21 Months

Happy 21 Months Bekah! Each month, we just seem to pick up speed in this sweet little life of yours and December was the perfect example of such a fact!

We were not in town, anytime near your 21 month birthday : ), so I just chose a pic from this month to head up this post : ).

I'll do my best to sum up her month/what she has been up to, in pictures but I'll get out the updates first:

 25 lbs

Sleeps about 11-12 hours at night

1 nap, that lasts from 2-2/2 hours, sometimes we hit that magical 3 : ).

She now  can be amused when I take her picture and will cooperate and smile and sometimes even say cheese!

She lays on her stomach now to read books, making her look so much more like a kid than my baby!

She started back up at music class and LOVES it!

She really likes haircuts now and is so interested in being "still" so we can cut her bangs : ). Big improvement from her first hair cut!

She still loves to cuddle and rock before naptime and bedtime. It's not needed, but oh so loved by all three of us!

She enjoys playing with blocks and one day, surprised me by counting them, and got up to 8!

The biggest thing this month was the way she started putting words together on her own! She says phrases now all the time, and it really started with her color words used to describe her outfits : ). The girl sure does know her colors, but embarrassingly enough, it is due to her interest in fashion : ). She will tell you everything she is wearing, with the color word in front of it. She will point it on out on my clothes too. But after the initial idea that clothing has colors, she definitely transferred it over to the real world and loves to talk about what color things all things are! It is a great distraction too! If she doesn't want to do something like put on her coat, if we start talking about what color it is, whala, her coat is on, buttoned and Bekah has moved on!

She has said a few sentences such as, "Mama hold it," or "Charlie is under the bed", but for the most part, she is talking in phrases, which is soooo exciting to me!

Here she is in her "red shirt" saying "cheese!"

I think one of the reasons her desire to talk and put words together talk has moved from needs to emotions, thoughts and observations, is because she had such a full month of meaningful experiences!

Here is a little idea of what Bekah has been "talking about:"

We went to SA for my friend Cathy's Baby Shower:

Here is sweet Andrew and Ellie gazing into one another's eyes, teehee, what a cute couple they make already!

There were 2 showers for Cathy that weekend, one with just us girls and a few of the kiddos:

(Carla and Cassie with the newest additions to the group : ))

and the big shower Cathy had with all her friends and family:

A few of us, including beautiful Eliana, were able to make it to both!

My dance team/drill team gals:

Carla, Me, Cathy, Kristen, Cassie and Eliana

( we missed you Shelby and Addie!)

( Vaughanie and Paige were able to make it to the first one, wish we could have taken a picture then!)

Just one day later, once we were back in town, Bekah asked her playgroup friends if they wanted to meet her at town hall to say hi to Santa! Some of her friends like Anders took her up on the offer.

Kind of funny how it was Bekah's idea, yet, she was not too sure about it when the time came:

With a good deal of Santa books and Santa discussions under our belt, we still weren't feeling it!

Zack said she was hanging on "for dear life" as he went in to set her down on Santa's lap, so he made the sweet daddy decision to hold on to her and just let mommy try to capture an awkward Santa moment.

The best we could do for a family Santa pic:

 ( I couldn't help but wonder, if  maybe Zack should have put her on his lap just to get one of those sad/yet eventually funny and memorable "crying on santa's lap pictures?"   

But at the same time, I am glad she wasn't too traumatized by it , there is always next year : ) ).Good thing is, she must like him, she always wants to read his books and when she looks at her play kitchen, lately she has been saying, "new kitchen, santa!" She associates him with one heck of a present!

Another one of our Christmas adventures included hosting a Christmas playdate with our wonderful pearland friends!

( Mason, Emily, Robyn and Hunter)

What's a Christmas playdate without cookie decorating? Although, Bekah did not catch on to the decorating one bit, the minute a cookie was placed on her plate, into the mouth it went! She is quite the cookie monster really, poor Robyn set down her own cookie, and the next thing we knew it had gone missing and it too was in Bekah's mouth!

( Barrett, Samanta and yes, shirtless Bekah, no need to mess up another outfit if you don't have to!)

The other kids got the hang of it though, and it was so cute to see them make their creations! I like this picture of Mason, getting ready to chomp down!

Later, shirt back on, Bekah and Hunter took a few minutes for some "light reading" of Christmas books : ).

Along with Christmas book reading, this month, Bekah enjoyed "drawing" all things Christmas with her new window markers from Gramommy! She sure does love them and loves them even more when artist Daddy joins in on the fun and draws whatever Bekah tells him too!

Eating had it's ups and downs this month and I realized how much I had to hide all those Christmas treats because she wanted them all the time! Here is one of the last shots I got of her in her high chair before I took it down to make room for her play kitchen.

(Notice her outfit that screams BOTH summer and winter, teehee! She wants to dress herself so much now, on the days we don't go anywhere, I really try to let her get it out of her system and we end up with things like this, Christmas jammies/flip flops and sunglasses for snacktime!)

A favorite pastime of the month included taking walks to see the Christmas lights and all of the decorations. It really made the things that we read about in books come to life, supporting her growing vocabulary!

Every day we had to go see Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse in the snow globe. It served as a great reward and incentive for listening to mommy! The past few days I have realized that I miss them as much as Bekah does, teehee!

The Nutcracker, a Burkhart Tradition

Zack and I had fun at the nutcracker with our friends Mike and Linnea : ).

It was by far the best Nutcracker I have ever been to and I can't wait to one day bring Bekah! She completely knows what Nutcrackers are, loves the music, appreciates ballet, likes to dance and is as ready as a two year old could be for this tradition of ours!

We also celebrated my brother becoming a CPA by traveling to Austin to see him get his certificate! Way to go Uncle Jeff, we are so proud of you!

( Walking up to the stage)

I am so lucky to have such a great "little" brother who, before my eyes has become both a CPA and  wonderful hubby!

What a dear family  we have to come out and celebrate with us!

( Igor, Ryan, Allegra, Kath, Rani, Jeff and Pam)

It was an especially meaningful day for my dad, being a CPA himself, he was given the honor of presenting his certificate to his very own son!

Random pic of Bekah, but  I just had to include it, look how she still sleeps these days, bootie up in the air and with her legs crossed, so cute!

This month, we actually made it to some holiday parties, unlike the past few holidays where it seems like she missed out on things because she was sick.

We had a playdate/ornament exchange and not only did Bekah try to wear her holiday attire, even those cutie patotie boys dressed up, like Colt and Asher!

Mr. Jack was dressed to the nines as always : ).

And look at Anders, with his Santa suit on! So cute!

And then, for the weekend Bekah had been waiting for, her Evie and Ava visits!

Evie came down first and stayed with us for a whole weekend! Mary Pat and I decided that just like last year, we needed them to have matching "friendship Christmas shirts." As much as we would have enjoyed making them ourselves, like last year, we decided to give some ownership over to the girls and let them make a hand print wreath shirt, and they turned out really cute! 

The girls wanted to wear them to the Christmas Train , a light show that we went to later on that night.

Doing our best to get pictures before it was our turn to jump on the train:

Mommy daughter pic, that from the looks on the girls faces, was not as much fun as the pictures taken just minutes before : ).

The Wonderful Whitesides, a family that Bekah talks about EVERY day, even Ryan must be discussed, can't leave the daddies out!

Evie is just a tad bit excited about her upcoming train ride! We sure do miss that gorgeous smile of hers!

It twas a lot of fun, we got all bundled up, jumped on a "mini" train and drove around looking at really beautiful light displays that a church set up just for the train.

Pretty impressive, huh? : )

We also made time to go to take Bekah's BFF to her favorite park. And really, as much as it looks like we planned the outfits to look like this, it was actually a coincidence!

Bekah loves Evie so much!

Since Evie is such a good model for the camera, she taught Bekaha move or two : ).

Bekah, doing her best to stay up with Super Model Evie : ). Now, whenever I tell her to put her hands on her hips like Evie, she totally does it and thinks it is funny! Thanks for the tips Evie!

Such sweet friends!

They might live in different cities, but after seeing them together the last few times, it is obvious how distance doesn't matter and that they will be friends forever!  Teehee! That's what their mommies say atleast!

Evie is always up for having fun, and here she is joining Bekah in Ring Around the Rosie : ).

After the park, we even got to go to a Christmas block party on our street! Evie, never being one to miss out on fun, had a good time,

though poor Bekah must have been exhausted from all her playing with Evie, fell asleep on the way home and missed the entire party! I do think it is pretty cute when she falls asleep in her stroller since it is such a rare thing these days, it makes me remember when she was an infant : ).

Getting ready to say goodbye the next morning:

Bekah definitely cried when Evie left, but I reasured her that another BFF would soon be walking through the door, Ava! The minute I told her this, she immediately looked hopeful through those cute tears of hers.

Just like Evie, Ava couldn't be a sweeter friend to Bekah and we loved every minute we spent with her!

Bekah loves Vaughanie and there are times during the day where I think she is saying "mommy" and I then realize she is trying to say, "Vaughanie!" It is cute how she mentions her alot : ), she really does feel the love that Vaughanie shows her. It is such a sweet feeling, knowing that your friends care for your children : ) and Vaughanie does such a great job at this!

Ava the explorer, checking out Bekah's toys : ).

What a cute cowgirl she makes!

Since Ava loves Christmas lights possibly more than Bekah, Bekah wanted to show her all of the decorations in the neighborhood by going on a wagon ride : ). I love how this pic makes them look SO uninterested, but trust me, they were!

No walk is complete without a trip to the park, where the girls REALLY had fun! This is a new favorite pic of these two girls : ).

Another favorite pic:

The girls were having so much fun, swinging and laughing in their swings, the boys decided to do some fake laughing for a good kodak moment shot, love the way Mikey is throwing his head back in laugther, teehee!

Wish we could see this pretty face all the time, it sure is hard living away from the Seamans!

But, when we do see them, it always reasures us that long distance friendship is possible and that our children reall can know one another and love one another, the way us grown ups do! Thank goodness for blogs, Bekah sure loves to look at her friends on the computer and knows everyone, even down to the daddies. It's really interesting too, the way she groups them correctly, with the right mommy going with the right toddler and so on : ).

A Few More December Moments

The poinsetta clip from last year inspired me to try for her first pony tail and it worked, with a few stragglers of course! 

Bekah and enjoyed being little elves by loading up the wagon and delivering Christmas treats to our neighbors. Each year, I really want to empasize more and more the "giving" part of Christmas and including Bekah on the delivery was alot of fun : ).

After Christmas was over, my parents actually came back with us to Houston and spent a few days with us since Zack had to work. It was alot of fun to see them and we appreacaited all that they did for us!

(such as- cleaning my fridge, babysitting bekah for our anniversary dinner, fixing things, taking down christmas lights, doing laundary, the list goes on and on with those two!)

Grandpa was able to put together the easle too! Bekah had her first experience with paint and really was mezmorized by it for a good 30 minutes!

Working on her first masterpiece : ). Thanks again May May and Grandpa for a fun gift, especially on rainy days!

And speaking of rainy days, we sure had alot of them that month! Thanks to Vaughanie's "create your own Gymboree in your house for free" idea, we were able to pass a few good afternoons by taking off all the pillows from the couches and having rumble tumble time with daddy!

I would have to say, one of my most favorite moments, and it will be of all time as a mommy, was, when Bekah told me she loved me! Unwarrented! We tell her we love her and encourage her to say it back and then, one day last month, as I was holding her and dancing, she looked at me, said, "I love you" and then, kissed my shoulder!

I about melted! I will never forget that special moment between the two of us! It was amazing, to hear it come out of her mouth, while she was happy and then to have her kiss not my mouth, but my shoulder, it was all her doing, you know? It makes sense to me that she would say a thing like that when we were dancing, because she LOVES to have me pick her up and dance with her! I always kiss her on her lips, but she did it on her own time, in her own sweet, sweet way.  . . .

As I said, melts the heart : ).

Happy 21 month birthday little one! We love YOU!