Amaya's Latest: Our Little Monkey

What's Amaya been up to these past couple weeks? Plenty since she now has 2 extra hours every day to fill with fun, fun, fun. All of a sudden and with no warning her 2.5-3 hour daily nap turned into a 40-45 minute cat-nap. I guess she just has to much to do to waste time sleeping. She doesn't get cranky and appears well rested, so she just growing up I guess. She continues to sleep great at night. We call her our little teen sleeper because she sleeps in and loves her bed. She goes to bed at 8 and we get her up at 8 and at night when we ask her if she wants to go to bed she says "yeah, bed, bed, bed, yeah" while smiling, giggling, and pointing towards her room. There was even a period of 2 or 3 days last week when she asked to go to bed before we had a chance to for both her naps and bedtime. And a couple of those times when we walked in to her room she went straight for her crib rather that to the chair for story time. Too funny. One time I asked her if she wanted to read first and she pointed to her crib..."bed, bed, bed." She sure cracks us up. We probably have the only toddler that asks to go to bed.

On the nap front, she had a 4 day stretch (Th.-Sun.) where she didn't take a nap at all, but today she went down for her usual 45 minute catnap, so hopefully that was just a phase. She had her 18 month check-up today. She continues to follow her trend of being petite. She weighed in at 21 pounds 3 ounces, and she measured 32.75 inches long. Sooo....she would still qualify to ride in her first car seat, the car seat we took her home in from the hospital . Crazy. It holds kids up to 30 pounds and 32 inches.

Amaya continues to love playing mommy. She mothers any baby and animal that comes into her contact, including the stuffed spiders at Gymboree. Yuck. She also loves to give kisses and hugs, including to the spiders at Gymboree. Double yuck.

Amaya continues to learn new words and tricks every day. It's crazy how toddlers pick up on things. It makes the day so fun just waiting for the next entertaining moment and the next discovery. Amaya is definitely into imitative play. Just yesterday she was "clipping her nails" with her comb and today she was feeding her bunny crunchies. Her latest words include shark, bumbo, bike, walk, and wolf to name a few. She continues to love balls and playing "catch." And....she continues to be our little monkey, as witnessed below.

CAUGHT IN THE ACT

So that is how she keeps getting onto the dining room table.

IDENTITY CRISIS

Amaya forgets she's not a doll and gets stuck in her baby doll stroller.

Amaya's Busy, Fun-filled Weekend

Pictures, Pictures, and more Pictures

(see previous entry for a narrative update)

Amaya coming for my camera.
Amaya "eating" one of her bows. They never stay in her hair very long these days.
Amaya carrying her bunny...she never goes very far without it.
We went over to Grandma Cindy's and Grandpa Jerry's on Sunday to watch the Jets game. I always fill up Amaya's suitcase with toys when we head over there and Amaya discovered her suitcase is a fun toy in itself. She started crawling into it, so I helped her finish getting in and she was thrilled. She kept ducking her head down inside like she wanted me to zip it up, but it isn't quite big enough for that. But, the good news is, when she turns 2 we can get her one that's a little bigger and continue having her fly free. Smile, smile. Just kidding of course.
Here she is ducking her head inside. I started pulling her around in it after this picture and she thought that was sooooo much fun. Who needs Disneyland.
G and G bought Amaya this stroller for the upcoming Christmas holiday...but decided she should have it now. Why not let her enjoy it for a few extra months. What a great G and G! Amaya had a ball pushing her babies around in the stroller on Sunday. There were definitely signs these past couple of weeks that she would enjoy a stroller for her dolls. She'd put them in or on anything she could find and push them around. On a stool, on the office chair, in a box, and even at the gym in a toy grocery cart and on a little chair. I'd see on the monitor pushing a chair all over the toddler room with a little baby on it.
Having a ball.
Wow, her bow is still in. Guess she's sidetracked with her new toy.
She should enter the stroller Olympics. Here she is just a blur of speed.

I think Amaya wanted to take her baby for a walk outside. Sorry Amaya...not during the Jets game.
She was fine staying in to watch the game.
She took her babies for a walk inside instead.
Oh, daddy's hair is soooo per-ty. Guess that means the bow is no longer in Amaya's hair.
After the Jets game we headed home and I had coincidentally planned on giving Amaya some of my toys from childhood Sunday afternoon. Here she is playing mommy with her bunny and using my old Cabbage Patch Kids playpen, high chair, and infant carrier.

After she got bunny up from naptime, it was time to feed him.
Then they had errands to run.
Here is my old Fischer Price cook-set. Blast from the past! Did anyone else have this? Our neighbors Carrie and Nate were over for Monday Night Football (along with our good friend Rob and his girlfriend Kim) and Carrie said she had the same set growing up. Neato!
Amaya cooking while holding bunny. Kind of dangerous.

What a good mommy! She put bunny down while she made the coffee...
and started dinner.
Amaya piling bunches of stuff into her "new" toy playpen...
including herself.
Sooo silly.

Stroller time again.
My cpk dish set with potty chair.
Amaya back to feeding her bunny.
She must be stirring up some chocolate milk.
The meal is done, time for Amaya's baby to use the potty.

How cute is that?!?!
Yet more evidence that Amaya may be ready for potty training.
I gave Amaya one last retro toy set. Check out these Tupperware relics. Did anyone else have these? My mom had the big version. Our neighbor Carrie had these, too. Our moms must've shopped at the same store.
Such cute little cups and bowls!
Amaya had a ball stacking the cups within each other and making a tower.

I can't wait until she's old enough for tea parties!
What fun that will be!
Creatures of all sorts have the ability to share a stroller ride peacefully. The Packer and Viking fans in the room at the time did pretty good, too.
Amaya had a ball (no pun intended) watching the Packer game on Monday. I think she enjoyed our guests more than the game, though. Smile, smile. Above she has a pretzel in her hand and below she's chilling in an empty beer box. Now, if those are signs it's football season, I don't know what is.

Amaya Update

Hello everyone. Long time no blog. What can I say, we've been keeping busy... especially miss Amaya. She's quite the busy girl. She's doing new things and learning new stuff every day it seems. So, here's a little of what she's been up to.



Amaya continues to enjoy Gymboree class. At first I wasn't sure it would really help her "learn and grow." I kept her in it just for the fun factor. But, her motor skills have improved immensely, so that has been fun to see. She can scale "the wall" with the best of them now. Which is a skill that has translated nicely to her home life. Amaya now climbs onto the dining room chairs and then onto the dining table. I walked out into the family room for a minute one day, only to walk back in the the kitchen area to see miss monkey sitting on the dining room table. She is also getting better and better at participating in the activities, although she still spends a good portion of the class "exploring" and doing her own thing. But, other kids do this, too, so it seems pretty typical of her age group. She always comes a running when it bubble, bubble time, though!!!

Amaya had her first (and last) Kindermusik class on Monday. She was not impressed. Too funny. She kept going to the door and saying bye-bye?, bye-bye?, as if begging me to go. And actually, I had to agree with her. It seems like most cities offer a Kindermusik class for toddlers, so I thought it would be neat, but I think the same class has been offered since the '70's. The music was really cheesey and dated...it sounded like I was listening to an old record back in my kindergarten class. Amaya prefers music with a beat, so she wasn't having it. So, she is now disenrolled and we are trying out Gymboree's music class tomorrow. We'll see if that will be "good enough" for my sweet little princess. Guess she's just use to jamming to hip hop music at home with mom, dad, and Barney.

For about one week I was able to keep Amaya's hair in pig tails. See photo above. Now's she's back to pulling out the holders, even the tiny silicone ones. Her hair is very fine like mine, so they slide out easily. But, her hair is getting long, so we shall see...we may end up breaking down and taking her for her second haircut. She just may stay with the bob look until she's a bit older. Meanwhile, she's got the shaggy look going on most of the day. She'll let me keep a barrette in it for about 20% of the time. Any pointers out there for keeping the little ones tresses tamed while growing out their hair?

O.K. What else? Amaya has started bringing her wipes and a diaper to us when she needs a diaper change now. Too funny. She's showing potty training readiness, but mommy's not quite ready yet. Where has the time gone?

Amaya adds new words to her vocabulary daily it seems. So fun....some of our current favorites are touchdown (sounds like bouchdown, but her t's are coming along), of course mommy and daddy, bunny, baby, side (she says this when she wants to go outside), bath, juice, light, plane and we we still love it when she days bubble and seriously (seriscy).

Amaya continues to be very affectionate, giving hugs and kisses readily. When the "I love you" song comes on on Barney, she comes a running from where ever she may be to dance to it and give a "great big hug and a kiss from me to you" on cue. Whenever we sing that song, even when Barney isn't on, she "go through the motions." So fun. She'll also randomly crawl up into Scott's or my laps and put her head on our shoulder and just hug and snuggle with us. We love that. She's such a sweetie.

She's also becoming quite the mommy! She loves playing mommy, but has abandoned her cabbage patch kids baby in order to devote all of her time to her pink bunny. She carries it where ever she goes and feeds, diapers, and rocks it like a baby. It truly is her baby. She even makes wah-wah noises at times, after which she'll feed or rock the bunny. So funny. And...it wears her cpk baby's clothes.

Amaya has also exercised her helpful and caring nature recently, showing she will be a great mommy someday, when baby Brooklyn was over for a visit. We were watching Brooklyn for her mommy and daddy (Mae and Brett), when she got a little fussy. I was rocking her a bit to calm her, when Amaya disappeared into the kitchen, only to return about 15 seconds later with Brooklyn's pacifier. First of all, Amaya had just gotten up for the day, being the teen sleeper that she is, so it's funny she even found the paci (it was on the dining room table). Secondly, I was impressed she brought it over, clearly knowing that it may help the baby. Then she went and found Brooklyn's blanket and brought it over. I never said a word...she did it all on her own. Amaya just loved having Brooklyn over and was even sooo quiet when Brooklyn was sleeping. This is quite amazing because Amaya is veeerrry vocal. After Brooklyn's nap, Amaya got sooo excited to go see the baby. She heard her stirring on the monitor, so she new the baby was waking up, but she wasn't sure where she was. When I took Amaya upstairs to get Brooklyn, she ran around looking for her. It was sooo funny. When she found her she was soooo happy. Brooklyn gets to come back and play on Friday and Amaya is soooo excited.

Amaya continues to enjoy the pool, but only on weekends when dad is home lately because mommy got a tattoo (actually two tattoos). I didn't realize I had to stay out of the water for 3-4 weeks. Oops. It was worth it, though. I love them. One is on my upper left back area and is S,A, and B all intertwined in a fancy design. It turned out very neat. The other is the Packers logo on my right ankle. I've wanted to do that for a long time, and with the whole Favre debacle, it was finally time to do it. I added Favre below the Packer G so he's forever a Packer to me. Smile, smile.

O.K. I think that's enough to make up for taking nearly a month off from blogging. Now I'll do another entry of photos, photos, photos.