Happy Thanksgiving!

Sleeping Beauty

If you look close you can see teeth coming in.
This is a welcome change to knocking them out!

Raise your hands if you are a sweetheart!

I don't know if Daphne is going through a growth spurt or what but she has been sleeping a ton lately. She is usually tuckered out by Thursday night because she doesn't sleep much at daycare anymore because little miss social butterfly doesn't want to miss all the action. However, this past Friday she napped for 7 hours! She did take an hour nap in the morning, which I woke her from for an outing, and later she slept 20 minutes or so at play park. Then she napped from 1:15 to 8:15. And she still went to bed at 10:15! I went in after she had been napping about 4 or 5 hours, left the door open with the hall light on, checked to make sure she was breathing, and even stroked her hair and rubbed her back and she didn't even stir. Since then she has taken 4-hour naps in the middle of the day! It must be nice to be a baby!

Fall Leaves

Daphne was amused to watch Michael and Tyler gathering leaves in the back yard. There are hand prints and drool marks all over our sliding doors. Tyler was very excited to be Daddy's big helper and Michael said that he actually was a big help. Tyler helped raked leaves into piles and used a pair of "rake hands" to put the leaves into yard debris bags.

Tackle Daddy

Lots of giggling ensues when Tyler and
Daphne decide to gang up on Michael!

Daphne Developments

Every time I blink Daphne seems to be doing something new:

• Babbling: Daphne has added consonants to her babbling repertoire. She frequently likes to say da-da-da. Michael is basking in the glow that Dada is her first word but I say it doesn't count until she specifically calls him Dada or refers to him as Dada.
• Waving: She has started opening and closing her hand in response when she is waved to.
• Speed Crawling: That baby sure is fast! When Daphne really wants to get somewhere or senses we are about to pick her up to distract her from something, she turns on the burners!
• Reaching: We often think that items are out of reach but Daphne manages to pull up and get to them one way or another. She is also able to bend down and pick items up off the floor while standing and holding onto something with one hand.
• Playing with the Big Kids: Daphne absolutely adores Tyler! He is starting to get frustrated that she is constantly getting into his toys but he also likes to play with her and make her giggle. When other big kids are at the house she wants to be in on the action too.
• Splashing: Daphne has started using her hands to splash water in the bathtub. Last night she started a splashing war with Tyler and kept giggling throughout.
• Trouble: Even though we are constantly moving Daphne away from the entertainment center, she will crawl over to it, pull herself up, open a cabinet, and look directly at us and smile. Little rascal!

Tyler's Art Work

Although a simple drawing, Tyler told us that the 4 green
vertical lines represent Mommy, Daddy, Tyler, & Daphne.
That makes this the first picture he has drawn of our family.

Tyler has been enjoying art projects at school for a while now. One day last week he brought home three drawings and told us that one was for his buddies Calvin and Christopher, one was for Daphne, and one was for us. What a sweetie!

Whoop!

Watching the Aggies beat No. 1 Alabama yesterday.  ; )