11 months

Okay this may be a Charley-picture overload but I took some 11month photos in our apt the other day and they turned out so cute (at least the non-blurry ones!) Out of the 30 pictures I took, these 13 were the ones that she wasn't crawling around trying to touch my camera. I gave her my lens cap to keep her busy and she kept it the whole time! AND her two favorite blankets that she keeps with her everywhere she goes! A childhood friend gave her the soft pink owl-blanket and one of my good friends in Utah gave her the mini light pink blanket. Charley takes her naps and goes to bed with them. It's pretty cute to see her snuggle up to them and start sucking her thumb when she is tired. 

This girl is one happy lady! If all babies were like this, I would have at least a dozen. She is a trooper and super mellow! She goes on runs with me, walks around the crazy city with me, sleeps with her window open at night with all the loud sirens and people yelling and still has a smile on her face the next morning! We recently bought a bike and a child seat for her too! Our friends gave us a helmet for her but it is still a wee-big and so we have to put on a beanie first and then the helmet! She protested the first couples times we did it and now she just knows it's part of going on our bike ride! I think I feel more bad for her than she does! She really is a champ. 

Charley has two bottom teeth, is crawling at 20 mph, and is starting to pull herself up onto things. Just yesterday at the park she also started walking around with a toy walker! It was amazing how quick they start to do things and learn on their own. I love watching her grow! Last night we were playing in her room and she also stood up and balanced on her own for a few seconds. Spencer and I both clapped and and were telling her "good job!" and I think she understood that she did something pretty cool and then did it again. It's probably only something first time parents get giddy about but we were so excited! 

Can we just talk about this hair? LOVE! 

Charley is down to one nursing at night and is still eating solids like a champ! She loves the smoothies I make even when it is carrot and broccoli :) Her favorite foods are eggs, yogurt and oatmeal in the morning; turkey, chickpeas, carrots and cheese for lunch and chicken, sweet potatoes, green peas and corn for dinner. And ANY and ALL fruit! We pushed back her sleep schedule to 8pm since we wanted to be out and about during these nice summer nights so she usually goes down around then and wakes up at 7am. She is taking two naps, at 10:00 and 2:30.  

Her favorite play buddies are Violet from downstairs, our neighbors Megan and Don (and their two dogs of course!), James, Mia, Oliver and Elsa, Wren, Greyson and Mabel. 

Fun fact! She started saying "dada" with intention and now says it all the time when Spencer walks into the room or when she wants to go see him in his "office" aka our bedroom. She says "mama" too but I don't think she knows it's me. She is also clicking with her tongue which is hilarious to watch:) 

We love our little Charley girl! 

June so far

 June has been such a great month and we are only half way done! It has been pretty rainy which I am okay with since I have heard NYC summers are miserable and humid. I am not really looking forward to the August heat, so we have been trying to take advantage of this cool summer so far. A few weeks ago we went to Madison Square Eats and got some yummy food! There were a bunch of food vendors at Madison Square Park that were serving all kinds of yummy foods. We bought a really good bulgogi beef burrito and then got some shrimp tacos. AHH the food here is so amazing we feel so spoiled to live in the middle of the the greatest food industry in the world. You can literally find anything here, it's amazing! 

 Charley and I have been hitting up the splash pad a lot too. There are a few really fun ones around where we live that Charley just loves! One has water fountains all around it that shoot out water and Charley loves getting her hands in the water as it squirts out. She also will try to slurp up the water like it's a water fountain. The splash pad has a few inches of water all the way around it so it's like a mini pool too which is fun! It's actually an ice-skating rink in the winter which is a genius idea! 

The kids were done at this point, but we wanted to get a picture of them anyway! 

 Charley is my little garden helper too! Every morning we water our plants on our deck and she loves to get into the mud and pull out the cilantro and eat it. 

 We went to this AMAZING Italian restaurant a few nights ago. We found a babysitter and went into Greenwich Village to go to Babbo. We didn't get a picture together, but I took a picture of the menu. We ended up doing the tasting menu which was so good. This place is owned by the Iron Chef, Mario Batali. He is on the food network and is that famous chef who is always wearing shorts and orange crocs:) Anyway, the tasting menu had 7 courses and each course was a small portion but was so tasty and good! There was tortellini, steak, ravioli and the best chocolate lava cake with raspberry sauce! 

Spencer and I also got our neighbor to watch Charley so we could go to a Yankees game. The subway takes you right there and it's a HUGE stadium. It was fun to cheer on the Yankees and watch a little baseball! 

 more splash pad fun! 

One night Spencer had some church meetings, so Charley and I walked up to the park to listen to Jack Johnson! It was so fun just sitting on the grass outside the stadium and listening Jack sing his heart out! Charley loved dancing to his music. 

 and... she is finally starting to stand! It's crazy how it happens overnight, but I finally found something that she can lift herself up onto. It has been hard living in an apartment and not having much that she can pull herself up onto, but one day I opened the dishwasher to get out a snack (yes we use it as extra storage and NOT for washing our dishes), and she came crawling over, so I put a few goldfish on the opened door and she stood right up to grab them! It was amazing!! 

 This is how we grocery shop these days.. love my little sidekick! 

 Yesterday we went to Coney Island and walked on the boardwalk. It is really cool down there with fun circus rides and the beach all in one! We want to go back with our suits and just sit out on the beach all day! There are playgrounds on the sand, so it's perfect to just spend the whole day there with rides, food, beach time and playgrounds. 

 She was a little tuckered out on the way home. 

 We are finally real New Yorkers with a bike and child bike seat to get around! We love this thing so much and so does Charley... well sort of. She cries for a little bit, but once we start going she is fine! Her helmet is a bit big, so we have to put a beanie on her head and then the helmet:) She is a trooper!