Julia - 8 months and crawling away....Joana - Almost birthday time again!!

Hey everyone,

So finally it happened, Julia started crawling at 7 months and one week. And now, she can go from the kitchen to the office in less than one minute. We consider that fast...lol. She looks quite tired in this picture from all the crawling.

She is also trying to say certain words. The first one was da-da-da-da...and now, very repeatedly the word "at"...don't ask me why...she just says it a lot. The video only shows her saying it a couple of times, but sometimes she holds on to the window sill, standing, and says "at" 8 to 10 times in a row. It's pretty funny.

She loves to crawl but her favorite thing is getting to a place where she can stand. That way, she can actually feel like one of us...lol...and when she gets there she gives out little "Aaaaahhhhsss" to let us know that she is up and when we acknowledge her she smiles, just like she did for this photo.

The most exciting this about this month? The arrival of Vovó Victoria and Vovô Jorge as well as Namaw for Joana's birthday in April! They arrived at the end of the month of March and we can't wait to have them over.

Joana is almost two. She has been practicing the answer to the question "How old are you?" because she was used to saying "One!"...now she is trying to remember to say "Two".

On March 21st, as you will see in the video below, we were hit with a snow storm and, in one night, we got close to 10 inches of snow. It was all gone the next day, but what a surprise for Jojo, who thought she was going to start wearing shorts and t-shirts, to pull out her gloves, hat, jacket and boots and go play in the snow. She loved it, though!

SUPERBOWL, SNOW AND SO MUCH MORE!

Ok, we have to dedicate this month to the incredible accomplishment of the New Orleans Saints football team. After being 13 and 0, then becoming the NFC Champions, they became the center of attention of the whole nation as they won the Superbowl. Needless to say that Mardi Gras came early to New Orleans and hung around for longer than normal.

John is ecstatic that his "Man Cave" now displays his football team's accomplishments for this year and it's looking GREAT!

Other than that, the girls had a great time with their cousins, Maw Maw and Uncle Roland when they came over to see us for Carnival. Below are some pictures of them.

One of the most beautiful moments this month was, without doubt, the three days of snow that we had. We probably got close to 14 inches (35 cms) of snow. Joana couldn't stop saying "Wow" and absolutely loved the whole experience. John made sure to build the largest snowman possible who stood stubbornly in our backyard for three days after all the snow was gone. We have the video and pics to prove all of this below.

Joana and Julia are doing great. They are interacting more and more with each other and have even started sharing some toys when they are playing. Julia is still not crawling and is continuously more interested in walking. She is also teething and, as you will see by the video below, she is enjoying gnawing on anything that can soothe that pain. It is quite funny to watch her, though, because she makes some funny faces. Enjoy.

Joana is loving everything that is new, of course, and is talking more and more each day. She is very good about saying Thank you and You´re Welcome (sometimes one after the other, without letting the other person answer), Sorry, God Bless You, and Excuse Me (sometimes she says Excuse You instead of Excuse Me, which is funny). Her normal obsessions with anything round (ball, baloons, bubbles, etc) still continue. Enjoy this Bubbles moment.

This month was an incredible month for me as far as work is concerned. The most exciting thing that happened was the opportunity that I was offered to work side by side with two veteran simultaneous interpreters and learn so much from them. My first experience doing simultaneous interpretation in Portuguese was amazing and I can't wait to do more in the future!!