1.13.2010

What's so funny?



Apparently Mommy's impression of Sam, even though it sounds like a feral cat ...

1.12.2010

Tessa's World

Tessa had another opportunity to wear her Christmas dress when we went to a wedding on Jan. 2. During the ceremony, after we finished singing, Tessa said, "All done!" and started clapping.

Little girl gets gussied up

She lets us know when she wants to go somewhere. Any outside apparel she finds will do, so she thinks.

Such a responsible pet owner — too bad she doesn't feed the real one!

Daycare is fun at the Y-W-C-A!



These are some of the gems Tessa brings home from daycare. We love that she loves it at the Y! She's such a big little girl! She sleeps on a cot during nap time and sits on a little chair at a little table with other little Tessa-sized people during lunch time. One day, I dropped her off right before the kids went down to breakfast. I watched as she walked to the elevator with all the other kids. Before she went in, she stopped, looked back at me and smiled as if to say, "See, Mom, I know what I'm doing!" It's just amazing to me.

1.08.2010

Something new every day

Our Tessa Babe is learning so much, it doesn't seem accurate to call her a baby any more. Maybe because she points to other babies and says "baby." Or maybe because she does little girl things like play with my hair, sing, dance and has even started to pray before meals.

She definitely tests us to see what she can get away with. If she doesn't like a particular food, she tends to shove it in the cushion of her high chair, look at us and say, "All done!" Even though we're laughing on the inside, our parental instincts are stronger than our funny bones (sometimes!), and we try to put the kibosh on that behavior. :)

Her vocabulary grows every day, too. She's getting good at repeating words immediately after we say them. She even says "baby John" (her cousin), even though her "John" sounds like "Don." It's super cute when she walks by the fireplace or sees steam rising from food cooking on the stove — she waves her hands and says, "hot!" Her favorite words to say, though, are names of animals. Her recent ones are turtle, frog and butterfly. She loves to make animal sounds, too. Her monkey mimicking is by far her best! But hands down, the absolute best phrase to hear her say is: "Love you!"

1.03.2010

Getting the hang of it

Tessa enjoys the art of gift unwrapping.

Tessa's new best friend

Animal lover

Tessa breaks in the shoes Mima got her by running laps through the house.

Tessa can record and play back messages with the phone from Mima.

Kory says ciao






Tessa was lucky enough to spend a week with Kory before he heads to Rome for spring semester. She showed him how she can brush her teeth and read some of her books. They also had fun playing with Tessa's foam battle ax (Eric had to get it after finding it at Target's dollar spot). And Kory gave Tessa the perfect Christmas gift: a toy doggy! When Tessa was opening the package and saw it was a doggy, she started squealing and dancing in place. Eric couldn't open it fast enough! We have never seen her so excited. It was really fun to watch. Thanks, Kory! Have fun and study hard in Italy! Ciao!