Little Linebacker

Ha ha... I think Em looks like a linebacker in this picture! Poor thing.... Notice all of the drool and snot? Anyway, she doesn't seem to have the cold that badly. Sneezes here and there, but nothing too terrible at night - yet!

In the other picture you can notice the swarm of "sharks" around Elliott as he is eating pizza.

So Emma has been standing A LOT, and today she took a couple of steps on her own!!!! Nothing big, as she really wasn't aware of what she had done. She was so focused on the remote control that she went for it. SOON she will be on her way. She is also enamored with Roscoe lately. She literally pounds on him, jumps up and down, pulls his skin/fur, and "bites" hime (yes, we have to wipe fur off of her face!!). Roscoe has been SO good and just lets her pound away. I think she is actually happy to have the attention- ha!

Love to all...

Ta-daaaa!!!

Emma claps a couple of times and then raises her hands in the air like she is saying "ta-da!" Except for Elliott tries to say it for her every time she does it. How cute... Tonight El shard a little of his pizza crust with her and she LOVED it. Notice all of the drool/slobber on the front of her? Good lord, it is CONSTANT.

Poor Aliyah had a cold this week, and of course Emma got it today. She already rememebred that she could lick the salt snot - lovely.

Love to all...

Snow Day!

We got snow last night! No school today!!!!! Yippie!!! So I knew enough to let Emma sleep in this morning, until I heard for certain if we were off or not. The girl slep until 8:30! That is unheard of for her. However, she did have a VERY hard time falling asleep last night. AFter many atempts we finally brought her down stairs and she was WOUND-UP until 8:45. She was hilarious. Into everuthing and going everywhere. It was like she had "restless BODY syndrome". Elliott ended up getting her to sleep.

Anyway today was nice but I had cabin fever like crazy. finally about 3 Em and I just headed out to the store jsut to get away. Not a whole lot new here..... Em is still dang cute:) Love to all

Playing with Roscoe

Emma and dad playing (pounding on!) Roscoe. The other picture is Em all dressed up to go to Aliyah's 1st birthday party. We had such a good time meeting all of her family, singing songs, opening gifts and eating yummy birthday cake. At the end Emma's outfit was SOAKING wet! She is drooling like CRAZY - and the tooth is working its way in. She has been standing A LOT on her own lately! It is so exciting.... Love to all...

Anything Can Be A Walker!

Emma has found numerous things that can be a "walker" for her. She still LOVES the walker her dad gave her, it is her new obsession. That being said, she seems to always be looking for new things to try walking with. SO she has stood on her own!!!! Not just balancing on her own, but standing up from a squatting position!!!! She has done it only a few times, but she is well on her way.

She has also learned to throw things down and pick them up herself (as opposed to dropping things and waiting for one of us to do it). She will spend many minutes att he coffee table (holding on) and dropping something and then picking it back up. SO cute. Just in general she is dang cute!!!

Man, thankgoodness Elliott got home early last night!!!! TOday has been wonderful with basically only emma to watch....

Love to all

New Teeth?

Sorry, no new pictures today. I just didn't have a moment to spare it seemed, until Emma was in bed. She is CRAZY! She only took an 1 1/2 hour nap today. She was up from 12:30, no nap, and I couldn't keep her up past 6pm. SO, a semi-relaxing evening. Cooper, Tom and I are up in bed watching American Idol (Roscoe seems to not be feeling well, so he is in the garage).

Anyway, Emma is just so busy! She has found the blinds and LOVES how they make noise inbetween her fingers. The minute she wakes up she is looking around and grunting at things. I know she in talking to me, I only wish I knew what she was saying and thinking! It is so dang cute.

Tonight I saw a "bulge" of another tooth coming in on her top left side, so that explains the lack of nap, and her crying or screaming in the middle of playing of just walking around with her walker. It is funny though, she get s SO mad and frusterated when what she is waking with or moving around, doesn't go the way she wants or gets stuck somewhere. She just squeals and then will most likely shak eit as hard as she can. Her nickname is becoming "destructor"....

Love to all..

Longest Day

Holy Crap! yesterday was LONG. Just to give you an idea... Up for work at 550, off to work at 730... Aimee came and let the dogs out about 10am, I got home with Emma at1pm, to clean the diarreah out of Cooper's kennel, then give him a bath, then feed Emma nd try to get her tot ake a nap, then go BACK to Jessica's to drop off Emma at 230, drive to the dance studio, teach till 6, go home to let Cooper out (no poop!!!!!!!!), go back to teach at 7, go back to get Emma from Jessica's at 9:45.... THEN back home! No poop again!!!! But TONS of energy! So I let him and Roscoe paly for about 1/2 an hour. Emma was awake when I wen tto pick her up at 945! So she was tired.

SHe did waku-up once, but barely, and I let Cooper sleep in bed (becasue he did it the night before!).... BIG mistake! Least to say, I am looking forward to tomorrow, and then fRiday when elliott gets home...

Love to all...

One Big Happy Family

Look at all the family in one little place! Everyone wanted to check out Elliott putting up the new dog/Emma gate. notice the little door at the bottom so that cats can get through?

So we made it through day number one wihtout Elliott.... Cooper was not so happy in his kennel. he pooped IN the kennel. The pet=sitter had to take care of it! He is sensitive and was nervous about being inthere for so long, and then El being gone too. Poor boy!
Emma was HILARIOUS yesterday! First of all, she didn't sleep at 12:30. I THINK she is tething... So she was OBSESSED with her walker. It was all she wanted to do, and had figured out how to steer it, and finally understood when things were in her way and she was PISSED when she got stuck. She'd start screaming becasue she couldn't get unstuck. AFter a while she just started walking in circles around the kitchen. Seriously!!!! Then, after awhile she just kept going, but was crying and walking at the same time. I have no idea what was going on, but it was soooooo funny!

Anyway, she slept good at Allison's last night, and only woke up once in the night, and cooper stayed in bed never getting up once. He is curled up on my lap as I write this.

Ok, gotta get ready for work. Love to all....

Climbin'

Emma enjoying time ON her carseat! She LOVES it and is trying to see all the different ways she can got up on it...

We enjoyed a family day together watching football yesterday. Emma WAS NOT interested in taking a nap! It was crazy! She didn't go down until 12:30 and that is not normal, so she was asleep by 6:30, and back up by 6:30 this morning! But, this is good becasue she will be with Allison tonight when I teach, so my hope is that she'll fall asleep easy, by 7pm! Wish us luck.

Elliott left this morning for CA. So it is me and the animals for the WEEK! Wish me luck on that too:) IT is all actually going well, as Roscoe and Copper are getting along SO well. I will post pictures of the two of them later.

Lvoe to all....

Pickin' on Cooper

Emma loves to just sit in front of Cooper and pester him! I think the one of him outside is especially sweet!

Em is really growing up! She has started eating toast, cheese, yogurt, and today even wanted to hold the spoon herself (that was a disaster)! I don't know if she wanted to chew on the spoon or the food, but she wanted it none the less. Also of note, she did it all with her left hand! The spoon, and any food she put inher mouth, was in her left hand! I said "oh she'll be so artistic!" and Elliott said "oh, she'll be a brain surgeon!" Ha ha! Happy Friday and love to all

Little Monkey

Emma is becoming quite the expert monkey. Her sitter Jessica says she is amazed at all of the places she thinks to explore. Here she is climbing on the chair (she had her legs wrapped around it and was trying to climb up it a minute before the picture), and then exploring Cooper's new kennel, she just went right up on to it.

Elliott came home early las tnight - yay! So no worries about all the people and animals that needed to be taken care of:) We left Cooper in his kennel when Em and I wen to get her new car seat and I think it went well. He wasn't crying when I got home, and through out the day if her was in his kennel he only cried a bit! yippie!!! And sweet Emm aonly woke up once in the night! Yippie again!!!!

YEsterday Emma had cheese for the first time, she liked that a lot. She has also been having toast and loved ehr "chicken noodle dinner" last night. So things are well.

THat's all for now... lov eto all....

Mama's Helper's!

Emma and Cooper helping me unload dishes this morning! And Emma deciding where she wants to chew on the cord!!!!!!!! SHe knows she isn't supposed to, but has now found this on ein the cupboard and continuously goes to open it up.

Las tnight was the first with Elliott gone..... Emma slept ALL night!!!!! Well, when I woke up at at 1am I noticed that the monitor was off:( Poor thing.... However, she obvously didn't wake up or if she did she fell back asleep. Maybe that was all that needed to be done? She just needed to cry it out? Who knows, but it was nice:) Cooper only got up that once, and then not again until 6am!! So all in all it was a good night. He is not so hapy in the kennel so we are still working on that.

Today we will go get Emma a new carseat and that will be the first time Cooper has been left home alone........... Such is life.

Love to all...

Tug-O-War

Look at that face!!!! She just sits in front o fhte kennel and torments Cooper when we have himin there!!!! And look how cute they areplaying together - he likes her toys and she likes his. She was getting SO mad when he would get the rings away from her. She would wave her arms and make a funny face. It was hilarious.

Elliott leaves this morning for Portland and will be gone till Friday. I am not pleased:) But, I guess we will deal. Cooper cries fro about the first 10 minutes he is in his kennel still, so that will not be fun in the middle of the night when I have to nurse Emma and put him in there! Oh well, we'll survive!

Love to all..

Lil' Helper

The only way we could get Roscoe to have anything to do with Cooper the first coupl eof days was to put him on his LEASH and bring him into the same room! They are finally doing well though, although Roscoe is a little grumpy, they are finally playing together.

You can see how Emma is my little helper? She loves the vacuum, well, the cords to be more exact! We REALLY have to keep an eye on her. She is a monkey and a rock climber all in one. She seems to be able to get at and see/find just about everything! We love her curiosity and fearlessness though!

Love to all on a RAINY day...

Dog Toys and Faces

Notice who is chewing on the doy toy????? We can't keep her away from them! And the other picture is of her newest face. She blows air out of her nose when she does it, and started it to get the snot out -ha! Now she has continued, eventhough there is no snot, and will copy you if you do it to her first.

She seems to be enjoying Cooper (we changed his name!!!!!!!), but did get two little scratches from him yesterday when we were RIGHT there! So, we will continue to encourage them to play together but will be even more vigilant:)

Love to all...

New Family Member!!!

Meet Ed! Our newest member to the PAtterson family. He is a 9 week old Great Dane....... Who knows what we are thinking, but Elliott is supper excited and happy and so in love! So it will be an adventure, to say the least!

Notice Emma clapping? SO CUTE!

More later... Love to all...

Working Hard

Emma is BUSY! Always going somewhere or doing something. She is getting ery bravea dn ceawling all over the house on her own, yet willing to come back when I call her name (wonder how long that will last!). She is clapping all the time and so involved with it. Tomorrow morning we may go to a Mommy and Me music class! If we both can keep our eyes open, as she was wide awake at 6am today!!!!! Elliott gets home in jsut a little bit, so I am sure he will be very excited to play with her a bit. Poor boy though, she is slowly getting crabby! Love to all...

Hide-n-Seek

Emma learned how to play hide and seek tonight! She hid behind the door, and then would push it closed and I would push it open. She loved it. She also learned how to clap her hands together! I have a feeling she is going to learn a lot, being back with Aliyah and Jessica. She is like a little sponge right now.... Love to all

Climbing Queen!

Emma is like a litle Mountain Climber! I turned around and found her basically IN the dishwasher the other evening! It has become a favorite passtime of hers. We have to be careful though, as she is no small child:) The second picture is of dinner gone-a-rye! I don't know what happened, but one spill turned into a hundred and then she started rubbing her hands on her face,then in her hair!!!! It was a delight....

Elliott is out of town for the week, so we have been very lucky that Holly came over last night and stayed with Emma (thankfully she slept the whole time!), and tonight she is with her sitter Jessica. THANK GOODNESS! So, I miss the little one. We are going to just hang out and relax the rest of the week (as much as is allowed with the house to take care of while El is gone). I also have a few job aplications to work on, one for MN for cross fingers! We may have a new puppy joining us on Friday, so I am going to enjoy the peace now...... SERENITY NOW!

Love to all.... OH, did I mention my daughter now likes to blow the snot out of her nose so she can lick it? There's a happy thought for all of you prospective parents:)

Sad News

Yesterday was a sad one. We had put Elvis to sleep yesterday afternoon. He woke up and simply could not get his back legs to work. He was not able to go down the stairs in the morning, even with Elliott's help. We called the vet and took him in. They said he now had spinal cord damage because fo the pressure on his hips, and it was most likely too late for surgery to do any good. It was very hard, but we know it was the right choice. We will miss him dearly.

On a lighter note, here are some pictures of our little monkey. She has been pushing herself ALL over the house! On the second picture you can see she fell forward on her walker and got stuck! It was cute. That's all for now..... Love to all...

Walkin' and Pushin'

How cute? Emma was so proud of herself when she took a little walk around the house on her own. She just took off all of a sudden! She tried to do it again today and began to push the clothes basket around. I was adding clothes to it though so it got too heavy. It is like she is a little old lady with a walker.

She is also a little monkey! Today she was holding onto the kitchen table with her fingers and all of a sudden she lifted her legs off parallel to the floor!!!!!!!! She is a rock climber in training... We are in trouble:) Love to all...

Beggar

Here is Emma literally begging for food from her Uncle Chris (Becca's finace)!!! How funny! This was the first ime we'd seen her do this. The other is a very typical face from her while she she is bouncing up and down on her own:)

Unfortunately all of the christmas pictures with the rest of the families are on my mom's computer, so I will have to wait for a CD to get them uploaded here! Sorry!!!!!

YEsterday Emma learned to push a tub (that I was putting christmas decorations away in) around the entire house!!! I have video of it and pictures that Iw ill upload probably tomorrow. The little stinker is a walker queen, and SO proud of herself. She is still working on getting back on the SEattle schedule, wemt to bed by 6:30 and up at 6:45! And she woke up 4 TIMES in the night! When we were in Minnesota she was down to only one time..... UGH! Oh well.... Love to all

Home Again

We had a wonderful holiday! The pictures here are Em with Grandma L getting all bundled up for th eMN cold, and Em playing wih Grandpa L'l nose. Unfortunately I don't have the other pictures with ALL of the other Grandma's and Grandpa's downloaded yet. I will work on it!

We spent Christmas eve and day with Jason, Holly, her dad Marv and his fiance Gail, and El's mom Carol. It was lovely and SNOWED! We flew to MN WEdnesday morning and then spent the evening at my Dad's side of the family. Actually Em's Unlce Justin met her for the first time. We've got some great pictues of that. Em was SPOILEd there with gifts from everyone. Some especially fun toys taht she loves! We spent most of the rest of the week at Grandma and Grandpa L's.

It was all so wonderful as we and Emma were treated so well and taken care of and spoiled!!!! Thank you to everyone for such a perfect holiday. I am still on MN time and very tired ao I will write more about what Emma is up to later.... Love to all...