What are the kiddos up to lately?

Caleb is talking up a storm. Every single day he says at least five things we have never heard him say before. My quiet stone-faced child is turning into a excitable and cheerful little intelectual. This morning he opened his door and stood at the gate and said, "Goo Mornin, goo mornin, goo morning, hello." He said them all in different tones of voice, so it sounded a bit like a song. I was in Carly's room next door feeding her and listening and just smiled to myself. I love hearing him when he doesn't know I am listening. This afternoon I watched from the doorway as he held a one-sided conversation with his sister. She was playing in the exersaucer and her face was riveted to his. He was telling her something, and calling her "Baby." That's why I know he was talking to her, and not just talking. I love this kid! He is learning his letters and numbers, not in any order, but he is soaking it in like a sponge. His favorite book this week is the cheerios play book where he counts the missing cheerios. His counding sequence goes like this, "one, two, four, five, nine, TEN!" No matter how hard I try, three is not going to happen. I think he's doing pretty good though. His alphabet puzzle is hilarious too. His favorite letters are the ones that end in -eee, like B, C, D, E, P, and T, and his favorite right now is K. I am simply amazed at how he has learned these, because we have not intentionally taught them to him. We just say the letter or sound when he does the puzzle. The highlight of my week was when he turned around and told me, "I wanna watch my fish show." I was floored. Six words??? In a row??? How? When? Okay!! Let's watch the fish show! (It's Finding Nemo, BTW.)

Carly is getting big, but staying little at the same time. She seems so tiny, but she is sitting up with help, and rolling around in the floor. Sometimes we can let go of her for about 10-15 seconds while she sits by herself. She is grabbing at things with her hands. Toys, shirts, hair, mom's cereal bowl, whatever is within her reach. It amazes me. The look she gets on her face when she is concentrating on putting that something in her mouth is priceless. She has recently decided that she hates naps, so today she cried herself to sleep for a good 20 minutes, then slept two hours and woke up happy. Silly baby. She laughs and smiles and sucks her fingers. She tries to get out of her carseat by straining as hard as she can to lift her head and body out, only to get mad that she is strapped in. Yesterday was a major milestone: she had baby food for the first time. Rice cereal, actually. I'm not sure if you can call that food, but it was something other than mommy milk. She ate it up yesterday, but today wasn't to excited about it. I got maybe 5 little spoonfuls in her mouth today. I guess that's good considering the weirdness of it to her. She smacked, gagged a couple of times, made spit bubbles with it, drooled it out onto her bib, and swallowed a little bit. I took pictures, which I will try to post tomorrow or so.

Growing up! I hate it. But I love it too. Oh the days when I can drop them both off at the grandparents all day and not have to worry about the little one. I know it is coming soon, and I'll miss these days, so I am cherishing them as much as I can.