Such a cutie!

Here is my little rockstar. Love the birthday outfit from Amy! Emily is obsessed with finding what is between her toes....typically it's random sock fuzz.

Here she is proudly showing me what she found.....well...it's better than buggars, right? Maybe? LOL!

This is Emily doing her donkey pose. It's from one of the books we read. The first time she did it, I was so confused trying to figure out what she was doing. Then I realized she saw it in her book and was copying it. What a smart girl!

Hard to believe Em is already 25 months old. She's growing like a weed!

She is very interested in potty training and has been on and off since she was 18 months old. In the last month she's really gotten into it. She asks to go quite often and in the last 2 weeks, she's actually gone on the potty every time she asks to go. Her diaper is still wet often times, but we are still so proud of her!

I don't think I've posted yet about Em's speech delay evaluation results. We are happy to report that she didn't qualify for services, that means she is considered a happy, healthy, well-adjusted 2 year old. She fell in the range of 21 months - 30 months for all areas of development. They don't just evaluate for speech. So they looked at fine motor skills, gross motor skills and problem solving skills.

Emme and Zander

We watched Zander for a few hours this past Saturday and Em absolutely loved having him here. She was so excited when he got here.



Em made sure as soon as Aunt Kacey left that she got to sit in her chair with Z:

Here is Emme giving hugs - she was doing that non-stop. Zander obviously thought it was a riot:

Here we are reading stories on Em's "couch" before her nappy time. They were so cute together...until Zander starting pinching Emily! LOL! She looked at him like he was crazy.

Here the two of them are hanging out:

What to say?

I realize I have not posted in a few weeks, so I thought I should write about something -- not so sure what though! LOL!

Guess I'll just post some pics that we've taken so far this month....

Here is Emme giving Daddy kisses before he heads off to work. She loves her daddy!!! Kory just started a new truck run yesterday. He now goes from Madison to Chicago, back to Madison, then up to LaCrosse and back home to Madison. It's a 13 hour run! Pretty intense, so we'll see how it goes. He is enjoying it so far.

My parents house in IL sold and is closing in about a week - in a way it's exciting because I know it's the start of a new chapter in our family, but it's also a little sad. We have grown up in that house. I've lived there since I was 10 years old. We are very excited that we have the house up in Hayward, WI and it will be so nice for my parents to only have 1 house to take care of - for the first time in what....8 years, I think?

Crazy!!

Kory's step-sister Liz got us hooked on a game called Rummikub, so we passed on the fun game to Casey & Mike. We played two weekends in a row and had a blast. Here we are all putting Emily to bed - note all the animals in her bed (and under her bed!)! LOL! This was after Emme made Uncle Mike read her some stories. She loves her Uncle Mike and Auntie CeCe.

Casey & Mike went to TX this week and we were on doggy duty. Winnie did great over here. It was a little chaotic, but we made it work. Winnie and Otis really enjoy each other. Now the cat is a whole different story!!!

We got Em this toy at Target. It lights up and spins, so it makes kind of a vibrating noise so she loves to put it up to her ear and listen to it. So cute!

I know this isn't the greatest pic, but I just thought Emily looked sooooo grown up! This is our big 2 year old. She is growing right before our eyes. Hard to believe it! She is still wearing 18 month pants, but looking at this picture, I think they are getting a little short...uh oh...not sure what to put her in next!!! She is working on her 2 year molars also - so if anyone has any suggestions for a 2 year old who is teething I would love to hear it! I hate giving her tylenol if I don't have to!

This picture is sooooo Em! I was in the bedroom and came out she was dancing in her diaper with all the necklaces and her dolly. It was a riot!! She is such a little rockstar. We still have her weekly music classes and she loves them. It's so cute now to hear her singing. I just know she's going to make us rich someday :)

Well that's all I can come up with! Things have finally calmed down after the holidays. Will post again soon!

2 Year Dr Visit

We had Emily's 2 year Dr visit today and all went well. He agreed that she is speech delayed, so we set up an appt with the audiologist to do a hearing test in mid-January. Her visit with the speech therapist and early education instructor is on January 7th. So we will see how it all goes!

Other than that, her appt went well. We ended up getting her the flu shot and the H1N1 flu shot. So we have to go back in 4 weeks for the H1N1 booster. It's hard to believe that she doesn't have another well-child visit until she's 3!!

Her vitals from her 18 month visit appear to be incorrect. The Dr is sure the head circumference is wrong because her head actually shrunk which is absolutely impossible!! Her height is now 32.5" (18th percentile) and at 18 months it was 32.25" - so he's pretty sure that was not correct because she should have grown a lot more than that. Her weight appears pretty close though - she was 22.8 lbs at 18 months and was a whopping 25.9lbs (36th percentile) today. So we were very happy with that. Our goal was 25 lbs and we beat it! Whoo Hoo!! Yay mommy and daddy :)

I can't possibly do a post without a picture of my little bug, so here she is tonight after bath in her brand new bathrobe that she got from Auntie CeCe for her birthday. It even has her name on it!! She loves it. Actually didn't want to put jammies on!

Our baby turns 2!!!

It's hard to believe our little "bug" is 2. We decided not to have a big party after the holidays this year, last year just got too stressful. We wanted her to have a special day though, so we took her to the Madison's Children's Museum. She had a blast!!!!

Here she is playing with the city table. Notice Daddy had to get the semi truck out of the bin!!


Daddy found the crane....we had to drag him out of it! LOL! He now wants one for himself!!


Here is Em and Daddy in the music room:

Grandma and Papa came with us too. Here's Em trying to run away while we are taking a picture:

She loved the water!!

A giant fish!!

After the museum we put her down for a nap and then after dinner had our own little celebration. Check out the video:

Do all two year olds almot burn themselves? LOL! Anyways, here she is in her new slippers eating her birthday cupcake...yes, it's a hostess cupcake! We have SOOO many leftover sweets from Christmas that the last thing we wanted was an entire birthday cake sitting around. So we got her a cupcake instead!

Happy 2nd Birthday Emily! Mommy and Daddy love you more than anything in the world! You are such a good little girl. XOXO

Merry Christmas

We had a really nice Christmas this year. We spent Christmas Eve at Kory's mom's house and hosted Christmas Day here with my family.

Here is Emme in her Christmas dress with Grandma Bonnie:

Here's a picture of Em with Uncle Tony's hand. I think it's riot to see the difference in hand sizes....and No - that's not Em's wine :)

Liz brought this game called Rummikub that we all got obsessed with. It was so much fun that we went out and bought our own last night!!

Here's uncle Tony with Baby Zander. Z is now 6 months old already! Emme bought her cousin some big blocks.

Here is Em opening up one of her favorite presents from Grandma Bonnie and Papa. She has been playing with her tea set non-stop. Who knew something so simple would entertain her for hours??

Christmas morning we woke up to Santa's arrival at our house. Santa brought Emme a giant Dora doll (the doll is actually from Great Grandma Walker, but we knew Emme would be excited when she saw it sitting under the tree when she woke up). Santa also filled her stocking with lots of little goodies.

Here's a pic of Em with Grammy and Papa. We had a great time hanging out and playing cards.

Here is Em sitting in her new chair from Auntie Cori and her family - she loves it and it even has her name on it!!

Auntie CeCe got Em this awesome sleeping bag and a duffel bag with her name on it - plus, the best gift ever - 1 free overnight stay with Auntie CeCe--Kory and I were trying to figure out if we could sleep a couple zero's on there for 100 free nights. LOL!

Grammy got Emme her first pair of underpants. Daddy thought it would be funny to tell her it was a hat. So yep - that's Em putting her new underpants on her head!!!

Here is Em with her new bike. She LOVES it! Rides it all around the house. Glad we've got wood floors!

We hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas. We surely did!

Em's 2 year pics

Here is the link to Emily's 2 year photos: http://photos1.walmart.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=2624312003/a=3242809_3242809/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/

Here are just a few of our favorites, they are all SOOOOO good!!!!
Thanks Krista!! http://www.kristaroderphotography.com/

Here is the link to Emily's 2 year photos: http://photos1.walmart.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=2624312003/a=3242809_3242809/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/

Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells...