Bye bye

July 19th. Nine months, three days. Hollin's first official word. Telling her daddy "bye bye".

She said it in a sweet, slow voice. And I'm pretty sure I heard a little southern twang ;)

Pretty fitting that she said bye bye, considering the mood I've been in today. I feel like we're always telling him bye recently. Bye bye, daddy's going to work. Bye bye, daddy's working the night shift. Bye bye, daddy's spending a week in Chicago/Boston/New Orleans for a conference (ie, adult conversation, restaurants without kids, and uninterrupted sleep). I'm a little jealous and a lot ready to be in the vicinity of family again.

She started waving a few days....maybe a week...ago. Zane waved backwards for a long time. Not this girl! She goes all out. Full arm motion and wrist action. Reminds me of the pageant wave.

Matt was leaving this afternoon to do allergy/asthma testing on the UW football team and I was holding Hollin in my lap. He got right down in front of her face. I said, "Tell Daddy 'bye bye'." She looked up at him and, slowly and deliberately, said, "Bye.Bye." Matt and I looked at each other with big eyes and started laughing. Zane peeked up from his Superman game on the iPad long enough to say, "How her talkin'?" He is more amazed than we are at her developmental milestones.

And this guy....this child that didn't sleep for the first year of his life.....says to me this morning at NINE am, "Can I way here just a wittle bit wonger?"

Ab.so.lutely.

Then he comes downstairs and says, "I wested just a wittle."

And when he was eating lunch he said, "When it's nap time, will you hold me in my chair in my room like you always used to?"

I wouldn't trade all the corn in missconsin for these two.