We had an exciting labor day weekend. Popeye and Mej came to visit on Sunday and stayed for a few days. When they got here, we woke Katie up from her nap and played awhile. All of a sudden, when we were all talking Katie took off on her feet across the living room floor. We couldn't believe it. The rest of the night, we worked on walking. She does it so well for starting out.
We have had an exciting week in our household. Katie still says mama and dada quite a bit, but has added a few words now. She loves to say ooohhhh, and we believe she has said no a time or two. She still just jabbers away. We interpret her words to real words a lot of the time and a lot of times it does sound like she is saying things. It is so much fun watching her learn. Also on Monday night, Katie took her first step. It was so exciting. Katie was at an end table she loves to go and stand up at. There is a picture of the three of us on the table and she loves to point at all of us. kShe thn moved to the arm of the couch and let go, taking a step until she fell into my lap. Jason was out working on extreme makeover: home edition but I called him and left him a message. Since then, Katie has stood on her own a few times for a few seconds and then took four steps on her own last night. She was at the same table and did the same thing, left the table to hang on to the couch and then took four steps towards me and my outstretched arms. I started screaming to make sure Jason saw it and ended up scaring Katie. We will try and get some picture soon to post.
Yummy yogurt.
Decided to sit in the basket with the books while she read.
Just can't resist this smile.
Trying so hard, but always seems to get the shoe upside down.
Chilling in my chair.
Ready to ride.
Talking to daddy on the phone.
Well, the summer is over and school is in and I miss my time with Katie so much. She learned so much over the summer and had so much fun. Katie has learned how to feed herself using utensils, to brush her hair, put on her shoes, to walk on her knees, to throw her cup down when it's empty, to walk really well holding on to furniture and pushing her car around, to climb on to her car to sit, to place things on her car to push around, to point with her thumb and then her pointer finger, what kitchen cabinet to get into, to throw balls, to pet Quillow gently, and to talk on the phone. There are lots of other exciting things that she is doing. For about the past month and a half she has really been interested in her books. She crawls over to her basket of books all the time, picks one out, crawls over to me, hands me the book and crawls into my lap. She likes to repeat this process several times. Sometimes she will get books out and flip through the pages and read to herself. Of course, I love this time because she is sitting still for a little while. Katie has become very interested in Quillow again. She screams with delight when she sees them and will fly out of our arms to get down by him. She has learned to pet him very gently and loves to get down face to face and look at him. Katie is able to recognize when we pull into the driveway and are home. She squeels with joy when we pull into the driveway. She loves to try and help us get her dressed. She often ends up pulling her bottoms down instead of up be she has the idea. She still loves to put everything in her mouth. Katie is such a delight and we love her tremendously.
One of our last Friday's together before school starts, Katie and I met Setler and Susan in Maumelle for lunch and some play time. It was a great time and they had a blast together. Katie hated leaving but she was out before the car even left the driveway.
Thursday after our trip to Tennesse, I kept Katie and cousin Anna. The lady that watches them took a week of vacation. We went to Jumpzone when Shannon came to pick up Anna and they had a blast. Friday, Shannon took the day off and we went to The Museum of Discovery in Little Rock. They had a blast here as well. It has a couple different play areas for kids 6 and under. These rooms are amazing. I wish I had taken more pictures because there were boats and docks and pirate ships , construction zone, performing stage, hospital nursery and lots of other areas. Katie kind of scared me how she was crawling and climbing over everything. We are going to have to watch her closely when she starts walking because she is going to try and climb everything. She was climbing in and out and over the boat, off the side of the dock. up the stairs to the stage, up a slide and everything in between. It was amazing to see her do all this . She wasn't scared at all. She did learn to turn herself around and get off of some things feet first instead of head first. After lunch we waked around the museum a little bit and here are a few picture from our time there. 
We came home Wednesday and made a pit stop before the last leg of the trip. Katie did awesome in the car again but had been awake for several hours in the afternoon. We decided to stop off at the Memphis zoo so that hopefully she would fall asleep after that. This is the only picture I took because there weren't a whole lot of animals out. The giraffes were walking out of their inside home when we walked up and came so close to the fence that we were at. It was really fun. Katie was watching so intently and excitedly. We also got to see the panda bears. And our plan worked Katie fell asleep in the car and slept until Little Rock. The greatest thing happened when we got home. Katie went crazy of course, crawling all over the house but then she grabbed her push walker and pulled up behind it and started walking. She had never walked forward before so Jason and I were ecstatic. She still will not let us hold her hands and walk and sometimes gets upset when we try and stand her up behind it to walk but she is getting there and I think she may walk alone before my summer is over. She has mastered walking on her knees and I hope feet will be soon. 
Crazy Caroline. These girls had so much fun together. We were so glad we got to see Tommy, Anna Lisa and their girls so much this trip. It's so fun to see them play together. Caroline is a sweet older sister and cousin.
Pig tails!
Tuesday morning we headed to the Smokies again. We were able to get out at a few different places and walk around and then our last stop we hiked a little bit. Wish we could have gone more because it was beautiful but it was getting late for lunch. The trail followed a river and if we had hiked up to the beginning of the trail we would have seen a waterfall. We'll be doing this one again sometime. Katie had a blast riding on her daddy's back and enjoyed being outside so much. We made it to lunch on the way home and then my mom and I went back out to shop a little bit.
We took it easy on Saturday and Sunday. We did go into the Smoky Mountains on Sunday morning but ended up raining just about all day so we didn't get to get out and walk or hike any. We did have a really nice drive through an area in the mountains and they were very smoky. We also got to see a lot of deer and wild turkeys. Monday my dad found a place where we could rent a boat and go out on the lake for a while just for fun. I think everyone enjoyed it but Katie. She did not like the life vest. I think if she were on her feet more she would have enjoyed it more because the life vest would not have been scrunched up to her face. She was a trooper though.
These are some picture of Katie in rare form. We went out to dinner Friday night since my mom and I were too exhausted to cook anything. Katie fell asleep on the way home and didn't wake up when we got inside. My parents had to take advantage of holding a quiet and still Katie. We don't get those moments much anymore and Popeye and MeJ loved it. Sleeping babies are so precious.
Jason, Katie and I drove to Tennessee to visit my family again. Katie did wonderfully in the car this time since she was not sick. We got there on Thursday, the 10th. Friday my mom and I took the three girls to the Knoxville zoo. We had a blast and all three girls were great until we had to leave. Caroline did not want to leave the zoo. She could have stayed there all day. Here are a few pictures from the zoo. I wish I could have gotten a picture of the three of them in the car on the way home. They were all asleep within five minutes of being in the car.
Katie had her one year check up back in the middle of June. Who would guess that she is still crazy tall for her age. She was 100% for height, a little over 33 inches, and weight, 26 lbs. and her head was about 97%. She would still be the biggest girl out of a group of 100 girls her age. I of course am loving it. With that one year check up came a cold, pink eye, ear infection in both ears and strep throat all withing the same week. This was the week Katie and I had gone out to Tennessee to visit my family. So, our little vacation consisted of a very tired and sick baby, one trip to the emergency room, one trip to the doctor, several trips to the drug store. Needless to say, it wasn't very relaxing for anyone. Since then, Katie has spent several days with me at home running errands, eating lunch with daddy, swimming, going to the Little Rock zoo, watching fireworks and swinging. We have had a pretty fun summer so far. We took some one year pictures on June 30th. I will try to post some soon. We have had a sneak peek so far on the photographers blog and can't wait to see the rest. I will put a link to her blog on our page but the site is mistyjohnson photography.com and then you would click on the box that says blog. We are going to try and go to Tennessee again this Thursday and I think this will be a much better trip and hopefully we can get some good pictures of Katie with her cousins Caroline and Grace. Oh, and Katie is doing really well walking holding to things. She wants to stand and walk so badly but just can't quite do it yet. I think she will have it down by the end of the summer.
Katie and her daddy on father's day. She was very sleepy when we took this, hence the fingers in the mouth.
The day Katherine Rose was born. This is one of my very favorite pictures of her.
And here she is a year later. It's crazy what a year can do.
Friday morning Katie opened some of her presents from her mommy and daddy. She got this big pink chair, some new balls, books and other fun toys. My parents and Jason brought Katie over to Maumelle to eat lunch with me and then Aunt Becca came into town to celebrate with us for the weekend.
Birthday Cake!
Digging in. I think she loved it.
We had a nice little birthday party for Katie on Saturday. She was interested in opening her first gift for about a second. Mommy got to
Katie's favorite gift. Chester's puffcorn. She can't get enough.
Trying out her new cup.
A few more cute pictures.
Mej and Katie on birthday morning.
Katie and Aunt Becca. We also got to celebrate Aunt Becca's birthday Saturday. 
Katie started crawling on her hands and knees two weeks before her birthday. Yep, until then she was still doing the army crawl. She was getting around then but is really getting around now.
