Joy in June

When looking back at these pictures taken throughout June, I realize that it was a good month with some great motor achievements! Gabi started the month figuring out how to open every single door in our house, big RUH ROH for us! She could first open the lever and push out, but it quickly became easy to turn the levers and pull doors open.  Since there really is no outstanding product to babyproof these types of handles, Nana asks, "Did you figure out what you're going to do about the doors?" My obvious answer was "Let her go into anywhere she wants to in the whole house...?" Seemed responsible at the time...right?

BUT, the HUGE news of the month of June was that at 16.5 months, this girl - who takes her time doing things as she wants to - decided it was time to START WALKING! She had been "so close" for "soooo long," and one day woke up and decided she was ready to let go. In less than 2 weeks after that, Gabi mastered the skills of getting up on her own (without pulling up on something) and squatting. With all those skills put together, she was a master walker by the end of the month, walking on grass, sand, rocks, etc, and you'd never know there was any delay.

With the skill of walking checked off her list, Gabi's language took a huge growth spurt this month, and we predict it's only going to explode from here. Her level of understanding amazes us, but her expressive language is so impressive as well!

...and we have a WALKER!!!

She didn't need the help of toy walkers anymore, so now she decides to push 2 at once.

Mommy is certainly proud of this word being introduced in Gabi's early vocabulary.

She loves music. She loves dancing. She has some pretty unique moves too. Only a few are displayed below. (She loved that we were installing the radio shelf and had to have the radio down where she could reach it.)
Gabi knows how to have fun at the park:

Pretty special Mommy-Gabi selfies:

and just for fun - double tickle attack

:/ MMMMM, She didn't do it???

Yup, she sure can. And she lets other babies in too.

waiting for Daddy to come home to open his card and present

We visited our Splash Pad again, this time with our awesome Houston hat from Aunt Sandi!

too cute to smile

One of Gabi's new favorite pastimes is to play with her cousins' pictures from the fridge. They often make it into her stroller to be pushed around the house.

She currently LOVES singing "Noah" over and over and over, but these 2 were the highlight one day.

A Sunday morning review in pictures:


Some preferred eating styles: 

in a princess chair

double fisting

from the ginormous serving spoon

This is how you teach tough babies to eat a banana. Open it yourself or deal with the peel. That's how we roll.

Some preferred relaxing styles:

in baby brother's car seat

topless on a pillow

with Daddy!

This month, we were introduced to Gabi's first ponytail! The Pebbles look was pretty darn cute. Pigtails and more followed. :)

ponytail twins with friend Kemper

Rockport Beach

Before we become a family of 4, we thought we deserved a family vacation, and we escaped for a couple of days to Rockport, Texas to enjoy the beach - and enjoy we did! Gabi absolutely loved the water and her first waves. She loved digging in the sand as long as the sand didn't touch her, and she smiled, giggled, and laughed almost the whole time. We captured some fantastic moments on camera for our memories and for our blog fans to enjoy!

This babe LOVED her first time at the beach!

Gabi has dug in dry sand and rocks before, but this was new fun!

These two were pretty cool dudes in their backwards hats.

First, an amazing family selfie!

And then a great family shot by a lovely stranger!

While Gabi LOVED splashing and digging, I'm pretty sure a third favorite part of the vacation was ALL the "teet teet"s!!! (her favorite animal as of now) Daddy had to show her what he used to enjoy doing with the teet teets when he was a little boy. Ahhh nurture...

We head back to the hotel for lunch and nap time, but someone decides it's play time! The king bed just wasn't big enough.

After we're all rested, we find Rockport's free aquarium, and Gabi loved looking at all the tanks of neat animals!

Yes, I had to.

Spending time on the pier in the afternoon:

more great family selfies :)

Day 2 comes, and we're ready to roll over to the beach again. But first, the obligatory tourist pictures:

Yup, this is what we call a beach babe. Yup, she can stand on her own. Yup, in sand.

Gabi was ready to go home after 2 great days at her first beach! Being my daughter, she was ready to take charge and drive the caravan herself.

On second thought, this is how she really felt after 2 days at the beach...