Papa, Nana, & Aunt Mariah came up to our house this Thanksgiving. Nana brought a fun, pink bonnet and a beautiful, black jacket for Jada. Here she is modeling her new accessories. :-)

Jada's new favorite toy... a box. She was totally content sitting in the box and riding along the floor.

Spending time with Aunt Mariah.

Mmm... candied yams, butternut squash, cranberry jelly, turkey, & rolls.

And, of course, Baby needs some food too...

Here's an awesome video of Jada copying my sounds. Listen carefully for "Daddy", "Mama", & "Wow". :-)

Jada is now 11 months old, as of this past Friday. Cruising is her preferred method of moving around even though she can take a few steps on her own. Once she gains a bit more confidence in her balance skills, she will be running around without holding on to furniture in no time!

She now has all four of her front, bottom teeth and two top teeth (her incisors, not the front ones) are about to cut through. These top teeth have bothered her much more than the bottom teeth. She's been a tough little trooper, but boy does that Tylenol work wonders!

Gabe & I went out to a dinner auction for his work on Friday night and Nana & Papa stayed the night to watch Jada while we were out. It was the first night that Mommy & Daddy weren't home for her bedtime routine. She did extremely well, though & went down without a fuss. I'm so proud of her. It was very fun for me to dress up & go out to a nice dinner with Gabe, too. :-)

Jada loves giving kisses. She gives kisses to Mommy, Daddy, and all of her babies. Even pictures of babies, actually. She looks at the dolls & pictures of babies, says very compassionately, "Dee Dee" (her word for "baby"), then gives them a kiss. It's SO adorable. Here's a short video of her picking up her baby & giving her a kiss.

Jada's third word is "Wow"! Considering it was preceded with "Daddy" then "Mama", I'm going to consider the progression to be a compliment to us... "Daddy...Mama...WOW!". Ha ha ha. She said "Mama" for the first time last night then "Wow" this morning. Last night, Jada was feeling tired and was ready to go to bed. She deliberately looked at me and said, "Mama"; it made me melt. My baby calls me "Mama". :-)

This morning as she was climbing on her walker (one of her favorite activities, might I add), I was talking to her and commented on something that she did. I said, "Jada, wow!". She looked back at me and repeated, "wow". We then went back and forth with our "wow"s.

Here's a little clip of Jada practicing her new word. I love her enthusiasm; that's my girl!!!

Four is a big number is Jada's life right now. She has four teeth (all on the bottom!) & has officially moved up to size four diapers! She's growing up so fast.

Here's a cute picture of our Jada Bear all bundled up to run errands on Saturday (cute beany courtesy of Lisa Brown; check out "Clackamas Crochet Chick" on etsy.com if you want one for yourself!). She's such a cutie.



Jada definitely loves adventure. She loves climbing on anything and everything. Here she is playing on (yes, I said ON) the dishwasher.



Although we run through the house (while she holds on to my fingers) and are physically active throughout the day, she seems to have crazy amounts of excess energy. According to Nana, her daddy was the same way when he was little (& at times, still is). Here she is burning some energy after lunch by kicking in her highchair. :-)

Jada took her first steps tonight (11/4/09)! We are so incredibly proud of her. I am SO happy that Gabe & I were both able to experience this together; what an amazing blessing. A couple minutes after she took her first steps, we tried again with the camera and were able to capture some more steps to share with everyone... Enjoy!



Earlier today, Jada & I met up with Becky & David in downtown Hillsboro for an awesome afternoon of pumpkin pie lattes (for the mommies) & playing outside! We had a fabulous time enjoying awesome company, crisp fall air, and the beautiful outdoors. Here are pictures of the kiddos in action...









On a separate note, Jada's 3rd tooth came in yesterday; it's the bottom tooth to the left of the two middle teeth. What a busy week!

For Halloween, Jada dressed up as a disciple. Daddy even tied a little, plastic man to a stick with fishing wire, so that she could be a "Fisher of Men". Yes, quite cheesy indeed, but so very cute. :-) We headed over to the Canby Conference Center for Athey's Harvest Festival. There were fun booths with various games to play, a bounce house (she'll LOVE that when she's a little older), and even a short skit. Jada was actually pretty entertained with the skit. :-) We had a fabulous time.