Gabriella has reached another milestone and is now sitting and scooting/rolling across the floor. She also has a very lopsided grin, with one of her top outside teeth showing up before the middle two. You can catch a glimpse of them in this video, where I think she is saying she wants to be a recording artist.
We met with the attorney for Baby C's adoption, and it sounds like it will be about a month away! He is starting to chatter a lot more and obviously understands more than he is letting on. His favorite pastime lately is to turn the tv on and off.
Graham has discovered fishing. My mom had a little fishing game at the July 4th celebration, and he has asked for his fishing pole almost every day since. Here he is in his traditional fishing garb:
I think he and Grandpap Smith will have a good time someday.
I was upstairs putting Gabriella to bed this morning when I heard Graham yelling "Diggadee!" (jellybean) at the top of his lungs. When I went downstairs, he proudly showed me that he had gone potty all by himself for the first time, completely on his own and without being prompted. We made a big deal of it, jumping around, clapping, and shouting. In my jubilation, I didn't notice that Baby C was carefully dipping my wallet in the potty chair.
Seems like our kids are always up to something. This morning, Baby C decided to carry the bathroom scale around with him wherever he went. Then I noticed that his cheeks were pudgier than normal, so I reached into his mouth and fished out my watch.
On Friday, Graham came into our bedroom at 6am looking very sleepy. Will said, "Graham, what are you doing awake?" and Graham suddenly started yelling at the top of his voice, "Caw! Caw! Caw!". He was telling us that he had heard a crow outside the window. Yesterday, he dumped out an entire bowl of pasta salad on the floor (which I scooped back into the bowl for us to continue eating). His favorite song lately is "Onward, Christian Soldiers".
Gabriella has a knack for rolling under things until only her head is exposed. For example...
We bought a playset for the kids and put it up over the weekend. Turns out all we really needed to get was a slide for the front porch.
They had lots of fun putting it together, though. Not sure what Graham's face is doing in this picture.
For all of you who are wondering about the status of Baby C's adoption, he is now in adoptive placement with us. Time to lawyer up. We could be about 6 weeks away from the official adoption, but it depends on how busy the courts are.
We spent the first weekend in June at Will's family's house celebrating our nephew Logan's birthday. It was good to see some people we hadn't seen in quite a while, and our kids enjoyed playing with their cousins. Like my sister-in-law Gwen said, at times it looked like a redhead convention.
Before we headed to the party, we stopped to see our sweet little niece Isabella and eat lunch with Gwen. Isabella looks like a tiny little doll, but she's growing like a champ. Here we are at the Children's Hospital.
Will's picture is with Baby C, so I can't post it. Graham especially liked the spinning chair.
Will had a business trip last week, so the kids and I stayed with my parents for a few days. We got to do a boatload of fun things: walking down to Dairy Queen for ice cream, playing in the wading pool, going to the park, and visiting Grandpa at work. This last one was intended for Graham, who was promised a chance to sit on a putt-putt. In Grahaminese, putt-putt means tractor. (My sister thought we had taken him mini-golfing.)
Dad took us to the university's machine shed, and Graham first got to sit in a green John Deere tractor that was large enough to have a cab. He was in heaven. Baby C was ambivalent. Next, Dad decided to up the ante and let him sit on the giant red combine. Graham sat there for about 10 seconds before he started violently shaking his head "no". He wanted to go back to the real putt-putt. This combine was the wrong color.
When we got home, Aunt Kim and Grandma were visiting and we got to hang out with them for a day. We're hoping Aunt Kim will find an accounting job in the area and get to stay even longer!
In other news, Graham's potty training seemed to be going okay until he had 8 accidents today. We used to be able to go an entire week without 8 accidents, so I'm not sure what's going on. He is also violently allergic to something in sunscreen. We've tried 3 different kinds with the same result: swelling and hives. We have resorted to going out after 4pm. Here he is in the pool at Mom & Dad's...
They enjoyed playing in the splash mat that was a birthday present from Great Grandma Funk. I particularly liked the fact that it said "No Diving".
Baby C is by far the most accident-prone child I have ever seen. He uses his forehead as a battering ram. Will finally got down on his level today and said, "Use your eyes! If you see something in front of you, stop!" Maybe he just needed someone to tell him that. He has learned the signs for "more" and "all done" and is learning to use a spoon.
Gabriella has her two bottom teeth now and chews on everything she can reach, including other people and the legs of chairs. She enjoyed all the attention from her grandparents because it meant she was held most of the time. Here she is enjoying the splash mat from her seat in the Bumbo:
She started solid foods this week and is doing pretty well with rice cereal:
And finally, Graham still enjoys baking. I showed him how to sprinkle the filling for a coffee cake, and he insisted on doing it himself. He is saying "Sprinkle! Sprinkle! Sprinkle!" until he gets bored about halfway through.
