It is just too beautiful for words outside today...I feel like I can do better than some lame cliche though...It is the type of day that where the sun is shining bright, there's not a cloud in the sky. The temperature is exactly perfect - in that you can wear long sleeves and jeans and be a happy, contented warm in the sun and enjoy the 'cooling off from the sun' in the shade...and there is a perfect, ruffle-your-hair breeze. It's the type of day that puts you in such a pleasant mood you greet nearly everyone you encounter and remark on the magnificence of the weather. NOTE: picture above taken on sunny but COLD morning, NOT on day described. I never would have gotten this shot at Forsyth on a beautiful day, are you kidding? On days like this it's mobbed! People everywhere, especially posing for pictures in front of the fountain.

Charlotte fell asleep, as she normally does on our walks. A police officer walked up to us and felt her toes. He was afraid they might be chilly. They weren't, they were warm...whew...
It was beautiful out most of this week. One day Charlotte and I strolled down to Forsyth to play on the 2-5 playground and to practice walking. The park was big fun. When we first got there we were the only ones there so we got the run of the whole place without me being too worried but then two more little girls showed up and Charlotte was super-excited and wanted to follow them everywhere and they wanted to pretend to be her mommy and kept telling me it was okay, that I could go and sit down and not worry. They would help her crawl through the tunnels and go down the slide. Charlotte looked at me as if to say, that sounds like a good idea, mom . Right. Well, then Charlotte kept hugging them and that made them want to pick her up and carry her, so needless to say, we left pretty soon after they got there. Actually, we were almost the cause of a fight. Both little girls wanted to be the "mommy".

So, we strolled down the sidewalk and wandered into the grass to sit down and enjoy the sunshine.
Charlotte held onto to her 'Little People' of the day, black girl in bathing suit and snorkel mask and we took Moses & Eloise for a nice long walk. Charlotte was in the Ergo (the back pack). It was the type of day (I started this post on Friday, I'm publishing it on Saturday) where Charlotte was able to be bare-footed, thank goodness because I'm tired of losing shoes, and Eloise's incessant biting, tugging and growling at the leash didn't even phase me, well, until she tripped me, the little rascal. Charlotte always has a 'lovey of the day'. Two days in a row this week it was a toothbrush and not the same toothbrush both days. One day it was her toothbrush and the second day was her daddy's toothbrush. We get quite a few comments when it's a toothbrush. She brushes her teeth in the morning and at night. I'll help first then I let her hold it and do it herself while I brush mine. She sits on the bathroom counter and we brush teeth together. But lots of times, she spots daddy's toothbrush. She likes to hold my blush brush and put on blush too. It's the cutest. She has a little blush compact that's emply with her own little blush brush that the Clinique lady gave her. Charty opens it up and puts on her blush.

We found belly buttons this week. I showed her hers and showed her mine and then we practiced finding each others. When daddy got home I asked Charlotte where his belly button was. She couldn't find it, so Adam pulled up his shirt and shower her. She crams her little finger into my belly button and wiggles it around. She was scared of Adam's belly button. I was afraid she would start crying when she saw all that hair in there. Five days have passed and she's still afraid to touch his belly button.

Charlotte loves to play outside on the back porch. Well, it's been cold out for weeks and she hasn't gotten to. Earlier this week it was nice and we all went outside - exciting, where there are toys and it's pretty child-proof...or was. I usually, after about 5 minutes, leave and go tidy up in the room adjacent to the porch, our bedroom and check on her every minute of so. Normally, she's pulling a petal at a time off of a fern. I walked outside and dropped the pile of folded clothes I was holding. She had climbed up into a patio chair and was turned around sitting backwards in it, bouncing, looking very smug and proud of herself. Needless to say, can't leave her out on the porch unsupervised anymore. RATS! So, after I pulled her out of the chair and told her 'danger' she wanted back up there. Well, who am I to be a fun-ruiner, so I told her okay, but only because mommy's here and she's watching. Trying to climb into a chair to sit is acceptable. Climbing from the chair onto the table to nibble a tangerine from the fruit bowl in the center is not, as her friend, Allison, learned to do yesterday. Well, so, she climbed up and back out over and over from the chair. A couple of times she got stuck. I've been trying to encourage her to say 'help' for weeks because I want her to know there's a word to ease her frustration and that the incessant whinning is just not necessary! And she said it! She was grunting and frustrated and she said 'help'! YAY! And then she said it 4 more times that day and hasn't said it since.

A friend gave me the first of T. Berry Brazelton's book on child development, 'Touchpoints 0-3' when I was pregnant. I've heard a bunch of moms talk about the book and it really is a GREAT reference. The best I have and I refer to it often.

Charlotte has tempter tantrums...already - not too bad, not too often, but they happen. It's funny how, as a mom, you always blame yourself. Well, luckily I have this great book, and it always helps. I usually read a chapter or two ahead and keep out my highlighter. It does no good to read ahead, not reallly, because the issues we usually come across are never the ones we expect to have to deal with. In the 'One Year' chapter I highlight all this stuff about diet and motor skills and speech, stuff that in all honesty, now that we're here, in the first year, we've done okay figuring out. Temper tantrums, on the other hand, that section was ignored by my highlighter so I had to go back and look it up. Here's what it says:

Not all babies get independently suddenly and dramatically. But when they do, I am always gladd to see it (he's a pediatrician). This is a real touchpoint if parents can see the progress it represents. Though it means the love affair of the first year is over, the burst of autonomy is normal and healthy. A baby's struggle to express herself and to find out her own limits will take many years. This kind of baby shows us that she'll do it openly. that becomes easier in the long run, believe it or not. Blah blah blah and then: When this new independence comes, parents inevitably worry about spoiling. An independent one-year-old is not a spoiled child.

Charlotte doesn't like to find daddy's belly button but she does like to give him kisses. But for some reason, she opens her mouth real wide...like she's going after his nose instead.