Brandrea

One day a few months ago, I crept into Cora’s room to find her lying on her back, cheery and chatty after her nap. I said something to her and she swung her head from side to side. It was so cute! I called Brad in to witness the cuteness that was Cora ignorantly communicating to us. We asked her silly questions like “Do you want to get up?”, “Do you want to ever get married?”, “Do you want mommy and daddy to pay for college?” and cracked up every time she shook her head back at us.

I know it won’t always be this way, but her “saying” no is pretty cute right now. A couple of recent anecdotes:

- I was watching/listening to a sermon online when she woke up from her nap one afternoon. As I was finishing it up, she was playing along side me. We got to a part where the pastor was making a point by saying a statement, and them emphatically shouting “No!” Then he would make another statement, and another “No!” When he was doing this for the third time, I looked at Cora and realized that she was firmly shaking her head along with each “no!” It cracked me up!

- While we have tried to childproof most of the house (or have just surrendered parts of it over to Cora), there are still a handful of places that we have to watch out for and keep her from. One of those is the dogs food and water bowl. While I know it likely would not be a big danger if she got into the bowls, still…gross. In spite of (or perhaps because of?) our frequent interventions to keep her from the bowls, she doggedly (ha!) goes after them on a daily basis. One day, I found myself repeatedly chasing her down, picking her up as she got in reach of the bowls, and firmly telling her “no” before setting her back down by her toys. After five or six times of this, I looked down to see her headed back to the bowls again – only this time she was shaking her head to tell herself “No” on the way over! Unfortunately, I still had to intervene, but maybe one day her she will be able to self-correct, instead of just self-reprimand!

The idea of saying “No” as a parent feels like a big deal. I don’t think that knowing when and when not to say “no” is going to come naturally. We want Cora to grow up feeling loved in every way. We want her to be loved in our allowances and in what we forbid. I know there are many more Nos to come, and that they may include meltdowns, tears, and embarrassing public appearances. And Cora might have some issues with it to! We will cross all those bridges when we get to them, however and trust that the Holy Spirit will teach us how to teach!

And, because pictures make a post way more interesting…

This girl is so often on the move, that following photo probably shows the side of her I see the most often!

Playing outside at GlaMo’s house!

Cora is an incredibly friendly girl. It is so sweet and fun to take her places because I know it will always bring her excitement and joy – plus it will make me pretty happy to see her that way!

(zoo trip, 4/3/11)
The other day we were at Aldis (a grocery store) and were making our way down the aisle. I looked down at her sitting in the cart and realized she was leaning completely over to one side, just beaming at something. I followed her line of sight and realized she was grinning (and waving and “talking”) to an older couple two aisles over. They were enjoying it and waved back, which of course thrilled her even more. If she just gets one person to respond to or interact with her, all of the sudden she thinks she is all that! She will start looking around at everyone in sight, waving at them or smiling at them to try and get their attention. Sometimes she will blow raspberries at people to try and get them to laugh at her. Interacting with others is the highlight of her life!

(zoo trip, 4/3/11)
I love that she is such a cheerful and friendly baby. She certainly seems like an extrovert, and it makes me curious to see if that is something that sticks!

9 month pictures

On Friday, I was feeling a little stir-crazy and overwhelmed and it just so happened to be a beautiful day outside. After taking Cora to play in the clover patches in the backyard (while deftly circumventing the dog droppings…), I decided we should take as much advantage of the day as possible. I needed one more ingredient for dinner and rather than pack up in the car for it, I thought it would be fun to walk to the Wal-Mart a little over a half a mile away. It involved crossing one “major” street, but it is a part of the road where the speed limit is 25 mph and really isn’t that crowded most of the day. I figured it would be a great little trip to take advantage of the weather. After I changed a diaper, let the dog out, got Cora a bottle of juice, grabbed a snack, my cell phone, keys and a hat to protect her fair-skinned head, we started to set out. (Oh, and I went back and grabbed my iPod, which I never actually used. I decided to not go back in and change my shirt once I realized that i would be getting a farmer’s tan with my tshirt – what’s one more random tan line?)

As we got closer to the “major” road, I got a little nervous about crossing. There was no crosswalk. (Does that make me a jaywalker?) I decided to continue on the side of the road (no sidewalks, boo) until I felt like there was a decent break in traffic to make my crossing the safest possible. As I was walking between cross streets I saw the perfect space open up. I rushed to the road ahead and then (not so) calmly sprinted across the road. I felt pretty good about it until I looked down and realized that Cora was no longer holding her sippy cup. I started having flashbacks to our family Valentine’s evening (a story for another time) and desperately scanned over the street I had just crossed. Fortunately it was not in the middle of the big road, but it was at the front of the cross street, just waiting for some unsuspecting mini van to crush it to bits. I said a couple PG words and waited for another pause in traffic. As I spotted the perfect moment to cross, Cora’s hat blew off and flopped around behind us a few feet away. I panicked, but managed to snatch it up before it went too far, and then hurried across and grabbed the sippy cup. Darn sippy cup.

At this point, I was considering going back home. But what would all this pain and misery be for if I did not press onward? It would be for naught. So we crossed one more time to get where we needed to be. The rest of the trip was through some mostly peaceful neighborhood roads, save a large (fenced-in) German shepherd and a noisy Latino group tearing up part of the road. During this part of the trip I noticed that Cora’s feet were exposed and getting a lot of sun. I realized on the trip back the sun would shine even more directly on them. After insulting myself for not thinking of putting socks on her little feet, I tried to come up with a solution. I had no extra material of any kind to use to cover and protect her! I finally decided I would solve the problem once we finished our shopping trip. After making our purchase, I took the food out of the plastic bag and put it in the basket under the stroller. Then Cora’s feet went inside the Wal-Mart sack, with the top part of the bag tucked under her little bottom so it would not blow away! I’m sure we looked a little funny, but it made my mommy-heart worry a little less.

Oh – and on the way home, we crossed the “major” road without a hitch.