Update

I've been posting a few pictures lately, so I thought I'd write a little note to update you all on what Kaia's up to these days. She's growing more and more every day. One day last week I weighed her on our scale at home and she weighed 21 lbs. We'll know her official height and weight at her next doctor's appointment in June. She's a busy little bee...very interested in everything around her. She's walking along furniture and behind her push toy, as well as while holding onto our hands. Occasionally she'll let go of what she's holding onto for a few seconds and stand on her own. This morning she let go of the couch and took her 1st step toward me! She says 3 words pretty consistently and seems to know what they mean: "mama", "dada", and "da" (dogs). She also babbles a lot. I've been doing sign language with her since she was about 3 months old, and she understands several signs. Last week she started making the sign for "all done" back to me. So that's pretty exciting! As you probably read in the last post, Kaia has 3 teeth and is working on another which hasn't broken through yet. She's a very good little girl who hardly cries, laughs and smiles a lot, and loves to play with her toys. She loves anything that plays music and is fascinated by the shower. She also loves to take things out of containers, so I always find the contents of the diaper bag all over our apartment. It's such a blessing to watch her grow and learn, and we can't wait to see what she does next! I would be remiss if I didn't add a few pictures along with this post, so here's one of Kaia and her new car, and a picture of 2 of Kaia's favorite friends: our dogs!

Check out my new car!

The "da"- Berkeley and Sampson

New teeth!

Kaia has started cutting 2 new teeth! Her top left front tooth has already broken through and the top right front is not far behind. This teething experience has been a lot different than when she got her bottom teeth. When she cut her 2 bottom teeth she barely fussed and the only thing she needed was her blanket to chew on when she was going to sleep. This time, however, has been much worse. She's been working on the top left tooth for about a week now, and has had quite a bit of trouble sleeping. She's very restless and has a hard time getting into a deep sleep. She normally goes to bed and sleeps all night, but all week she's been getting up at least once or twice in the night and being restless for 1-2 hours. She isn't awake, but she cries if you're not holding and rocking her. Last night was the worst night yet. It took 3 hours to get her to bed, and then she woke up at 11 and 3. She didn't want to take a bottle and was just antsy. I think she's working on that top right tooth. On a positive note, she has figured out a good use for those 2 bottom teeth. She's figured out how to get the lids off containers by using her teeth. I have included pictures below that show what happened after Kaia got the lid off her Gerber puffs...

Hmmm...what's inside here?

These are tasty!

Did I do that?

Helping Mama Clean!

Cleaning the cabinets

I love to sing while I work!

I'm such a good cleaner!

More lake

Checking out the water with Mama

Playing in the sand

What is this stuff, Daddy?

1st trip to the lake!

We went to the lake today with Josh's family and had a picnic. The kids had a great time playing and swimming in the water. It was a perfect day!

Our family

The cousins: Kaia, Addyson, Luke, Isabella, and Jude

Hi everyone!

Mmm...tasty!

9 Months Old!!

Brushing my teeth!


When can I go to Grandma's?



I don't want to hear it, Mama!

Check out my cool shades!

I love to eat!!

Kaia says "night night"!

I'm sorry it's sideways...I couldn't get my computer to flip the image around. We hope you enjoy! We just got the video uploader to work. Kaia (as you can hear from this video, we call her Maisy because of her middle name Mae) loves this video! She keeps wanting me to play it over and over again!

Happy Mother's Day

We had a great 1st Mother's Day! Josh's cousin got married on Saturday, so we went to that and then stayed in Des Moines for the weekend. Kaia stayed in a hotel for the 1st time and did great. We went to our old church on Sunday morning and then went to lunch with Josh's family and spent the rest of the day shopping! We had a lot of fun and especially enjoyed our beautiful reason for having Mother's Day!

Do I really have to give up the card?

Having fun at Joe's Crab Shack

Having fun at the hotel!

Mommy and Me!

Not a Boy!!

As all of you know, Kaia is a beautiful little girl. But when we go out strangers keep calling her a boy! Now, I understood this happening when it was colder out and of all the blankets to choose to cover her up, Josh would choose the one blanket we own that has blue on it. But people say "what a cute little boy" even when I dress her in bright pink clothes! I understand that she has short hair and that might influence people into thinking she's a boy, but I don't know of any little boys wearing all pink! I would say the most interesting example of this happened yesterday. I took Kaia with me to get groceries yesterday around lunchtime and our Wal-Mart has a McDonald's in it, so I decided to get us some lunch before we did our shopping. I had her dressed in a pink shirt that said "ballerina" on it, with some black pants. While we were standing in line an older gentleman in front of us turned around and said, "What a handsome little boy. He looks like a little president." With that, he turned and walked away. I wasn't thrilled with her being called a boy yet again, but I'll take her looking like a president as a compliment. Maybe someday we'll have a President Kaia!