Update

Well we are slowly settling in here in our new home. We love it (except for the tiny garage) and we're thrilled to be in this area. Boxes are still in many of the rooms as we figure out where things need to go in the new place. New houses just necessitate more storage and organization....like in the pantry and in closets with the shelving and bins etc. It is also taking me some time to decide how to make the best use out of our closets for storage since we have zero room in the garage. (This is particularly hard for us since our previous home had a huge garage, a workshop and an unfinished area. We didn't even worry about saving space because that was never an issue!) The clutter created by the boxes and items that still don't have a real "home" is really hard for me to ignore, but I'm trying to be patient as we move at a manageable pace!


Here is our fabulous new fridge. (Thank you to everyone who gave their input.) I think we're going to like the f reezer on the bottom, and even though I originally wanted a stainless version, I really think this looks best in the kitchen.

little secretary

Lydia loves phones. She has about three toy phones, my old cell phone and now this one that we're not using. She still prefers our real cell phones though. She has a word for "hello" - it sounds something like "ah-DAH." She can say "hi" but never uses that on the phone. She usually puts the phone up to her ear and babbles in her own language. It is so cute.

with Grandma B.

Now that we are no longer on my mom's way home from work, she doesn't have the opportunity to drop by for those little spontaneous visits to see Lydia. She came over last week just to see her little granddaughter. Here they are reading Lydia's favorite book, "Moo, Baa, La La La" by Sandra Boynton. Lydia really loves to look at her books. She will often entertain herself for an extended period of time by just flipping through the books. She understands when I ask her to go get a book and bring it to mama to read. Depending on which book we're reading, she usually wants to turn the pages at her own pace without waiting for me to finish. The exception is with her favorite book...but if you're familiar with Boynton books, you know that the text on each page is really short, so perhaps she doesn't have time to get impatient!

She is trying to say more words now. She knows bye-bye, but just a couple of weeks ago she started saying "bye-da" instead. I'm not sure if at first she was trying to say "bye da-da" but it seems to have stuck. She also uses that word or her sign for "all done" anytime she is tired of what is going on and she is ready for a change. Other words she has recently added to her vocab:

Joss -for Uncle Josh
Puh - her stuffed dog, Pup
Maw - more (she also signs this one)
Naw - no
side - outside (with an arm stretched toward the door)
Baw - ball
Baa - bath
men - Amen

I've also realized that she can understand more than I thought she could. Just last week I started "testing" her to see what she would do. I asked her to go get several things that were out on the floor - Pup, a ball, a book etc. She would look around, find the object, go get it and bring it back to me. At the same time she is very stubborn and won't do this type of thing if she doesn't want to!
She is quite independent and I would not call her clingy at ALL. I started back to work last week which means she stays in the nursery while I teach. The two women that take care of the children are wonderful and Lydia loves them. Obviously a summer away didn't produce any uncertainty or clingyness in her - the first day back she reached for Carmen while I was still holding her! And later that day, she was having such a good time with the Little Tikes kitchen that she cried when I came downstairs to get her. I had to pull her away from the toy. It is nice to know that she is happy while there....even if I miss her more than she misses me!!

Is a picture worth a thousand words?

Regardless, this post will be heavy on the pictures. Hopefully I can choose from the vast amount of pictures I took and give a synopsis of our vacation with just a few comments. We went to our family vacation cabin on a lake in MN during the last week of July.

Lydia woke up with a yucky runny nose the morning before we left. She doesn't look too happy here, but thankfully she did not get a cold or anything worse.

We visited Ben's Grandpa Don and Joann for a delicious dinner at their place in Minneapolis when we arrived Thursday afternoon.

Friday we met two of Ben's friends from college, Kris and Rachel, at Annie's for lunch. Afterwards we walked around downtown and visited a few favorite spots from their days at the U of M.

We spend the first weekend visiting Ben's relatives in Pine City. We stayed on Chris and Hadley's farm and had a great time.

Ben's mom was also there and she enjoyed her time with Lydia.

Lydia and Auntie Chris

We headed up to Orr, MN and the family cabin on the lake on Sunday. It was a packed house with 10 of us in a small cabin with one bathroom, but we all had a good time. Lydia slept GREAT every night and all of you with children know that peaceful sleep is key for an enjoyable vacation!!
The boys did their share of fishing (this time once was enough for me) and brought home 30+ fish for dinner one night.

Lydia and Catharyn (my cousin Brigette's 18 month old) met and "played" - as much as it is possible for two such young ones to play together. Lydia LOVED going outside and took advantage of all of her doting relatives by walking up to any of them, raising up her arms (to be held) and then pointing outdoors and saying , "side?". Uncle Josh was, and always has been especially kind to take her outside whenever she asks. The other day I was talking to someone, not directly to Lydia, and I used the word "outside" in conversation and Lydia immediately looked at me and said, "joss?" (her word for Josh).

Although she wasn't "bad" on the plane ride up to MN, she did have a little meltdown near the end of the flight. However, she did MUCH better on the way back to GA. For those of you who don't know her personality, she is a little "busy bee" and rarely wants to sit on your lap. She is constantly in motion and always exploring her surroundings. You can probably imagine what she thought of a two-hour plane ride where she was pretty much confined to mama and daddy's laps!! (On the way to MN we were upgraded to business class and the man across the aisle must have had 3-4 drinks. I was wondering if her wailing for the last 30 minutes of the flight had anything to do with his rate of consumption!)
The drive from Orr to Minneapolis is about 4.5 hours, then you have the airport time and then the 2 hour flight. We decided this would probably be too much for Lydia to handle very well so we broke up the trip back to Minneapolis by staying Friday night in Pine City again. Josh and Liz were helpful as ever and kept her entertained in the backseat.

She decided to start picking her nose (lovely, I know) and we caught her in the act while on vacation. As impolite as it is, it was pretty hilarious to see her doing it(she had us all laughing as we tried not to give her any encouragement) and I attempted to capture it on film...this was the best I could do.

It was a wonderful vacation and we were all so happy that Liz was finally starting to feel "normal" again. We had a great time seeing all our relatives up north and also spending time relaxing with the family we see every week!!
For a more detailed account of our vacation exploits, visit Elizabeth's blog!! http://bellablogga.blogspot.com/