natalie lately

I've been kind of terrible at taking any pictures of Natalie this week.  She is maybe at her cutest EVER lately, and I am just failing miserably at capturing her sweetness in pictures and video.  Usually this is because I'm too busy enjoying her funny little personality to evn contemplate running to the other room to grab the camera.  Oh, well.  Here are a couple of the very blurry & imperfect shots I've captured of her in her element over the past couple of days:



- Eating "Gruffalo Crumble" (have you read The Gruffalo?  It was a gift from Aunt Emma, and we love it.  The dish above is actually just an unsweetened fruit cobbler with a bit of honey on top.  Natalie wasn't a huge fan, but she was super psyched that we were cooking the little brown mouse's favorite food).

- Our little Miss Bedhead is still in her crib (hopefully for as long as possible) because she just hasn't seemed to figure out that it's even an option to climb out of it.  This is crazy considering how much she loves to climb on EVERYTHING.  But, we're considering ourselves lucky that she just stays confined in bed hollering "I wake up!  Mommy, I wake up!" every morning instead of trying to climb out.

- Her "Cooper" (Cozy Coupe), a gift from Uncle Jon, is her most favorite thing on the planet right now.  It's been raining like crazy over the past couple of weeks, so we've had to bring it inside so she doesn't have a complete breakdown over not being able to play with it.  She puts all of her stuffed animals in, pretends to pump gas, tells me she is "Going to Atlantic City!" or "Just running a couple errands.  Quick, Mommy.  Just grocery store.  Get cookie maybe!" or "Let's go to Boston, k?"  It is adorable.  She prefers to watch Gabba while sitting in the little car, like she's at a drive-in.  We have to pretend to park it safely in a parking garage every night, and she waves goodnight to it before heading to bed.  It is so preposterously cute.

There are so many other little things about her developing personality and opinions that I want to make sure I record somewhere so I don't forget them.  She is talking so much, and everything she says makes me crack up.  Her daycare teachers told us recently that she has become their little translator--helping them to understand what the other kids are trying to say.  I just know we are in for it with this chatty little girl.