Move Over Mia Hamm!

Our little Abby is preparing to take the UNC soccer world by storm! I'm not when or how she mastered this skill. We would sometimes take her foot and help her kick the ball, but I've never seen her try it on her own. Suddenly today, however, she's kicking the ball all over the place! It's pretty exciting.

Natalie also likes playing with the balls, in fact she has previously shown more interest than Abby. Natalie mostly likes picking the balls up and carrying them around.

The girls have been really funny lately. They are very into squealing and running up and down the halls and around the living room. I love the running and I'm okay with noise making, but the squealing sort-of gets to me. When I was on staff and served as a counselor at Johns River Valley Camp, one of my cabin rules was, "NO SQUEALING - You are not pigs!" I really don't like squealing. I'm torn though, between trying to quiet them down and encouraging their vocalization. I also want them to learn the concept of "indoor voices" so when we go to restaurants, we aren't obnoxious. I hate it when little kids are screeching and squealing in restaurants and their parents just sit there and don't even bother to try.

Also on the verbal front, Natalie and Abby are adding sounds every day it seems. In the past few days Natalie has added "baa-baa" for sheep. She also seems to be trying quack, quack for duck. Abby is regularly doing "quack, quack" and will sometimes do "baa-baa". Abby will regularly make the sign for doggy and sometimes add a little "oof, oof". Abby is doing really well with the sign "more". We are trying to also apply it to when she wants us to read her book again as well as more food or milk. Natalie will also make the sign for doggy with prompting. Natalie also uses "more" and even more often, the sign for "eat". She will use it when she is thirsty as well. Both use the sign for "all done" when finished eating.

Other than chasing balls, Natalie and Abby are really into their books right now. You can often catch them sitting and turning through the pages of their favorite books. Their favorite books, by the way, include: Brown Bear, The Foot Book, their Baby's First ABC picture book and Baby's First Words, a couple of animal books and anything with cats in it or on it. As you can see, they are very into animals. I have an old fashioned, "The cat says...." spinning toy. It's the kind where you pull the lever and the pointer spins around and says whatever it's pointing to. Natalie LOVES it. It's hard for her to pull the lever, but she's working on it.

The slide is still a big hit, of course. They have even discovered the space under the slide which can somtimes get a little tricky if they get stuck. Ususally, however, it's up the steps, down the slide, up the slide, down the steps, up the steps, down the steps, up the steps, sit on steps, up the steps, push sister off steps, roll ball/car/spoon/block/etc down slide. Two days ago Abby actually took a ball, went up the steps, rolled it down the slide, went down the steps, retrieved the ball, went back up the steps and repeated the process at least 4 times in a row. Now, if I can just get Natalie to fetch the ball and give it back to Abby they will officially be playing a game together.

They do "play" together though - especially in their cribs. Their cribs are end to end and they pass things back and forth before they fall alseep and when they wake up. I will often find all the toys on one side or the other. The girls laugh and babble and touch hands. It's just adorable. Tomorrow, I will post a cute video of them playing after a nap:-) It just makes your heart burst with joy.

Okay - this is long enough...enjoy the video!