Boo Boo - and not the Halloween kind

Poor Mia fell off the couch on Saturday night and injured her elbow :( This is the THIRD TIME she's taken a tumble off of furniture. And, for the THIRD TIME, I was sitting RIGHT BESIDE HER! I'm not sure how it happened; she was actually sitting down beside me and I looked over to tell Andrew something and next thing we know, she hit the ground. When I picked her up, she was crying in a way that I hadn't heard before. It was a "ok mom and dad - this really hurts" cry. I stripped her down to look for bruises or red areas but didn't see any. And, then we noticed she wasn't using her right arm. So, I started doing some exercises with it and when I bent it back toward her body, she started screaming. We called the doctor. To make a long story a little shorter, the doctor thinks she dislocated her elbow and I popped it back in when doing the exercises. Ouch!!!!!!!!! The good news is that she healed quickly. She already was feeling much better when we got to the doctor's office. It was still a little sore yesterday - but only when I moved it in funny ways to see if it still hurt. Today, she's back to hanging off the counters and tables. We go to The Little Gym with one of our pediatricians whose little boy has been in classes with Mia since they were about 8 months old. Her husband was teasing us last Thursday saying how Mia was not afraid of anything, and we were going to have to put his wife on speed dial. I don't think he was thinking this soon, though!

Tu Cute

For Halloween, Mia is going to dress up as a ballerina. I bought her a tutu a month ago, and she wears it all the time. She puts it on and does a little twirl - it's so cute. In fact, she's worn it so much, I had to go buy another one because the original one got ink and food on it and the threads starting coming out the bottom (Ok. Ok. So it could've been cleaned. And I could've cut the threads off the bottom. But, I actually found one I like better :) Stay tuned for Mia in her full costume later this week.

Cheers Daddy!

Andrew just accepted a position at UVA Medical Center working for the CFO and the Chief Environmental Care Officer (the guy in charge of the new construction for the hospital and the medical school). The day that Andrew got the call, we had a little champagne toast to celebrate the occasion. We included Mia, who's enjoying juice on the rocks in, yes, a crystal champagne glass. It was a bittersweet moment for me. I was so relieved that he got a job so soon but also sad that he had to go back to work. Mia and I have really enjoyed having him around. (Note: This is a horrible picture of me but the only one we got at this moment, so please disregard my sweaty face.)

Carter's Mountain

A few weekends ago, we met our friends at Carter's Mountain. I'd heard it was a great place to take the kids, and the weekend that we went was the annual Apple Festival. We picked apples, rode on a hayride, ate some yummy apple cinnamon doughnuts and danced to a bluegrass band. Mia had her first hot dog - wasn't quite sure what to think of it. She's not big on meat these days. But, she kept full by eating apples. I think we went through four of them. She'd eat part of the apple and then throw it on the ground. And, then she'd want another one. She had apple juice everywhere - including Andrew's hair because she was sitting on his shoulders for the apple picking/eating and kept spitting the skin out in his hair :)

Look Who's Talking II

Here's a little video I took of Mia this morning. She's repeating a few words. She never repeats this many all at once - she usually gets tired of this game pretty quickly. So, we were lucky to capture it on camera.

Look Who's Talking

Mia is really expanding her vocabulary these days - I counted and it's about 30 words. And, she's learning new words every day. It seemed to happen out of nowhere. She'll repeat what we ask her to say, which is a fun game. Although, it's about a 50 percent chance she'll get it right. For example, I'll ask her to say chicken, and she'll say "chicken," but then I'll ask her to say couch and she'll say "teet." Ahaha - cracks me up.

I was most excited when she put two words together last weekend - "more apple." She loves apples - and it's her favorite word. (Side note - that's what she's eating here in this picture. It's the only way I can get her through the entire grocery store without her wanting out of the cart :)

This past weekend at the lake, she said "boat," "fish" and "pizza." She also learned how to say her friend Davis' name - it sounds like "Dsss" - and she now calls her cousins Baba (Bobby) and JoJo (Joey). Very cute moment - Bobby and Joey taught her how to say their names at the lake two weekends ago. The next morning, I went to get her from her crib and she was laying there saying, "baba jojo baba jojo" over and over. It made them very happy to hear that.