What Everybody's Up To

It's been a while since I've shared milestones and such.  Apologies for this post to those of you only here for the pictures, but I'm going to want to remember these things 20 years from now.  Here's what June's been up to:

• Utter fascination with her own belly button.  We might as well throw out all onesies, because the lack of access to view and touch her belly button drives her bonkers.  She sleeps in fleece footy pajamas partially unzipped in order to let her get to that fabulous belly button.
• Screeching and squealing.  These aren't unhappy noises, but they're not really pleasant for the rest of us to be around.  She sounds a LOT like the animated eagle in the intro to the Colbert Report. 
• Hugging, cuddling, snuggling, lounging.  It is all too good to be true. 
• New words.  Apple, cracker, sticker, lots of others that I can't recall right now.  You wouldn't recognize most of her utterances, but to my ears and Joe's, there has been a vocab explosion.  Her first phrase is "Here you go," and yesterday at breakfast she came out with "big spoon."  She's also been attempting to say her own name, which comes out, "Juuuuuuuuu." 
• Giggling and smiling a lot.  We must've come through the extended slow teething phase.  Also, Georgia and June are really starting to interact more and make each other laugh.  It's a great joy to watch, especially since we also have to mediate several tear-inducing skirmishes each day, too.     

This was originally meant to be a June-only post, but recent advancements in Georgia's development are too big to ignore, such as:

•  She peels her own carrots. Standing on a chair at the kitchen sink.  And she hasn't even lost any fingers yet. 
• She has been trained to read the hour on a digital clock and not get up until 7.  I know, I can't believe it's working either, but it is.  
• She is sleeping in the big girl bed.  Yeah, that's great and all and maybe even deserved it's own post, except that we wouldn't care a lick about it but for the fact that she no longer screams through the monitor for us to come get her in the morning.  Up until two weeks ago, every one of our days began by being jolted out of slumber with yells of, "DADDY! I WANT TO GET UP!" coming through the monitor - over and over, loudly, while one of us sprang from bed and sprinted to the freezing cold downstairs to make her stop before she managed to wake June.  Now she gets up on her own, removes her own diaper/pull-up, comes upstairs, grabs a banana for herself from the kitchen, and casually walks into our room to eat it while snuggling in bed with us.  What the???  This has been a truly awesome improvement.  

As for Joe and me, despite highlights like our trip to Galena, February was a tough month so we're glad to put it behind us.  Bring on March!