All I want for Christmas

Is Ally's 2 front teeth!

One of them has appeared just a teeny teeny bit...Ally doesn't excatly show it off, though! Maybe it'll be easier to see tomorrow.

Here are some holiday pics of Ally!

Our assorted Christmas Card photos:



And some snapshots from home:

Home Six Months!

The counter on the left says it...Ally has been with us today for 6 months. How exciting!

In celebration of her 6 months home, a new video for all. A bit of a montage, if you will. This highlights what things Ally loves these days. With the exception of eating fruit.

Hope you enjoy!

Not so much fun with Santa

Ally had her first visit with Santa Claus. I think in this case a picture is worth a thousand words. Or maybe I should say she does not need words to communicate how she feels about Santa Claus!

Oh Sippy Cup, Oh Sippy Cup, Why won't Ally drink from you?

Its Sunday night. That means I have to go back to work tomorrow. I like my job, really I do, but since becoming Ally's mom I prefer the weekends to the weekdays. Sigh...

This weekend we purchased our tree. I broke my long standing rule about artificial tress and so we braved the snow on Friday night and got a tree at T.arget. Then Saturday night we decorated the tree. It looks pretty good. Beth was here for a few hours on Saturday and she couldn't even tell it was fake until she got right up to it with Ally to touch it. A trip to the mall today where we purchased a Balsam and Cedar candle and so now the house even smells like Christmas.

We baked cookies, we did some Christmas shopping and had a surprise visit from Beth. It was a great weekend.

Except...Ally refuses to drink milk out of a sippy cup. She'll drink water from the sippy, and has for months now. We give her a sippy at meal time and she happily drinks a few sips. So we thought transitioning from the bottle to cup would be easy. Not so.

She howls, she screams, she throws things, she flails; she refuses to drink milk from the sippy cup. Pictured below is the display of sippy cups we now own. Yes there are 11 different styles pictured. We had a 12th kind but we got so ticked off when it would not stop leaking we threw it away. If there is anyone out there with advice or tips on how to get Ally to drink from a sippy cup we would really appreciate it. If there is a style not pictured that you think we should try please let us know. We'll try anything. And to be honest if we have this many - what are a few more?

Other than the sippy cup refusal, Ally is doing well. Her latest favorite is to walk with her walker.

See - I was not kidding 11 different styles of sippy cups!

This is her bottle - she loves these, has since she was in Guatemala. They sell them here in the USA - its the cheap ones available at every drugstore and supermarket so we just kept her on these.

Lunchtime Fun

Maybe you thought a post about lunchtime would be about food and eating. Sorry to disappoint you. I try and come home for lunch every day. I usually make it 4 out of 5 days a week. Ally is so happy to see me - it just makes my heart melt. Today when I came home I just couldn't resist throwing her up in the air. She loves this - as you can see from the glee in her eyes and the huge grin on her face. After the fun we had a smooch and then Ally rested in the big chair! Too soon I had to go back to work. Becky had Spanish class tonight, so I had Ally all to myself this evening. She was such a good girl. She ate tons of fruit at dinner, some water from her sippy cup (we're still not having much luck getting her to drink milk from a sippy cup) and then she went right to sleep at 715.

Remote Control

The Life of Ally

So Ally has been having it rough lately. Here's what's happening in her life.

1. Recovering from a cold. Right now she is asleep, but wakes herself up coughing often.
2. Teething, or so I'd assume by the 2 foot long strings of drool hanging out of her mouth today and from gnawing on her hand.
3. She's figuring out the walking thing
4. (By the time I got to 4 here she has woken up again) She got 4 vaccines at the doctor's office Friday
5. She quit napping all together this past weekend. She took a good nap finally this morning, and a short one this afternoon
6. How could I forget? She has switched from formula to whole milk and her mean mean moms have made her use a sippy cup for some of the time. Not that she does it. I mean, if she can't get it her way, why have it at all?

So yeah, life here is busy. I've dubbed myself the walking tissue. I don't really mind that much, but it is a little gross. I have to add "see if my shirt is presentable" to the before leaving the house list.

By the way, all was well at the 12 month checkup. She's now a whopping 18 pounds 11 ounces, firmly in the 10th percentile all around. And she didn't pee on me this time. And she only cried momentarily for our very nice doctor.

Just returned to the computer from a 20 minute Tylenol-rocking-singing-failed bottle. And as I finished that sentence, she started crying again. Poor kid.

Anyway, here is some cuteness from today and a few days ago.

What, you expect me to eat? I think I'll just mash the food into the tray and then one-by-one drop any remaining pieces of food off the side.

A girl and her cat.

Ally this week can now walk around the house with her walking toy. She needs a spotter, but it doing it all herself.

An actual smile. Today! Unbelievable.

After dinner, we had another meltdown. We popped in the Baby Einstein as a last resort to sanity. This is what happened. 15 minutes of zone out time for us all, and a cessation of loud fussing.

Just too cute

One of Ally's favorite things right now is pulling up. I was lucky enough to catch all of her motions from crawl to standing. And the ruffle butt is all for Debbie!

Thanksgiving

Sorry this is so late. We had a wonderful visit in the Philly area with Grandma Debbie and Poppy Dave and all of their relatives. Ally is such a super traveler and so much fun to be around. Enjoy the pictures!
Becky and Ally in the airport. I have to say the Providence airport was the cleanest airport we have ever seen - yes we let her crawl all over the place. Our flight was delayed almost 2 hours and she was happy or sleeping the whole time!



Above is Ally reading with Grandma and below are a montage of pictures from Thanksgiving. Sorry we didn't get one with the whole group!



See Aunt Pam - Ally really does love her Great Aunty Pammy!

Ally enjoyed some quiet time in comfy clothes hanging out under the dining room table!


We had a nice visit with Great Grandma Florence. I think this picture is so cool - it looks like Ally is reaching for Florence's hand! So sweet.

A slow stream of photos

Well, the craziness is over. Getting ready for the birthday party, hosting the party, packing, travelling, Thanksgiving and visiting Grandma Debbie & Grandpa Dave, travelling home, unpacking and getting Ally back to herself. So now I have time to fill you all in on the photos! I'm going to pace myself so I'm not overwhelmed.

Ally's party was great - we are so thankful that so many people could make it! Ally was not so keen on cake, even with Aunt Beth trying to shove chocolate icing into her mouth when the hot pink butter cream failed. The kids, though of various ages, all seemed to enjoy themselves, and gave the adults a good laugh with crawling parades behind Ally all over the house. They were so unbelievable and randomly timed that I have no photos of that.

Enjoy the pictures!

Happy Birthday Ally!

Today our little girl is 1 year old! We'll be having our main celebration tomorrow with friends and family, but we'll do a little celebrating today. Icing will be everywhere.

What I have for you now, prior to the glorious frosting photos, is a Tuesday night gem. Ally discovered splashing. Yes, she's splashed before, but she really clicked on the cause and effect of it. Or maybe she was just hyper. Let's just say that I was very wet.

Actually, that was the second time that day that I got soaked. The first time was at the doctor's office (checking in on a rash - turned out to be no big deal). I went to get the naked baby off the scale, and then the floodgates opened. Pee all over my shirt, all over the exam table, all over everywhere. When the doctor came in and saw me with my goofy smile, she said "Well, it's sterile!"

Enjoy the show, folks!

Our first understood word

Okay, so she doesn't say anything that I understand as a word.

But today, it seems pretty clear that Ally knows one word: CLAP!

When I tell her to clap, she claps. It's pretty cool. I guess I need to use the same intonation and say "BURP!" or something unrelated and see if she claps, too. I am, however, very excited. I feel like she is suddenly very interested in all the noises that come out of our mouths, and has figured out that they mean something.

Watching a kid learn is really cool!

Back From The Desert

We had a great trip to Arizona to visit Ally's Great Grandma Mimi, Gruncle Phil, and Great Aunt Suzie. Flying that far with a squirmy 11 and a half month old baby was not exactly fun for all, but we made it just fine.

The one kicker is that the morning after we got back, Ally woke up with a nasty cold. She's looking better today, but has not exactly been a happy camper. She is, however, thrilled to see her stuff (and her cats) again.

Gruncle Phil, the self-proclaimed "King Of Fun"

The KoF was glad Ally was too little to say "Stop poking me!"	Great Grandma Mimi couldn't believe that Phil held Ally
We'll admit it...	...he does look like the KoF.

Aunt Suzie, the "Queen of Fun"

We also got to go swimming! Outside! In November!

Ally went swimming in her new friend Claire's pool	Mama also got to swim with Ally for the first time - it was awesome!
	Ally is our little moviestar!

Too much time with Phil, King of Cheez-Its.	Our family out on the deck
Ally loved to climb up onto the hearth!	Four Generations!
Ally playing at Mimi's	Ally could pull up on the window!
We think Phil taught her this	Having fun with Grandma Mimi