Tag Archives: growing up

#MySundayPhoto, Parenting, Silent Sunday

Waving to the Airplanes: #MySundayPhoto – 10.04.15

10/04/2015 R.C. Liley 10 Comments

We’re at the stage of toddlerdom (hey, it’s on Wiktionary!) where every new thing/word is repeated somewhere between 10 to 50 million times a day. One of those things is “plane” or “jet” every time she hears one flying overhead.

Oh, I should mention we live between two airports, one being the extremely busy DFW Airport. In other words, there’s a lot of planes that fly over us. We rarely noticed the flying vessels until now, since Avery calls out their presence upon each passing. We’re proud of our girl for everything she’s learning, obviously, but the repeated words can take a toll sometimes. First world problems, I know.

We encourage Avery with supportive words when she acknowledges a color, sound, object, etc, so now we have her waving to the planes as they fly by.

I’m not sure if she understands that she’s waving to people (like we told her), or just the actual jet and/or plane, but it’s cute nonetheless. Speaking of, we also try to explain the difference between jet and plane since she’s been using both words.

Essentially, all jets are planes, but not all planes are jets. The propeller driven planes and in a different category. All of this just goes over her head (ha ha, puntastic!), but I know she’ll eventually catch on.

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday!

Do you have a lot planes fly near your home?

Are there things you never or hardly noticed that your kid constantly discovers around your home now?

Life, Monthly List, Parenting, Photo Journal

22 Month Photo Session + Posing As The 7 Dwarfs

09/18/2015 R.C. Liley 4 Comments

This month’s photo session was more rushed than most of the previous ones, so our picture count was minimal in comparison. Luckily, Avery graced the camera with several expressions earlier in the day that I felt compelled to share.

Okay, so I always feel compelled to share, but these pictures aren’t just like the random photos I always take. Fine, you got me again, they are, but after looking through them, I noticed a close semblance to The Seven Dwarfs. Some more than others, but close nonetheless.

All I was doing was snapping photos and never asked her to make any of the faces. This makes it even more astonishing (at least to me) that she hit mimicked the munchkin Snow White characters without having ever seen the movie. See for yourself and tell me if I’m just crazy or if you can see it too.

Doc – It’s like she’s listening with a stethoscope, and she’s obviously wearing a look of concern for others.

Happy – That smug look may not be an ear-to-ear grin, but you certainly can’t say she’s not happy here.

Sneezy – If “Scaredy” was the name, this would be more appropriate, but I would argue she’s gearing up for a big sneeze here!

Bashful – She even has those cute cheeks fluffed up from holding everything in.

Dopey – If you were to pose as Dopey, wouldn’t you do something like this too?

Sleepy – Spot. On.

Grumpy – Her face might say “Happy”, but just read the sign language for her true feelings…..

My first thought, when going through these pictures, was of the Three Wise Monkeys who “Hear no evil, see no evil, and speak no evil”, but then the dwarfs came to mind. The pictures for Doc (Hear no evil), Bashful (Speak no evil) and Sleepy (See no evil) were the ones I felt fit best. Yes?

Now for the 22 month photo session. I only have a few to share this month, hence my dwarf pose pictures above to fulfill the multi-pictures I usually do. First, we took her by surprise with a quick snap of the camera…

Avery quickly caught on and flashed us a grin as she raised her super flexible leg. She seriously puts her feet to face with ease, and does so quite often.

Then my wife and I both spouted out several pose commands at once while I waved my arms like a crazy ape in order to get her to smile. The result?

Not impressed, not the slightest. But, the mention of cheese (the actual food) made her smile and say it out loud. Going Mom was quick with the camera and caught the quick showing of her pearly whites which marked the end of our session.

Really, that pic should be her Happy dwarf pic. There you have it, our 22 month old posing as characters she’s never seen and giving one big grin for her monthly photo session.

Ack! I just thought of how we’ll soon be saying her age in years! Isn’t 2 the norm for when you do that? Or is it still acceptable to go by months? If so, for how long?

Do you have any pictures of your kids that bear semblance to movie (cartoon or real) characters?

Life, Parenting

Typical Conversations With Our Toddler

09/12/2015 R.C. Liley 2 Comments

At almost 22 months old (seriously, time, just stop for a change), our toddler daughter seems to increase her vocabulary every day. Not that it’s a big surprise with how much time we spend reading to her as well as her reading by herself.

Reading usually occurs sans animals, but Nana’s dog was adamant about sticking around for the ending.

I figured I would share some of the typical conversations we have with Avery at this stage in her toddler career. Obviously, they are less like conversations and more like us asking a lot of different questions with one syllable, hard to distinguish answers. Or just going through asking what noise *insert animal* makes.

When she’s getting fussy and we can’t figure out why or it’s just because she wants us to give her something she can’t have, we’ll bust out with the animal sound questions…

Us: What does the kitty say?
Avery: La (sometimes it’s more of a meow, but not quite yet)
Us: What does the owl say?
Avery: Who-who
Us: Ummm, what does the dog say?
Avery: ruff
Us: How about the pig?
Avery: very soft snorting noise I’m not sure how to spell out
Avery: getting fussy again
Us: Uhhh……what does the bear say?
Avery: rooaarrrr <—-cutest thing ever!

Just recently, when we’re changing her and just took off her pajamas, she gets upset if she’s not wearing a shirt.

Avery: Shit, shit, shit
Us: What?
Avery: *pointing at our shirt* Shit!
Us: Oh, you want a shirt?
Avery: Yesshh
Us: Okay, what color do you want?
Avery: Pink (this was the first color she could say, so it’s always her first color question response)
Us: Would you like this green one with the Ninja Turtles?
Avery: Yesshh
Us: We’ll put it on right after changing your diaper. What color diaper do you want?
Avery: Pink
Us: How about this one, what color is it?
Avery: Pink………bllluuueee
Us: Yes, good job dear! You’re so smart!
Avery: I smaahht

And then, quite often, there are times where it’s just a drawn out guessing game. She’s fussy and only getting worse by the second…

Avery: Uh, ugh, ugh….bla
Us: What do you want sweetie?
Avery: bla baaa, laa
Us: I don’t understand what that is, dear. Do you want another book?
Avery: nnnn, bla bla baaa
Us: Still don’t know, does something hurt?
Avery: *reaching up but not really towards anything* blaaa laaa
Us: *finally realizing…we think* Oh, you want water?
Avery: Yesshhhhh

So apparently “W’s” are hard to pronounce right now. No worries, we have plenty of time to learn. Since a toddler is usually around the ages of one and three, I see follow-up posts in our future, and maybe by then she’ll at least have “water” down.

There are plenty of other “conversations” we have with Avery in a day, but these seem to be the most frequent so far. But with a constantly growing list of words she can say, including high chair, bear, book, swing, slide, mow, squats, shorts, mom, glasses, phone, trash, pig, squash, and most of the primary colors, our talks are sure to get more interesting. Oh yeah, she started saying No, which is already proving to be a problem. Apparently for the both of us….