Developments

This week has been major in Evie's life. On Thursday morning, Evie finally rolled onto her tummy! Of course, Todd and I both missed it (Todd was practicing his trombone, and I was getting dressed) but John watched her do it. She was playing with her toes, started rolling, suddenly whipped her arm out of the way, and found herself on her tummy with a really surprised look on her face. Once the shock wore off, she was thrilled with herself and looked around at all of us with a proud little smirk. I still haven't been able to catch her in the act, but Todd has.

Saturday, we went to the Aurora Reservoir for our niece's birthday party. We slathered Evie with sunblock and then took her to the beach to play in the water. I dipped her toes in the water and she immediately started crying so I pulled her back out. I dipped her back in, up to her ankles, and she started crying again. When I put her feet back into the water, though, she was fine. She squished her toes in the wet sand and splashed in the water. Our pool closes this week, and we didn't think it was worth it to find swim diapers for Evie for such a short time, so her feet was the only part of her that got wet while we were at the beach. Even that much was fun for her, though. She kicked hard at the ground so I would help her bounce and she just jumped and jumped in the water and sand. We only stayed out there for a few minutes before we headed back to our pavilion because my legs were cramping up and we didn't want the baby to get sunburned. When we got home that night, I gave her a bath to get rid of all of the sunblock gooping up her hair. For the first time ever, she really had fun in her bath, splashing and playing the whole time; she thought it was funny to splash water on Mommy's clothes. She would kick so hard that her little bottom would almost scoot past the seat ledge and she would almost go under the water. After her bath, the water was murky from all of the gunk that came off of her, but she was clean and sparkly.

Sunday evening, I propped Evie up in the corner of the couch so I could have my hands free for something. When I looked back at her a moment later, she was leaning forward instead of back against the couch. A thought suddenly occurred to me, so I sat her down on the floor and, sure enough, she was sitting up by herself! She was a little wobbly, but was able to sit up completely unsupported. Margot got a few pictures of her, both by herself and with the two little kids.

For the past couple of days, Evie has been playing a new game with her Mommy. She'll grab my glasses and deliberately pull them off (good thing they're sturdy plastic!). Then, for several minutes, she'll look back and forth deeply into my eyes one at a time, with her little hand placed softly on my cheek. Sometimes she laughs, probably because she can see her reflection in my eyes. Other times she tries to grab them out of my face so she can play with them. I don't know if it's just me, but it seems that Evie has been even more cheerful this past week than ever before. Maybe it's because we're feeding her more at each feeding so she feels more full, or maybe she's just learning new things and is excited about sharing them with us. Either way, I've really been having a blast playing with her lately, and I'm hoping that one of these days while we're playing I'll actually be able to witness her new-found ability to roll over onto her tummy!

Cat Person-in-Training?

When Todd and I got married, we discussed the possibility of having pets one day. The trouble is, Todd really doesn't like dogs and thinks they're stupid. He's very much a cat person, and frequently tells stories about his favorite childhood cat, Nigel. I, on the other hand, was never much of a cat lover, except for when I was little and loved to play with kitties. Once I got older, I much preferred the mindless devotion of a dog to the god-complex of a cat--just because they were worshiped in Egypt thousands of years ago does NOT make them a superior life-form. I finally told Todd that if he would let me get a snake, I would let him get a cat and we would name them Mephistopheles and Maleficent respectively. That will probably never happen.

Since we've moved in with family, however, I've come to prefer their cat, Jonesy (from Alien), to their dog, a poodle named KC. Jonesy seems to think that our bedroom is actually his lair, and he's very eager for our affection. Well, the affection of me and Todd, that is. Today, just after noon, I was changing Evie's diaper (it occurs to me that so many things happen when Evie is getting her diaper changed. Oh well!) and the cat was perched just behind her head, begging Todd to pet him. She kept squirming, trying to get a good look at him, and once I had a clean diaper on her, I sat her up so she could touch the kitty. Evie was able to touch his soft fur and pet his face, just lighting up the whole time. She loved him! He was less impressed with her.

Finally, Jonesy turned his back on her and walked away. For the next hour, he hid on the floor at the foot of the bed so Evie couldn't find him. But as he walked to the edge of the bed and prepared to jump off, Evie tried really hard to roll onto her tummy so she could see where he went. Todd and I agreed that Jonesy will probably be the "catalyst" (hee hee!) for Evie's rolling over and starting to crawl, just so she can follow him everywhere.

I'm left to wonder, though, will Evie grow up to be a cat person like her Daddy? Or, like her Mommy, will she outgrow her fascination with the kitty's soft fur?

Bouncing Checks

We just got our new checks in the mail! Since we moved last month, we had to open an account at the local credit union, and Todd realized that it would be cheaper to have Walmart print up our new checks than to have our bank do it. So he asked me to look through the available patterns online, and pick out some that I really liked. I liked several patterns, but finally found the ones that I loved:It was a good thing that Todd liked them too. My first reaction was "Oh! I can't wait until Evie does cute and creative stuff like this!" And now, looking at them again with our names and information on them, I realize that I'm officially a mommy now--getting things just because they potentially remind me of my child. But aren't these checks seriously adorable?

First Trip to the Zoo!

Yesterday, we received a late anniversary present from John and Margot: year long passes to the zoo! Evie is under two, so she gets in free. Since our nephews and niece all started school today, we all went to the zoo yesterday to celebrate their last day of summer break. Todd and I both LOVE zoos, so we were excited to take Evie on her very first trip to see all of the animals. We dressed her in her lion outfit and John and Margot let us use a baby Denver Zoo hat that their kids had grown out of. We went to see the lions first, but we couldn't see any in their enclosure, so I took a picture of Evie with Daddy next to the lion sign instead. Evie was in a great mood, and even deigned to smile for her pictures!We went into the viewing building, and I was able to get a picture of the lion's head poking up above a branch. But when we got out of the building, he'd moved again and I was able to get a better picture with Evie and Daddy in front of him. Right as I took the picture, the lion lifted his head and yawned, so you can see him in the background. After the lions, we moved to the zebras, and I was able to get several pictures of them. Evie seemed more interested in sucking on her shirt than in seeing the zebras, so I just angled the camera to include her in one of the shots.
Then we moved on to the Feline House. Earlier this year four tiger cubs were born, and I was excited to see them. Two of them were playing right up against the window, and Evie had so much fun watching them!It was Mommy's turn to hold the baby, so Daddy got several pictures of us, and a video of Evie watching the tigers play:

We finally had to drag Evie away from the tigers so we could go see the other big cats. All of the leopards were always sleeping, so it was easy to get pictures of Evie and Todd in front of them.Once we were done looking at the cats, we took Evie over to see the giraffes. We'd hoped that she would really get excited about them, and to help her connect with the big real animals she was going to see, we brought her toy giraffe that my mom bought for her. Unfortunately, she was getting a little hungry and cranky, so she didn't even notice the giraffes and started chewing on her toy instead. Maybe she was channeling her inner lion again!Everyone was getting hot and hungry, so the kids cooled down in a kiddie pond while we fed and changed the baby. Then we went to a large, shady, grassy spot for lunch (John brought sandwiches, chips, Cracker Jacks, and soda) and while we ate, we saw peacocks roaming around near us. We finished eating just in time to snag a place near the water so we could watch the sea lion feeding demo. Evie didn't really notice what was going on until the very end of the demo, when the sea lion jumped out of the water to touch the ball with his nose and splashed her on his way back down, which startled her and made her jump. Todd got a video of the whole thing, but it's about 5 minutes long, and it's mostly the lady talking about how big sea lions get. After the sea lion demo, we went into the Tropical Discovery building--filled with snakes, lizards, fish, etc. We walked through a "mountain cave" and saw a room of bats behind glass. Evie loved them! Her eyes were flitting back and forth, trying to follow the rapidly flying bats. Then she noticed the ones hanging from the ceiling, and just stared at them. She really thought that the bats were fascinating. We moved on to the snakes, which I love, but Evie couldn't really see them where they were camouflaged against the plants in their cages. When we started looking at the fish, however, Evie lit up. She enjoyed seeing the light reflecting on the water, the bright fishies, and the pretty plants.

When we finished with the Tropical Discovery building, Kim really wanted to go to Bird World, but John thought that it closed early, so we galloped clear across the zoo to get there in time. Poor Evie was so tuckered out from all of the excitement that she zonked out on the way over and stayed asleep for the rest of the zoo trip.Everyone was getting tired, so we quickly carried her through the Bird World, and then hurried through the pachyderm house. The two elephants were getting their toenails painted with an anti-infection ointment, the rhino had his head jammed in the corner of his cage while he ate, and the hippo stayed underwater the whole time. The zoo is building a HUGE addition to the zoo, called Asian Tropics, and the pachyderms will all be moved to their spacious new home soon. We stopped at the cheetah enclosure on our way out of the zoo. He was lounging on a hill, and when I pulled out my camera, he got up, paced across the field, and flopped back down in the grass just as I finally got the camera to record. However, I managed to catch a video of him anyway when he decided that that particular patch of grass wasn't what he wanted after all.

We walked out of the zoo, and Evie woke up on the way back to the car. I think she had a really good time seeing all of the animals. There were so many baby animals born this year, and we only saw a few of them: the four tiger cubs and the giraffe. We only had time to see maybe a quarter of the zoo, not even counting the Asian Tropics section that hasn't opened yet. We're really excited about our new zoo passes, and we're looking forward to taking Evie back often!

Plosives and Giggles

Thursday was my mom's birthday, so I called her while we were out and about running errands. When we got home, Todd and John worked on replacing our DVR hard drive in the living room while I changed Evie's diaper in our bedroom. She's been learning to babble at us and to herself, so we're focusing on new sounds all the time. While I changed her booty, I chattered to her as usual and started making a popping noise with my lips. Evie smiled at that, but when I moved from the "pah-pah" sound to the "bah-bah" sound, she collapsed into giggles. REAL giggles! Something about bilabial plosives just tickles her funny bone. I spent between 5 and 10 minutes making "bah-bah" noises and hearing her laugh and laugh while her little tummy bounced. Todd could hear her through the door, and he said it sounded adorable and made him smile. Yesterday, before we went to our ward camp-out (Evie's first camping trip!), Todd was watching the Republican debates and playing with Evie. She was having so much fun playing with her Daddy, and I was able to catch a couple of videos of it. I tried my plosives again, and sure enough, they still work!


We have no idea why Evie loves these noises so much. I can only guess that maybe it is because so many words I use around her begin with b's: baby, bottle, booty, belly, blech, big, bath, blow, bubbles, boogie, bounce (bouncer, bouncing), boing, etc. We're so excited that Evie is learning to really laugh and giggle; she's such a happy little girl and watching her makes us happy too.

Roly-Poly

Like I mentioned in my last post, Evie is getting very round. On top of that, she's becoming more mobile. Wednesday morning, Todd and I went to do church service in the cannery, leaving Evie with his parents. When we got home, we were informed by Todd's dad that Evie had gotten hurt. She'd fallen asleep, and he left her in the middle of their bed so he wouldn't wake her up. He left the door closed until he heard a thud. He ran into the room and found Evie on the floor making scared noises because she'd scooted herself backwards off the bed. She was more scared than hurt, but now she still has a small red mark on her forehead.

Evie has been able to scoot herself backwards and around for a while now, and often wakes herself (and us) up when her head gets worked into the corner of her cradle and she can't move anymore.
Also, for a couple of months she's been able to roll from her tummy to her back. One day before we moved, I was playing with Evie on the living room floor during Tummy Time while Todd did the dishes in the kitchen. I had to go to the bathroom, and when I got back, Evie was on her back. I asked Todd if he'd moved her and he said no. So I put her back on her tummy and got the camera to see if she did it again. It took a couple of minutes, but sure enough, I was able to catch her rolling over on film:



She's not quite able to roll from her back to her tummy, but she's so close that it frustrates her. Once she sees something she wants, she'll roll onto her side and arch her back, even getting her leg up and over, but she can't quite overcome the obstacle her bottom arm presents. We think it'll happen soon, though, and once it does, we won't be able to leave her unattended anywhere anymore. She'll be able to roll under and over, onto and off of everything in our house. And then will come crawling, and she will be unstoppable! I'm a little nervous, but so excited too--almost as excited as Evie is.

Cute Little Round Baby

Evie has been going through her 4 month growth spurt for the past week. She used to eat 4 oz. of formula every 3-4 hours; now she eats 5 oz. every other hour. We can definitely tell a difference, too--she's sprouting up before our eyes! Her bouncer toy used to devour her... ...but now she's tall enough to actually see the toys and even play with some of them. Today she discovered herself in the little mirror on it.

Besides getting taller, everything about Evie is getting rounder too. Her eyes are always wide open, like they've been since the day she was born. Since she's always smiley now, her cheekies are rosy and round. Her nose is still a cute little button. Her chins (all three of them) are getting nice and chubby. All of these things together make her head a cute little round sphere. Her arms, from her shoulders to her elbows to her wrists, are all filling out, causing dimples in her plump flesh. Her legs have dimples too, on her thighs and knees, and her heels and toes are soft, round, and pink. Evie's pooh-koo is a perfectly round little ball, with her belly button poking out in a tiny little ball of its own. Her booty is cute and round too, especially when she's wearing a diaper, and helps balance the weight of her head.

A couple of nights ago, I was holding Evie's little round self against my chest so that she would get drowsy and go to sleep. Todd was sitting next to me on the couch, talking. Suddenly, Evie looked at him over her shoulder until he smiled at her. Then she grinned hugely, stuffed her fists in her mouth, and buried her face in my neck. Then she did it all again, and again. Silly little baby was flirting with Daddy and getting bashful. We thought it was really cute, seeing that little round face light up and then whip around to hide in Mommy's neck. The next morning, she was especially happy to see us, and her smiles turned her face into a perfect little circle made up of even smaller circles. Evie is such a cute little round baby, so much fun to hug and kiss and snuggle!