18 months!

Elizabeth is 18 months old today! Wow time flies. My baby is getting to be a big girl everyday. This hilarious picture was taken on Saturday. I love it so much. I call it her paparazzi shot (dark sunglasses and blurry).

Here's a list of her measurements, milestones and accomplishments!

Weight: 21 lbs 13 oz.

Height: 30 1/4 inches

Head Cf: 46 3/4 cm

Her words (I may be forgetting some, but these I know for sure): Mama, Dada, Dexter, Casey, Jesus, apple, baby, ball, bath, bear, bird, blanket, blocks, bubbles, bye-bye, car, cat, cow, cracker, dog, duck, egg, fan, giraffe, hi, light, milk, moon, more, mouth, mouse, rah (for lion), papa, shoes, snack, sock, star, thank-you, toes, uh oh, up, walrus, water, wow, yogurt

She can point to these body parts: hair, head, ears, nose, mouth, hands, fingers, bellybutton, toes, foot

She can sign "eat," "more," "milk," "please," and "thank-you"

She can walk really fast but she hasn't taken off running yet. Maybe soon.

She sleeps 11-12 hours at night and takes one 2-3 hour nap during the day. She sleeps with a lovey and blanket. I have two of each so she has them at both daycare and home.

She's been in the Toddler 1 room at daycare for a couple months now. She LOVES her room and is always in a happy mood. She enjoys the soft play area and playing outside (when it hasn't been so hot). Because all the children in her classroom take a nap on the floor at the same time, Elizabeth sleeps so much better now. Pretty consistent 2-hour naps. In the other rooms, she would hardly sleep in her crib for fear she was missing all the action. Needless to say she's been a lot cheerier in the evenings because she's not so sleep deprived.

From the post "Dancing for Joy. Finally a Post!" I wrote that she moved up to a convertible car seat in April. We still have her rear facing, and I plan to have her rear facing for as long as possible. But so far she's liking the cushioning and being able to look back and see us in the front seats.

She's a pretty good eater for the most part and enjoys a wide variety of foods. Some days it takes a little coaxing for her to eat her dinner (mixing her dinner with other food she loves, singing songs, making a game out of it, feeding her animals, etc.). Luckily she doesn't need too much coaxing. Hopefully as she becomes an older toddler she won't turn into a picky eater.

LIKES

Activities: Reading books and pulling all her books off the shelf; coloring; playing peek-a-boo; watching her learning DVDs; climbing on everything; pushing her baby doll in its stroller; getting into mama's purses and shoes; wearing mama's purses; trying to put on her own shoes; getting her hair blown out by mama's hairdryer, playing with chair seat buckles; pulling all the pillows off the sofa; pushing chairs; pushing our big blue exercise ball around the room; playing with her small purple bouncy ball; stacking blocks, playing with her puzzles, playing with her toy CD player; playing with her tea set; feeding her toys; looking out the window ... And getting into trouble.

Food: pasta, eggs, cheese, cottage cheese, yogurt, bananas, grapes, pears, peaches, dried apples/pears/bananas/strawberries, green beans, peas, carrots, mashed potatoes, chicken, nut butter and jelly sandwiches, pancakes, waffles, bagels, goldfish, ketchup

DISLIKES

The vacuum cleaner, the Dustbuster, the lawnmower (anything that makes loud noises, except mama's hairdryer); most fruit (I'm working on it. tips anyone? amazingly she eats more fruit at daycare); too spicy food (flavor enhanced, not hot) ... And not getting her way/being told "No."

Round 2 of travel month! Destination: Port Aransas!

The weekend after the graduation and Mother's Day, the Grohmann clan headed to the "coast" (as my mother-in-love calls it) to enjoy a nice, relaxing weekend at the "beach" (as I call it) with family and a belated birthday celebration for Casey's 23rd birthday.

Let's talk weather first. What's the worst thing to hear when you've planned to go somewhere to relax in the sunshine? RAIN! The weather forecast predicted rain all weekend. Luckily weatherman can't always predict the weather. And as Grandma Keillor says, "In Texas if you don't like the weather, wait a minute." Course we indeed got our fair share of sprinkles. On the drive down on Friday, we survived the monsoon rain in Sugarland but good thing that was the worst of it. On Saturday it rained for a good part of the morning (thank goodness for the Wii) but then it cleared up in time for swimming in the afternoon. After that, no more drops.

While in the past we've usually stayed at the Gulfstream Condos on Mustand Island, this time we were treating, so I decided to pick somewhere different. My ultimate choice taking price and amenities into account was the Sandpiper Condos. Twelve floors of gulfront condos offering spectacular views of the Gulf of Mexico, a heated swimming pool, a fitness room, two tennis courts, a shuffleboard, table tennis, boardwalk to the beach, DSL internet in every unit and more! (I sound like an ad for the place - where's my commission?) We stayed in unit #1103 so we were pretty high up. The view of the Gulf was spectacular, but as I'm afraid of heights, I didn't venture out onto the balcony nor did I dare walk close to the railing on the outdoor hallway leading to our unit.

Despite the early setback with the rain, we ultimately had a wonderful little vacation. Andrew and I got a good workout in at the the fitness room (no rinky dink machines - they had a PreCor elliptical). We enjoyed several dips in the pool and Andrew enjoyed playing Casey at table tennis (although he was badly beaten and Casey admitted he was only giving 10%). We all worked on our bowling games on the Wii, including mom (it's funny watching her kick up her leg after every bowl hoping that will steer the ball right). And we ate, snacked and ate some more. Elizabeth finally discovered she likes grapes and couldn't get enough. I kept telling her to give them a chance!

Here she's so excited from swimming in the pool with her floaty that she kept wanting to lay in it in the condo.

Course what's a weekend at the beach without actually going to the beach? So we had to make at least one trip out to the shore so Elizabeth could experience the sand and saltwater. She's changed so much since last year's trip to the beach. Even though her first instinct was to shove a fistful of sand into her mouth (like last year), she delighted in playing in the water and occasionally taking a spill because of the current.

Sadly the weekend went by too fast. Thankfully we decided to take off work on Monday and enjoy a 3-day weekend. It was a good feeling on Sunday knowing we had an extra day to relax. And because we left on Monday with no traffic and lines, we decided to ride the ferry across to Aransas Pass instead of going through Corpus. Elizabeth's first ferry ride! Though the ride lasted all but 3 minutes, it was neat getting to experience something different.

Round 1 of travel month! Destination: San Antonio!

Elizabeth attended her 2nd ever college graduation on May 8 in San Antonio. Chris Schraer (him and his family are long-time family friend of the Grohmanns) graduated from UTSA with a B.S. in Computer Science. Go Chris and good luck in Phoenix! The graduation ceremonies at UTSA are a well-oiled machine. Most definitely the shortest graduation ceremony EVER. 1:00 p.m. start time and we were back in our car exiting the parking lot at 2:46. No joke. Not that I'm complaining. With a toddler, the faster the better!
Elizabeth had the most fun at the after party doing cheese runs (grabbing cheese cubes of mommy's and daddy's plates, running off to play, repeat) and learning to shake hands with everyone around the room. Here she's playing with her new favorite toy - a roller coaster bead toy that was graciously set out by the hosts for her enjoyment.



The next day we celebrated Mother's Day with Mass followed by an appropriately themed lunch to Mama's Cafe, and cards, kisses and hugs. Elizabeth wore her "I love my Mommy dress" for the occasion. SO cute!

She also specially made me a beautiful card at school. On the front side she colored with crayon. On the inside her teacher helped her glue a hand giving the sign for "I love you" and she drew flowers as if the hand was holding them, and she wrote "I (heartshape) U," "Happy Mother's Day," and "Love, Elizabeth." On the backside her teached helped her glue a lovely poem entitled: "Happy Mother's Day" Means More.

"Happy Mother's Day" means more

Than have a happy day.

Within those words lie lots of things

We never get to say.

It means I love you first of all,

Then thanks for all you do.

It means you mean a lot to me,

And that I honor you.

But most of all, I guess it means

That I am thinking of

Your happiness on this, your day,

With pleasure and with love.

My heart just melted! Handmade cards from my sweet little one are the best! Even though her teacher helped with most of it, I'll always treasure it. Andrew also gave me a very sweet card and handwritten note that made me cry. He always knows what to write! Thank you for making this day very special! I love my family!

Dancing for joy. Finally a post!

Elizabeth is dancing for joy (yes, she's learned to "twirl") Yea, finally a post! Sorry for not keeping everyone updated in a while! Hmm, since our last post, a lot has transpired! Here's a recap on events in the Grohmann household.

In October Elizabeth celebrated her first Halloween by dressing up as the cutest pumpkin ever and going trick-or-treating (via stroller). The highlight of the evening was not all the candy she received (and she had a lot of candy) but seeing our neighbor's Great Pyrenees, Nelson. What can I say, Elizabeth loves dogs!

In November Elizabeth ate spaghetti for the first time and loved it! A girl after her daddy's heart (for those of you who don't know, Andrew's favorite meal of all time is spaghetti). She also took her first steps on November 21st and celebrated the big #1 birthday on the 25th with family and friends. The highlight of her birthday party was lifting her whole birthday cake with both hands and putting it up to her mouth! I'll have to post the video of that another day since we'll have to borrow it from the in-laws. Thanksgiving was spent in San Antonio so while in town, she also visited the Alamo and the Riverwalk for the first time!

In December she picked out her first Christmas tree, met Santa for the first time, switched to the big girl tub and watched her Uncle walk across the stage at her first graduation! Uncle Casey graduated from Texas A&M Corpus Christi on December 19th. Go Casey!





There seems to be no news from January. It was a cold month and we didn't get out much!

In February Elizabeth attended her first Super Bowl party. She was rooting for the Colts and luckily had to go to bed before she could watch them lose to the Saints. We were excited that Aunt Amy could come into town that weekend! For Valentine's Day weekend, we traveled to San Antonio. Andrew took me out to dinner at San Francisco Steakhouse for my first time there. Sadly we didn't get to see the lady swing; she had retired for the night. Boo! But it was nice having family around to babysit Elizabeth so we could have an evening out. The next weekend, Grandma and Grandpa Keillor drove up to Houston for a visit. My mom had a landscape design course at A&M the following week and I bribed my dad, the biggest model train enthusiast on the planet, with a train show that was in town that weekend. We celebrated Fat Tuesday by donning Elizabeth with some of my old Mardi Gras beads - Elizabeth got them for being cute.

March brought the Oscars, Elizabeth's first trip to the Houston Live Stockshow and Rodeo, and the big 30th Birthday for me. I found my new favorite place to shop - Arne's Warehouse and Party Store. Any party theme you want and they have it! At our Oscar party, Elizabeth was nervous at first at stepping on the red carpet through the gold curtain, but she soon started having fun! At the Rodeo, Elizabeth got to pet a real live cow and bunny and savor her first turkey leg (now a girl after mommy's heart!). And now she can officially say "This ain't my first rodeo!" For my birthday, both sets of parents/grandparents and Amy, Casey and Erwin were able to come into town to celebrate. Thank you so much to them and to all our dear wonderful friends who could come to the party. We had a blast eating sushi and rocking out to Rock Band!

We spent Easter weekend in San Antonio. Except for a very scary night on Saturday, the weekend was fun and Elizabeth enjoyed hunting for Easter eggs and her Easter basketS on Sunday. Elizabeth had been running a fever since Good Friday and we had been giving her Motrin and Tylenol as usual. Elizabeth was active and playful like normal and the fever had gone down on Saturday afternoon, but had gone back up to 102 in the evening right before dinner, so Andrew gave her another dose of Motrin. Even as she started eating her dinner she was acting fine ... right up until her lips started quivering and she sunk back in her booster seat, going unconscious. We know now that she had a febrile seizure brought on by the spike in her temperature that day. I hope we'll never experience that again - those few short minutes when she was unconscious were without a doubt, the scariest moments in my life. I think I lost 5 years of my life! But thanks to the paramedics and hospital staff, we're better prepared in case something like this happens again. Although we were in another city, I'm so thankful we had our family there for support. My "mother-in-love" especially. She has seen me through some scary, tough times! If you're reading this and have small children, I would do a little research yourself on febrile seizures. That way you can be more prepared in case something were to happen. Needless to say we were exhausted on Easter Sunday, but we celebrated the wonderful day. Yea, Jesus is risen! I guess Elizabeth's seizure couldn't have come at a better time to remind me of God's love for us.

Elizabeth's new car seats came in last week! She finally outgrew her infant car seat (in height, not weight) and both of us got tired of lugging her to daycare in it. Too bad we had to buy one for each car. That's one advantage of the infant seat I won't miss. So far, she's liking them and I love the cute color! The real test will come when we go on our next road trip. The extra padding in this seat should be more comfortable on her tushy and allow for an easier time for everyone!

I'm calling May, "Travel Month." We have 3 weekend trips planned, one being Elizabeth's first plane ride! Elizabeth also turns 18 months old May 25. Check back for more details!

Just looking through all these pictures, it's as if my baby has become a big girl overnight! She must have had a big growth spurt between March and April. She's definitely gotten more hair since the New Year.

If you've read this far, sorry for being out of touch so long and having to write a book to catch everyone up. Maybe if Andrew posted too (hint, hint) we would have an easier time staying updated! Thanks for reading!