Sterling Grace at 16 months

Our sweet baby is quickly turning into a big kid!  She is changing so much these days and her little personality is really coming out.  Here is what Sterling is doing at 16 months:

*Sterling is attached to her baby.  As soon as it gets in her hand her two fingers automatically go in her mouth and the baby up against her face.  Baby has really gotten pretty ragged (she got it in her stocking this past year for Christmas) so I set out to find a new one as backup just in case.  Easier said than done and I ended up ordering the only two I could find off Amazon for $40!!!!

*She copies everything Brayden does and wants to do everything he is doing

*She is still a really good eater, eats almost anything and a lot of it!

*Likes taking things out and putting things back in containers

*Really likes listening to books!  Hurray!  She will grab books, bring them to us, sit in our lap, and sit through a story or two.  She likes to kiss the different animals in the books we read too, so funny!  She does, however still prefer short books.

*Sterling is pointing to several body parts.  For the longest time she would point to her mouth for every body part we would ask her.  Now she will point to her mouth, nose, eyes, hair, tummy, and belly button correctly most of the time

*Speaking of belly buttons, Sterling is obsessed with hers and anyone else's she can find.  She is always trying to lift up her shirt or dress trying to find it.  She pokes at it and makes this this cute little high pitched noise.  

*She is finally starting to say some more words.  Her vocabulary has taken quite a while to pickup but she is saying a little more now.  She will say:  mama, dada, baba (baby) ni-ni (nigh, night which she does along with laying down and pretending to go to sleep) ball, her version of yes (which she nods her little head yes while she says it) her version of thank you, but still mainly grunts and fusses at us to tell us what she wants.  
*Sterling loves all stuffed animals and babies, she loves to snuggle them, pretend feed them, give them a paci etc.  It is just crazy to me how this is an innate thing with Sterling that Brayden obviously never did!

*Girlfriend is obsessed with shoes!  If she is not wearing shoes (or even if she is) she will bring us shoes, hand them to us, and "uh, uh, uh" until we put them on her.  She will hold onto my shoulder and lift her little leg up for me to put the shoe on.  We may have a problem with this one people!!!
*She has a newfound interest for eating with a fork.  She has obviously been feeding herself for a long while now but really has no interest in being fed anymore.  I have a couple more baby yogurts in the fridge to feed her if she will let me.  She loves eating with a fork, is getting pretty good at poking the food herself and is really good at getting the fork with food into her mouth.  A lot of the time she will "uh, uh, uh", hand her fork to me for me to poke her food and hand back to her to put in her mouth.  It is funny because we have to make Brayden (who is perfectly capable and proficient with utensils) use his fork and lately we have been pointing out what a great job his baby sister is doing!

*Sterling gets called a couple of nicknames around here:  Tootie, Tootie Girl, Toodles, Kitty, and Brayden will call her "Tootie Giwl"
*Sweet girl is really into pretending she is a puppy dog...She will pant, put dog toys in her mouth and run around, and of course cuddle up for "ni-ni" in Mia's dog bed.  She of course learned this all from her brother who also likes to play dog, especially fetch....:)

Pretty soon this baby girl won't be the baby around here anymore!  Just LOVE our girl and watching her personality grow and change as she gets older :)

June 2014

Seriously, how is June already over?!  This summer seems to be flying by and we will be back to school before we know it!  

Here are a few pictures of what we were up to this June:

Grandpa came by for a couple visits, Brayden especially likes it when Grandpa reads to him and plays basketball with him

Grandma came from Dallas for a couple days and both kids had such fun playing with her, especially hide and go seek!!!  We spent a fun day at the zoo one morning:

Both kids are such animal lovers

We spent a fun weekend with the whole extended Barron Family for "Christmas in June" down at the Guadalupe River.  Both kids had a great time and enjoyed all of the extra attention.  We spent a lot of time at the pool which was perfect for Sterling and Brayden had lots of fun playing washers and bean bag toss with family.  I always start out with the best of intentions of getting lots of great pictures of the weekend and pretty much got a couple shots of the first day...

We had the greatest patio with a nice breeze and pretty views where we spent quite a bit of time

Brian and Brayden have a "best friends" song that they made up and sing so when I saw these shirts I knew they were meant for my boys!  We got these for Brian for a fathers day gift and I think they are just too cute!

Snacks on the patio

Sterling now shares Brayden's love for playing with balls and is working on throwing and kicking

Brayden just thinks the world of cousin Kyle and he had so much fun getting to  play with him some

Of course both kids got plenty of time with their GaGa and PaPa

Bedtime stories :)

Lately when we go out of town we have been letting the kids share a room.   Usually the first night is always a little interesting and then they get settled in and do fine the rest of the time.   Sterling of course sleeps in her pack-n-play and Brayden sleeps in the bed.  The first night was pretty rough getting them down way past bedtime and they were both wound up!  We listened to them scream and play with each other for close to an hour before they fell asleep!  Then Sterling dropped her beloved baby from her crib and screamed until we came and got it for her, it was a miracle that Brayden slept through that!!!  

Finally, my favorite pictures from the month!  It has been so amazing watching our two sweet children become friends playing and interacting together more and more.  Sterling just thinks the world of Brayden and Brayden enjoys Sterlings company a little more everyday.  

*Lately Brayden will request that Sterling sit "right next" to him when they are eating

*Brayden loves "waking Sterling up" in the morning and always wants to go first into her room.  He barges in and says "Hi Tooootie!" she just sits there in her crib beaming at him

*Sterling loves giving Brayden kisses and some days Brayden will reciprocate 

*Brayden gets excited when we tell him that Sterling is going to be sleeping in his room at the coast etc.  and gets upset when we don't let her sleep with him during naps

*Brayden still loves playing "tackle" with Sterling in the trampoline and anywhere else we will let him
*Brayden loves getting in Sterling's crib and playing with her every morning

Sweet kisses in action

When Sterling kisses Brayden she always grabs him by the hair and pulls him in!

This turned into a full on bath on the back porch!

We have caught Brayden on more than one occasion lately "reading" to Sterling....melt.my.heart!

So looking forward to watching their relationship continue to grow as they get older.