Emmy Stats, Updated

Em had her 4 month well child visit this week, and her growth stats were pretty impressive! She weighed 14 lb, 2 oz (50th percentile), and was 25 1/2 inches long....hold onto your hats, an impressive 90th percentile!!! She's got some long Stouder legs, evidently! Developmentally, the doctor said she was right on track. He encouraged us to start trying cereal since she's routinely taking about 34 oz of milk a day. She wasn't impressed with our first attempt, and wrinkled up her nose at the rice cereal. Actually, she looked rather disgusted by it. We'll keep trying, and maybe she'll discover a taste for it. Here's a picture of her first attempt....

It's a Jungle out There!

We live in a pretty wooded area, and as such, see a fair amount of wildlife on a regular basis. Our daily drive in and out of the neighborhood includes seeing loads of deer, rabbits, squirrels, birds, frogs, snakes (ugh!), turtles, and other interesting creatures. We have seen turtles several times in our yard, slowly walking through on their way to some unknown destination. In fact, this week, Keith saw the largest turtle yet, and snapped a few pictures! He had the idea to document some of the wildlife we see and post to our blog. We also have a bird in one of our hanging flowerpots who hatched a little baby birdie (or two...hard to tell). Got a pic of that to share as well. One of the local stray cats decided to have 2 kittens on one of our larger empty flower pots, back beside the shed. Once she realized we had discovered them (and were coming out to look at them regularly), she moved them. I had no idea what happened to the little things until about 1-2 weeks later when I saw one of them peeking out from beneath our neighbor's back porch. We see the momma cat in their yard regularly, so she's keeping a close eye on them. It's fun to see all this in our backyard, and we look forward to sharing some "animal adventures" with Emmy!

Showtime

So, I was thinking the other day, on my long commute to work...how many countless hours have I used up of my life watching movies. Good movies, bad movies, stupid mediocre movies. How many movies can I quote, recite a dialogue, or conjure up a scene? Too darn many. When I think about it, I probably have seen thousands of movies. Average movie = 2 hours....that's a lot of my life! Keith and I enjoy going to see movies, and like to try to stump each other by quoting odd lines from various films. (Sort of like how Keith likes to stump me with random 80's music that was clearly before my time!) It's amazing to walk through Blockbuster, searching for a movie to rent, and in my mind say "Seen it, seen it, seen it". That friends, can be a real wake up call!

So, in honor of this realization, I thought I would post some of my favorite movies (in no particular order).

1) When Harry Met Sally...way too many good quotes originate from this flick!
2) Lord of the Rings trilogy...didn't think I'd like the first one when Keith dragged me to it, but I was surprisingly hooked.
3) Harry Potter films...lots of good material there.
4) Shawshank Redemption...sort of a classic.
5) Murphy's Romance...gotta love Sally Field.
6) Terms of Endearment...too many similarities with my mother and I!
7) Home for the Holidays...Robert Downey Jr just cracks me up in this movie.
8) Silence of the Lambs...freaky deaky, but very quotable!
9) okay, pretty much any cute Meg Ryan film....You've Got Mail, IQ, French Kiss, Sleepless in Seattle
10) Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon...very cool effects.
11) The Pianist...Adrian Brody did a remarkable job.
12) Little Miss Sunshine...sort of an indie flick that made it big...laughed my butt off.

4 Months Old!

Yup, Emmy's four months old today! Here's a recent photo...check out Keith's new glasses! Isn't he hip?! Have you seen wrist rolls as big as Em's??

Holiday Weekend

For Memorial Day, we traveled to DC to visit Keith's family. We stayed with his Stacy, Greg & Abby in Woodbridge. Ed & Judy were up as well, and Kevin came over for the weekend too. It was a houseful of fun! Abby turned 3 earlier this month, and she was smitten with Emmy. She kept saying, "Look at her cheeks!", and counting her fingers & toes. Emmy was just as fascinated with her older cousin, and watched her very closely. We got some great photos of the two of them, and I'll share them here.

Emmy is grabbing toys now, and making all kinds of bubbles with her mouth. She's drooling more now, and blowing raspberries this week. I think she is very close to starting solid foods. I am waiting until her 4 month well-child visit to do so, but I think she'll be ready. She is sitting up in an excersaucer and eyeballing all the activities. She loves to push up with her legs when sitting on your lap, so she was definitely ready for the excersaucer. She's getting lots of rolls on her legs, arms and chin! I am very interested to see how much she weighs at her checkup in 2 weeks!

Keith and I went to see Fracture while his parents were visiting last week. It's the new Anthony Hopkins movie, and I really thought it was good. You spent the entire film trying to figure things out, and then there's a big "Ah-ha!" at the end. We watched Pan's Labyrinth on video last night...sad movie, but worth seeing. It's in Spanish with English subtitles. Speaking of subtitles...it must have been a good weekend for them! We watched Apocolypto and Letters from Iwo Jima over the weekend...both are subtitled. Both were good, but Apoco was intense and rather gory. It was interesting to see things from the Japanese perspective in Iwo Jima...good movie. We'd like to rent Flags of Our Fathers now to see the American side of the story.

Cute Photo of the Day

Emmy loves bathtime, and I caught this photo last night as we were drying her off. Her faces are getting so expressive!

Happy Mother's Day!

It's so special to be able to celebrate Mother's Day this year as a Mom. I woke up this morning to the sound of Keith changing/feeding Emmy at around 6 am. Keith had gone out VERY early this morning to bring me home flowers, and had a lovely card for me as well. He ordered an awesome charm bracelet with a black & white photo of Emmy and I. I LOVE IT! It has room for more photos in the years to come. The link for the jewelry website is to the right...check it out!

I took several photos today, as I want to do a scrapbook page for my first Mother's Day. I'll share my favs, as well as a pic of my bracelet. We took a walk around the neighborhood this afternoon, and will be going out for dinner tonight at our favorite Singaporian restaurant...okay, so it's the only one we know, but it's still our fav!

To our mama's...Happy Mother's Day and thanks for all you do/have done for us! We love you lots!