Zoo day!

After having an extremely long, hard week, we took advantage of the beautiful weather (76 degrees and no humidity) on Saturday and spent the afternoon at the zoo in Nashville. We had a great time and Emma did wonderful. She really enjoyed looking at the animals and kept telling them bye-bye. Emma had a fascination with 2 crazy looking birds, the bongo and of course her favorites, the giraffes. She even had a staring contest with one of the Meerkats. She just looked at them and tried crawling out of our arms to go to the animals. She is really starting to get into everything and is constantly jabbering. She crawled into Lilly’s cage again, she loves to go in her bathroom and sit on the scale and now unroll the toilet paper, she gets into the drawers where her spoons and bowls are and takes everything out. She put two words together and said byebye mama. She refuses to say dada and instead sticks her tongue out and blows. She is now eating macaroni and cheese and yogurt melts and so far so good with the milk type products. She is developing quite a little personality. We have an appt Sunday to go and have 9 month pictures done. We will post pictures when we get them.

In Memory of Uncle Jerry

This is in memory of my Uncle Jerry. This was my dad's oldest brother. We learned that he passed away during the night. He had been sick since February but the family just learned of this a couple of weeks ago when we almost lost him then. His condition had improved and he was supposed to be leaving Vaderbilt this week and going to rehab but during the night he took a turn for the worse and his heart stopped. Please keep the family in everyone's prayers. My dad and his brothers have been through so much in their lives. Their mother was killed when they were a very young age and had struggles with the father after that and he has passed as well. As a daughter it is very hard to see your father cry and not be that strong figure because of something so heartbreaking but my uncle wanted no tears. He would not let anyone cry or miss out on their life these last couple of weeks. My aunt and cousins would have to leave the room to break down and he made my cousin finish his finals for his master's program even though we didn't know if he would make it or not. That was just the type of man he was. He will be deeply missed.

9 month checkup

Emma went yesterday for her 9 month checkup. She is doing wonderful. Her height was 28 3/4inches (85th percentile) and weighed a whopping 20pds 13oz (80th percentile). Dr. Ray is very pleased at what she achieved and developmentally is right where she needs to be. Emma showed her that she could crawl and stand up and even showed her how to put the tounge depressor in her mouth which was so cute. We are going to start trying some milk based products such as the yogurt melts to see if Emma can tolerate that so we will know what to do at her 1 year appt. We survived the doctor without getting a shot because they were out of it. Yay! We learned that Emma doesn't like bandaids. They had to prick her toe to check her iron level and she through a fit and cried because there was a bandaid on her toe. Unfortunately she has been sick and that is what the picture from above is from. She is so pitiful and we are all so tired because she won't sleep but about 10 minutes after you put her down. However, she is napping right now since we tried Motrin for the first time and that seems to be helping. We hope everyone has a great weekend.

9 months today!

Yes, she is walking under the high chair and got mad b/c Lilly's cage was in the way! She is non stop
9 months today at the pool enjoying a cracker after swimming.
Couldn't resist.
Drinking juice for the first time
She was looking at herself in the mirror.
Emma turned 9 months old today. It is unreal to us at how fast the time has flown by. She is changing and growing more every day. We love that she is jabbering all the time and trying to walk but we miss our tiny little baby that we just brought home from the hospital. I did have a cuddle day with Emma on Thursday. She was the sweetest baby. All she wanted to do was sit in Mommy's lap and snuggle which was so nice and something I will treasure. She started trying apple juice this week for the first time and she will only receive it in a sippy so here we go at trying to ween her to that. She is crawling all over the house and chasing Lilly. Emma is also really starting to wave bye-bye and patty cake if you tell her to. Emma also cut another tooth this week which brings the total to 5. Thursday Emma did get in the floor and turn Bryan's game controllers on and the stereo off. I told him she was definitely his. We were fortunate today to have Bryan at home but in exchange he has to work all day and night at the fair tomorrow. :( We spent the afternoon at the pool and it was so nice. The heat and humidity are up here but the water was so nice. Tomorrow Emma and I will be going to Lawrenceburg to visit with family and friends. She will go for her 9 month checkup Wednesday so stay tune to find out how big she is now.

Beach time/many milestones

Orange Beach, AL
Emma floating in the pool
Mom, Em and I
Mom and Dad
Mawmaw and Emma
Bryan and Katie riding the waves

family picture
Cheese
The girls were in matching outfits and were so cute
Mom keeping the girls in the shade for a little while



Katie's pics that I took. I think they turned out wonderful
Cheesing
She loved wearing Katie's head band

Daddy and Emma
A nice gentleman offered to take our pic in front of the ocean


Our little family minus fur ball
Dad and Katie
Dad working on his tan
Katie aka fish
Me and my Katie Bug
I love this. Emma sleeping on me at the pool
The first day there
Emma's first waves
Sticking her feet in the water and sand for the first time

As you can tell, we just returned from the beach with my family this weekend. We had a wonderful time. Emma did remarkably well considering it was an 8 hour drive and had an upset tummy going and coming. We had some overcast days and it stormed the evening we were at Lamberts waiting for our table. It hailed and the power went off so that was an experience. One night Bryan and I got to drive to the other side of Gulf Shores and look at some the condos that have been rebuilt since the hurricane a few years ago and we also crossed over the Florida line so I could show him the famous Florabama. Emma enjoyed sticking her toes in the sand and playing in the ocean as well as swimming around in the pool. One afternoon we went to the big outlet mall because it was just miserably humid and was able to get Em a few outfits for this fall and winter as well as Bryan finding a weedeater at the Black and Decker store for $11. What a deal and works well. It was so nice getting away and I tried my best to talk Bryan into moving down there but had no success. When we returned Friday night we found out that one of our favorite restaurants here in Columbia had closed down on Wednesday without notice so that was a bummer. On Saturday, we attended a baby shower for one of the media teachers that Bryan works with and had a wonderful time being with co-workers away from the work scene. We even kept a late night and didn't get home until 9 because we decided to have dinner out and make our target run for the week. We sure do have an exciting Saturday don't we?

Milestones

Emma has changed and achieved so much over the last 2 weeks. She is walking around the house holding onto our fingers. She can stand by herself for a minute. She has started crawling everywhere and is now chasing Lilly. Last night I sat her in the floor while I took Lilly out and came back in to find her on the other side of the living room and pulled herself up to a standing position at her leap frog table. She is loving going to Ms. Holly's house and playing with Evie. They laugh and talk and crawl around and play with toys. At the shower saturday she started waving bye bye and is all smiles and giggles now. She is giving lovings and they are the best, the wet tongue kind. She is eating her food for the most part and now eats wagon wheels for a treat. She has cut 2 teeth in the last 3 weeks and working on another. It is incredible how much she is changing and it saddens me at the same time. I can't believe she isn't my tiny little newborn anymore and that she is growing so fast and developing a personality. We are trying to decide on the theme for her first birthday. We are at 20 pounds now. We go in 2 weeks for her 9 month check up and can't wait to see all the measurements.

This is just a few things going on and hope everyone has a wonderful rest of the week. We also wanted to say good luck to Greg and Lisa. You guys will be great parents and can't wait to see little one in the next few weeks.

Ross Family Vacation

NANNA READING A BED TME STORY
NANNY, POPPY AND SLEEPING BEAUTY
SHE WAS POPPY'S GIRL ON THE TRIP
SILLY GIRL. SHE WAS CUTTING A TOOTH AND KEPT RUBBING HER TOUNGE AGAINST IT
RIVER PICTURE ALONG A HIKE
EAST RIM OVERLOOK
"THE MOST PICTURESQUE BEACH IN THE SOUTH" PER THE BROCHURE

SHE SLEPT ON ALL THE TRAILS
HAZARDOUS CAVE
READY FOR OUR FIRST HIKE
THERE WAS SERIOUS PING PONG ACTION GOING ON
THIS WAS A HILARIOUS TIME

THESE ARE JUST A FEW OF OUR PICTURES FROM THE VACATION WITH THE ROSS' LAST WEEK. WE STAYED AT LAUREL FORK RUSTIC RETREAT ON THE KY/TN LINE. IT WAS NICE HAVING THE ENTIRE FAMILY TOGETHER FOR THE FIRST TIME. WE LOOK FORWARD TO THE NEXT FAMILY EVENT.