Halloween

We put a few pics up on Picasa today from the last week or two (including Ada as a daisy for Halloween). The closeout Halloween rack at Babies R Us is a great place to get a costume, by the way.

So smart!

Ada is talking all the time now.

She says:
Mama
Dada
Papa (always whispered)
Meme
Ghee (Granny, just like her dad used to call his Granny)
Nee (Nana or Nolan)
Meh (Aunt Megan)
Cha (Charlie)
Ta (our roommate Todd)
Chee (Cheerios)
Wa (water)
MMma! (Elmo)
B (blanket, Big Bird, belly button, balloon, or book)
Ba (bottle, ball or bath)
Saa (Sock)
Sues (Shoes)
Wee! (that means she wants to go to the park in the stroller and ride the rides...wee!)
Peas (please)
Da or Oof Oof (dog)
Maow (cat)
Bye Bye! (with a big Texas accent)
Night Night (also with an accent)
after praying with us each night, sometimes she says Amen
when we say "one, two..." she says, Free!
her new favorite, Nu Nu Nu Nu! (No!)

She's not only busy talking, but busy doing as well. She loves to turn the TV on and off. She plays her piano. She watches Sesame Street (Elmo's World is her favorite). When it comes on she dances! And she loves Mr. Rogers and a locally produced show called The Buscuit Brothers. She plays in her sandbox and runs around the yard with Nolan. She'll go into a room and close the door behind her. She loooves books, especially her children's bible. But it's rare that we get to read whole stories before she turns the page. She drags her blanket around behind her with her thumb in her mouth like Linus. Yesterday, she was with Sam and she put her thumb in her mouth, grabbed her blanket and walked into her room. She then walked over to the crib, patted on it and said, "night night." When she wants to go somewhere, she pats on the door and says, "bye bye!" She put her big stuffed Elmo to bed the other day by covering him with a blanket. She is getting quite good at problem solving with her toys.

Basically, our 14 month old daughter is brilliant. We just wanted you all to know.

Walking Talking Ada

We've not posted in a bit. Partly because of busyness, school, or unplanned for travels. But mainly, we've been disorganized and lazy. That should all end soon as Dad has been reading "Getting Things Done" and is now the archnemesis of disorganization and laziness.

A lot of our "free" time has also been spent chasing this toddler around and laughing at her... a lot. We put up a few new videos and pics on Youtube and Picasa, so make sure to check the links on the right. For now, here's some video.

1 Year Old

Ada turned 1 year old on Saturday. We had a party for her at our house that a lot of her friends and their families attended. There were also out of town family members of Ada's present. It was a great day filled with swimming, music, snacks, drinks, homemade ice cream, and of course... cake.

For tons more pictures and video, make sure to check out our Picasa and Youtube pages.

Catching Up

Ada’s just a couple of weeks from her first birthday, and she seems to be doing new things everyday:

-She stands up unsupported for 5-10 seconds.
-She takes one or two steps before needing to sit down.
-She can say “Daddy,” “ma,” “dog,” and has an inquisitive “Huh?” kind of noise when she doesn’t understand.
-She waves, french kisses on the mouth, and as of this morning, blows kisses too.
-She knows the difference in and points to: “Ada’s nose,” “mommy’s nose,” and “daddy’s nose.”
-She grabs her blanket and lays down on it or in it when she is ready for a nap or bed.
-It’s a tad early, but when you ask “How old is Ada?” she holds up one finger.

We had a great time on our first family vacation last month. We’ve put up pics from the last several weeks on Picasa and will soon have new video on Youtube as well.

Her new thing

The photo has nothing to do with what I'm writing about but it should make ya smile!

So Ada has been waving at people for some time now. It used to be a whole arm up and down motion, but now it's just a hand rotating from side to side like a pageant winner. Our little princess...

But yesterday Sam taught her to clap. They watched a local PBS show called the Biscuit Brothers and they sing and teach kids about music. And if there is anything that Ada likes, it's music! The girl is bound to be a musician...or a dancer...or both!

This Always Happens

I've had a few different blogs in the last several years, and it seems like this always happens - long amounts of time between posts. Life just gets busy, and other things always seem to be above blogging (parenting, pastoring, etc...). Still, we are sorry it's been so long and we'll try to do better. We do sometimes put up pics or Youtube videos even when we aren't writing, so remember to check those from time to time.

Here's a video of Ada crawling:

A Communal Blog

For the first time ever, we're both writing this blog together - stream of consciousness style:

Kim: We could talk about all of the new food she is eating.
Sam: Oh yeah, so far it's what? Peaches, carrots, apples...
Kim: Peas, Sweet potatoes
Sam: How do you spell potatoes? Ever since Dan Quayle messed it up I get self conscious.
Kim: Dan Quayle's nephew sold us our car, he's a nice guy.
Sam: Oh, bananas too. And still some rice cereal. Those two are the archenemies of her butt.
Kim: Ok, I don't know that we have to talk about all that.
Sam: You're right. Let's just say she sometimes has difficulty "going" and it makes us sad to hear her cry. It sucks that it's the first thing we can't really fix or help her with.
Kim: But the good thing about her crying is that she lets us know when she's going, so maybe we can put her on the little potty and have her potty trained by the time she's one...
Sam: Kim is always the optimist in our family. We should talk about other things now. Like how great we have been at updating our picture and video sites lately. Everyone should go look at them if you haven't yet. We're a lot better with that than we are at blogging.
Kim: I didn't think that it was possible, but she just keeps getting cuter. And now she has two teeth so we can't let her bite our fingers like we used to...owie.
Sam: The level of her cuteness is really too much to handle. It's hard not to smother her with kisses while holding her. And when other people talk about other children being cute, I want to say "Yes, they are cute. But ours is empirically and scientifically the cutest baby ever...in the world." We don't know how it happened; we both think of ourselves as average - but somehow we have created superbaby.
Kim: Hunny, you don't have to be so dramatic. But I do worry about the next child. How will they ever compare to her greatness? Are they doomed? But then again, I was worried that Damien Rice could never create music as beautiful as his first album, yet he did. So maybe we can too.
Sam: Who's being dramatic now? It's a good point though. I have a few rebuttals, then we will move on. First, it's entirely possible that Ada becomes less attractive with age; it happens pretty often. Secondly, if later Myrick children are less attractive, they can excel at other things besides being really really good looking. And finally,...well I forgot my last point. But we should wrap this up. It's getting to be pretty long and I think it's going to scare a lot of people.
Kim: Though you can't tell it from this blog, we really aren't such superficial people. We do care about things other than looks...look at us. Right now I'm wearing what I wore yesterday...and the day before that. Anyway, when Ada gets older, we know we won't be able to tell her so often that she's beautiful cause it will make her self-conscious and materialistic. We'll tell her how great she is at the piano and how nice she is to everyone. We look forward to seeing who she grows up to be.
Sam: Of course. So in conclusion, there are new pics, new videos, Ada eats things, sometimes poops, has some teeth and we think she is beautiful. Am I forgetting anything?
Kim: Ada and Nolan are getting along great now. They love each other! You can see the video of the two of them at the bottom of this blog. And lastly we are going to dedicate Ada on Easter. Come to Mosaic that night if you can make it. We will be such proud parents.
Sam: Thanks for reading and indulging our boredom while we are rained in and Ada is napping. We love you all and hope to see you soon.

Sam and Kim, over and out.

"They grow up so fast..."

Everyone says so and everyone is right. Ada has such a big personality these days. She laughs at us when we make funny faces and she screams at the top of her lungs when she gets bored...which is often. She's not even mad a lot of the time, she just likes to scream for attention. She loves to go places and see things and people. She loves to be in the Baby Bjorn facing out when I go to Whole Foods so that everyone can smile at her and stop to talk to her and tell her how beautiful she is. She hates being stuck in the back seat of the car all by herself. She's a social one, for sure. We have a bedtime routine that we stick to religiously and she responds the same way every night. She loves her bath, especially now that her Meme got her some flashing ducks to go in the water with her. She doesn't like to be dried off and she always screams when I put lotion on her (she's just like her Daddy there--he hates lotion) and she hates when I put clothes on her. She prefers to be naked. Too bad it's so cold!

She's so much fun right now. I love being with her. I'm so glad that I have the opportunity to spend so much time with her. Thank you, Sam, for making sacrifices with me so that I can have the job that I do and so that I can be home most of the time. We may never have much money, but I'm so happy.