22 Months

(This photoshoot was a bit of a disaster - Annie did not want to sit in the chair AT ALL (kind of a miracle that this is the first time that's happened in 73 of these photos, I guess) and then would only look at me and smile in this one single solitary shot - so behold, Annie and Raggedy Ann "stup" as Annie said - standing up. She did all the arranging here :) Also, this outfit is DEFINITELY a bona fide "daycare outfit" - forgot it was picture day when getting her dressed!)

My dear little Annie,

You are just 2 months shy of 2 years old now! I'd say that is hard to believe, and to slow down, and all those things other parents seem to say, but really I have just loved watching you get older and seeing you figure out the world. This month especially has seen a huge explosion in your understanding and vocabulary, that's for sure! The things you say are so funny, and you're starting to develop a lot of sass and a sense of humor with your words. Just last week, you slammed your milk on the table, spilling a bunch, so I said "Don't do that! Okay?" and you gave me a look right back and say right back to me, "Don't do that...... okaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay??" and now do that every single time I even give you a look - I definitely couldn't help laughing at that one!

Just recently, you've started saying "Annie's turn" when you want to do something yourself or basically want to do anything. I think it is pretty cute for now, but I can see that getting a bit out of hand! Usually you are pretty good at letting other people take a "turn" too, if necessary, but theirs are always shorter than yours. Right now, this is also a good way to get you to do something you don't want to do - such as put your hat back on - if your Dad puts it on and says "Daddy's turn", you immediately want it back, saying "Annie's turn!" Whatever works! You also like telling me "No cheese mommy!" if you are in a bit of a mood and do not want your picture taken anymore.

You still love playing pretend, and now can actually "read" stories to your babies, instead of just turning the pages. You remember some of the words on each page, and say them, or point out items. It's amazing to see all the things you can remember! Some of your dolls have gotten names - if I ask, most are named Annie, but you did name your magnetic dress up doll "Nola" (after your friend at daycare). Your baby dolls and books are definitely still your favorite toys this month, but sometimes you enjoy playing "catch" (which is more like fetch, but... whatever) or playing with Legos and other random toys. You love filling up bags and purses, putting them over your shoulder, and telling everyone "Bye bye!" as you walk out of a room.

This month you've learned your colors much better, and can name them accurately most of the time. You randomly announce the colors of things throughout your playtime, and at dinner, and definitely want to be acknowledged. You also like to point out (and have for a few months now, I just forgot) who things belong to, and point out "Mommy's cup" or "Daddy's jacket" or "Annie's shoes" as well. This used to be just Daddy, Mommy and Annie, but you've started identifying the actual objects now too. Your version of counting right now is pretty hilarious - you always start with 3, and it's 3-4-5-4-5-4-5 most of the time - you'll get it eventually :)

You're still a pretty good eater, with things you like. Your favorite meals are chili, black bean soup and spaghetti, and you will certainly never turn your nose up at carbs or anything sweet. You like to ask for a bite or more, and get quite insistent if we don't immediately respond. If you see anything resembling bread, you ask for "muffit" (muffin I guess), and you always want a napkin, which you for some reason pronounce "mackack", although if you get one, all hope of you eating is lost because you just then want to wipe up the table. You also love to "help" bake and cook - if you see me baking, you have tried to bring over a chair so you can stir and watch. I look forward to many afternoons making cookies and cakes together!

Daycare seems like it's a really fun place for you - you still love your new role as a "big girl" and greatly enjoy doing crafts. I guess several days you have completely not napped because you just lay there "chatting" with your friend Imogen. Imogen and Nola, who both just turned 3, LOVE to help you out - when you get there in the morning, one of them always pulls out your chair at the table while the other puts your booster up since you're a little too short for the chairs. They apparently alternate these roles - Susan runs a tight ship over there! Imogen and Sienna frequently try to hug you when we leave, but you're typically halfway up the stairs yelling "BYE BYE" and won't come back - as SOON as I get there, you run for your jacket and the second it's zipped you are off and running - you love pointing out the many things we see on the way out, too - the bears in the basement window sills, the rocks in the neighbor's landscaping, and now the nativity and the Christmas trees (pointing out all the different colored lights) that are up. It usually takes a good 5 minutes to get from the door to our car, and I think you'd sit out there for an hour examining things if I let you!

What has really been fun for family is that now you are GREAT at remembering everyone, including their names. Thanksgiving was especially fun for you, as you randomly proclaimed family names and pointed everyone out around the table. You have so much fun with your family, and they definitely love hanging out with you too!

We are so lucky to you have you in our lives little bunk!

Love, Mom

27 Weeks

By the fire at the cabin!

Compare to 27 weeks, 4 days pregnant with Annie.

Due Date: February 27, 2012

Weight Gain: Not sure, but I'm guessing it won't be pretty at my midwife appointment on Wednesday after several Thanksgiving celebrations.

Symptoms: Getting out of breath quickly still, some cramping when I roll over at night or just when walking. Overall feeling pretty good!

My cold started subsiding on Wednesday, thankfully. I was really annoyed because Ben got me some Yogi tea to have to help my stuffed head, and then I noticed it said to not have while pregnant or breastfeeding. Seriously?! Even tea? I drank it anyway and it really did help and just for my own curiosity I called the nurse - I did google and saw that licorice apparently can be bad during pregnancy or something. The nurse basically said that with all herbal stuff, they just don't know enough to be able to say for sure if it's okay or not, but she did say that one cup of tea here and there PROBABLY is okay :) So annoying though!

What's different this time: Right now, it seems my pregnancies feel very similar - even looking at my belly pic from Annie, I feel the bellies are identical even too. Oh, what's different is being more laid back I guess - because last time I probably WOULDN'T have drank that tea because of the warning, and I also would have FREAKED OUT when I realized I forgot to take my prenatal vitamin the entire weekend up at the cabin - oops! But now I just feel like, eh, oh well. He'll probably be fine :)

Cravings/Aversions: Nothing specific.

Sleep: Starting to get mighty uncomfortable. My hip/arm/shoulders start to ache from laying on my side so I have to roll over which is getting to be an ordeal.

I am loving: getting into the Christmas spirit! Feels weird without snow though, although I know it's not that uncommon to not have snow yet. I hope it comes soon!

I miss: sleeping on my belly.

I am looking forward to: decorating for the holidays, picking out our Christmas tree, and taking Annie to a variety of Christmas themed events around town over the next few weeks!

I'm spazzing about: my upcoming Gestational Diabetes test - I'm following the same strategy to hopefully pass the 1-hour test that I did last time - trying to avoid all non-naturally occurring sugar the day prior, and no food after dinner until after my test (which should be over hopefully by 9:30am - will be quite difficult for me). I passed easily last time doing this. I know if I actually HAVE GD, I will fail regardless, but I want to avoid taking the 3 hour test! I'm not spazzing about the actual test, but tomorrow will be a sad day of eating for me without my sweets, that's for sure :)

Best thing about this week: spending 4 solid days with Annie up at the cabin - she was so much fun! It was hard to come into work today and say goodbye to her, although she was very excited to see her friends at daycare.

Milestones: nothing new is springing to mind. My mom and sister felt some kicks though, which is cool. I did realize that as of yesterday, there are 3 months exactly left until my due date, which seems nuts.

Movement: Starting to get crazy. Seriously, what I wouldn't give to have an ultrasound machine to see WHAT in the HECK he is DOING in there sometimes! I think he's still sideways so I feel punches/kicks on both sides of my belly frequently, and sometimes he moves so violently it literally shakes my whole body. It's crazy. I LOVE how much he moves, even if lots of it seems to be concentrated into the hours I am laying in bed...

It's a...: boy

Exercise: Sadly none - I was still feeling pretty crappy on Wednesday so didn't go to yoga, and was gone the whole weekend. Will get back in the saddle again this weekend!

Diet:Left this one on here this weekend because I ate like crap - ha! Sooooo much sugar and carbs and not much vegetables. Trying to compensate with a fairly healthy meal plan this week!

Thanksgiving Part 1

As I mentioned in my last post, we celebrated Thanksgiving with Ben's family on Sunday. This Thanksgiving celebration reminded me a lot of the one we had 3 years ago, mostly because I decided to make apple pie again :) This time, I shook things up by attempting a lattice crust! I am really not detail oriented enough for that job though, despite both Ben AND I working on trying to go every other piece over and under, there were still many mistakes :) Oh well - it tasted good!

I tried a different recipe, from Annie's Eats this time. She also has a helpful tutorial on how to make a lattice pie crust, that probably would have been useful if I had actually followed the directions :) I do think I slightly preferred the recipe I used last time - it just seemed a little more "Thanksgiving-y" to me.

I told Ben he could help me out by cutting the apples - he was pretty pleased when he discovered that his mom has a tool that peels, cores and slices an apple in one fell swoop :) (DORKIEST VIDEO EVER!!)

My dough - I made this the night before and just brought it over.


How perfectly sliced!


Steve wanted to help roll dough


You can note all my mistakes here :)


Sure is pretty still! It got really runny and was hard to slice though.


Sadly, forgot ice cream so we had to settle for freshly whipped cream instead - darn :)

I also signed up to make cranberry sauce, and used this recipe. That's one of those things that I like to have a tiny bit of, but don't really care much about. I don't even care if it's the stuff from a can - I actually like that quite a bit, but figured I might as well try my hand at making it from scratch! This was really easy and delicious! Ben reports that was quite good on a turkey and cheese sandwich too.

Simmering away, it smelled delicious!


Very pretty, and gelled up quite nicely after sitting out for a few hours!

Of course, in addition to the food, I also have a great many photos of some adorable children :)

Ben's parents hooked Annie up with an old disconnected cell phone - she was seriously in heaven - this is her taking a picture of me taking a picture of her :)


Such joy can be found in boxes!


Sam, Steve and Steve's old Tigger


Annie was very excited to see Grace. As you can see, Grace did not share her enthusiasm :)


Annie was tickling Grace - got lots of laughs from the rest of us, zero from Grace - tough crowd, that one!


At Grandma's house, Annie is allowed to play with glass pitchers and actual water - such fun :)


Cousins with their PKU friendly graham crackers - this is basically the closest I got to them all looking at me...


Family reading time


Annie watching the carving...


A few of Ben's cousins came too, with their tiny babies! Becca always goes right for them... I, however... do not :) Ha!


I just want to show how small this table was to start - soon you will see how HUGE it got!


Yup, same table! Crazy!




PKU friendly green bean casserole from cookforlove!


The toddler portion of the table


Annie really does love sneaking into babies carseats!


The whole crew!


Pretty sure Grace enjoyed her mashed potatoes


Gabe decided he really liked Annie :) Annie was less than thrilled - ha!


Lots of babies!


Annie just wanted to touch the babies - hope she is as gentle with her baby brother!!


Gabe is only 4.5 months older than Annie, by the way. He looks like he's 2 years older or something!!


Annie even got to hold baby Fiona!


Ended the night playing cards - a great pre-Thanksgiving celebration!

26 Weeks

Another "boring" (aka in the house) belly pic - this was before we went out with Lori and Jeff to Republic (review on We Got Served hopefully soon... it's about time!) I didn't feel like taking my belly pic in a dark bar, or outside in the snow :)

Compare to 26 weeks, 4 days pregnant with Annie.

Due Date: February 27, 2012

Weight Gain: Not sure. It does seem like my belly has kind of evened out with how big I was at this stage last time - I feel like I got bigger way faster, but thankfully the rate of growth of my belly has slowed down a bit now!

Symptoms: Nothing pregnancy related, but I did get a nasty cold on Friday, thanks to Annie! Annie seems a ton better now, but my cold still remains - super stuffy nose, headache, body aches and now a cough. Fun! Even more fun when you can't take anything! I am generally very healthy, and honestly think the last cold I had was when I was pregnant with Annie, so I guess I can't complain. But yet... I still will :)

What's different this time: No birth class to sign up for or attend - which I'm happy about and I'm sure Ben is too. Still haven't cracked a single book. So, same old - just not as focused on this pregnancy!

Cravings/Aversions: Well, this week - orange juice, soup and lots of water. I also have been really loving hot drinks, like cider and hot chocolate. The salted caramel instant hot chocolate from Starbucks is great - you can get it at Target!

Sleep: Bleh..... pretty horrible this week. The stuffy nose makes it near impossible, and I officially have to be a full on side sleeper now which is pretty uncomfortable to me. I use a pillow between my knees but I still get really sore. I did get one really amazing 2 hour nap this weekend though!

I am loving: my in-laws! They sent a text last Wednesday asking if they could take Annie this past weekend since we were already hanging out and celebrating Thanksgiving on Sunday. So Ben's dad picked up Annie Friday after work, and then we got her on Sunday. I had grand plans to do a lot, but then got sick so spent most of the time just lounging - but it's still obviously much easier to do without a toddler! Annie had a blast with her grandparents, we got to go out on two "dates" in one day, and I got to lay around a lot. Win for everyone!

I miss: taking drugs. At least trying a few right now for this cold might be nice.

I am looking forward to: a short work week, and then a long weekend up at the cabin for Thanksgiving - we've got lots of good meals and treats planned, so basically I'm excited to eat :)

I'm spazzing about: After seeing a few newborns this weekend, I'm starting to freak a bit about having one again. Mostly all the unknowns - will he have reflux? allergies? colic? unnamed other thing I haven't even thought of yet?? I know we'll figure it all out, but dang would it be nice if they just came out with a few boxes checked that would tell you what they need without having to go through weeks of investigation!

Best thing about this week: Definitely having a lazy weekend, culminated with a family Thanksgiving celebration including TONS of delicious food!

Milestones: Baby boy's kicking has started moving my laptop :) Yup, that's a milestone.

Movement: Getting stronger and stronger, and feeling more body parts through the belly! I can't wait until he times it right so Annie can feel him.

It's a...: boy

Exercise: Sadly, nothing :( Due to the cold, I skipped prenatal yoga - I figured it wouldn't do much for me (or anyone else there) if I'm blowing my nose every 5 minutes. I HOPE I'm feeling well enough to go to the Wednesday night class before we leave for the cabin, but at this point, I doubt it.

An assortment of items

I've been feeling kind of all over the place with the blog lately - I have a lot I WANT to write about, but really only end up posting about the pregnancy and cute pics of Annie, because the other topics feel too daunting to me. Really, that is 95% of what's going on in my brain anyway - so here are an assortment of items that I've been mulling over, INCLUDING a few adorable photos and videos of Annie from this past week.

Mom wars. So I've made it no secret that I am a message board addict. I have had to take some self imposed breaks, but like a true addict, I keep going back for more. I really don't post that often, but I do get my kicks on reading posts that attract a lot of controversy and comments and get all riled up about them. I'm always seriously just SHOCKED at how worked up people get about some common mom debates - the most recent being cloth versus disposable diapers. Hey, I know cloth is great and better for probably everyone involved, but it's not for everyone. This post on babble, while really condescending and pretty lame, had some comments that were seriously astounding to me. I find it REALLY sad that people actually took the time to say this author is a bad mother and lazy and stupid, etc, for not cloth diapering. However, she was being a brat in her original post too - so I guess that's what you get. But really. Over 250 comments?!?!?!?!?!?! Insane. There are so many of these wars and we are honestly so privileged to get to even fight about them. Our kids all have food, shelter, and ANY diapers to wear. Chilling out would probably be beneficial. So would me just.... stepping away from posts like this in the first place! I'm glad my blog is in no way controversial because I'm pretty sure I couldn't handle reading comments like that directed at myself.

Baby gets a try at Dad's shoes


Annie has recently been holding up baby to say cheese for pictures - Ben has also caught her holding her hands at her eyes like she's holding a camera and saying "click" and then "cute!" when taking fake pictures of her baby.......... hahaha

Since I was gone for the majority of the day on Saturday at prenatal yoga and my little tea gathering, Ben took Annie to the Children's Museum with Nate and Mia. They decided to go to McDonald's for lunch after (Ben did discuss this with me first) - yeah I know we all grew up going to fast food (or I did at least) but it still makes me uneasy introducing food like this to Annie. Ben and I had a little discussion about this and came to the conclusion that it's fine in moderation (as in, maybe 2-3x a year) and that we feed her whole, unprocessed foods at home (even if it does include a lot of cheese) so to let it go. She enjoyed it greatly, apparently - Ben got her the milk and apples option and didn't get the toy, but then you apparently STILL get fries. Great! :) I'm not sure why in my head I make a distinction between "fast food" places like Chipotle, smashburger and Panera, but I definitely do. Those places are okay to me (well, smashburger is debatable) but McDonald's just seems so... dirty. But yet... I still love their Sausage McMuffin with Egg something fierce....

A little worn out - when they got home she took a 3 hour nap, so one of the 3 longest naps OF HER LIFE.


Apparently kept tapping the wrapper asking for ketchup here. We barely ever have ketchup. Really, how do they learn these things?!

On the eating front, in the past week Annie has been really annoying at dinner time - just not wanting to eat, even things that are pretty tasty, and really picking at her food and playing with it. Pretty typical stuff. I had a discussion with Sue about limiting her snacks at daycare (we rarely give her snacks at home, especially in the afternoon) so I thought that would help, but it hasn't. Mostly I think we need to stop ANY commentary about eating and food during dinner - no more "don't you want to try this?", "can you take a bite?" type of crap. If she wants to eat, she will eat. If she doesn't, there is very little we can say or do at this point in her life to make her - I don't want to bribe her with dessert and even if I did, she doesn't get that concept yet. So, basically dinnertime will be practice in zen meditation and deep breathing exercises for Ben and I :) I included a story about one dinner time in this post on the cooking blog - it was both maddening and completely hilarious. Another would be when we made this meatloaf - Annie ate it really well (pointed at her plate several times asking for ketchup though, which is annoying to me for some reason) but then kept the last few bites in her mouth for seriously probably 30 minutes. I sat there with her at the table, since I didn't want her to leave with food still in her mouth - previously she has spit it out and we very sternly tell her no, and then she freaks out - so she was keeping it in her mouth but not swallowing. I kept telling her to swallow her food (not sure she even REALLY knows what that means since it's just a reflex to her) but she'd just start crying.... finally Ben had to just take her and take the food out with his finger. Thankfully that hasn't happened since! SO weird though - just..... why?? WHY?? Which reminds me of this article, and the first tip of what you SHOULDN'T do with a toddler - ever ask them why, or in general try to reason with them. So true, and something I find myself doing way too often! "Why aren't you eating?" "Why are you holding food in your mouth?" Oh what? You can't speak in more than 2-3 word sentences? Oh, I guess I forgot :)

But see how cute she is?!?!!

Oh also, sometimes when Annie is having a meltdown at the table, she points at her room saying "room?? room??" because she wants to go in there, slam the door (her version is just pushing it closed for now, thankfully), and throw herself on the ground to have a little tantrum before coming back out. It's alternately disturbing that she's freaking out that much, and awesome that she knows she needs a little alone time to chill out - she usually comes back out in a minute or two for a hug and to resume whatever we were doing. One time she was in there for a bit longer, so I went in there too and found her curled up on a pillow with a blanket - so I laid down with her, and she got all excited and jumped up, saying "pillow??? pillow??" until she found me one, and then, "blantet" (blanket) and then got me a stuffed bunny too :) It was quite cute.

Crazy hair in the mornings

On that note, I do sometimes really miss eating just with Ben, and not having to account for a toddler at all when meal planning, and mostly just when eating. I LOVE making and eating things that we all enjoy, but it was nice to be able to make stuff that was a little more adult oriented... however, family meals are really important to me, and since we are able to do them easily with our schedules, we will forge ahead :) I was looking back through the main dish tag of my blog last night and just reminiscing about the days of eating sans toddler..... how relaxing... and .... clean :) I know by most standards, we are pretty adventurous with what we eat as a family anyway, so I guess it's really not so bad.

We had a little playdate on Sunday with Adelaide, Abby and Nathan - Adelaide looks really excited to play with all the little kids :)


Adelaide gave Annie these frozen peas to help her when she "hurt" herself and cried for a second :)


Their little makeshift train

Now after all that semi-complaining about Annie, I also want to share just how awesome she has been lately - so much fun! She seems again like she's just grown and changed overnight. This whole weekend she was in such a good mood, and so playful and funny. I have been trying to get a few videos of her lately so I can capture some of her cute ways of pronouncing words - here are a few pics and videos I got lately.

She really is in LOVE with coloring now - she asks to color pretty much every single day!




Enjoying the fort that Ben made her!


So this photo is what I was showing Annie in the video below... just for background :) because I wanted her to say glasses and smoothie on camera


Seriously my favorite video yet. I LOVE her pronunciations and will be a little sad when she figures out how to say them correctly!


Another awesome one - Annie loves the book Corduroy, so we read it a lot - her way of saying Corduroy is adorable. No clue how she came up with that one, but whatever!