Happy 2009!

Sorry we missed the month of November on the blog updates. It’s been a busy end of the year. The big event in November was our trek up to Fenwick for the traditional Edwards (extended) family Thanksgiving. It was sort of small this year. Don’t think there were more than 70 relatives. Caitlyn slid through the legs of the crowd with ease, unlike Mom and Dad as we tried desperately to chase after her! Luckily Caitlyn was healthy for Thanksgiving, which was kind of amazing seeing as she only managed about 5 days total in November without some kind of cold. We were all a lot healthier in December, although Caitlyn had a rough time in the middle when she got 5 new teeth in the span of 10 days. She’s been a much happier baby in the first week of 2009 now that she’s getting a bit of a teething breather.

Caitlyn was a lot more involved in her second Christmas than the first. Somehow she learned the phrase “Christmas Tree” and all December all you had to do was say the words and she’d run right to it. Speaking of words, while she only says a handful ("Mama", "Dada", "Up", "Dis", "Dat"), it’s clear that she understands a whole lot of what we say. She’ll bring us toys by name. She points to the bird feeder when you say “Where are the birds?” She’ll touch her ears, teeth, head and hair on command. And of course, you can’t say “Jack’s Big Music Show” without her immediately running over to the drawer where we keep the remote, pulling it out, and pointing it at the T.V.

She’s also getting much more openly affectionate. All of her stuffed animals get frequent hugs, and occasionally Mom and Dad do too! She likes to sit in our laps now, although she has a very unorthodox approach: A while back, we taught her to sit in her toddler chair by turning around and backing up into the seat. She’s really good at it now, but she’s discovered she really really likes backing up. When she comes to sit in our laps, she’ll start backing up from about 6 feet away! She also likes to dance with us. She follows along with the lyrics of this one song, stomping her feet, spinning around, and bouncing up and down on cue.

She's also getting very adept at running...running away from putting on her jacket and diaper changes that is.

It’s really amazing how fast she’s learning new things now. Sometimes we look at her and for a moment she looks more like a little girl than a baby. It’s hard to imagine everything she’ll have learned before we welcome in 2010! But we’ll be sure to keep you posted.

From Jaety, Geraldine and Caitlyn, Happy New Year!

December '08 pics