Cats and dancing

So I've got a January video collection for your Ally's Grandmothers' enjoyment. It is cute...contains several clips, but it's about two and a half minutes. You can look forward to some good 14 month old dance moves at the end!



From the weekend...here are the photos!

High Chair Hijinks

So yesterday began at 3:15 AM. Yup, Ally woke up in "the middle of the night". That's what you all would call it. Ally called it "the beginning of the day". She fussed, she cried, she refused to settle, so at about 5AM we gave up and took her to the living room to play. I took the first short shift, and then Julie relieved me and I caught a bit of sleep. While sleeping, apparently Julie decided to give Ally breakfast a little before 6AM. She ate some bananas...some toast...and then she passed out. Here's the scene. (For more detail, click on the photo to get the full size image)

Later that same long, long day....she decided she wants more control over how she eats her yogurt.
And today, she found that clapping with yogurt covered hands has spectacular results - a fine spray of yogurt over every surface within range! Most noticably, her forehead get covered with teeny dots of yogurt. (This is the photo to enlarge- you can see all the yogurt - and a bit of her only top tooth!)

And yesterday she also found a new way to stack stuff - she fastidiously placed bits of mango on top of her sippy cup.

Standing!

On Sunday she did a little standing on her own, but yesterday she was a superstar! Ally can now stand independently, not holding on to anything. She did this several times yesterday for probably around 20 seconds at a go.
Our souvenir this weekend was a cute little t-shirt for Ally. We took a bunch of photos today trying to get a good shot and couldn't decide which of these two to put on the blog. She is just too cute - so we put them both!

Nantucket!

This weekend Beth had an Open House at her place on Nantucket. So Saturday morning we drove to Hyannis (90 minutes) and then took the ferry (60 minutes) to get to the island. Then it was just a short walk to her place (5 minutes). We had lots of fun. Ally got to see the ocean for the first time. She slept in the Ergo (carrier) on Becky's back most of the time - but she did wake up at the end in time to see it. Then she got all dressed up for the party. It was so nice to meet so many of Beth's friends and co-workers.
Beth was nice enough to put us up for the night, and you can see there was some bonding in the morning!

SNOW!!!

It Snowed again this week. On Monday we got about 7 inches. We were finally brave enough to take Ally out to play in the snow. I think you can see for yourself how she liked it: Its not so bad....
On second thought, maybe you could pick me up?

Ok, the third thought is please pick me up!!! But in the end all she wants is to have us help her out! She liked being held and looking at the snow and she did not mind walking around in it either. We're looking forward to next year when she can walk and run in it.

Weekend Fun

This weekend we watched a lot of football. We saw all of 3 1/2 games. Phew - and my teams won 3 of the 4 games. Even with all the football we had plenty of time to get some great shots of Ally. She is so much fun. It seems like everyday there is something new and different. She has learned the Baby Sign for "more", she tends to use it when she wants something different to eat, not just more food. But she is definitely getting the idea. Her "all done" sign is really just an arm sweep, but her point is loud and clear!

I hope you enjoy the pictures.Ally loves the chair. One of her favorite thinsg is to bang stuff on the window. You can imagine how annoying (um delightful) that is for us, but you can tell she is really proud of herself.I did say there was a lot of football watching. Becky thought we looked so cute, me, Ally and Ally's baby doll all lined up in a row.

I keep catching Becky sitting in the pink chair. I have no idea why, especially when there are 2 adult-sized chairs on either side of it!
Here I am watching the Green Bay-Seattle game and yes, I let Ally sit on my head and pull all the tissues out of the box. It ss amazing what I will put up with to watch football.

This is a new skill Ally demonstrated this weekend - eating applesauce with her fingers.

She almost got it in, you can see her finger tracks in the pile of applesauce.Yum - I think it feels good on her teething mouth to suck the applesauce off her fingers. But judge for your self in the next shot.

I just love these 3 pictures of Ally reading the ads in the Sunday paper. She is also modeling her Christmas gift from Aunt Suzie & Gruncle. Happy belated birthday Aunt Suzie!!!

She caught me looking at her.

She looks so grown up here.

January 13 was our 7 month family anniversary. June 13 is when my mom and I brought Ally home to the US. It was so amazing to see Becky at the airport and introduce Ally to the rest of our family over the next week.

Today is January 14 and as much as I have looked forward to today for the past 14 months I almost missed commemorating it. Today is the day that Ally has been with us longer than she was away. Wow - I am so glad to have reached this milestone. We are so grateful to her foster family for taking such good care of her for the first 7 months of her life.

Ally & Mommy

Where's Ally?

Now she starts this on her own...particularly when her hands are covered in food... and plays it repeatedly.

Where's Ally?

Can you see me with one hand still up?

Suprise! It's me!

Fun Times

Ally is not yet walking by herself, but yesterday she started the one handed shuffle while holding her dog vaccuum. Thank-you to Aunt Christine & Uncle Kurt for giving it to her for Christmas - I think you can tell she loves it. Thanks too to Karina for being such a good friend when were in NY that she showed Ally how to use the vaccuum.

Just some cuteness to share with you:

New Furniture

Ok, so I have been eyeing a pint size chair for Ally. But it seemed so decadent to buy her a special chair. But then the new Pottery Barn Kids catalogue came in the mail, and I saw it now comes in bright pink! Then I saw some other bloggers got similar chairs for their daughters. And frankly I wanted one too.(Thanks for the justification fellow bloggers Ashley & Tera.) So we went to the mall yesterday and let her sit in the chair and crawl all around it and she climbed all over it and she looked so darn cute and happy, that was enough to give in! So here she is in her new chair!
After Ally went to bed Carl made himself right at home. For the record (and for those of you who know our cats) Bryce was the first feline in the chair, but has since given it up to let Carl enjoy it. I think Carl slept in the chair all night.

This morning we pushed the chair up against the window and she was so excited to look out the window all on her own. Here she is sharing the chair with Carl.

Now its off to watch the Giants game. I hope everyone is having a great weekend!

Friday Photos

Here are some photos from this week. The first one is right before bed - doesn't she look so happy?

These next 3 are playing with her new stacking buckets.

Believe it or not this is a happy face - such a ham!

This is just so Ally - happy and calm and such a wonderful daughter. We are so lucky.

Holiday Recap

I'm sorry it took us so long to post but its been an exhausting and wonderful couple of weeks. Becky and I were sick a lot. Grandma Debbie, Grandpa Dave and Aunt Beth all got sick too. But that was after Christmas - we called it Santa's curse. Ally thankfully never caught it. We're pretty healthy now - Ally has a slight cold, but nothing too bad. She remains her happy go-lucky self.
It was amazing to have Ally home for the holidays. We've been thinking about all the parents out there in Guatemala adoption limbo right now and we are so very grateful to have Ally home with us. If you can please say a prayer and send good thoughts to everyone in process right now I know it would be appreciated. The future of adoptions is pretty much up in the air as of yesterday so all we can do is hope and pray.
Ally was a tropper - we hosted our first Christmas gathering at our house and then we traveled to NY to see my family. Ally got to meet her Aunt Christine, Uncle Kurt and cousins Kaitlin & Jackson for the first time and she got to meet her Uncle Frank. It was very special to have all of my family under one roof, and I am really proud of my parents for hosting all of us.
New Years was quiet at our house, just the 3 of us and then today it was back to the office for me, and back to work as a Stay at Home Mom for Becky. I keep telling her that her job as SAHM is just as tough as mine.
Enough chatter - here are the photos!

Our Christmas Tree. We were so amazed by all the wonderful gifts we received.

Grandma Debbie got a new camera for Christmas and this was a very frequent site. Debbie taking pictures of Ally. I hope she got some good ones!

Ally opening up her stocking.

Ally and her cousin Kaitlin.

Ally received this very cute warm-up suit from her Great Aunt Cindy & Great Uncle Denny. I was so excited b/c we happened to have shoes from last year that matched the snowflakes perfectly! Yes she has discovered the fridge and speed crawls over to it everytime we open it up. It is pretty funny - she looks so proud of herself, I have no idea what she is looking for. And for the record our fridge is not usually so full - we were all stocked up for company.

Grandma Debbie gave her this dress - so Ally was all decked out in it for Christmas Eve.

She loves this stuffed snowman that Great Aunt Louise gave her - it plays "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" the entire song - every verse and note of it - she holds it up for us to push the button and then she dances along. Here is is happy because she got Grandpa Dave to push the button!This dress was a gift from my cousin Tom and his wife Joyce. Ally looked so cute.

So that is it for tonight. I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday week. We really enjoyed spending so much time with each other and our families.

Oh and I also wanted to congratulate my cousin Dan on his engagement. Welcome to the family Jessica!