9 months!

Tag turned 9 months on Feb 21st. I think if you look closely at this picture, you will see that he has grown quite a bit. This is a 12 month outfit. As you can see, the pants are riding up the calves, the crotch snaps have split open, etc. He typically wears 9-12 month clothes, but this outfit was so cute (bugs are so boyish, right?) that I had to put him in it. These photo shoots are cracking me up these days because I used to take literally like 50 pictures and like 40 of them were keepers. These days I can snap about 5 or 6 and then he's clear across the room with the sign in his teeth. Here are a couple of the keepers. And here's what I was talking about...I cannot believe how much this kid has changed, even in just the last couple of months. He is so much more aware and opinionated - he notices when we leave a room (and doesn't like it) and he knows which toys he wants (to take from his sister) and which ones he won't settle for. He really wants to crawl but hasn't mastered it, so he is developing mad scooting skills! He can army crawl forwards and "normal crawl" backwards - hence getting stuck here under the couch...And he loves to laugh - I love to see him crack himself up like he did here...And he's usually in a great mood right after he eats - gotta feed that belly!
He still loves to play with the piano and keeps trying to pull up on it but can't quite muster the strength to haul up that belly and those thighs! Speaking of which, time for some more nekkid shots :)I'm continually falling deeper in love with this kid. He has been sick and feeling mostly bad for like the last month and yet he still has smiles for us and has been such a trooper on lots of trips to the doctor, lots of poking and prodding, medicine, and ear pain. I think we are on the road to recovery, but he's not 100% there yet. He's got some serious faces these days where he really looks like he's pondering his next move. So Kinsey and Emma get a lot of facetime on the blog. You know, Kinsey totally looks up to Emma like she is the epitome of a cool grown-up girl. Case in point - Kinsey has never seen a Barbie movie except once at Emma's house and today she told me that Barbie is her most favoritest tv show. Anyway, the McBrides churn out some cool kids and I'm just really grateful that they thought ahead and created a super-cool grown-up boy in Jacob. We have started trading off date nights with the McBrides and watching each others' kids, so Tag is getting to hang out with Jacob more often and I'm really glad because Tag is becoming pretty taken with him. Jacob shared his cool baseball cap with him last week. Thanks for being a cool kid Jacob!!!
Kinsey has been in serious dress-up and role-play mode this week. We have been playing Ariel and Prince Eric, Belle & the Beast, and most recently, Emma and Dionne. She cracks me up with the things she wants us to do when we are pretending to be someone else. Yesterday when we were Emma and Dionne, she took a moment out to be Kinsey again and informed me that she was going to marry Kurt (Dionne's husband). It was so funny. Here she is yesterday in her princess dress, being Emma, having lunch. Every morning we get up and she has an immediate request: "Mommy can I keep my nightgown on for a while?" (she's pretty much nightgown obsessed) And then, "I need to put some shoes on now!" It's usually these, bright red ones with rhinestones from Nana. They are about a size and a half too big, but she loves them and wears them all day every day :)
She is really into climbing things and balancing on things and in general looking for ways to injure herself every day. Yesterday I came out from putting Tag down for a nap and saw this...And then she wanted to stay there and relax for a while. Last week we got a little crafty. Kinsey loves flags and so we made a "Kinsey's Favorite Things" flag. It includes stickers from her favorite shows, names of good friends, foods she likes, etc. She has had a blast waving it around. I think she's going to be crafty :)This afternoon we went to lunch with Daddy and Tag had some carrots - looks like he enjoyed them :-).So next week is Kinsey's 3rd birthday (or as she calls it, her "three birthday") and she's getting really excited. This is cracking me up - I told her for her birthday dinner that she could have all of her favorites and this is what she requested (in order):
-corn on the cob
-broccoli
-shrimp
-birthday cake
-cheese
-cherry tomatoes
-bell peppers

later everyone!