Emmeline is 11 months old!

I found my card reader. Here is a current photo. Emmeline LOVES playing the piano!

The last month has gone by in a complete blur at our house and Emmeline went along for the ride like a 6th child champ.  I've lost track of the number of times we visited the doctor or dentist in this time, but it was a lot.  So, in looking back, I'm going to have to stop and reflect for a moment to try and remember what this little kiddo has done these past few weeks because almost all I can remember is endless laundry, vacuuming, medical visits, medications, and cleaning.  Emmeline has really just taken her family life in stride and become an involved member.  I can see babyhood starting to slip away like the fat shedding from her thighs and belly.  She is such a cute little thing! Emmeline is holding firm at 17 pounds.  She doesn't stop moving long enough to gain any weight.  It's just go go go! She can stand on her own, but she doesn't believe it yet. But, I have seen and I believe. She loves to walk holding on to our hands but falls to her knees if we let go.  So, crawling is still her preferred mode of non-parental transport.
The biggest development this last month has been Emmeline's vocabulary.  She loves to talk and mimic what we say. She has said up, happy, Mama, Dada, baba, brother, Clara, Audrey, bye bye, and hi. She claps and waves constantly and blows kisses and gives kisses.  But her kisses are only for me and they are nice and juicy. Mmm, yummy- baby slobber! She has also discovered the wonder of her own hair, which is 5-6 inches long now, and really fun for her to twirl while nursing. 
Emmeline is the mini ruler of our house.  When the big kids come home, she is the first one they want to see.  I might as well be a mushy dog gift in the grass for all the attention I get. But, that's okay. I don't blame them, and I probably do the same thing.  I can't help it! She 's so cute! It's impossible not to love this baby.
She is working on using utensils.  Right now they are really fun to hold and wiggle and throw overboard.  She is also hoping that I will give up my quest to keep her out of the toilet.  I've never had a kid play in the toilet before, so I needed one to help me learn patience in that area.

Emmeline is a couple of weeks old in this photo.

This is mere hours before Emmeline was born.  I was in labor and standing in front of the awesome tub where she was born.  It's a big jacuzzi tub with sand underneath that makes the tub floor soft and squishy. It's so deep I was able to deliver on my hands and knees like I prefer.

Every kid needs a funny bath picture posted on the internet. 

I wish I could post some photos, but my house ( with the help of an un-named 10 year old) ate my card reader and my camera won't transfer pictures, so I'll have to use  old photos this month.

Emmeline is 9 months old today!

Emmeline trying to escape baby prison, a.k.a. her crib



"Why are you torturing me?"




These cheeks are empty, believe it or not

 I remember thinking as I wrote a post on facebook one month ago that there probably wouldn't be much to tell about Emmeline's life during her 8th month. I mean, how do you top an E.R. visit?  Well, little did we know about the present she brought home from the E.R.- a supersonic strain of pink eye.  72 hours after visiting the E.R. Emmeline's left eye was puffy.  The next day, of course a Saturday, we were at the doctor's office with a full blown case of pink eye and a fever.  The fever lasted for 3 days and the eyes didn't get any better so we were back at the doctor on Tuesday for an antibiotic.  And of course, antibiotics bring the gift of diarrhea, but at least we didn't have to keep putting drops in eyes that we so swollen we couldn't get them open to put the drops into them.  Emmeline did get better, eventually.  It took three weeks for the swelling to go down.  After two weeks, we visited an opthomologist, who said the swelling would go down soon.  In between all of this glee, and because of Emmeline's irresistible infection laced cheeks, I got pink eye, Judd got pink eye, Reuben got pink eye, Clara got pink eye, and Timothy got pink eye.  We went through about 400 tissues, 2 bottles of hand soap, and 32 ounces of hand sanitizer in 10 days.  We spent over $100 on eye drops.  We all learned how dangerous it can be to touch your eyes.  Thank you Emmeline! Even very little people can teach big people important lessons. 

Despite illness, Emmeline took time over the last month to perfect her speed crawling and continued to work on her goal of introducing non-digestible objects to her stomach.  We have taken away game pieces, wood chips, a sewing needle, a gobstopper( she actually had gotten down to the soft insides before that one was found), a dime, a nickel, and lots and lots of plastic in many forms.  Last night Grandma Dellory ordered a Super Play Yard with the two piece expansion set so Emmeline can have her very own 24.5 sq. ft. "cage".  I never felt a need for one of these before, but I am counting down the hours until it comes. 
Emmeline has also learned how to pull herself to stand at the furniture and to exist with irrationally small amounts of sleep.  She abhors being put in  her crib and only likes to go to bed being held by Daddy while watching T.V.  She thinks nap time is for babies without hair and does not appreciate our feelings on the subject. 

Somehow we have taken to calling her either Lemon or Roomba.  Roomba for the vacuum, Lemon for Lemon Lime because it rhymes with Emmeline, sort of.  I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about calling my child Lemon.  I still mostly call her Emmeline.  And we all still adore her.  Audrey has learned to hunt for choking hazards, but she doesn't quite understand what that means.  She was sure baby spit up was a choking hazard.  Clara continues to pick her up, without permission, and carry her around, without permission, and she even dropped her, definitely without permission.  Amy, Timothy, and Reuben are truly helpful and are on constant alert to keep the baby safe and happy. She knows their names and looks at them when I ask her to find them.  We love you Emmeline!

It's About Time!

I love to write, even if nobody is reading the things I have to say, which is why I keep a journal and also comment on Facebook almost every day. But, I've been thinking lately that it's about time I created a blog. So, I decided to just dive in and get started. If I wait for the housework to be done, the blog will never get started. A couple of recent articles about Mormon Mommy blogs got me thinking that it's about time for me to join the online community of bloggers. So, here I am. I'm going to have this blog be a joint one for me and my husband, so we will sign our entries.

Have you ever noticed when you have gotten out of the habit of journaling that, when you start up again, you have a desire to write down everything you have neglected to mention since you last wrote? These entries tend to be obnoxiously boring, so I have decided to dive right in and act like I've been doing this my whole life.

My hubby had the flu while the baby was

ferverish, so the cuddled together.

The last few weeks have been unreal for my family. Nothing really bad has happened, but we have been afflicted with some unusual trials and challenges and they just keep coming! Two weeks and one day ago, my baby Emmeline swallowed something that she found on the floor while sitting at my feet. 7 hours later we brought her home from Primary Children's Hospital, exhausted from general anesthesia and the trauma of having a wire lodged in her esophagus for over 5 hours. Little did we know that she brought home an unwelcome souvenir- pink eye. But, this was no ordinary pink eye. This pink eye comes with a runny nose, sore throat, fatigue, and a fever. 6 of the 8 people have caught it so far. It's been 11 days since the baby got sick and her eye is no longer pink, but is still slightly swollen. We have been living in Pink Eye Prison. I finally let the boys make a jailbreak and go back to school after being on drops for 4 days. Whew! On the first day that I drove somewhere in 3 days, because I needed to get awards for the pack meeting I was in charge of, I got the first speeding ticket of my life. After that I decided to stay home longer! Seriously, it's been hard. The pink eye was extremely painful and I wanted to rip my eyeball out at times. But, in the midst of this suffering, I remain grateful for the things we have that we actually want: 6 fairly healthy children, cars, modern appliances, a house, education, the internet, extended family who rallied around us and dropped everything to help us, doctors, food. . . .And why stop there? The few years I spent living in Russia taught me to be grateful for EVERYTHING. I will never stop being grateful for snow plows, peanut butter, root beer, toilet paper, clean air, and people who speak English. I could go on for pages, but the important thing to me is that no matter what happens in life, there is always good that comes out of it if I am willing to look for it. Usually it is things like gratitude, empathy, understanding, patience, the ability to endure, greater strength, and growing closer to God. But, it can be other things too. I might as well make the best of the trials, or they just might get the best of me.