18 Months

Today is Tatum's 18 month birthday. She has a laundry list of accomplishments in the last six months, and as a proud momma I'll name a few:

walking up and down stairs without holding a hand

sliding down the slide without assistance

saying more and more words like dog, up, down, out, bye, orange, egg, eye (while sticking her finger in your eye), and ball

finding mom and dad's shoes and bringing them to us when she wants to go "out"

finding her own shoes when asked "where are your shoes"

discovering her belly button and other's belly buttons

putting puzzle pieces back in the right place

Her laughter remains vibrate and her health, so far, is solid. We are so blessed to have such a darling and sometimes demanding daughter. Happy 18 months baby.

New Photos on Flickr

Check them out using the link to the left (or upper corner of the blog).

Halloween Revisited

And by revisited I mean that we stuck to the same Scooby Doo crew costumes as last year. Hey, they fit, and since I hand-dyed, hand-sewed Tatum's costume last year, it's best she gets two years out of it. And you must admit, Thelma, Shaggy and Scooby are a pretty cute group. Our friend Sonja invited us to a family friendly party in Pasadena where Tatum had her first chance to walk the block and get candy for her parents. Yes, we are that family, having our 18 month old hold out her bag so her folks can enjoy candy later that night.

Tatum and I went to the LA Arboretum in the morning so mom could study trees. To our delight the Arboretum was sponsoring a Halloween event for kids. Tatum was a bit small, but we still took pictures and had fun playing with the balloon and seeing kids in costume.

Adventures in Self Feeding

Wow - this is what bibs were made for! There ended up being more squash soup in the bib than Tatum's belly.

The harvest season of fall has taken effect on Tatum - she now wants to conduct her own food harvest. As seen above, Tatum prefers to eat dinner herself, risking food loss to clothes stains. Her wrist turns need perfecting, as she tends to turn the whole spoon upside down as she inserts it into her mouth. But we've got plenty of time for that.

Her place is now set with two utensils, one for mom and one for Tatum.