It's the most wonderful time of the year!!

Here we are all dressed up in our Christmas attire for church on Sunday (today). I had every intention of getting a family picture, but we were running late for church and then Sophie was not a willing participant after we got home. Sundays are always hard for Sophie! Our church has 2 services which helps because usually I can work around Sophie's nap schedule, but today there was just no way around her missing her nap. Fun times, ha!

Joyful Heart

The thing that I probably feel the most blessed with is how joyful Sophie is! She's such a happy baby and loves to laugh! Where ever we go she brings joy! You can't really hear it well, but she is giving the deepest laugh here. She was putting a bottle of tylenol in my mouth and the would pull it out. She apparently thought it was pretty funny. Joe and I couldn't help but laugh with her which drowns out her laugh :(. And, yes, I am in shorts and a tank top a week before Christmas. Sad I know!

Sophie has her first two teeth! YAY! Finally, ha! She might have 3...I can't tell because she won't let me get my finger in there long enough to confirm that :). I'm going to miss that gummy smile!

Lovey Dovey

The older that Sophie gets the more loving she becomes! She loves on her baby dolls, her animals, and even her beloved cell phone! She hold them up to her shoulder, lay her head on them, and pat them while saying "baby". It's precious. Well, I have also noticed her going up to people and bulldozing them with her head. It resembles something of what a bull would do when in a fight. I thought that she was trying to hug people, but yesterday I realized what she was doing. I think I've mentioned in a previous post where she'll be on the ground and I'll put my head on her belly and kind of push - not hard, of course. Then I'll kiss her all over. She LOVES when I do this! She laugh and laugh. It hit me then that is what she is doing. Anywho...that's what she is doing in the video. If you listen closely you can hear her Making the sound that I make while I do it to her, ha! Let me tell you, she imitates EVERYTHING we do!! The other day I had some soup and I was blowing on it so she started blowing her on food. There is one point that she starts blowing on a cap to her sippy, ha! At the beginning I was trying to get her to Roar like a lion. She has a book about animals and I was doing the noise that each animal made. Well, she loved to roar like a lion. I was trying to catch it, but wasn't able to. At one point it looks as if she is giving the bear CPR, but she's only kissing him. The end she gets upset and when she gets upset she rocks her whole body. We're working on that :). At least she isn't throwing herself back like she was!

More Pics

I realized that I didn't put all the pictures up of Thanksgiving weekend that I wanted to so here are the rest. And please know that I DO put socks and shoes on Sophie :)...she just loves to take them off. Keeping socks/shoes on is a constant battle with this child!

This picture sums up so much of Sophie - wanting so bad to touch the candle holder, but not because she knows she's not suppose to! However, she's going to get as close as she can with out getting in trouble! Boy, am I in for it, ha!

Ok, this is a HORRIFIC picture of me - I have no make up on and my hair is, well, who knows what my hair is doing, ha!, but I had to put it on here because it's one of a few family pictures :). We hardly have any family pics which is sad!

Right as I was about to take a picture she put her foot in her mashed potatoes!

She's always so happy!

Sweet Baby!

Sophie loves to splash, splash, splash!!!

The floor had pools of water on it, ha!

I just love this picture because it shows off her chubby lil' legs, ha!

Sophie loves animals!! She reminds me of the cartoon character on Looney Tunes. You know the one that loves on all the animals and they run from her! That's Sophie! Bless her heart, no animal wants to come with in 10 ft of her once she's gotten a hold of them one time! FYI - she has a dress on even though it looks like a shirt! It just kept riding up!

Thanksgiving '09

**For some reason it's not letting me move my pics so it's just going to have to stay here (and out of order)**

Decorating for Christmas!

All ready for the UF vs FSU game!

My Uncle snuck Sophie some chocolate for during breakfast! AND she has discovered her nose lately, ha!

Playing with Cade who is my cousin Tanner's boy. He was SO good with Sophie!

Sophie is ALWAYS playing with her tongue some how! Glad I finally got it on camera!

Sophie terriorized this poor dog!! She LOVES animals and goes crazy anytime she sees one!! He was pretty patient with her until the end and we had to keep her away from him! Bless his heart!

This Thanksgiving was perfect!! I LOVE LOVE LOVE the holidays and was so excited to share it with Sophie this year that I couldn't even sleep Wednesday night, ha!! We got up Thursday morning and headed to Homosassa Springs to my Aunt Renee's (FYI - my middle name comes from her) house. On the way to my Aunt's we stopped and visited with my dad for a bit. He had a funeral to do the next day so he was in town. We arrived at my aunt's just in time to eat, ha! I meant to get there early to help cook, but traffic wasn't very good so the trip there took a lot longer than expected. There was a house full of family waiting some what patiently for us to arrive so that we could eat :)! It was such a wonderful feeling to be surrounded by family!

Basically, all we did this weekend was talk, fish - I don't fish, I just hang out with the others, watch football, and eat until we were stuffed! It was so much fun!

I did something that I said I would never do...I went shopping on Black Friday! It wasn't just shopping it was going to Toys R Us at 12am and standing outside in the freezing cold for two hrs! What us mothers do for our babies, ha! It was actually a lot of fun! I hate to admit it, but I had to REALLY refrain from being "one of those shoppers"! You know the kind that push people out of the way with my buggy, tackle another for the toy they have, and make little kids cry because their lil' legs can't carry them out of my way fast enough! I did end up getting some great toys for Sophie at half price! I am having a HARD time not giving them to her, ha! I've always been the type to tell what I get people just because I get so excited I can't keep it in, ha! I don't know what I'm going to do when Sophie is older! She's going to have to convince ME to wait!

Brag much :)

So this post is going to be that of a proud momma and all about the cute stuff Sophie has done lately! No one will probably be very interested except for me and my family so feel free skip ahead :)! Each day Sophie discovers something new! She is the most amazing little thing to watch! Since there is so many worth mentioning that she has done I'm going to bullet point them, ha!

-She has started cuddling with her babydolls/stuffed animals! She'll even pat their backs like I do her!
-When Sophie is laying on the ground I will start blowing on her tummy and kissing her all over so now she is laying her dolls/stuffed animals on the ground and doing the same thing I do to her
-She is saying "Kitty" when she sees a cat and will cuddle her baby while saying "Baby", I think that she has said "Dog" but it's not as pronounced as the others. And she is FINALLY saying "MaMa" along with "Nan Nan" which is what she calls my momma and what she said BEFORE "MaMa" (One thing is FOR SURE - she is her Nan's girl!!)
-she claps her hands to the music - and stays on rhythm - which is something that I can't even do, ha!
-She is climbing the stairs - which is a bit problematic! The other day I ran upstairs for literally two seconds and when I came back down she was already on the fourth step. Let's just say the gate is going up this weekend!
-The other day I was blow drying my hair with my round brush and put the brush down. I looked back over at Sophie and she was brushing her hair
-Yesterday she tried putting my shoe on Joe, but he had his shoes on so she untied them and tried to get them off to put mine on him!
-THEN she tried putting her own shoe on her foot!
-She LOVES to entertain us! I think she is going to be funny like Joe's Aunt Teresa and Grandma! Which I am so happy about!! I've always wished I was naturally funny like them so I hope she does take after them!
-She has been SO loving lately! Yesterday she actually gave me a hug! It was the most special moment! She did it a lot that morning! And she would grab my face and smile at me. LOVED LOVED LOVED it!
-She still doesn't have any teeth, ha! However she is eating table food - she's quite the 'gummer'!
-I was holding a container of Sweet Potatoe Puffs and Sophie would stop by occasionally during her play to grab a few puffs. Well, she picked up the lid that was laying next to me and put the lid back on...maybe it's nothing, but I was very impressed!

Places to go and Things to see

Sophie has been on the move, folks!! She LOVES to stand up so she'll go from one object to another and pull herself up - ALL DAY LONG. I would say that she'll be walking with in the next month, but I know as soon as I say it she'll make a liar out of me! Sophie does things on her time and not a minute sooner - or later for that matter! I am beginning to see how her birth is going to be the story of her life! I was in labor for 16 hrs (14 hrs of hard labor). From 8:30pm-11:30am I was stuck at 3cm. At 1pm I was fully dilated. She was ready. After the nurses kept me from pushing for TWENTY minutes so the doctor could get there, the dr walked in and 15 mins later she was out. I was ready to have her here!! The last part is to show where she gets her stubbornness from, ha! My mom said that she looked down and saw that look on my face - which she knew well from my teenage years - and KNEW I was getting that baby out NOW! I can be stubborn about doing something when I'm ready. (My stubbornness is REALLY something I have to constantly work on!) For example, in high school a bunch of us went cliff jumping - ok, there aren't any cliffs in FL...it was some kind of REALLY deep sink whole. Safe I know! It took them about 15 mins to convince me to jump and only then would I do it if my bf would do it too. Well, he started counting and was at "2" and I jumped! I was ok, but almost threw him over. I was ready to go THEN and if I waited I knew I wouldn't do it. All of that to say, "What goes around, comes around!"

There is nothing really too exciting going on in our lives! Everything is pretty quiet and we welcome it after the EVENTFUL past two and half years! I think that I have had every "life stressor" during that time and I'm pretty sure God knew that I needed to have things settled for a bit. My personality craves change and something to do so it's been a learning experience to just be still! However, Joe graduates in May and we might be having some changes again! I'll keep you updated! And no I'm not pregnant :)!