If You Could Talk with the Animals

Hello all,

I know it's been simply forEVER since I've updated this thing. I've been out of it and not myself lately. I'm starting to get back to my old self again. Thank goodness! We all get like that, I'm sure.

Chloe is doing great! Getting bigger and bigger every day. She sits up without falling over at all unless it's on purpose. She's not crawling yet but somehow is all over the place putting everything she can pick up in her mouth: her toys, the dogs toys, my shoes, my phone, October's foot, October's pacifier that's still attached to her sleeve. You know, the usual. She rolls and rolls for the major travel but otherwise scoots backwards and then spins on her belly to reach what she was after. She can go forward but it's pretty slow. She reaches with one hand and rocks on her side and when that's not enough she reaches with the other hand and rocks to the other side all the while pushing on the ground with her little toes. She'll get up on her hands and knees like she's gonna just start crawling but then she just bounces and then throws herself on the floor. Sometimes she goes forward and sometimes she goes backwards. She's so much fun to watch.

She's taken a header off my bed three times now. I swear I watch her like a hawk! She's just too quick sometimes. She hasn't gotten hurt falling, yet. I don't let her take naps on my bed anymore unless I'm snuggling with her. I can put every pillow in the house around her on that bed and check on her every 2 minutes and she will still wiggle out of them and jump off the bed. I dragged the playpen into my room for nap time for her during the day. Little stinker!!!

She's discovered how to spit copious amounts of drool and thinks it's hilarious. Preston and I went to BJ's for dinner and we took her with us because she can now use the highchairs in the restaurants. When our food got to the table, little Miss Quick-Hands-with-Long-Arms had her little paws in our food before the waiter had even let go of the dish himself. Poor guy! We had him bring out some oyster crackers for her to eat so she'd stay out of our food. That worked! She loved those things! Anyways, as she's eating and throwing food on the ground and getting the stuff everywhere Preston thinks it would be funny to blow a raspberry at her to get her going. Fortunately, I stopped him before she caught on and made the real mess.

We think she's left handed. When she eats stuff like cheerios, with her right hand she'll grab the food into her little fist and with her left make a perfect pincer grasp. She can still eat with both hands but the finer motions are usually with her left. It'll be fun to see how that turns out. If she is left handed I'll have a hard time teaching her how to write.

We finally broke down and got a video camera. Now she will not only have more baby pictures than any other kid that ever lived but she will also have her childhood on video. Who needs a memory anymore? But really it's great cause now I can SHOW you things like how she gets stuck under the entertainment center. I don't' actually have that one on video but I do have tons of pictures. She just back up under it till she couldn't got any further and started to cry. I do however have this great video of her talking to Charlie. Not in people or baby talk mind you, but in HIS language. Pay close attention to the noises she makes.

What's the doggie say? *cough* *cough*