They Love Each Other!

I am loving how sweet Aspen is with Journey. He just loves her. He tells me almost everyday how pretty he thinks I am and has started to tell Journey how pretty she is too! So sweet.

Lately, Journey's favorite thing to do is play with the books.........well, more accurately, she likes to sit by the shelf of books and pull them all out and look at them. Her favorite books are the ones with the pictures of animals. Aspen has fun sitting next to her and piling all the books and toys on top of her. By the end, you can only see her shoulders and head. He thinks it's hilarious :) He also enjoys tickling her under her chin. She is very ticklish there and loves the attention from her big brother.

I really love watching their relationship with each other develop. Oh, and that reminds me of one other cute thing - Journey fell asleep in the car yesterday holding Aspen's hand. Aspen was loving it and figured that it meant that he would have to go to sleep with her when he got home (he's not allowed in her bed).
This is something I have prayed for, and although I know there will be rocky times (thinking junior high years) I really hope that they will have a close relationship as they grow up and become adults.

Randomness

For the past couple weeks Journey has been staying half the day with Aspen at Grammy's house. It is tough to leave her because she starts crying when she knows I am going to leave, but it is nice to have a little break. Even if I am going home to work in the office!

Journey has become quite the animal lover. She loves Auggie (our cat) and looks for her every time we go outside or to the car. She also loves dogs and is saying doggy and kitty.

Other new words are: "booh" - book, "di di di" - for Aspen, and her new favorite, "mo" - more, which she says constantly because she is always hungry! I swear she eats half the day.

Today Journey threw her first real fit in a store. She started screaming when I needed to look at my list and I think everyone in the whole store heard her. Fun times!

Today Aspen had a prayer answered. He found his "man"! It was lost at Grammy's house for about a month and he was very missed. Another great thing is that he has stared eating veggies. If you know him, you know this is a huge breakthrough. If I had known how easy it would be to make him eat them, I would have done it a long time ago! So far he has only eaten green beans and edemame, but he eats them without a huge fuss and that is something I never thought I would see :)

Aspen has a very passionate personality. High drama just like his Daddy. He has been going overboard on the crying fits lately. Everytime we say "no" to him it's a crying fit. I have reached my limit with this and am DONE with it. I am laying down the law! Things may be a little rough around here for the next couple days, but it can't be worse than all the crying I have been enduring just for saying "no"!

Better

I'm feeling a little better today about Journey. She slept through the night last night (yea!) and I read something online that around 13 months babies sleep at night and naps goes through a phase of interruption. That makes me feel so much better! Also, in the last couple days Journey has been starting to throw little "fits" when she doesn't want to do something and kicks her legs.
It's kind of funny but here is where the harder part of parenting starts......

Ahhhhh!!!!

That is how I feel about Journey right now. She has been soooo crabby and hasn't been sleeping or napping well for the last week. It is driving me insane! I can't tell if it is teething (please tell me it is!) or if she is just being difficult.

I am starting to wonder if she is going to be a stubborn one. This worries me because I don't know how to deal with that! Aspen is very busy, high maintenance and passionate (aka cries at the drop of a hat), but isn't what I would call stubborn.

More New Words

Journey has been saying a few more things...

"papa"

"kit kit" for kitty, kitty

and she imitates us saying"tickle, tickle, tickle" which actually comes out more like "thicka, thicka thicka" :)

She is such a sweet little girl. I LOVE having her. Last weekend we had a girls morning. Mark, Dan and Aspen went out looking at cars and Journey and I went to coffee together. We sat for about 30 minutes and ate a scone together. She was completely happy to just sit on my lap and say "hi" and smile and wave to everyone that came in. Then we went shopping together. It was so much fun and what I had dreamed of doing years ago when I was hoping to have a girl.

Quck Update

Journey had her CT scan on Wednesday. It was very tough to see her put under for the scan but it only lasted about 15 minutes. We got the great news this afternoon that everything is normal. Thank God!

I think I was most stressed about the scan. Or maybe I was just too emotionally spent to be stressed about the results. Or maybe it was the prayers, but once the scan was done, I didn't worry too much about the results. I had peace. I guess it must have been from God.
Anyways, her doctor wants her to do some physical therapy to strengthen her upper body.
So good news!

New Things

This is a little gross, but I have to write it down because it probably won't last.....
For about the last 4-5 days Aspen has been running to the bathroom to fart. He will announce and then run! It is so great! If it lasts, it may be the first "polite" thing that I have imparted to him :)
Oh, and Journey made her first official mess today. She can get around in her walker now and likes to open drawers and cabinet doors. I don't really watch her too closely because I didn't think she could get to anything much.....Wrong! Somehow she got her hands on a big container of oatmeal, took the lid off and walked around the house, dumping it as she went.