Halloween

I'm crazy far behind on blogging!  Sorry about that.  I will start with Halloween. It was rather anti-climatic this year.  I bought a ton of candy because we always have so many trick or treaters but this year we had maybe 10, it's December and I'm still eating tootsie rolls.  We were not planning on taking Bella trick or treating and that's good because she refused to wear her costume.  We were just going to have her answer the door in her costume and hand out candy.  She did fine when we tried it on before Halloween, wore it all over the house but the night of she wanted no part of it, so we let her wear her Halloween pants and t shirt that Gran and Tom Tom got her (the pants are actually from last year, guess that's a benefit of having a kid that doesn't grow much).  We let her have a few pieces of candy and she freaked, she LOVED it, and then got a crazy sugar high.  When the children came to the door she would scream "NOOO, my candy, mine, mine."  For a few days she demanded candy all the time but luckily that's worn off.  I gave her a tootsie roll last night and she threw it across the room, now all she wants is "nanas" - that's bananas if you don't speak toddler.

Bella's Birthday

We postponed Bella's second birthday celebration until we returned to Dallas.  Chris's parents came for the weekend, that morning we went to the Arboretum and then after nap time we had cake and presents.  Bella still refused to eat the cake so we had cake while she opened her presents.  She received lots of great stuff, an alphabet toy and really cute clothes from Gran and TomTom and a baby doll with stroller, a play tent, a couple of books and a puzzle from her mommy and daddy.  She seemed to enjoy everything.  She also received gifts before her birthday from family in Georgia, the dress she is wearing was from Aunt Anna and her cousins Matthew and Madison, and then yesterday she received an art easel in the mail from her cousins Ella and Caroline, she really racked up this year!  

She seems so grown up to me these days, she talks all the time, saying things like "I don't like it" if you're doing something she doesn't want to do or chasing you around tickling you saying "I got you."  She is eating grown up foods with her fork and spoon and drinking out of an open cup and she's out of diapers, it's shocking how fast the last two years have went.  

Getting Ready to Move -- again

We have been in Kansas for almost 6 months now. It's been hard being apart from Chris and the pups and trying to work full time and take care of Bella in this icky apartment. I will be happy to go home but am also anxious about trying to work at home with Bella when I'm not in Kansas and then leaving her for five days at a time to come back to work in the office. But we'll see how it goes, it will be good bonding time for her and Chris. Hopefully somebody will buy or rent our house quickly so we can move on and all be together.

Bella has recently started talking more. It's very exciting. Tonight she dropped a small cup of water out of the bathtub and yelled "oh no I dropped." I think that is her first real sentence so I was very excited. She says all sorts of things now, dog, car, truck, bird, rock, color, blanket, juice, I got you, thank you. It's very cute and helpful! One night she was having a fit to go out on the front porch late at night and I kept saying that she couldn't, that it was too late and she just kept crying and finally she said "ball." Her ball was on the front porch, she didn't want to go outside after dark, she simply wanted her ball inside. If she hadn't of used the word then I wouldn't have known to go get her ball and she would have kept crying.

She is turning 2 on Sunday! Crazy how time flies. We went to her 2 year check up yesterday and she weighed 24.6 lbs and was 33 inches tall so she has finally gained a little bit of weight. They are changing her reflux medicine again so hopefully she will stop puking so much. If this doesn't work she will have to have some tests run over at the hospital. Otherwise she seems to be perfectly healthy and developing on track.