Update

Grace Olivia~ 32 months old, or to make it easier, 2 2/3 years old

Grace is very outgoing when she's in groups of other children. She likes to be the leader and initiates and orchestrates all sorts of singing, dancing, and pretend-play activities with any stunned-into-submission or easy-going kids that happen to be around. With adults, she is shy at first and can take a while to warm up. She is becoming more tender with her little sister and likes to show her how to do things.

Grace is potty trained! It took us about 4 days. She still wears a diaper to bed and during naps, but we've graduated to wearing the panties for the hour-long car ride to Harford County. It's been about three weeks since we've become a family with only one diapered child. Grace likes to visit all the public restrooms, incidentally. We ran errands last night with Aunt April, and Grace had to pee pee once before we left the house, once at Target, and again at Paper Source.

Grace loves to point out letters in the world around her, and then tell us someone's name that begins with that letter. i.e. "I see a D! D for Daddy!" Sometimes she'll say "An H! That's for you, Momma!" (she knows that my name is Heather Deterding).

Grace's favorite things right now are: coloring with crayons and cutting paper with safety scissors, any kind of art project, hummus, sitting in a regular kitchen chair instead of her booster seat, saying her First Catechism answers and asking us her own version of the questions, helping me cook and sweep the kitchen, and playing with her friends. She's asking me to help her make cards to send to people, and I really hope that this is a ministry she has for the rest of her life! It's so sweet.

Leah Anne~ 15 months old

Leah is very easy-going ( I think this is a must for a second-born sibling!) and generally very happy. She'll laugh at almost anything, and still likes to cuddle. She is running around now and loves to play with her sister and follow her around the house. She'll usually cry when Steve and I leave her with someone, but she gets over it quickly.

Leah isn't putting words together yet, but her vocabulary is slowly getting bigger. Most words aren't very clear but here is a sampling of some things we hear her say: Grace, banana, balloon, hush, moo, yeah, hi, night, bye, she says a lot of family members' names, that, swing. She is also repeating a lot of words back to us.

Some of Leah's favorite things right now are: reading books! (she'll sit by herself and flip through books one by one), Goodnight Moon, swinging on the swing set, balloons, playing on our iPhone, dancing to music, giving kisses while saying "mmmmmmmmmmmwah", and eating.

Grace took off both of her shoes in this pile of leaves while I was trying to take her picture. Incredibly, I found them!

Pictures don't always happen. Leah is pointing at the swing she wants to swing in.

We're loving life with our big girls!