Trick Or Treat

 Since neither Eliza or I can eat candy, we dressed her up just for the heck of it. We were given this costume, and after careful application, were able to get whiskers on her. 

 Her scrunchy nose worked perfectly for this costume!

I love my little tiger cub :)

World's Cutest Witch

I have never been as excited for Halloween as I am for it this year. There are too many cute things I can dress Eliza in for costumes. Yesterday, I dressed her up as a blueberry, since that was her first name.

Mindy and Clarence gave Eliza an adorable pair of shoes that were Halloween colors, so I decided to make her tutu and a bow to match it. However, since I never go to the craft store and get ONLY what I went for, I found this adorable witch clip-on hat and decided I could make it into the cutest witch costume I have ever seen!

Eliza getting into character

Click here for more pictures :)

Eliza Knievel

 Now that Eliza can Army crawl like a champ, she is experimenting a bit with her new found independence. The other day, I noticed that she would get up on one knee (like above) and twist her hips from side to side. I imagine this is how babies learn to sit on their own.

 Then she started heading toward Face Plant City. It is scaring the tar out of me to watch her doing this, but I can't keep her in a bubble and she has to learn. She will not stay on the nice soft padded rug, so she will have to do her learning the hard way.

Perhaps, she is just practicing her baby Yoga. Either way, this child is already giving me heart attacks!

Nothing Better Than This

 This is one of the best days I have had in a long time! Eliza woke up in an excellent mood, which is unusual lately. We played together all morning until Michael woke up, then drove to Roca Scary Farm to visit the pumkin patch.

 Since it was chilly outside, Eliza wore a hat most of the time, so instead of carrying the headband, Michael and I took turns wearing it. I think it goes well with his eye ;)

While we were there, Eliza got to see many new things! She was very interested in the goats and pigs in the petting zoo and really liked looking at all the pumpkins! I can't wait until next year when she is walking to take her back. I love our little family, nothing is better than spending the day with them. <3

7 Months Old

 I feel like I just uploading the 6 month pictures! Over the past month, I think her personality has grown more than her body. She has leaned more expressions with her face and has learned to imitate some of the noises of the animals on her toys. Everytime the elephant goes on her jumper, she yells similar to it.

 She has also mastered the scrunchy nose, which makes Michael and I laugh so much. Now she'll do the scrunchy nose and laugh along with us. She is a mess :)

Over the next month, I suspect that she will start full-on crawling and getting into much more trouble :)

Places to Go, Things to Say

Eliza is currently learning so much, she is getting tired more quickly, and because of this, is more fussy. She is working on learning to eat solids, crawling, popping teeth out, and who knows what else! Thankfully, we have a good hour after each nap of happy time.

During those happy times, she is now laughing at things on her own that she thinks are funny. Common 'funny things' are the animals, and funny sounds by mom and dad. One of our favorite things write now is her "scrunchy nose". In the video above, she tells us all about her scrunchy nose.

Although she doesn't have the full crawl yet, that doesn't stop her from getting to things she wants! The scary thing about it is she can get there so quickly. I can't imagine the trouble she is going to be able to get into when she really is crawling, and then later, walking.

Daddy Time!

So the past couple of days Stacey has been substituting at Goodrich Middle School, which means I get to have pure Eliza time. I hope that the days are pretty much the same routine for Eliza as with Mom but I am sure there are a couple differences.

1st difference: No PJ's in the morning.

 2nd Difference: No Bibs! Living life dangerously (or forgetfully).

3rd Difference: No Pants!

4th Difference: OK, this isn't a difference eating polar bears is just cute!

Love,

Dad

Progress Report #4

We have been very busy getting our house finished. So far, we have painted our bedroom. We still have curtains to put up and have a picture that we need to get framed to go above the bed.

 We have ripped up all the carpet from the hallway, finally gotten it clean from all of the grinding and painted it. The next thing to go is the carpet of the stairs and then we will stain the wood to match the rest of the house.

 We have painted the floor and brick in what will be Michael's bar.

 

We also put drywall up in the bar to cover the stairs. In the near future, we will paint, build a bar and shelves to make this a proper man cave :) 

 

Finally, we have painted the office, the floor (although it needs to be cleaned already) and got new windows put in (which aren't right, but that's a whole other story). The only other project in the basement is to put new drywall in the bathroom and tile the shower. We are SO close! 

Happy Birthday

Every set of vacation days Michael takes, we always spend it traveling and rushing. So, this set of vacation, he traveled to a wedding and then we decided to take it easy. For both of our birthdays, our Date-iversary, and just vacation, I rented a cabin at Platte River State Park for few days and had a great time.

 It is starting to get cold in our area, so when we went out for walks, we made sure to bundle Eliza up. Complete with mittens, a hat, warm clothes and the coma blanket, she was toasty next to us.

She seemed to really enjoy being outside. While Michael and I were talking as we were hiking, she would laugh and join in. Angel and Coral also loved being outside, able to chase small, fuzzy creatures.

One of my favorite places in the park was the Falls area. The sound of the water was very relaxing and the trees were starting to turn all sorts of wonderful colors. Notice, Angel is having a grand ol' time. Even though it was cold, she was playing the water. She has truly missed being outside.

Our cabin was very cozy and had room for Eliza to play. It had a small kithcenette, but Michael grilled outside both nights. Overall, we had a wonderful time being away from the house, technology and basement problems, and just enjoying our mini family retreat :)

All Natural

 After getting out of PJs this morning, we decided that it was just fine for her to go all nat-u-ral for the day.

 Besides, what kind of mom would I be if I didn't get tons of pictures that will utterly embarrass her when I put them in Senior slide shows?

 This past week, I looked at her and said, "OMG! You are skinny!" I also noticed that this is correlating with her pants getting a little shorter and her eating like a little piggy. I think she is going to grow just like Michael: plump up, shoot up taller, get real skinny, repeat.

The Sweetest Sounds

 Despite not sleeping, listening to fussing, changing diapers and having no free time, motherhood is absolutely wonderful. Since Michael has been gone the past 3 days, Eliza and I have spent a lot of time together, and it has been great. Today, she was sitting in my lap while we were reading a book and I wiggled my toe, knowing that Coral would attack it. It's our little game. What I did not know is that I would get this response out of Eliza.

That is the sound of her watching Coral attack my foot. Thankfully I had my phone near so that I could record this beautiful sound. She has never laughed this long or hard. You can tell by the end of it, she is struggling :)

I love that she is laughing on her own now. For some time, I can get her to laugh by making a silly face or noise, but now she is finding things funny on her own. I turned her upside down today and she thought that was great. Hopefully she will be just as smiley when Michael gets home. We've missed him.

Mischief

 

We are about a week in on eating solids twice a day. She has also figured out that there is 'stuff' in the cup that she can get out, but she hasn't figured out tipping it up yet. She'll get there. I can't tell if she likes water, because she always makes a face like, "what the heck?" But, she wants more... so I will take that as a stamp of approval. 

Jackpot!

 I am reorganized all of our baby stuff, because it is getting out of hand. I used to have a nice, organized, clutter-free house and then Eliza got here. We have toys everywhere! Now, all of the toys  are in a basket. I made the mistake of setting her in front of her toy basket, and just look at that face. Pure mischief!

 I gave it a few seconds to see what she would do and the hand went for it. She grabbed it and it didn't go anywhere, so I helped out. When I tipped it over, she get very excited and started grabbing for everything.

 She sat up and played for about 10 minutes before her little body got tired of sitting. She is getting so big! I say it every time, but this stage is my favorite!

  Wait! I thought the point was to clean up! When she goes to college, maybe.

Jumpin' Jumpin'

All Eliza wants to do these days is jump when we are holding her. We have thought about getting her a Jumperoo, but they are so expensive. Last night, while she was in child watch at the YMCA, we put her in the jumper and she had a blast! So, I found one on a consignment site, brought it home and cleaned it, and put her in it. She loves it!

Winter Ready

I have been talking about Eliza's crawling progress and, although we aren't quite there, she is making progress. She has realized that the little black box that I have lights up and she wants it! In an effort to see how well she is moving, I had to frustrate her a bit :)

 Since is starting to get colder here, I ordered her some winter gear. It came in today and I HAD to do fashion show. Here is Eliza in her new jacket, hat and mittens. Apparently she likes the mittens.

Wood Floors

In some instances, like the one above, Eliza seems to very much enjoy our wood floors. She can roll around on them and now 'walk' on them. However, attempting to crawl is downright frustrating!

Another New Toy

In case you don't believe me, here is proof that I have the cutest daughter in the whole world. Everyday I am amazed at the personality that she is developing and how sweet she is. Although I can already tell she is going to give me LOTS of gray hairs, I am so excited to see the person she becomes. 

So, maybe I'm a bad mom, but there are some times that I just need to put her down and wash the dishes. Or, run to the basement to change clothes to the dryer. She no longer tolerates her Pack n' Play because it is too small for her to barrel roll in. And, now that she is getting close to crawling and she rolls, I can't leave her 'loose'. We have the Exersaucer thing for her, but she easily gets bored with that because it doesn't do much. The solution: a walker. All of our house is wood or tile floor, so it will be perfect. We have gates to block her from getting to anything dangerous and have baby-proofed anything she can reach. Maybe she'll like it. Based on this video, it seems she will. 

Photo Shoot

 Our Eliza is 6 months old! We had family pictures taken with JB Photography and were very pleased with how they turned out. We will most likely use Jenni for Eliza's 1 year photos, which will come much sooner than I know.

 Here is a link to all the pictures.