11 months

Only one more month until William is 1!  William is very active and into everything.  He pulls up on everything and has started moving from the sofa to the coffee table and back.  He loves to climb up the fireplace and pull out the gravel inside and when we tell him no he shakes his head and grins.  We have given him a bunch of foods with dairy in them and he has been doing great.  We haven't tried pure cheese or milk again, so we will test him with that sometime soon.  He takes 2 naps each day and drinks about 3 bottles. 

This month William said his first word!  He loves the Elmo video with the ducks and says quack quack along with them.  When we ask him what a duck says, he answers "quack" and is so proud of himself.  When you say hi or bye bye, he waves, and sometimes says bye bye back to us.  He copies everything we say, so sometimes it's hard to tell if he knows what he is saying or is just repeating us.  We can't wait to celebrate his first birthday next month!

Twins

Playing in a box

Dinner with cousins

A few weeks ago we went to Uncle Scott and Aunt Jan's house for dinner with the family.  All of the cousins were there, and the kids had a blast playing together!  Their favorite activity was crawling through the coffee table in the sunroom.  We even managed to get a picture of all 6 cousins together.  We can't wait to play with everyone again soon!

Julia and William

Squish

Having fun

Julia, Evelyn, Allan, Ben, William, and Sophia

The big kids

Sinai Circus

Every year on the last day of camp (or as Sophia calls it, "regular school"), the teachers and kids put on a Circus performance for the parents to come and watch.  During the week the kids make their own costumes and practice their act.  The three year olds were lions this year. 

Parade around the room with all of the "acts".  

William can't wait to see Sophia!  Sitting with Nana and Pop

Hi everyone!  Walking up with Aunt Jenn

The lions had to crawl through the hoops.  The teachers are the lion trainers.

Lion Sophia crawling through the hoops

End of our trip

One of the last days of our trip, Ronni and I took Sophia and Max out for a fun morning in Stresa.  We planned to go on a boat ride, but the kids wanted to ride the train instead!  We walked around and played by the fountain until it was time for the train to leave.  The train took us around the town of Stresa, and the kids enjoyed eating their grisini during the trip.  When we got back, we walked around town and had some yummy gelato before heading back home. 

Playing in the fountain

Sophia at the fountain 


 

















Posing with our train




















Choo choo!

Ready to go

On the train, eating her grisini

Yum....gelato

Last cousins picture of the trip!  Eating one last popsicle together

Alpine bobsled video

In the last post i said you wouldn't be able to see the Alpine bobsled video by email, but forgot to tell you how to get to it!

Click the following link:

http://molinarifamily.blogspot.com/2012/08/mottarone.html

And scroll to the bottom. The video will be there.

Mottarone

Above Gignese, where we were staying, there is a mountain called Mottarone. It's not a huge mountain, but it's a nice day trip for skiing in the winter and hiking in the summer. We took Sophia and William up one morning, went on the Alpine bobsled (well, Sophia did, William was too little), had lunch and went back down to Gignese. It was a great morning outing.

Instead of driving the 20 minutes up the mountain we took a cable car. Sophia loved this.

At the top of the cable car ride.

On the chairlift going to the top of the mountain. Thank goodness for this or we would have not made it to the top.

On the way up on the chair lift.

Daddy and Sophia overlooking the lake

At the top of the mountain there is an Alpine bobsled. Basically you sit in a little car that's on a track, and you control the break with your hands. We were sure Sophia was going to come back scared, but instead she wanted to go over and over again, as FAST as possible! (A video is at the bottom of this post. You wont be able to see it by email)















Daddy and Sophia going by.

Sophia also rode with Mommy, but she was going too slow!

A nice picture of the lake and some islands on it.

Day trip to Milan!

Towards the middle of our vacation, Mommy and Daddy went on a special day trip to Milan with Sophia. We left William with Nonno and Nonna and made a special day of the outing. Sophia loved riding the subway and chasing the pigeons in Piazza del Duomo was her favorite thing of the day!

Just out of the subway in Piazza San Babila. We walked around and looked in all kinds of nice shops. That's the Duomo in the distance.

Shortly after getting into Milan we stopped for lunch. We went to a favorite place of ours called Charleston. It's where we always go when in Milan for lunch. Delicious!

Sophia and Mommy had pizza. Good stuff!  Daddy had pasta and then seafood. Yum!

During the whole lunch Sophia kept asking to go to the race car store that was next door to the restaurant.

After the Ferrari store we kept walking until we reached the Duomo. So beautiful!

Sophia was more interested in chasing pigeons. She did this for a good 10 minutes. This poor guy just kept waddling away and she kept chasing this particular one down.

We bought some corn and had Sophia hold it out. She enjoyed this but was kind of scared of the pigeons as soon as they landed on her. She didn't understand to keep her hand flat for them to peck from.

 
Feeding the birds

Of course after the pigeons we had to go spin on the Bull's Balls! They say it brings good luck. This has been done by so many visitors that the mosaic has been redone repeatedly as a hole is worn straight into the concrete from all the people spinning.

No visit to Milan is complete wihtout a gelato from Grom. So good.

After the gelato we took the subway back to meet Nonno who picked us up in the car and we drove back up to Gignese. Within 3 minutes of being in the car Sophia passed out, she was so tired! She's not used to all the walking we did since in Atlanta everyone drives everywhere.

Troublemaker

In the past month or so, William has become quite the troublemaker.  He gets into everything!  Here's a small sample of his troublemaking ways...

Playing with the gate to the stairs (as well as opening and closing all doors, drawers, and cabinets)

Pulling up rugs

Climbing through the exersaucer

Climbing under the coffee table

Eating his friends

Putting his whole hand in our mouth

Kicking the trampoline up and letting it slam back down

Climbing onto the fireplace to play with the gravel inside















Licking air vents