Sophia went down the slide all by herself!

This afternoon Sophie and I tried a new playground near our house. She always has a blast when we go to the playground and until very recently her favorite thing has been the swings. Well, now that she's a "dare devil big girl" she prefers climbing up the steps and sliding down the slides instead of the ho-hum swings. Until today she's always gone down the slide with assistance like she is in the picture.

But today we hit a milestone. She went down the slide all by herself today! I could tell that she was scared to let go at the top, but she slowly scooted her butt to the edge and then slowly let go. I caught her at the bottom and when she looked up at me she was absolutely thrilled with herself.

Here's another picture of Sophia from our play date earlier this week. The little girl she is sitting beside just turned 1 last week.

This is soooo cool!

To see a larger version of the movie click here

Johnny Rockets - Take 2

I swore we would NEVER eat at Johnny Rockets again. In my opinion they have disgusting food. Well I broke the rule today and we went there.

We were at the mall this morning for a play date in the kids play area and by the time the play date ended, it was already after noon. I knew Sophia was hungry and I had a certificate for a free kids meal so we went to the Johnny Rockets diner inside the food court.

Sophie liked coloring while we waited for our food. Check out this video. Can you tell she's tired?


When the food did arrive, she especially loved dipping her french fries into the smiley face ketchup design they always hand out to kids. She only ate 2 bites of her hamburger, but she drank all of her milk and ate a good portion of the fries. Even though the food was gross, we had fun together. Check out this video of her coloring while we waited.

Please take special note of the bead necklaces she's wearing. When Nana was here this weekend she bought Sophie some dress up clothes, jewelry and shoes. Sophia loves to wear the necklaces - and the more that she can get around her neck the better. On Sunday when we went to the auto parts store with Dad she had on at least 10 of them. It sure beats her running around the house playing with my "grown up" jewelry...

Chicken

Yesterday Sophie and I spent most of the day in the car running errands. How boring for my little angel!

We have a stack of books and toys in the backseat so she can keep herself entertained in the car. She loves to browse through her books and point to all the animals she sees. At one point we pulled up to a red light and I turned around to see how/what she was doing. She looked at me, pointed to a page in the Animal Farm book she was looking at and proudly performed the chicken sign for the first time. She literally bent her arm at the elbow, tucked her thumb under her armpit and started flapping her arm like a chicken.

Animal signs she knows now: frog, duck, dog, lamb, fish, elephant, giraffe, chicken, butterfly, bumble bee, bird, lion.

Animal sounds she can make: meow, moo, the pig noise (not the oink, but the the nose snort), the bark of a dog (but it doesn't sound like a real bark).

A fun weekend visitor

Grandma (Nana) came to visit for a long weekend. Sophie and I picked her up at the airport on Thursday and we headed to the WOW sprinkler garden for a day of fun in the sun. We ate a picnic lunch and then spent a majority of the day playing in the water sprinklers and taking turns riding on the swings. Grandma was just like a kid herself in the sprinklers, but I think Sophia's favorite part was seeing the ducks at the end of the day.

Um, Sophie, I don't think you're supposed to drink the yucky sprinkler water.









On Friday Grandma played with Sophia all day and I had a chance to paint Sophie's room. I ran out of paint before it was finished...so that's going to be a fun project to finish up one of these days. (I'm in the process of turning her room into a little girl toddler room instead of a baby nursery.)

On Saturday we went to the beach and had a blast. Will and I actually were able to go into the water and use our body boards for some ultra fun surfing. I lost my sunglasses in the water, but it was definitely worth it to have Nana babysit Sophie under the beach umbrella so I could acquire my first tan of the season!

Of course the weekend went by way to fast and Grandma had to head home early on Sunday morning. Sophie literally spent the day catching up on her sleep. She didn't wake up until 11:15 on Sunday morning, was back down for a nap at 2:00 woke up at 5:00 to eat a light dinner and was back in bed at 8 PM for the night. Right before bed we decided to take a quick walk around the neighborhood and Sophia didn't want to ride in the stroller. She wanted to walk. We figured out that she lasted for a 1/2 mile before having a COMPLETE MELTDOWN.

The search is over!

I found the perfect bean bag chair for Sophia! It's pink and cushy and it's just her size. I put the bean bag into the back seat of the Explorer and Sophia had her hand resting on it the whole way home. I think she was staking her claim. Take a look at how adorable she was this afternoon after we brought it in the house.

Talking...

I thought Sophie would take a nap this morning. She didn't. Instead she was practicing how to say Mama and Da Da, but as soon as I turned on the camera she stopped and moved on to "better practice words"! Typical, huh?

15 month old pictures

These are Sophia's official 15-month old photos. She's wearing a super cute outfit that her friend Isabella got her for her birthday.
Um....what's up with her hair? Oops.

The Fall Lineup

Sophia and I are testing out some free classes to see what we're going to enroll in this fall. Thursday mornings will be reserved for the Library Story Time program. They start again in September. Sophia, but mostly Mom, can't wait.

Next week we're trying out a Kindermusik class and I have a feeling that we will be enrolling in it.

About a week ago we went to My Gym with our playgroup and had a good time, but I noticed that Sophia was kind of timid. My Gym is full of obstacle courses including climbing areas, a ball pit, a balance bar, swings....etc. Kind of similar to a playground, but with a teacher and instruction to folllow. Here's a picture of the group.


Yesterday we went to Virginia's School of the Arts to take one of her music classes. Miss Virginia was very lively and let all the kids play 2 white notes on her electric keyboard. She asked each kid to come up to her whiteboard and helped them draw a dotted half note. We sang animal songs and danced around a lot. Sophie had a really good time and, of course, didn't want to leave even though she fell on the sidewalk and scraped her knee on the way into class. In the first picture she's really wailing and in the second one she's trying to show me her boo boo. I thought the classroom was a bit crowded and only lasts 1/2 hour.

Talking up a storm

Sophia talks like this all day long. $100.00 to the first person to figure out what she's saying.

A lazy day at the beach

Today was the first day all summer, I think, that the sky was overcast with clouds. The temperature was a warm 85 degrees and there was a really nice breeze blowing so we took Sophia to the beach. Take a look at Sophie's sun suit - it's got 50 UV protection built into it. How awesome it that?

Sophia had sand in her mouth before we stepped onto the beach. She must have found some in the parking lot and decided to try it out. She didn't seem to mind the sand in her mouth and tried it a few more times throughout the day.

She was a little timid at first to step into the sand and she didn't want to get off our blanket until she was good and comfortable with her new surroundings. She played with the sand toys that Grancy bought when Terra and Madeline were visiting last summer.

Dad and I built a few sand castles for her and she basically banged the shovel in the bucket. After a while she warmed up to the sand and boy was she off and running - literally! But mostly after seagulls.

She acted the same way with the ocean. At first she didn't want to approach the water, but once she got used to the waves she didn't want to get out of the water. Mom and Dad had a blast with her in the waves. Take a look at the rest of the pictures.

A new kid in town

Um, can someone please tell me who is this new little toddler is that seems to have overtaken my little baby's body and mind?

Sophia has a mind of her own and over the course of the last few weeks has decided that sitting in her highchair just isn't as cool as it once was. I think she assumes she's a big girl now and needs to sit in a seat at the table instead of at the outskirts. We have a booster seat, but I really think that's more for a 3 year old than for a 15 month old. The booster seat securely attaches to the chair, but doesn't strap in the child.

Yesterday I found the solution...a toddler lock chair that secures itself directly to the table. Check out the pictures below. Sophia loves it!!!!! Lunch was the first meal we used it for yesterday and she dangled her feet and banged on the table in delight. This morning she ate strawberries in her new chair to show off for Dad.

Driving with Dad

Will, AKA, Mr. Spears driving with his little Sophia.



Yep - they stayed in the driveway.

Living it up at 15 months...

Which one is having more fun?




Does she look like a huge kid here or am I imagining it?



My blurry little ballerina angel princess.

Birthday parties....

Sophia has been invited to 2 birthday parties recently and I wanted to share the pictures of her and her friends so you can see how tall she is for her age. She'll be 15 months old tomorrow (August 14).

You may have seen Clara in our 4th of July pictures. She turned 1 at the beginning of August so she's about 2.5 months younger than Sophia and you can see how Sophia towers over her. Sophia really had fun at her birthday party. She loved the castle pinata game they played outside. One of the streamers was a "magical" one that opened up the bottom and released bubbles and fun bouncy balls. Sophie was really excited to play with Clara's new baby doll and we couldn't get her out of the blow-up moon bounce toy that her Grandpa got her as a gift.



The other birthday party Sophia was invited to was yesterday at Chuck E Cheese. Our neighbor, Liana, just turned 3 years old. You can see that Sophia is almost as tall as Lianna. Sophie was terribly afraid of the live, costumed Chuck E Cheese that mingled with all the little kids in the game room and restaurant, but she didn't mind the "band" which appeared to be mechanical costumed animals. She really kept her distance from them....take a look below. The party was a "Dora" party and Liana's mom made her cake. It looked awesome, but tasted even better.

Strange cravings

I'm warning you, all I want for dinner is grape tomatoes and a cup of milk! And that's it!

Sophie and her babies

Sophia fell out of love with her baby dolls for the last two months, but her adoration has returned after our visit to Grandma's house where Sophia acquired a baby doll pack-n-play, matching swing and bouncy seat. She's loves to sit in the pack-n-play with Bitty. Other times she puts all of her babies into the pack-n-play as if it was a crib. She still loves to take her babies for a walk in the stroller, but now putting her babies down for a nap is a new top favorite game to play.

Recovering after vacation

Sophia and I arrived home on Saturday evening and we're still not caught up to "normal life" within the Alexander household. I've been doing laundry and cleaning and Sophia's been napping and sleeping in to catch up on all the zzzzssss she missed at Grandma and Pappy's house.

And I think she's getting a tooth.....

We had a great time in Pennsylvania. Sophie and I went to the National Aviary in Pittsburgh with Nana (which is how Sophia says Grandma) and Aunt Carole. It was a really fun day. A pigeon got pretty friendly with Sophia, but we thought it just wanted to steal some of her pretzels. My camera didn't quite capture glowing pinkish orange color of the flamingos. A real letdown.

We started our trip by stopping overnight at Big Daddy's house and Sophie played with Jinx and Charlie outside before she decided she wanted to go for a spin in Grancy's car.
Sadie must have thought that looked like fun because the next day when we were leaving she picked the drivers seat! Look out Grancy, careful where you put your keys when these two are around!

Sophie enjoyed cooling off in the plastic pool in Grandma's yard almost every day.




There's so much more to discuss, but I wanted to post these few pictures so you could get a taste of our vacation.