Funny Faces

As I uploaded these pictures, I realized a lot of them are funny faces, so I'm going to call it a theme and run with it. :)

Making faces with Papa.

Little Dunker.

(Mike's hands are right outside the shot, because this was a very precarious place to sit).

This is a little slide that is currently taking up residence in our living room. Mike took Reed and pushed him up the slide, and he thought it was the greatest thing ever.

Happy Reed:

Really Happy Reed:

So what has this little dude been up to lately? Well, he's fully mobile now, crawling all over the place, sitting up on his own, and trying to pull himself up on anything and everything. Also, as of yesterday, he's finally getting his top teeth in, which is fun, but I'll also miss the two-toothed grin, which is probably my favorite baby feature. He's really good at saying "Dada" but we're still working on "Mama". It's a sign of who his favorite parent is, for sure. He's also really good at screaming and random noises, and likes to cough on purpose because he knows it gets attention. He'll cough and smile and then do it again. He loves eating with his hands and is starting to get little tastes of table food once in a while in addition to his baby food and Cheerios. I also love that he can sit up (and get into sitting up position) on his own now. It makes baths really fun too, Rachel and Reed both love taking baths.

Rachel wanted a close-up

...Or two

...or three

She loves the camera. And I love taking pictures of her. It's win-win.
And what's Rachel been up to? Well, her vocabulary is just exploding and she talks all the time. I love that she can actually tell me what she's thinking and follow fairly complex directions. Besides excessive whining, we really haven't seen much "Terrible Twos" yet. Rachel loves making people happy, and has always been a cautious and mellow person. She's such a sweetheart, and I think I ask her for kisses at least 20 times a day, because I know a day will come when she won't give them so freely. She loves going outside to play with the neighborhood kids, and to get the mail with me every day. And I love watching her play, as she's having more imaginative play all the time, with her dollhouse and stuffed animals. It also amazes me the things she knows already - she can count to 10 on her own, can identify a bunch of shapes (including hexagon and rectangle, which particularly impress me), knows her right from her left, and knows all her basic colors, except she always calls black brown.

This is the first time I've seen the two of them actually playing together, since I don't count Reed constantly pulling Rachel's hair as "playing together."

Again with the green snake. :)

Rachel probably knows more about electronics than most Grandmas. She's an expert with my iPhone. Here she is multi-tasking.

And this is what she's looking at on the laptop, which is pretty much the only thing she uses it for:

Having the video camera on and looking at herself. She loves making funny faces at herself. :)

Reed's funny face:

And, hey look! Some pictures that actually have Mike and I in them!

I don't know why I've been so bad at blogging lately, but I'll try to do it more often. I think the good weather we've been having lately might be to blame.