A little progress this week

She needs hair cut again

Last time I cut Sophia's hair was mid May. Her hair grows so fast.

A corner of our home

This year we invested some money in garden, new fence, new door, new pavement. However the outcome is not as good as any year before. We had our first cucumber yesterday which is one month later than last year, pepper is still tiny, eggplant is still a sprout, not flowers at all, tomato overgrown, nothing too exited.

If you have a boy...

you will love this cushion cover I made. The front fabric is cut from a curtain made by Ralph Lauren, back fabric is thick navy linen, and ribbon ties are from baby Gap, all my favorites go into this cute cushion cover.
It's made for the coming up sample sale. Here is a sneak peek...

一个准妈妈写的...

字数不多,却令我淆然泪下

我的生命不够茁壮，我如何去孕育他（她）？
我的个性不够强势，我将来如何去保护他（她）？
我拙于与人交流，我如何去聆听他（她）且让他（她）懂得我？
我自己尚未真正在这世上立足，如何才能为他（她）去挣最美最好的人生？
我无半点生存智慧，如何才能教会他（她）面对纷繁复杂的世界？

Big plan vs. small progress

Wzg and I both have a big plan for the weekend, however we did very little progress. I don't even have a picture to share, wzg has this one...

6 Months

Children always give you surprise, no matter how old they're.
In the first 6 months life of Sophia, we experienced a lot of milestones, from a little peanut to a happy chubby baby, there are too many things to list. I must admit that my memory of that part is fairly vague now. Not because I didn't pay much attention, it's just because Sophia keeps giving me more and more surprises as she grows.
In a couple of days Sophia will turn 2.5, we're not celebrating her half birthday but I think I should write down something about her at this time in case all the memories are faded some day.
In the last 6 months, Sophia has changed so much. I don't judge it from her daycare evaluation anymore because that thing will fit any 2.5 years old, nothing Sophia specific.
Her language skill is the biggest improvement, she not only talks a lot but also talks very clear now.
She tells me the names of all her daycare friends, and even pointed a car at parking lot and said "Mommy, that's Parker's car" and she was right. She still likes to say "That's mine" with a very serious face. I even heard her saying that while sleeping.
Sophia can count 1 to 4 and then 7. She knows the name of 7 days of the week but not able to tell them in order.
When Sophia sees some nice toy in store she will tell me "This is nice, Mommy I need this". She never says "I want this".
There was one time we were shopping in the mall, I brought her with me to a fitting room to try on a shirt. When I had that shirt on, Sophia said "Mommy, you, so cute". I bought that shirt immediately.
I sometimes do sewing while watching Sophia play in basement. When I had a little something done, I showed Sophia, Sophia said "Mommy, good job!".

Her favorite things:
TV, she always asks me if she can watch TV, now she likes "Miffy and friends" at YoYo TV, she also likes other cartoon shows, but not crazy about any.
Milk, Chocolate milk is still her favorite drink so far, she also likes coconut juice.
Tofu is her favorite Chinese food, snow crab leg is her favorite restaurant food, she also loves all those American food: cheese, ham, meat ball, hot dog, French fries...
Snack, she loves all kinds of nuts, but we're a little concern about choking hazard, so very careful, not letting her eat by herself. Mini Oreo is her favorite, too.
Favorite toys, Sophia is very into pretend play now, she can play all by herself for hours with any little people figures, any play set, she asks her dolls to go to bed, eat, drink, and even timeout. She still loves books as before. She can play all her puzzles very well with minimum help. The only thing that she hates is her used-to-be-loved TV chair. She haven't sit in it for at least three months. She wants to sit in Sofa like mommy and daddy while watching TV.
Sophia loves to play outside, she asks to stop at playground whenever we see one on the road, she even called "7 flags" playground when we saw it from highway. Sophia started to like to play sand since we were back from Angela's house. So we got a sand box at home, but haven't get to use very much (waiting wzg's pergola to be done).
The thing that made me happy was her potty training. She started on Saturday, it's almost a week now. I was amazed at her big progress during past 6 days. She had 3 accidents on the first 2 days of daycare, then Wednesday and Thursday were accident free. She had an accident last night while she was sleeping. Hopefully I don't need to buy any diapers anymore.
The Thing that frustrated me is bed time. Since I started sleep training she did so well that she never went to bed after 9:30 and always fell asleep by herself in her own bed. However, all those training were a waste when she found out mommy's bed is nicer 4 weeks ago. I could never be able to have her go to her own bed. This morning wzg complained again and asked me to find some way to move her back to her own bed. I'm still thinking, how? Sophia is now smart enough to know how to cry and makes me give in.

Shallow box + Apples

Since last week I have addicted to shallow box frames. I looked everywhere for good looking, good size and good price shallow box frames. Ikea has a good selection, I like their square ones, 5.5''x5.5" and 9"x9" ones are good size, but the quality isn't great, I passed. Target has some random ones on clearance, but most of them are premade which I don't like. Eventually I bought a 8"x10" simple white frame with very shallow box space to display all the apples I made during TV time every night.
I'll keep looking for shallow box frames while shopping. Hopefully I can find one as nice as the one I found last year. I fill it with some random memories during the year, will update with some new things soon.

ETA: I just found a vintage shallow box at local thrift store yesterday for less than $4, I'll show it after some TLC.

Bye, Chicago!

We just had a short vacation at Chicago. Short but great, we spent lots time with friends, had lots of good eats, Sophia had tons of fun, too. And came back with a wonderful gift, Barbie and Barbie house.