We celebrated Sophie’s birthday party on Sunday and fun was had by all. Here are a few pictures.

The incredible melting cupcake.

She liked the frosting, not the cupcake itself.

Our lovely girl….

She might be two, but she still eats yogurt like a one year old….

And apparently finds me taking a picture of it hilarious.

At two Sophie is spot on for everything. She’s even on target for speech and has over 60 words. I signed her up for the summer reading program at the local library today and we checked out two picture books.

Things she loves right now (off the top of my head):

apple juice
cheese
telephones
water, water, water!
climbing things
slides
animals of all kinds
balloons
Cinderella and Pocohantas
playing dress up
playing with her dolls
being outside
bananas
her nana
books/being read to
her polar bear
shoes
stacking and organizing things
brushing her teeth

Things she doesn’t like very much:

Sweet stuff. (Can you believe it? No cupcakes for this girl… so sad! I keep trying even though her dentist would want to shoot me.)
Swings
I know there’s other strong dislikes, but I can’t remember any right now.

Overall, she is a very good natured, good hearted child who is a bit shy around others, especially other children. She’s starting to tantrum some and is becoming more opinionated, which is normal for this age. Luckily I have the patience of a mountain. When she tantrums I just let her go for as long as she’s got the energy for it and deny her whatever it is she’s throwing the fit over. I won’t ever do time out with her, but I’ll let her fit until she’s tired of it. LOL.

We plan to celebrate her birthday this Sunday. Saturday we’re attending the birthday of a friend’s little girl. Today I bought her a balloon and a new pair of shoes (she’s in heaven). Now I’m taking her to the pool.

, thank you so much for the card, sweetie. Sophie kept looking at the kitty kats and going awwww.

We’re off to splash in the water now and hope there aren’t any pop up storms.

An Update…

I have blogged at length about Sophie’s sleep issues–waking up in the middle of the night and not going back to sleep for two hours at a minimum (more often it was a good three hours). This usually occurred during the nights before I went to my day job or the over the weekend preceding those days.

Well, I have been free of my day job for about a month and a half now and the sleep issues are GONE. *Knocks on wood like crazy* They more or less ended in Pittsburgh at the hotel in a fireworks display of non-sleeping. It was pretty bad. Once we got home and we settled into our new pattern, which did NOT include waking up on Monday morning to Nana and not to Mama, and which did NOT include being dropped off at Grandpa’s very early on Tuesday mornings, the waking up STOPPED.

Not only does she not wake up in the middle of the night anymore, I can put her in her bed for naps and just walk out of the room. I tuck her in, I kiss her little cheeks, I tell her I love her, I give her the Woobies, and I walk out. She gives not a peep and within five minutes she’s sound asleep. I haven’t tried this at bedtime yet, just because I like to rock her to sleep too much to let it go quite yet. Though soon she’s going to be too heavy for me to lift into her bed, so we’ll have to end it.

I honestly am not sure if the improvement of the sleep situation owes to simple development (she’s almost two, after all), or if it’s indeed because I’m not working anymore. However the fact it coincides with my quitting so perfectly makes me think it’s the latter. Perhaps it’s a combination of the two. Whatever it is, I’m not complaining!

Speech issues…

She is finally starting to put two and more words together. Yay! Sometimes they’re not very understandable, but she’s trying. She’s also finally starting to say her name. It comes out SO SO. We’re still thinking about doing speech therapy, even though some of her delay undoubtedly comes from the two languages at once thing.

Oh, and she’s saying, MAIS, NON! Heh. That’s French, obviously picked up from James. Literally it means, but, no and is usually used to mean but, of course not! Sophie uses it when I tell her no for something. She’ll respond, mais, non. Or, alternately, maisnonmaisnonmaisnon!

She’s got quite a few French words now and mixes them with English (as she will and as is normal). She stills calls me Maman instead of Mama (there’s a slight difference in pronounciation which Sophie nails pretty well). She says Attends! a lot too (wait).

For Father’s Day we went to the Renaissance Festival. Here are some pictures….

Last at this time of year Sophie had just learned to crawl. She rode in her stroller for Ren Fest. This year she walked pretty much the whole way and we used the stroller to cart our stuff.

Sophie at the joust last year.

And…Sophie at the joust this year….

Wow. What a difference!

Oh…and she wore her wings (which we couldn’t get off her until bedtime)

…of Sophie today. What a great smile!

We’ve been watching a lot of Thomas the Tank Engine. *Makes bibbility face* They really need to find an alternative fuel source on the Island of Sodor.

A few pictures from yesterday….

Okay, maybe only interesting to me.

She calls/cries/says “mama” all the time, but she pronounces it the French way. Maman — er…maMahn. When she’s really agitated it’s MaMaaahn! MaMaaahn! in an accent fit for any angsting/overacting French actress.

Understands SO much in both French and English it’s crazy/scary. This morning I uttered the word “ergo” because I’m eBaying it. I probably haven’t said the word ERGO out loud for months and months. Sophie heard the word, got excited, and dragged me to her room where she pulled it from the hook and had a tantrum until I wore her around the house for a few minutes. I was astounded.  She knew what the word ERGO meant. *shocked*

Calls all cartoons toot toot!

Like lots of little kids, ADORES Elmo…and doggies. Right now I’m deciding between the two things as a theme for her second birthday party (maybe this year she won’t be afraid of the cupcakes!)

Loves coffee. This morning she pulled a spoon from the drawer (she can open the drawers now, she’s that tall) and brought to me, freaked out until I gave her a taste.

Is 26 pounds and 100 cm tall. She’s in the 90th percentile for height, our little girl. If I’m reading the chart right, she’s in the 10th percentile for weight. Huh. Is that possible? She’s got a good appetite and doesn’t appear overly thin. Iiiiintereeesting…. (Isn’t it cool that you get my thoughts processes as they happen?) Chongqing girls are tall/thin as a general rule, however.

Has outgrown most her shoes. DUDE! I’m taking all her old clothes into a consignment place today, selling them, then turning around and buying her more. I’m eBaying all her Hannas.

It’s been a while since I posted, owing to deadlines, writer conventions and illness. Oh, and houseguests. Sophie’s paternal grandmother was here for a visit.

What’s new? Well, for starters I’m now a stay-at-home mom. Too weird that I don’t have to get up and shlep myself into Cubicle Land tomorrow. I’m not sure how I’ll adjust to it yet. Time will tell.

In other news, I think it’s time we put Sophie into a Playgroup. Just a couple days a week and just for a couple hours. I’ve started to look into programs and have some good recommendations. I think it will be good for her socially and help with her verbal skills.

And here are lots of pictures! These are all from the past month.

Flower Series….

The Family at Lunch….

Mama and Sophie….

Grandma and Sophie… (drawing with Bumba markers with Bumba on in the background)

Sophie plans to mow the yard….

I can’t believe my little baby is going to be two soon. *sniffle*

I haven’t been keeping this blog up, but I’m going to try and do better. To make amends, here are a BUNCH of pictures from over the holidays. We spent Christmas in Belgium, where Sophie met her overseas family.

Gosh, I hope y’all don’t have dial-up.

Sophie got along well with her cousins, (the two other girls you see pictured here. There’s another little blond, too, she’s the child of one of James’s friends). Sophie seemed to like the four and a half year old better than the 15 month old because the older one DID STUFF, like run around and play hide-and-seek.

How did Sophie sleep? Uhm. badly. Like we all did. We never really got on Belgian time. We tended to stay up really late (for Belgium) and sleep in late in the morning.

In general, Sophie is doing very well. She’s definitely hit toddlerhood and is pushing the boundaries of her world. That’s a good thing! She’s talking a lot these days and for the first time put two words together last night (no mo). I think that means No MORE. She was shaking her head and pushing her dinner plate at me when she said them.

Nope, I didn’t forget the 26 pic. It just took me a few days longer to post it.

My baby on her first sweet sixteen:

It is getting really hard to get a good 26 shot of her now. She’s moving all the time. So from now the 26 shots will be more of the “action” variety, I think. I got lucky on this one.

The trip to Belgium should be interesting. The trip from China with her I anticipated would be bad, but it wasn’t at all. Sophie cried once for like three minutes. The rest of the 24 hour trip she was fine. (Amazing, if you think about it). But she’s older now and won’t stand to be confined to one area, so I expect we’ll be making friends with lots of the other passengers on the plane. We’re going to ask for the bulkhead seats. I hope we get them.

Here’s why I’m the luckiest mama in the whole world. Every morning I get to greet this smiling face (with lion and blanket, her “woobies” and hella lot of teefers!)

She’s been released from PT (No doubt, geeze!) and soon will be released from OT, I think. Her sensory disorder is GONE. She has no more symptoms at all. She never does the bearing down and shaking thing. She doesn’t hit her head when she’s upset anymore (she would do this with her palm, not against the wall or anything) and will touch/play with anything. Eating is no longer an issue like it was before. Now any texture is okay with her.

The sensory thing was why i wanted her in the program to begin with. Now that it’s cleared up, it’s probably time to move her on. The OT is hanging on a bit I think because she likes Sophie (Hey, who wouldn’t? *g*) but she’s talking about releasing her within the next couple of months.

Sophie’s cut two incisors completely and is working on more. Solids are not a problem for her at all and she LOVES Goldfish and graham crackers. If I say, “Sophie, do you want a cookie?” she’ll toddle over to the cabinet where I keep the graham crackers and open it up.

Still not talking much (she’s babbling a lot), but I know that will come in time. She loves to sing. If I sing to her, she’ll sing back in baby talk. She seems to have a preference for music in general.