By far the highlight of last week was Samantha’s accomplishment! As I said earlier, Samantha has never been a great sleeper. From day one we had to hold or rock her to sleep. When she got a bit older and moved into her toddler bed we started to do out nightly routine and then stay in her room until she fell asleep. Some nights it would absolutely drive me crazy because I knew I had a ton of stuff to do yet I was still just sitting in her room. Later I started to read a book while waiting for her to go to sleep and this helped me take my mind off of it.

A couple of weeks ago we decided we were done and she needed to learn how to do it herself. We worked on it a few nights and then we had some odd things come up where we were up very late, etc. and we just put her to bed. Last week we really started to work on her. I made a chart for her and explained that every morning if she went to bed by herself the night before she got to put a sticker on and at the end of the week, I’d buy her a doll.

She did really well except one night where she ended up crying herself to sleep and getting up a couple of times. We gave her the sticker anyways and by Friday she got to go and get her doll. We even stopped by Starbucks on the way!! She was thrilled that she got to pick her out and then she took her to bed with her at naptime. I told her now she just had to keep it up and she said she didn’t want to.

She has continued to do it, even tonight laying there for a half-hour before actually falling asleep. We are so proud of her accomplishment!
I started to notice that Samantha could pronounce certain letters but had learned words before she could. For instance she would drop the letter “P” in picture and the letter “b” in book. She can say the letter B and P so we’ve been working on getting her to stay the words correctly because now it’s just habit.

Blake has continued to do well. He’s really started to reach or things and you’d better be careful if you bring him to the table because he’ll grab your plate or placemat. He grabs for toys so well.

We bought him a new toy this week that he can “work” with his feet (which are always going) and so far he really enjoys it.

We’ve been working on solids with him and he’s doing better although he doesn’t scarf them down. I figure the more we try it the better he’ll be.

We started to give Blake a bath with Samantha. So far, I’ve been in there with them. He seems to really love the water. The first time he was in he ended up splashing in the water and got Samantha to start laughing and then he started laughing. It was so cute.

It seems Blake is beginning to be a bit more determined to roll-he did it three times in one day and we often catch him arching his back on his side-he’ll get it pretty soon!

Last week Travis and I decided we should have a picnic. We invited a few of our friends to picnic with us on our deck. We were thrilled that everyone could join us and enjoy the great weather.

We put water in the pool, took off the cover of the sandbox and let them play on the swings. I think it’s safe to say that everyone had a great time and we need to do it again. Samantha had a great time running around with her friends but was so tired by the time everyone left.

Monday we went to the Chattanooga Zoo and I had great intentions of taking lots of pictures but I left it in the car. We enjoyed our time there and even ran into some friends. This evening we took a walk on the Greenway.

Samantha with her chart and new doll...

Our picnic...

Random shots...