Brain Growth

It's like you can see the neurons connecting every day. As she's coloring a picture of a zebra in her coloring book, she spontaneously says "zebra". I didn't tell her that's what it was. At the mall there were a line of brightly colored chairs. She runs up, slaps the blue chair and says "blue". Lucky guess I think to myself- until she runs to the orange one and says "orange". Crazy!!  The stuff she picks up on and remembers blows my mind. I LOVE watching this happen. 

The other big news was a pee and poop on the potty because she told us she had to go. Over thanksgiving she told Maymay and me that she had to potty so we went in and she did it. SO happy about that one!! Since then she's pooped on the potty again and every day we have to sit on the potty and try-that's her doing not mine. And I read "Potty" the book about 10 times and she pretends she's dumping out her little pot into the toilet. We are certainly on our way.

Thanksgiving was great. Family time with Maymay, Boppa, Booboo, and Al was very fun and relaxing. Another generation of Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade has come along...Frannie loved the balloons (and even some of the Broadway singing and dancing). We went to get our tree and then to see the Bentleyville lights too. Really, really fun. Frannie enjoyed the lights and all the peole....and the best part was that it wasn't totally freezing like last year.

Sensitive

Each day I get a note saying what Frannie did that day at school. This also includes an am and pm mood report. The vast majority of these say Happy :)

However, the past two weeks or so, more and more "sensitive" is being written with today and Thursday last week being sensitive both am AND pm. What happened??!? I know she's teething because a canine popped through and you can see the others and I think those back molars must be moving a little because she's constantly chewing on her finger way toward the back of her mouth. So is it just teeth? Is it the terrible twos starting early? No matter what it is, it's killing me not knowing what's happening with her. Like can I do something to help? I'm hoping it's either teeth or a stage because a whiny fussy kid is not fun.

On the flip side, for the most part (there are more "sensitive" times at home too but they aren't the majority) she is happy and busy. She is stringing words together like crazy and I swear just within the last day she is able to "read" parts of books from the pictures. She is big into dancing and music. We hooked up our TV to the basic stations and we watch The Voice together on Mondays. She claps and dances....SO CUTE. She also loves swimming in the bathtub. We went into a pool two weekends ago, and she really liked the hot tub. Since then she considers herself a swimmer :)

Cartoon Voice

Talking up a storm. And the best part about my little parrot is that she has the most adorable cartoon voice. She gets more clear with her words every day and I'm amazed at how she uses them correctly. Love love love this stage.

We went to Boo at the Zoo, which is essentially trick or treating during the day at the zoo and had a whirlwind yet fun time. I had the cutest tropical fish costume that a friend gave me for Frannie to wear, but she absolutely refused (aka enormous fit) to wear it. So we settled on a purple princess and got a few suckers and fruit snacks along with great people watching and animals too.

It's a good thing we did that because Halloween in Duluth was the coldest in like 5 years or something ridiculous with temps around 35. We opted to stay home and hand out candy to a whopping  10 kids.

She's still loving school and loves doing "big girl" stuff like standing on her stool to brush her teeth at the sink and wash her hands. The potty is a topic of conversation and she's pooped on it twice but we still have a long ways to go. 

Her latest obsession is Chapstick. She will carry a tube around with her and just continually put it on. And then when I'm not looking she'll dig in it with her finger and rub it on her hands/the couch/her clothes/etc. 

Being outside is still a favorite as well. She doesn't mind the cold and would dig in the dirt, run around, play with her ball, slide and swing, and eat apples of the tree for hours if she could.

1 1/2 already

Frannie is changing like crazy. She says words out of the blue and is making connections all the time. She just started saying "Foxy" which is unbelievably adorable. School is perfect for her. She loves going and has adjusted super well. The teachers all say that they can't believe how well she adapted. They also told me the other day that she is one of their best eaters. HUH??!?? At least I can count on her getting her nutrition at school. At home eating is only to be done as she's in motion doing something else. She did sit at the table for 5 minutes tonight eating her yogurt. That may be a record.

She had her year and a half check up.... 45th%ile weight, 80th%ile height, and 90th%ile head size. She's totally still a long lean little thing and just so cute I can hardly stand it. 

She still loves picking and eating anything growing outside. It's apple season so she loves eating apples off the trees and we went to Bayfield to pick apples and raspberries last weekend. She ate the first few handfuls of berries (I was unsure we'd leave with any), but then filled up I guess because we left with a small container full. Then on the way home we stopped at the pumpkin patch to pick out our pumpkins for carving. In one of the pictures you'll see the three "Frannie sized" pumpkins we found that she decorated her table with. And truly-she put them there on her own. Interior designer maybe? Her own show on HGTV?

First Day

How can summer be over already??? Not sure about the rest of the world, but Northern WI/MN didn't see summer begin til the 4th of July so I feel a little ripped off. We have been trying to squeeze as much fun in as we can before Frannie and I go back to school. 

One of Frannie's new developments has made me so excited. It seems that she loves the garden, mostly because she's realized that when we walk around in it, she can eat stuff. I can give her blueberries from the store or cook frozen green beans and she will maybe eat one or two. If we pick it from the garden, she'll chow down. She has been loving looking for (and eating) wild raspberries and thimbleberries and is pretty sure I'm lying when I tell her they are gone for now. She looks at me likes she thinks I'm keeping them to myself.

She also has become interested in watching and helping me cook. She sat for 10 minutes the other day picking basil leaves off the stems and putting them in a bag so we could make pesto....which she also helped with. I pull a stool over to the counter and she helps pour ingredients in or whatever else I can find for her to do. It makes me so happy to have her be interested and having fun in the kitchen. She'll even "make eggs" with a bowl/cup and a whisk...super cute.

Yesterday was our first day of school/work. I found it harder than I thought leaving her, but she was great! We walked in, I held her so she could look around, I asked if she wanted to play- "yeah", she walked around to check things out, came over once to kiss my hand, went back to play, I said I'm going to work, she blew me a kiss, and off I went. It was only as I drove away that I had that heavy feeling in my throat/stomach and I understood what our kindergarten parents feel as they leave their kids on the first day.

No need to worry apparently, though, cause she had a great day! Happy all day, ate all her food, napped when she was supposed to, played outside, and even went to Spanish class. :)

Hopefully today and the rest of the year can go so smoothly.

Busy

Lots has been going on the last several weeks. Frannie got to have some serious family time....several days with her aunts (great aunts but they are much too young to be called that) and cousin, then another few days with her uncles Ben and Alan (for their marriage!) and then a day meeting her great grandma, aunt and uncle on Brian's side of the family for the first time. Throw in some Meemaw (Frannie has changed this to "Maymay" much to my dismay) and Boppa (Grandpa's new name) time and she's been quite the attraction.

She's also been talking up a storm. She tries to say most everything we say. Lots of it sounds similar but her communication gets better and better everyday. She puts her shoes on (anything that slips on) by herself and loves being a helper. She feeds Foxy in the morning and helps throw things in the garbage and even helps me take the garbage out. Flowers, animals, and birds are still her favorites. But her all-time favorite activity at the moment is digging in the dirt/sand and playing with water. Preferrably combining the two together. The weirdest and most amazing development is how she is now using our phones and iPad. She doesn't use them that much but in the past few months she has learned how to delicately tap the screen on the app she wants and touch the buttons/pictures to get the game going or play the video/music. It's incredible! I heard music the other day only to find that she had gotten it going all by herself. Crazy. 

I love watching her learn and grow by the minute. She truly amazes me every day. And she not only makes me smile everyday but she seems to bring a smile to most people around her as well. She says hi and bye to pretty much everyone and for those (even cashiers or fellow shoppers) she seems to really like, she blows them kisses. I think she said bye bye to the entire Chipotle restaurant the other day. Social creature she is.

Birthday

36? Can I really be 36? I'd like to say my math is wrong but numbers don't lie. My birthdays used to involve several days of parties and get togethers along with eating and lots of drinking. Sigh. It's very different now but there were highlights of a different sort.

I was able to have a little alone time in dad's garden harvesting blueberries, we had a family day at the beach, we went to Wilderness Walk, and Brian and I were able to sit outside, eat pizza, and drink beer for almost two hours without being eaten alive by mosquitos. It reminded me why I love summer.

Frannie was a riot at the beach slowly, slowly making her way into the water. We figured out that we have to leave her totally alone for her to make her way to the water. If we attempted to help...she ran back to the sand. Because really, for her there is nothing better than playing in the sand. Finally we were all in the water and she was up to her chest splashing and having fun.

Wilderness Walk took on a whole new meaning for me this year. I know I took her last year, but this year Frannie's love of animals culminated at Wilderness Walk. She had SO much fun. She loved the ducks and feeding the goats. She really shows no fear and went up to most every animal. Her only hesitation came in the form of a large tortoise in the petting zoo which is probably because Brian and I both envisioned it snapping her fingers off-until we found out it was a tortoise, not a defunct snapper.

Thanks to everyone for their well wishes and kind thoughts. I'm so lucky and grateful for my family and friends.

Camping

We went on our first family camping trip- and it was great! Thanks to Sarah and Mike for the inspiration.... We went to Tettegouche State Park up the North Shore and had a walk in campsite for one night. We didn't have to walk very far so it was perfect to still have access to the car if we needed it but we felt "away" from everyone. Frannie was awesome. We only had to tell her once about staying away from the fire pit and she kept her distance. She LOVED the tent...all those zippers to play with and seeing through the mesh windows. The bugs weren't even too bad-we were able to get away with using the natural bug spray and didn't require the "real" stuff. We went hiking both days; the first evening we went hiking up and down the Baptism River to see the waterfalls and then the next day to Gooseberry Falls to play in the lake. There was a swinging bridge that you could see through that we had to go over to cross the river and although Foxy struggled and I was super nervous for both Foxy and Frannie, Frannie had no fear. She was looking out the railing and squatting down to look at the river through the bridge. And then she hiked her little legs up a ton of steps and would have kept going on her own, but she kept getting distracted by the flowers and then the bugs would find us. The only tough part was sleeping since it's so light out, she was awake til 9 and then every move she made through the night woke me up since she was between Brian and I. Overall, very successful and I can't wait to go again.

"No"

She may not say a lot of words but she knows how and when to use the ones she does know. This includes "no". Not only does she say it, but she also provides actions to go along with it by shaking/waving her hands and arms back and forth across her chest just in case I didn't understand that indeed she does not want to do that or does not want to stop doing what she's doing. She is VERY independent and I'm learning to be sure to ask if she wants help first before I even go near whatever she's doing lest I ruin it.

The good news is that it doesn't last too long (nor does the mini fit that comes after) and then she will come over to me and either hug and kiss my leg or hand. She's quite the lover....always blowing kisses (sometimes to random people in the store) or patting and kissing me. 

We have scored some fun summer toys from friends and garage sales. She got a wagon with oversized Legos and conveniently for her she is tiny enough to fit in it so that's good times going down the driveway. She has a little car/rider thing that she's figuring out how to push herself on. Bubbles are a favorite both to say and do. Playing in containers of water and throwing rocks are good too. On the other hand, a friend gave us a kid swing that is great and I found a perfect branch for it but Frannie HATES it. She'll go speeding down the slide at Sarah's and at the park but swinging-no thank you. 

We are holding out on a kiddie pool due to the un-summerlike weather we are having. I found two cute suits and now we just wait and see if she ever gets to wear them. We may have to go to Hayward if we want warmth....which we did go celebrate Meemaw's birthday last Sunday-warm weather, eating outside, and ice cream....aaahhhh, it felt like summer.