As Chris and I sat down for our date night last night, the conversation of course, turned towards Jocelyn. This wasn't an unusual event, as she is one of the largest part of our lives. It's more of the the picture of the smile that comes over both of us as we talk about her. The warmth that fills our hearts when we think about her, and the laughter that comes from our lips. This child has brought us more happiness and enjoyment then we could ever have expected.
She is growing up so quickly and everyday I see her attempting new feats. Today I watched her try to put the rings back onto their holder and also watched her walk down the hallway all by herself (although I was in front of her coaching her along the way.)
Books continue to be her fascination, although she is becoming attracted to other toys now too. Her new thing is to point up to the book shelves we have in her bedroom and say "booooook" while waving her pointed finger about. In Jocelyn language that means "I don't want to read the books in the basket any more, I'd much rather get a hold of those enticing books you have so nicely placed on those shelves. Of course though, once I get a hold of them, I will quickly realize I don't want to read them because they don't have soft things to touch and play with and will merely begin to throw them all on the floor... but really, you should let me get a hold of them."
Crawling is still #1 in J's book, and walking is something she does only to amuse Mommy and Daddy. I spoke with the Doctor in case this was something to be concerned about, but she felt it's fine and J will become a stronger walker in her own time.
Talking however, is a different story. Jocelyn says new words on a daily basis, most of them just mimicking what ever it was you said, but some of her fav't new ones are:
* book (or booooook), no-no (for most things), peas, cheese, shoes, Mi-mi (Mima), Pop-pop, Daddy (an advanced Dada). As mentioned earlier, Chris and I have also started to have date nights again (and by again, I mean the first time in 15 months). We always swore we would be the couple that did them, but time just gets away from you and suddenly, we're 15 months later without a sitter or time to catch up with one another. So we found a girl that we liked (a young girl from the neighborhood) and we started her out as a Mommy's helper during the early evenings. This allowed me to get my tutoring work done without stressing, and it worked out so well that we quickly moved her to night time sitting. Having her on speed dial has been the second big game changer for us (the first was putting the car into a garage here in the city). The sense of freedom that comes along with calling someone to sit in your apt while you go and act like adults is amazing!
Chris continues to really enjoy his job, and we are so thankful that he is with such a good, family oriented company. He splits his time between here in the city and Long Island, so he's on the road quite a bit, but on the road now means Rockville Center, not Florida.
I continue work as a Math tutor 2 nights a week, which I love. I currently have 6th, 7th and 9th grade students and I love the challenge of working with all of them. For the fall I'm looking to go back and begin acquiring the 10 additional math credits I'll need to become fully certified as a secondary math teacher (I currently hold an elementary w/ math specialty certification).
We really feel blessed right now, and thank the Lord every day for the family he's given us.
