Play date, liquid intake and baby doll lovin'

Today was so much fun. E and the kids came over this morning for a play date and we had such a blast hanging out, eating snacks, waiting for the cuckoo clocks, and just enjoying little people being little people. I love watching Nedy watch other kids, always with a "hmmmm...I wonder if I could do that" look on her face. I'm looking forward to Nedy growing up with E's kiddos--we just love them.

Nedy continues to amaze us. She is such a curious, outgoing, strong-willed little being. It seems every day brings some new discovery. Today she was having fun with her baby doll--feeding her, hugging her, patting her back. It makes my heart swell to see her mimic nurturing with her doll. Just the idea that she knows how to give love to a baby...it just makes me so grateful for the love she's been given and that which she is open to receiving from us.

Nedy is now napping twice a day in her crib! HOORAY! We are hopeful that nights in the crib are just a couple weeks away. In the meantime, she is continuing to sleep through the night in her stroller. Man, am I ever thankful for a kid that sleeps!

On the food front, I think we have a foodie on our hands. Nedy will try anything new. Last night we sauteed spinach in bacon and ground it up in the Cuisinart and she LOVED it. I mean, LOVED, LOVED, LOVED it. We had to cut her off for fear of a stomach ache. Tonight we had Bob-Bob and Ne-Ne's fantastic beef stew and ground that up for her--again, LOVED it. She really seems to love new foods. The only time she seems to reject food is when she had it recently--aside from the yogurt and apple sauce staples. She needs variety, I guess. :) Dan is loving that she likes food and is making all sorts of stuff to grind up in the food processor. She has teeth and can chew, but we find she tends to "hold" food in her mouth much longer when she has to chew, so we grind up the main part of the meal and then give her self-feed food chunks as a supplement after we get the main stuff into her. We're kind of obsessed with getting a lot of food into her, as she's not much into drinking at all. I can get 3-4 ounces of formula into her via her sippy cup first thing in the morning, but after that, it's a huge struggle. She will take water from a spoon (yes, a spoon) so we give her about 8 ounces daily of that. And tonight we discovered that we can give her formula with a turkey baster (yes, a turkey baster), so that's what we're doing for now. We've tried a million bottles, sippy cups, and different liquid options, but she's just not into it. Our doctor told us we could move her to milk if she rejects formula, but she doesn't like milk either, so we'll continue to try getting the formula into her with the turkey baster. Between that, the water via spoon and liquidy foods, she has wet diapers and enough liquid to make a ton of drool, so I guess I'll be content with this system for now. As everyone tells me, the phases pass eventually. I'm not a big liquid person myself, so you'd think I'd get it! :)