Baby Dare Devil

I know, I know, it's a miracle that I'm writing 2 posts in the same month, let alone the same day, but I wanted to document while I had the chance.

My Child is a baby dare devil. She's not afraid of anything. Therefore, she doesn't learn from failed stunts she pulls.

I don't know if you can really see it that well, but she has a couple of rather large bruises on the left side of her forehead. The result from the 4th or 5th time she's fallen down the stairs at work. Like I said, she doesn't learn.

Pumpkin Patch/Halloween

"WEEE!"


Mini Corn Maze


"trick or treat"




I could not for the life of me get picture of the front of her costume. This is as good as it got.

3 1/2 months later...

It's taken 3 1/2 months to post them, but here are our Chicago Vacation pictures. We had a great time, and I would love to go back to see and do all things we didn't have time for.


Chloe playing peek-a-book in the car at the end of a VERY long car ride.




"Look, Mom! It's a big fluffy bed!"


"WEE!"


First trip on the subway for mommy and Chloe.




Super Star!


After seeing lots of animals, this is the one she gets excited about. Not even a real one.


Such a big girl.


Watching Elmo before bed.


Chinatown from the Subway.


This is the hallway and mirrored closet that Chloe was absolutely obsessed with.






The Navy Pier, and the beginning of a very long day.




A very distant skyline.


Chicago skyline.


A giant balloon that gives you a "bird's eye view" of the city.



After the Pier, we WALKED to ,and up and down, Michigan Ave. It was, like I said, a very long day.


Tiffany & Co.! Need I say more?


Chloe and her new Elmo book from Borders Bookstore.


The view from the 7th floor of the mall. It was sickening.


Human Statue. He would dance if you gave him money. It was actually really cool to watch.


Chloe's very first Oreo!! She liked it, as you can tell.

Long Time No Post... again

In my last post I had hopes of not taking so long to post again, and to post vacation pictures......
Neither of those happened... I've recently been bitten (no pun intended) by the Twilight bug. Last week I finished reading the entire saga...twice... spending every moment of free time I have either reading or sleeping (mostly reading). I'm totally obsessed. So much so, in fact, I started the first one again last night. Yeah, sad. I know. But, I was bound and determined to find time to get some snap shots posted. So here they are.


Chloe's first set of piggy tails.


Her hair has grown out some since I've taken these, or since the last time I fixed it like this, but it's so hard to get her to sit still enough to do them. Are they not the cutest things you've ever seen though? I know they're that way for me!!

Someone's in the Kitchen with Chloe!!




We tried making some edible play dough.... one of the worst ideas ever. That's all I'm gonna say about that. But she really enjoyed helping me make it.


She got mad that I made her wear a trash bag to protect her clothes, so it kinda ruined any of the fun we might've had...
Well, that's all. Hopefully it won't be so long before my next post for real...

100th post!!!

Wow, 100 posts! An even bigger wow, it's been almost a month since the 99th post!! What can I say?... we've been busy around here.
Well, let's get you guys up to date...
First of all, I guess my background was deleted off the website I got it from. Oh well, I got a cute new one. You like?
Anyway, Chloe is a little machine that never stops. She learned to run a couple weeks ago so she's even more non stop all the time. She's still working on coordination though, so she keeps me on my toes.
Her language skills are exploding!! She tries to repeat everything, EVERYTHING you say, so kindly watch yourselves if you're ever around my kid. Thanks. She's putting two word sentences together sometimes. Popular and most recent ones are "bye-bye, Elmo", "Elmo book", "Go bye-bye", and 1 or 2 others that I can't remember. She can speak fluently in complete sentences in her own little language, but she's the only one that can.
She knows all the basic animal sounds, and some not so basic ones like, dolphin, and llama and lizard (sort of). She love, Loves, LOVES to read. Reading, running, and Elmo are her most favorite things on the planet.
She also knows all of her facial features and some other body parts, like hands, toes, and arms. She's discovered her hair. Occasionally she'll reach behind her head and start playing with it. It's really more like pulling though...
In other news, since our vacation has come and gone (post coming soon... hopefully) and our savings account has been replenished, we have truly begun saving for a house! I've made it my personal goal to have us in a house, or at least in the process of buying, by May of next year at the latest.
We took a day trip on Saturday down to Mansfield, MO for the 2010 Swofford Family Reunion. It was fun to see everyone and show off my baby and my husband to everyone. It's been such a long time since I've been to one.

This is a picture of my grandma, my mom, Chloe, and I at the reunion. 4 generations of women.

That's all for now. Hopefully it won't be another month before I post again.....

Chloe Fun Facts

I thought I would take some time (what little time there is around here) to update on some fun, quirky things about Chloe.

Chloe Marie Savage...
won't eat real fruit, except bananas, but she'll eat all kinds of vegetables

she has to back up to and sit on EVERYTHING

as of tonight, she's become a head-banger while dancing

has a small freckle on her ankle, just like me

she's 14 months old and still in mostly size 6-9 month clothing

just got her first pair of size 3 shoes yesterday, and they're still a little big

is a major mama's girl,

and...
she has an extreme love for Elmo to the point where we can't say his name out loud... or else

A Few Loose Ends...

We're preparing to go on vacation soon and I wanted to tie up "a few loose ends".
Here are some pictures from several posts I've been wanting and meaning to do, but just haven't found the time.


Chloe's reading corner. I have a video of this I'll have to post later. It's sooooo cute.


A pic from our little "mommy and Chloe photo shoot" we had.


Finally moved up to the front facing car seat. We moved her up like a pound before we were supposed to, but oh well.


Getting comfy with her basket of stuffed animals.


First spaghetti dinner (that she fed herself).

Through the First Year and Then Some

WARNING: this post has no pictures. For those who only like the posts with pictures (mom...) STOP READING NOW.

It's been awhile.... Well, since my last post I've completely stopped breast feeding Chloe. About a week ago we were down to just her feeding before bed, and now she's no longer nursing at all. In turn, our bed time routine has changed a little. We get her dressed in her jammies and she get's a vitamin with iron (she's a bit anemic). She has I'd say about 3-4oz. of whole milk and some kind of snack, if she'll eat it. After that, we brush teeth and she gets to pick out a book to read before we lay her down for bed. On bath nights we of course do a bath before all of that and put on lotion and stuff too. It's been working out pretty well so far. She's still sleeping through the night and everything. After about a week, I'm starting to get a little uncomfortable, but a hot shower works wonders. I never really had a big problem with engorgement anyway. I'm proud and relieved to be able to say that I made it through the first year, and then some, of breast feeding. I didn't give up when I really, REALLY wanted to, and Chloe only had formula a few times.

I never thought I'd say that I was a little sad to stop nursing her, but I was. I did not enjoy it a whole lot at all. I was stationary a lot and felt it was an inconvenience at times. With a bottle you don't have to worry about finding a private room if you're, like me, and not comfortable doing it in public. In the times you do have to be in public it get's harder as your baby get's bigger and wants to look around and not be covered up. So to be sad about quitting was not expected. But how could I not be a little sad. It means that my baby isn't a baby anymore and doesn't need her nourishment from me. She still needs just about everything else from me, but still. Well, now I know that I want to breast feed any other babies God gives us... unless He gives us multiples. I'd have to think long and hard about that one.

Cool Pool Play

Alrighyt, so I've been a bit of a lazy blogger the past couple weeks and I'm behind, so this post is going to be kinda long. Just a warning.

We broke out Chloe's pool she got for her birthday. We didn't have a lot of time to leave it out in the sun, so the water was pretty darn cold, but she had fun anyway.


Chloe in her baby shades. [Side note: The penguin she's holding has a propeller behind it and moves in the water by itself. Pretty cool.]


Those lasted all of 2.8 seconds


"Look, there it goes!"


Daddy was very mean and turned the fountain on WAY TOO HIGH and got me soaking wet. I couldn't just leave our 1 year old in the pool to get away from the water so I just had to stay there getting soaked. My husband is already a little "hard of hearing" and I'm not the loudest person in the world, so he couldn't hear me screaming for him to turn the water off, so finally I figured that holding a wet baby would get me far less wet than staying there for the 2 minutes or so he left the water blasting. I was so not happy.


She had a pretty good time.

Chloe had her 1 year check up on Friday. She weighs 17 lbs. 14 oz. (still not enough to be in a front facing car seat), I forget how long she is (like, 27 inches or something), and she's in the 4% for weight and 6% for height. The doctor showed a little concern for her low weight at her 9 month check up, but didn't this time. She loves to eat and is far from malnourished, so she must be just destined to be petite.

We're planning our first family vacation! We're going to Chicago! Kris went once on his senior trip with the youth, but this will be mine and Chloe's first time. I'm really excited. We already know where we're going to stay, and what we want to do, it's just a matter of putting on paper (and of course saving the money).

Chloe has decided to refuse to say the word "mama". If you ask her to say "mama" she says, "dada!". If you ask her to say "elmo" she says, "mamo", but then ask her to say "mama", she again says, "dada!" with a huge smile. I personally think she's doing it on purpose because I'm trying so hard. But wouldn't you? I mean come on! The last time I can remember her saying "mama" and meaning me, she was whining. Not exactly my favorite way to hear it. I guess I'll just keep trying.....