Baby sign language

So it turns out that teaching babies sign language is the new thing to do. This allows them to communicate with you before they have the verbal skills to talk. I've been working on a few signs with Ariah for the past couple of months (milk, eat, more, and all done). She has been moving her hands to mean "milk" for a couple weeks now, but didn't really know what she was doing. Now she's signing "milk" and means it! It is so amazing to watch. She is just thrilled with herself (probably because Mom and Dad get so excited :-) She usually signs "milk" about halfway through her meal in the highchair because she knows she gets milk after her food. But she has also signed a few times before she eats, when she's starting to get hungry. Now we just have to work on deciphering "milk" from her waving! Here is a video of her signing milk (her hand opening and closing means "milk")

Ariah's first Santa visit

Santa stopped by Ben's office last Friday, so Ariah and I went to visit. We didn't know what to expect...screams, smiles, giggles? It turned out that Ariah was so intrigued by Santa that she wouldn't take her eyes off of him! We couldn't get her to look at us. So here is the only picture we could get....

Here is a picture of Ariah and I getting ready to see Santa

Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving this year at our house! We hosted Ben's parents and grandparents, my parents, my brother, and Ben's uncle Scott.

The night before Thanksgiving we held our annual family pinochle tournament. (This was our 8th annual tournament, and I was the only one not on the trophy yet!) Needless to say, it was my year! I drew Ben's sister, Stefanie, as my partner and we dominated! It was tons of fun (especially since I won). I proved everyone wrong that Ariah would make it on the trophy before me.

It was great to have both of our families here on Thanksgiving Day. Ariah even sat at the table with us and tried some turkey. She preferred the cheerios to the turkey though.