Happy Baby

Earlier this week, we had a little family pizza dinner in Daddy's office. For some reason Emily was in a great mood. In the first video she is holding the plastic container of crushed red pepper. (Emi loves things that are round, things that are red, and things that make noise. This was a winner!). In the second, she's playing with an empty Snickers bag.

Sunshine!

It's amazing how the weather affects my mood. It was sunny and 70 degrees here last week, plus the extra hour of daylight made it really feel like spring. I feel more relaxed that I have in months. I can finally run again, now that it's warm enough for Emily to be in the stroller. The other day we visited Alasdair at work, and it was nice enough at 5:30 to play outside in the CCEF courtyard.

Sleepy girl

Granny Groves watches Emily on Tuesday mornings while I am at work. Yesterday I walked in to this sweet sight. (Note: Granny is not sleeping:)

Emily Runs on Dunkins

Alasdair & I stopped at Dunkin Donuts for a treat before church on Sunday. The ladies working there were charmed by Emily, and gave her a munchkin. Yum. It took her all of breakfast time to eat about 1/3 of it. :)

Robyn & Emily and some odds & ends

I'm trying to remember to keep up with posting here. Since the house has been on the market we've had everything tucked away neatly, including the camera. This great shot of Emily & Robyn was taken while we were in VT.

Emily's crawling has really taken off. She'll follow me across a room, or drag a toy along with her. She loves to pull up on anything that will hold her (and some things that won't...), and she'll now hold on with one hand, as if she's thinking about letting go. I thought this stage would make life a lot harder, but it's actually so much better! Emily is so much happier now that she can get where she wants to go.

We have to leave the house when there are showings, so we've spent a lot of quality time at Heather Lane (Granny's house). Perfect timing, since Eowyn (& her roommate Sally) have been home from college. :) We will miss you guys!!

Here's a cell phone shot of Emily in the shopping cart at Target. She loved riding in it, although insisted on having her feet up. That's a bag of Dunkin Donuts coffee she's holding. Good taste :)

Crawling!

While we were in VT, Emily learned to crawl. She hasn't realized her trouble-causing potential yet though, she only ever goes a few 'steps' (crawls?) before she stops & sits up. Baby-proofing, here we come. Here is my first attempt to post a video (I took it on my phone, so the quality isn't great.)

Flirting!

Emily made got right in Joseph's face and made him cry. Not the best first impression. She was delighted to have the attention (and share the toys) of Nathaniel and Kyra.

Emily finally met a baby her age who is bigger than she is. She & Elliott played very well together, when they weren't pulling each other's hair.


More pictures of Emily & her new friends here.

Traveling!

With the house mostly finished, we headed to VT/NH for 10 days to meet with pastors about our counseling center venture. We started with a few days in Killington with my parents. It was my first time skiing in two years, and God blessed my patience with some of the best snow Killington has seen in my lifetime. Glorious. Thanks to my wonderful mother who stayed with Emily all day both days so that I could ski.

For the business part of the trip, we stayed with our friend and partner-in-counseling Robyn and her husband Karl. We got to know some of their kids and Emily fell in love with their dog. Pictures were taken, but not on my camera. We met a lot of pastors, and some other key counseling-minded people. No pictures were taken. We visited some friends, including two of the boys mentioned in this post. Emily loved playing with her new friends, and luckily Alasdair did get some pictures. (See next post.)

I could go on and on about our trip, but I'm sure anyone actually reading this is really only here for the pictures of Emily. I will say though that Emily was wonderful. She slept well, despite being in three different places the first four days. She participated quietly in meetings without being too distracting, she was good in restaurants. We dubbed her our marketing department. (Oh, and Uncle Nick came along for the first few days to babysit Emily and to drive all over VT looking for my keys when I locked myself out of the car. Thanks Nick!)

Standing!

A lot has happened since my last post! I'll update in bits & pieces.

We worked hard throughout February to get our house market-ready. (Thanks to family & Katie for all your help!!) During one long Saturday, Emily must have felt she wasn't getting enough attention, so she learned to stand up in her crib! This earned her a break from her nap while we lowered the mattress so she wouldn't fall out.