23 months

In less than a month our baby girl will be turning 2. Amazing. She is learning and talking so much. I know I didn't update at 22 months so I have 2 months worth of "bellaisms" to update. She makes us laugh and smile all the time. It is quite incredible what her little mind has absorbed in such a short amount of time.



She is talking like crazy. Her words and phrases include, but are not limited too (in case I can't remember them all):

"wan go ouside"
"you wan go ouside"
-both said first thing in the morning, all throughout the day, and last thing before bed. She LOVES to be "ouside"
"shoes"
-she knows that if she puts on her shoes and we put on our shoes she can go "ouside"
"okay"
-this is her reasoning word. "okay" has MANY different meanings. It can be a happy, sad, excited, or mad word.
"hi"
"hey"
"byyyyyye byyyyyye"
"read"
"sllliiiide"
-this is her other favorite thing to do. she loves to slide.
"eat"
"buppy"-puppy
"babby" - Gabby
"ba-be" -baby
"I comin"
"juice"
"RyRy" -Ryan
"Corky" -Cortney
"KeKes" -Kenzie
"Mommy"
"Daddy"
"Nana or Nanny"
"Papa"
"Rose"
"Tree"
"sky"
"awesome"
"cool"
"light"
"off"
"wan go see.....rose"
-Daddy takes her around the yard and they talk about all the flowers and trees.
"tee tee"
"poo poo"
"potty"
-we are in the beginning stages of potty training.
"hiney"
"all done"
"up"
"down"
"duress" -dress
-she loves her clothes
"sit down"
"chair"
"seepy" -sleepy
"nigh nigh"
"wan go seepy"
"blankie"
"I see you"
"I-kee" -Inki for Niki
"hep me"
"agg" -egg
"da do" -thank you
"two, three" -still won't say one
"no man" -no ma'am
"es" -yes
"yeah"
"go"
"ook" -look
"choo choo"
"cheese"
"milk"
"apple"
"nana" -banana
"I sore-ry" - I'm sorry
"hat"
"hot"

I know there are alot more but I can't remember them all!! She also still speaks fluent gibberish.


Last Sunday Terry and I were teaching Children's Church and our lesson was about the lame man and how he was healed. Before the lesson I asked the kids "What are some things you do with your legs and feet?" Bella was very quick to answer "Shoes". I cracked up as she and Ryan both then showed me their shoes. I said, "You are right! Your shoes go on your feet!" I was so proud of her.



One morning this week Bella was in the bathroom with me while I was getting ready. The door to the bathroom was closed. All the sudden she started saying "I want Oso!" "I want Oso!" and wanting out of the bathroom. It took me a minute to figure out what she was talking about, but then realized Agent Oso was on the Disney channel and she could hear the intro music to the show. She watches him every morning but I was still amazed that she had picked that up.


Her favorite song is the "B-I-B-L-E"
She also loves to sing her "A-C-E's"
and "E-I-E-I"

Look at those curls!!

She is also an expert at using my iPhone. She knows how to turn it on, swipe through the pages, and find her apps. She has also been know to call people. It is quite amazing that she isn't even 2 yet and she is already becoming tech savvy. No telling what she will be doing in another year.



Pointing up to the "choo choo" flying over. All things transportation are choo choo's.

She gives the sweetest (wettest) kisses and hugs. She is doing so well at MDO, no more crying and she naps like a champ. Next year cousin Lexi will be there with her too so she will have Lexi and Ryan in her class. How fun is that?!? She also loves her cousin RyRy. My mom is keeping him right now so she is with him at school and then they both get to go to Nana's. He wasn't there (at Nana's) Thursday morning and she looked for him everywhere calling his name. They are pretty funny together. They will hug one minute and then the next minute be fighting. Mom said they walk around the house holding hands also. They are so cute!

We are also in the beginning stages of potty training. We are going to go full out with it until summer when I can be home with her everyday and focus on it. She loves her potty chair and loves to sit on it. We just haven't had any luck getting anything into it. The other night she wanted to sit on it so she took off her pants and diaper and sat down. Nothing. So she stands up and walks over to the ottoman and tee tee's on the floor. (the potty chair is in the living room). As I go to clean that up I look over and there is poop coming out of her rear and my first instinct was to run over and catch it ........ with my hand. Luckily I thought twice about that. One would think I wouldn't let her run around the living room naked so that these things wouldn't happen. Oh well. Good thing we have a carpet cleaner. I'm sure there will be many other calamities in the potty training area. At least we have a sense of humor!

Family Pictures, Papa's Birthday, & Easter

Easter weekend we headed up to Dallas for a BIG weekend! I had my first Good Friday off in 4 years so we headed up to Dallas on Friday morning. Bella was so good in the car, she watched her movies and played. We stopped by Corsicana on our way up there so Terry could get his mom to help us with our taxes (THANK YOU, GAIL!). Bella got a good break from the car, insisted kitty was a "buppy", and got to hang out with her big cousin Taylor. Late afternoon we continued up towards Denton. We were worn out when we got there so we hung out with Tiffany and went to bed. We had to be up early on Saturday morning for family pictures. When I say family pictures I mean ALL 23 of US. I'm so happy we were able to do this with all of us. We had a great photographer Paige Pearson. Our sneak peak is the one dated April 10, 2010. She got some great images of our family that we will cherish for many years to come. After our photography session it was time to get down to business with an Easter egg hunt and celebrating Papa's 85th birthday.
Bella started off the hunt for "aggs" trying to get this one out of the brick wall. She had some difficulty and asked for help with her favorite phrase "hep me". She then proceeded to walk around the yard, point at "aggs" and say "hep me" to every single "agg". I think she thought maybe they would all be stuck and she would need "hep".
She was cracking me up because she really would not bend over and pick up an egg.


She even got Mema in on the action. When you hear this very pitiful "hep me" come out of her mouth, you just can't help but "hep" her.

Beautiful Courtney. I don't have any pictures of her hunting eggs because she was very serious about it and couldn't be bothered. She had a TON of eggs!

Papa is giving RyRy instruction. Papa is RyRy's favorite person. Seriously. While taking pictures Dad pretty much had to be holding him or he was not happy. He LOVES his Papa.

I LOVE this picture of these two! I can't believe she actually smiled at me for the picture. Notice how they are both holding her basket. She has everyone wrapped around her finger. Can you blame us?

Ryan is wiping his hands. He doesn't like to be dirty. He is such a cutie boy.

It's possible that there wasn't anything in his bucket. Not because he needed "hep" picking up eggs. But because he would pick them up and throw them. I'm pretty sure his big sister would them grab them :).

She might have wanted to eat her "aggs".

Sweet sugars. Get them while you can.

After we hunted for eggs it was time to celebrate Papa's 85th birthday. Bella helped him unwrap his presents. She was just practicing for her big day next month.

There is something in the Cox gene that LOVES m&m's. Especially peanut m&m's.

Papa showing off his new birthday duds!

I hope you had a great birthday, Papa!! We love you!

After presents and cake we got this special treat. There really are no words. This suit that Blake is wearing was his dad's (Uncle Jerry) "leave from the wedding" outfit 35 years ago. There was an attempt to make Katie put on the matching dress. Maybe next time.

Easter morning Bella had a surprise. She got a new baby with a potty. Hmmmmm.

She was very interested but at first did not want the baby to sit on the potty. She did not like sitting on the potty so why should her baby.

She did such a good job changing her baby. Luckily Daddy came to the rescue and talked her into letting the baby sit on the potty. This potty flushes so we got to listen to that all the way back to Houston.

Then we headed to church and Bella wore her new Easter dress.

My sweet loves....

Mommy and Bella on Easter morning.

We had a great EASTER weekend and really enjoyed getting to see all of the family. It doesn't happen very often where all 23 of us are together. We must cherish those times.

WaRReNton

Oh how I love the Antique Show in Warrenton! This was our second Antique Show and it was even better than the first time because it was BEAUTIFUL outside. Perfect weather to shop outdoors. We went with Mom & Dad again (we love traveling with them ;) and we spent the night so we got 2 days of shopping!! We had SO MUCH FUN!! We got some really neat finds this time. I can NOT wait to go back in the Fall.

Bella had the perfect place to ride and nap......Lucky!

Notice Bella not looking at the camera. She thinks this is funny. I'm not sure if I think it's funny or not.

Testing out some pretty cool kid chairs.

Bella fell in L~O~V~E with the flamingos at Junk Gypsy.

I {big red puffy HEART} Junk Gypsy!

She loved them so much that we may just have come home with one and it might be hanging out in our front yard. Yes, we went there.