouts, she gobbled them up. She LOVES food. Alice has also got the pincher grasp down and can feed herself really well. 

 Alice still loves Elanor so much and Elanor loves her. I hope despite the age gap that they become the best of friends.

Oh, and she loves putting pretty much anything in her mouth and she is simply wonderful.

The Weekly Photo

Little ice baby.

Thanksgiving

We went up to Spokane to spend Thanksgiving with my Grandpa and step-Grandma Vonnie. It was so much fun and I am glad we were able to go, as Elanor had not been to Spokane before and it had been at least six years since I was up there. I do not get to see all of my extended family very often, so it is means a lot to be able to see some of them!

There was some snow in Spokane!

Uncle Ian spent some time teaching Elanor how to "snowboard".

We helped Grandpa and Vonnie decorate their Christmas tree and tried to take some family pictures.

Ian is such a good uncle.

I love this one of Elanor and her Great Grandpa Roger.

Happiness.

 I love this picture so much, but why am I blurry?!?!

 Four generations.

 Grandpa and Vonnie with the girls.

(it is hard to get pictures where everyone is looking as there were multiple cameras going off)

On Saturday, we took Elanor on a mini Spokane tour.  First stop was the carousel in Riverfront Park (the very best one--it is beautiful and unique, moves quite fast, and you have to try and grab these rings as you go around--it makes sense, just go to Spokane sometime.)

How cute is this?!

My Uncle Scott, with the girls and his soon-to-be step daughter Marley.

I have a pretty mom!

Elanor and Marley got along so well and were fast friends in a matter of minutes.

We also stopped at the giant tree at the mall, walked around the very fancy and very cool Davenport Hotel and met my cousins, Marlana and Andrew there for desserts. If you ever happen to be in Spokane, go to the Davenport and explore. The ballrooms are beautiful, the main lobby area stunning, and the bathrooms are quite fancy.

 I am so glad we were able to travel up to Spokane. It is wonderful to see everyone and there are so many more family members we need to visit now that we live a little closer. I love spending time with family and hearing stories. It really is so important and our time here is short.

And to close, here is little Alice asleep on the car ride back home. 

And I stayed up way too late writing this.

The Weekly Photo

I have just been the worst at this lately!

Here is last Monday's (Nov 30th):

Elanor and Great Grandpa Roger

The Weekly Photo (s)

Ugh.....

I got behind again! There has been a lot going on and I have started on some posts, but never got around to finishing them. I also cannot get this Syrian refugee crisis/Paris bombings/ISIS stuff out of my head. My heart hurts so much for the refugees and I want to help. I am also so infuriated that U.S. governors (half of them) will not let refugees into their states (even though the immigration process is very thorough and safe). Plus, the U.S. is hardly accepting any refugees and the small amount that Obama wants to bring in, has crazy right-wingers up in arms about it. I just don't understand how people can be so un-feeling and anti-human. It has been troubling me greatly. 

This week is Thanksgiving and I feel very blessed and lucky to be where I am. Running for my life with my husband and little girls, with hardly any food or water, sleeping wherever and having nightmares of the horrors we've seen would be a very grim situation. While I am grateful for what I have here, I am so extremely sorry for these Syrian refugees and I want to help. What can I do?

My brother is on his mission for the LDS church in Sweden. He is right in the midst of it, with refugees streaming into Europe for sanctuary. His missionary letters are wonderful and his pictures beautiful. You should really consider hopping on over there. https://scottboys.wordpress.com

Here are some Weekly Photos and hopefully I will write again soon.

For November 2:

November 16th:

November 23rd:

7 Months

I feel like these past couple months have flown by! I love, love, love babies and am really loving mine. She has grown up so much this month.

Just look at that posture!

 She was sitting up at six months and is pretty much a pro at it now. She scoots and rolls around, and also turns circles on her tummy (like a clock hand). She is getting much stronger and I predict she will be crawling within the next month or so.

 She still rather prefers me to anyone else (as it should be), but is much better about not crying when other people hold her. When she is in a new place, or even a place she has been, she takes some time to warm up to people and mostly observes and has a very serious expression. Once Alice warms up, she is all smiles! She has also started getting excited when Tyler comes home, which is so cute!

 Alice lights up so much when Elanor plays with her. Alice is also extremely patient with Elanor and only cries if she believes herself in real danger. I obviously watch Elanor very close (Elanor just loves her so much, so I have to remind her to not smother Alice with love).

As with most babies, Alice loves being outside. She also really loves animals and gets so excited when she sees a dog or cat.

 Alice is now sleeping through the night!!! I will write more on this in another post, but if your baby has trouble sleeping or napping I recommend The Sleepeasy Solution.

 Alice loves to eat and will eat anything! Her favorite is probably avocados, but she does seems to really enjoy soup broth as well. Alice is getting that pincher thing down and has started getting food in her mouth herself. She seems to be quite a dainty eater and tries to be very careful about getting food to her mouth.

 She is also pretty funny and likes to make us laugh with faces like these or funny noises. (She is doing this face on purpose.)

It is so fun to get to know Alice and figure out her personality. She is quite a bit different from our crazy, social, fun-loving, deep feeling Elanor. Alice seems quite calm, quiet and observant. She does however let you know when she is tired or upset in a pretty big way. Alice needs time to adjust to different places and people and is pretty dependent on me and needs me close. She likes to make us laugh, but does not seem to be an attention-seeker (being an attention-seeker is not a bad thing--being one myself as a child--so is Elanor). Alice also really enjoys music and dancing. She has the greatest smile and brings so much joy to our little family. 

Halloween 2015

It was really fun to have a new member of the family for Halloween, as it has been the three of us for the last four years. Elanor wanted to dress as a squirrel in her costume from the Willy Wonka play, so we themed our costumes around that. I made Alice a little acorn costume and Tyler and I were trees.

My face paint looked pretty good in person. I tried to make my skin look like bark.

Alice was such an adorable acorn and I love that Tyler humors me and dresses up. Though I suspect he likes it/does not mind and loves how excited Elanor gets when we are all in costume.

 Another one at Mema's (Tyler's mom) house! 

I did not get any good pictures unfortunately! It was too rainy outside and too dark inside to get any decent pictures.

It was raining so much (it had not rained for awhile and then this week, and especially on Halloween, it was torrential!). We had an umbrella, but Elanor was too excited and running from house to house to stay under an umbrella. Plus, her head was covered and she was warm.

A wet, but very successful squirrel with a full bucket of candy.

There is this house in Troutdale (little old people), who go all out and decorate for every holiday. Elanor loved trick-or-treating here!

 Look at that happy baby!

Here is Elanor's pumpkin. She just wanted everything to be very themed this year!

 We were able to see family, visit with friends, trick-or-treat in the rain, eat pizza and eclairs--so it was a good night!