Playing Dress Up

Sophie has enjoyed dressing up in our clothes lately. She especially likes our shoes and Daddy's ties. In fact, Daddy had to teach Mommy how to tie a tie just for dress up time!

That's Mister Sophie to you, Buddy...

Sneaking into Seats

Sophie has been sneaking into seats lately. Sometimes they're our seats, and sometimes they're created seats (as you can see below). We've taken to closing the office door since she's been sneaking in there to sit at the computer (and as you can see by the mess, it's no place for a toddler to play!)


Also, the other day, I heard some noise and giggling coming from the living room while I was cooking dinner. I went out to see what was going on, and Sophie was sitting in this box that I had brought home! She watched TV in it until she pushed a little too hard with her feet and broke the box.

Office Mascots

Every so often, my coworker, Joy, and I get Sophie and her son, Daniel, together for a picture together since they're only three months apart. We actually have pictures of them posted on our website as our official mascots. (You can go here to see past pictures. Click on the picture that's there to see the progression of mascot pictures over the last year and a half.)

We both brought them to carnival, so here are some updated pictures of them. You'd be amazed at how difficult it is to get two kids this age to look at the camera and smile. You'd think with all the antics mommies and daddies are doing behind the camera, we'd get at least one!

Carnival 2008

Every year, Centre hosts a "carnival" with games and food. This year's was on Friday night, and Sophie was finally old enough to enjoy it. The games were a little too old for her, but she is still talking about the big blow-up slide, which she thinks was Mickey Mouse's house. (We often watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on the weekends, and she made the connection between the cartoon and slide on her own!)

Mommy carried her up to the top so she could go down the slides. It was a little big for her, so we only did it once, but here she is coming through the last part of the slide:

One of the students was gracious enough to let Sophie play with her bubbles for a little while:


And here is Mommy playing one of the games. As you can see, Sophie is looking on. According to Ian, she was laughing hysterically at Mommy the entire time:

Sophie insisted on eating her corn like everyone else--on the cob. Surprisingly, she actually got most of the corn off without eating the cob:

Here is Sophie and Daddy posing after the carnival:


For some reason, Sophie really likes to stand and dance on manhole covers, so we usually have to stop every time we see one. This time was no different:

Birthday Update

Sophie is very excited about her upcoming birthday, so I wanted to give you an update about the plans. We will have a birthday party, but it won't be the weekend-long extravaganza that it was last year. Sophie's birthday falls on a Saturday this year, so we'll have a little birthday party that afternoon (May 31st) probably. We'll be sending out invitations, but anyone who is reading this blog is welcome to come...just let me know that you'd like to come and I can give you the exact details.

Also, as I mentioned at Christmastime, we'd prefer that Sophie not receive gifts this birthday. We will be moving to France just a month after her birthday and we will not be bringing very many toys with us. Instead, I'd like to ask that if you want to give her a gift that you give her money so that we can buy her some toys once we get to France. (I'd be happy to take requests for the type of toy that you'd like for us to buy with the money, though.) If you really, really, really want to give her a gift, let me know, and I can give you some ideas of things she might need to take with us.

No, it's "apple-auce"

Sophie's linguistic skills (and attitude) continue to develop in a very independent-minded way. Recently, she's taken to correcting our language sometimes. The first time she really did it, I was trying to help her pronounce one of her favorite foods better. I said, "It's 'apple-sauce,' Sophie," thinking that she may have had problems with the two S-sounds of the word. Sophie responded immediately, "No, it's 'apple-auce.'" That's confidence.

Other lingustic landmarks include much better mimicry (she can repeat almost anything--which means we, i.e. I, have to be even more careful) and consistent identification of herself as "I" and her things as "my" and "mine." She still uses "Sophie" and "Sophie's," but she's definitely switching over to the first person.

I'm not sure if this is truly a linguistic achievement or not, but in response to the question, "What does Snoop Dogg say," Sophie will respond "chill" (in true Snoop Dogg style).

Paddington Bear

Grandpa and Grandma Wilson spent Christmas in London this year and brought Sophie a special present--a true Paddington Bear from Paddington Station! He's very cute with his rain coat, hat, boots and suitcase. Sophie really likes him, but can't figure out why she can't undress him! (He's more of a display bear than play bear for someone her age.) The other night, Sophie got out of bed for the first time without permission to try to take his clothes off. Ian caught her in the act of taking off his boots! She had a stern talking-to and hasn't tried to undress him since!

More Pictures from Baltimore

No, Sophie has not been imbibing in this picture! It's actually a picture of her trying really hard to wink.

And just some smiles:

Do the Hokey Pokey...

I just got Aunt Heather's pictures from our visit to Baltimore, so I'll post them over the next week or so. These are some of my favorites. Recently, the retirement home where Great Grandma Wilson lives installed a jukebox outside of the dining room. We took Sophie there one afternoon, put on some kids music and let her enjoy herself. Hands down, her favorite song was the Hokey Pokey. She must have learned the dance at daycare because she already knew how to do parts of it. Here are some pictures of her dancing the Hokey Pokey:



And I just thought that I'd throw this one in for fun. She loves to play patty cake!

Playing with Dolls

Sophie has been really getting into pretend play lately, and really likes to play with her dolls by feeding them, bathing them, putting them to bed, etc. Here are some pictures of her feeding her babies lunch. She did everything herself:

Sophie's Art

I realized after reading my cousin's blog about her little one's first art project that I haven't posted very many of Sophie's. She came home last week with all of March's projects (and I had a stack of February's at home), so I've scanned them all. Here is her early 2008 collection: