Fire Station Field Trip

When I met with Bridget's preschool teacher last spring before I decided to enroll her, I asked how many field trips the kids go on, and she said about one a month. Sadly, that has not been the case. Here it is January, and this is only the 2nd field trip they've gone on this year. Anyway, I was happy to be able to go with her on this one as we toured our city's fire department.

Her teacher actually has 3 different classes, so there were about 24 kids there. Here's a picture of her class together sitting on the front of the ladder truck.
The kids had the opportunity to walk through part of the ladder truck, walk through an ambulance (Bridget thought that was pretty cool), see the inside of the fire station where the firemen sleep, eat, and hangout, and see, hear, and touch the fireman while he had all of his gear on.
I also really appreciated the lessons in fire safety - not playing with matches, having a meeting place outside for your family, stop, drop, and roll, etc. - since that's not something we've ever really discussed with Bridget.

It was also kind of cool because while we were there all of the firemen had to leave on a call with the pump truck and ambulance leaving the fire chief to do some of the instruction.

At the end, all of the kids got little plastic fireman hats, and Bridget looked pretty darn cute in hers.
Although this was not her first time in a fire truck (thanks to Grandpa being a fire chief), she had a pretty good time.

First Snowman of the Winter

Here it is January, and we finally got our first really decent snowfall of the season (as in 4-5 inches overnight). I'm by no means complaining about this because Nate and I are not snow people, but Bridget always looks forward to a chance to bundle up in her snow gear and play. She and Nate built this snowman together, but sadly it warmed up enough during the day that it toppled over by the end of it.

9 Months

I didn't think it was possible, but Felicity gets cuter every day. Her little personality is really starting to come out, and it makes me look forward to the coming months ahead. Overall, she's still pretty mellow but she's started laughing and giggling a lot more lately - especially when she's getting into mischief.

This past month has been a busy one for her as far as developmental milestones. On Dec. 22, she learned to crawl up the stairs herself. On Christmas Day she walked more than she had up to that point (5-6 steps). In the week and a half since then she's been walking more and more. She lets go of things all the time and walks anywhere from 1-6 feet. My guess is she'll be walking proficiently by the end of January. Can someone please tell her to stop growing up so fast?

Right around New Year's her top two front teeth popped through. It hasn't seemed to bother her too much...yet. I'm just grateful that another accomplishment occurred before those teeth came through - I successfully weened her about a week before Christmas. It took a lot of patience and effort to get this girl to take bottles, but I'm glad to be to that point. The timing really worked out in a lot of ways because giving her a bottle really helped on both airplane flights at Christmas, and with as sick as I got with the stomach flu, it would have been really hard for me to try and nurse her.

She still continues to do a lot of exploring around the house, and especially loves to open and play in all of the kitchen cupboards. She's also recently discovered how fun it is to play with the computer mouse and keyboard and continues to pull DVDs and books off all bookshelves. Playing with toilet paper and curtains also continues to be a favorite activity. She also LOVES taking baths and doesn't mind getting splashed or having water dumped on her head at all.

One of my favorite things lately is hearing her say "Mama" or "Mom." At first she definitely wasn't attaching it to me, but I think she's starting to, and I love it!

Her 9 month stats kind of surprised me. Her increased mobility has certainly helped her slim down, and I'm pretty sure the height measurement is a little off because she wouldn't lay down on the table very well at all to get measured.

Height: 28 in. (66th percentile)...she's probably longer than that though

Weight: 20 lbs. 6 oz. (77th percentile)

Head: 17.5 in. (64th percentile)

I love this girl! (Photo taken by Bridget)