You can't see it, but both of her hands are in Madeira's water bowl. This one time I let her indulge her little fetish and she thoroughly enjoyed it to the point where she was dripping wet!

Note the pool of water near her knees

First attempt at escape

Our Mardi Gras baby

Anna is growing in many different ways. She is communicating more by using the sign "more" and telling us she's hungry by opening and closing her mouth really fast. She knows the word "NO", and shakes her head when she doesn't want something or knows she shouldn't do something (like put a plastic bag in her mouth). She's transitioning to whole milk, and eats mostly table food with the exception of some leftover jarred baby food.

We're planning her first birthday party and baptism (which we're so lucky will be on the same day!) and are looking forward to having our small family with us for them. The theme is butterflies and I'm in the process of finding a bakery that will make a butterfly cake and cupcake. I've found a sweet dress for the day, but need to find shoes and a cardigan now!

I just found the camera in the basement, so I'll have to update with more recent pictures soon!

Today Anna learned how to flip the light switch on and off. Now if we can only teach Daddy....

Today we had an inside day. It was so cold outside that I didn't think Anna's chapped face needed any more exposure!! We played, watched the Backyardigans and WonderPets, took a bath, slept, and most of all, weaned off the bottle! Yay! We found sippy cups with soft straws, and today Anna had all her formula in the cups! I wasn't expecting her to transition so quickly and easily. I don't know if she'll keep this up or start refusing the sippy- so I'm keeping the bottles close by and will probably send at least one to school tomorrow! I'm a little too anxious about her eating that I'll probably give in! I'm looking at her bottles now thinking, wow, Anna really isn't a baby anymore. She looks so big drinking from a straw!

Making up for delayed blogging...

So today Anna must have known I griped about her lack of eating yesterday. She had no problems with any meal, and she even had a little snack of goldfish (the baby kind, on sale at Ukrops!) with diluted pear juice. It's amazing how picky she is with sippy cups- the one we found that she'll actually drink from is this one, the Take'n'Toss sippy cup. Of course we're not tossing it anytime soon, but I won't hunt it down at school, either.

I've always wondered if kids could move in sleep sacks. I love putting them on Anna when it's cold because they keep her nice and toasty. Anyway, Anna put it to the test the other night! She reminds me of Maggie Simpson, minus the pacifier.

Anna's newest hobby is chewing books. She will occasionally sit still long enough for us to read to her (not counting bedtime books), but would rather chew away her beloved books. I don't know whether to discourage her or just let her "explore" her books by eating the cardboard. At one point I was even thinking that these books would last through multiple children...I'm guessing that idea wasn't one of my best.

Anna waves bye-bye to the passing cars...

One of Anna's favorite Christmas presents is this house. She opens and closes the door, crawls through it, rings the doorbell, pushes the different sound buttons, and LOVES to get mail. She rarely will let a letter in the mailbox go untouched!

Another one of Anna's new antics is flossing her 6 teeth with string. I guess this feels good to her gums??

What child can get by without one of these bathtime pictures?? Anna's hair is getting longer, and with that growth means more of it to get messy! Anna loves to rub her hair with her hands during mealtime, and of course that equals bathtime. We might as well get used to the daily bath!

Anna at 10 months

Moving on...Anna is no longer a 1 room baby!! She loves to crawl into the dining room, kitchen, and down the hall. So far she hasn't found the steps (the door to the basement is closed). Funny how she can climb the steps at Grandma and Great-Grandma's houses with no problem. Did daycare teach her this?? They do have a mini-gym in the infant room with a few steps and a ramp. It's amazing what she's learning everyday. Her favorite off-limits item is Madeira's water bowl. Yuck-she'd climb in it if it was big enough! Instead, she dips both her sleeves in and sloshes all the water around. Maybe we should bathe her more often to get her water fascination taken care of! I can't wait for the summer so we can go to the pool!

I've been wanting to capture this pose for a while!

Anna loves her lovey, and her thumb, too! We have 3 loveys now, 2 for home and 1 for school. At school the other day, I watched her crawl over to her crib, reach between the slats, and pull her lovey out. I thought that was so smart!! I'm not so sure the rules are being followed there, (lovey is supposed to stay in the crib!) but oh well, if she needs it to soothe her at school, that's fine. One of the home loveys is down to one eye- I'm wondering if I should repair it (since back-up lovey has 2 eyes) or just let it be one eyed??

Madeira waits patiently for scraps

Mealtimes have gotten frustrating- one day she'll eat diced peaches, the next day, forget it! I feel like we're in a food rut- she's not eating as much as she used to because she refuses to eat what she used to! I've tried carrots, green beans, sweet potatoes, tofu, peaches, pears, bread, pasta, egg yolks, veggie rings, and every jar of baby food under the sun. She does eat some bread, but she used to eat a whole slice- now she won't even eat half a slice! I know she does eat, but I don't want to get into feeding her puffs or crackers the whole day to count as a meal. She loves crackers and baby cookies, but she only gets those maybe once a day (if at all). I just wish I could find something she liked that was healthful!!

Thanks Angela and Brooke for my new "smooshie" frog!


For some reason, Anna likes to hook her toes under the feeding chair's tray. It reminds me of how closely related we are to monkeys. And yes, she got her toes from me (unfortunately!).

Anna's new word for the week- Duck! She's also said/waved Bye-bye for different people. It's really cute when she does it for strangers! At the doctor's office she waved to a family leaving and after everyone else said goodbye, she waved and clearly said, "Bye-bye!" Everyone laughed and I was one proud mama. She has her 3rd ear infection now, so maybe that has something to do with her appetite? I look forward to having a hungry baby again!

One of John and my Christmas presents for each other was our new dining room table and chairs. Anna has found a new jungle gym!! Now that she's crawling everywhere, she likes to head into the dining room and check out the cats sunbathing or view the scenery in the backyard. These pictures capture her with one of Rye's toys (he's had it for years...it's his special friend). Madeira took a liking to it when she joined the family so my mom bought her one, too. Now Rye is in caterpillar heaven with one nearby at all times! Haha.

Anna's new antics....

John's way of feeding Anna- you feed me, I'll feed you!
Anna is learning to give kisses, point, pull up, dance, and bite. She now has 6 teeth- 4 up and 2 down! Her first word (other than Mama and Dada) is "Kittycat" !! We think she said "Baby" the other day, but the verdict's still out as she hasn't said it again. Today Rye helped us play with bubbles and Anna laughed out loud when he swatted at them. I wish I had videotaped it! Her laughs are hard to come by, so when I hear them, I want to bottle the sound.
This weekend was spent mostly inside- I came down with some flu-like bug so John kept Anna entertained while I slept all day Sunday. Needless to say, we were asleep when the New Year rolled around. I am very thankful that John is so wonderful with Anna- I had no doubts that she had a great time with him, and while I was upset I lost a day of spending time with her, I knew she was getting quality time with her sweet daddy.

More Christmas pictures

Our Christmas mantle

Braxton taking a nap in the jumper

Sean and Anna playing with the new table

Braxton checks out the tree

Sean cruising the couch

Anna's first Christmas

What a fun time for everyone!! Helping Santa was great!! I really look forward to the years to come of Anna waiting for Santa and putting cookies and milk out for him!! We had a busy but fun holiday. My brothers and John's sister all came up for Christmas, so we split time between the two families. We had a full house with 6 adults and 3 babies!! On Christmas night we hosted dinner for both our families and really loved not having to go anywhere! :) It made it much easier for all 3 babies to be able to go to bed at their normal time and then we were able to eat, although Anna decided she liked the hostess role, so she refused to go to sleep until everyone left! We also loved catching up with Sean and Braxton's development! All 3 babies are crawling, and they all have top and bottom teeth! Braxton's trying to catch up by getting 4 top teeth all at once! Sean's cruising everywhere and is a speedy little crawler.

More pictures to follow!!

What's that you say, Rudolph? Santa's coming to town??

So today was our first experience with Portrait Innovations. What a neat place and geez- they make a KILLING. We were there for a total of an hour (not even 15 min of taking pictures). And after waiting only 30 min for the pictures to develop, we walked away with 71 proofs...it was SO hard to choose the poses I wanted, but luckily I have the cd of all of them...I'm not posting too many more because I don't want to spoil any Christmas presents, but they are too cute!

Anna gets some snuggle time with Great-Grandma

My favorite thing about Thanksgiving? Leftovers!!! I just threw away the last of them, but I could eat them forever! Anna loved having Great-Grandma over for the night of leftovers after Thanksgiving because she got her all to herself!

Bubbles!!!

I'm not sure why we hadn't brought these out before now, but we just found the bottle! John is very good at blowing BIG bubbles...

Anna's early Christmas present from her Mom and Dad

We decided to go ahead and get the next best thing to a tank-kinda-carseat. This thing feels so secure yet soft. It fits up to 65 pounds, so we figured that since it won't get used by another sibling, we could go ahead and get a girly pattern. I love it! My favorite feature is that you can velcro the straps on the side of the carseat so that you don't have to hold them at the same time you're trying to put the baby in! It is a little challenging getting Anna ready to go out the door with all her STUFF, and carrying her with everything to the car- it takes a little more organizing and baby wrangling, but I'll get used to it! It beats lugging this little chuncker in that carrier! It seems like over the past week Anna has seemed heavier every time I pick her up! Is there lead in her formula?? Haha.

On a different note, we've decided to switch pediatricians, due to the fact that ours is leaving Richmond, and based on others' recommendations. I'm excited but nervous to learn a different group of doctors, but I'm also happy to have done this before Anna gets any older. She has her 9 month check-up in 2 weeks with the new group.

Anna is "scooting" now, half crawling but using one elbow instead of her hands to move. She rolls/scoots wherever she wants to go, so she's not missing anything!! She also just started getting into a sitting position from her stomach. She seems very proud of herself when she does this, and gets quicker everyday. Her favorite toys right now are the remote control, phone, any sort of cable, and Madeira's bones/toys (yuck). Apparently, Madeira likes to share, because everytime I look around, a bone or toy is on Anna's playtime blanket!!

Our little prisoner

Anna shares her chicken with Rye

Due to Anna's recent pickiness with food, we've been trying different finger foods out. The cats like it when we feed her chicken because they get to sample some, too!

We have a new closet organizer!! Courtesy of John, the wonderful woodworker! Look at the fine detail- it looks great and I can't wait to get our clothes into it!

Anna can now pull up to her knees!

Time to lower the mattress again! When we put her in the crib seated, she can move over to the side and pull up on the rail to chew on it and look like a pitiful little prisoner.

Today was a very exciting day- I got to play dress up with Anna, and she made her first sign! When I was home this past weekend I found some old baby clothes of mine that I used to dress my cabbage patch doll in. This was a homemade cabbage patch doll, so she was a little bigger than the average one. Anyway, here are the overalls that my real babydoll fits into!

The next picture I thought turned out pretty amusing...it looks like Anna has just killed the cat. In reality, Whiskey was like that before Anna got there, and exited quickly after the murder attempt.

What does this face say to you?

Anna also got another hand-me-down, a puppet monkey I used on mission trips to Ecuador and Honduras. It's a fun toy for both parents and baby!

At dinner tonight, with 3 witnesses, Anna made the "milk" sign!! Earlier today I noticed her little fist opening and closing but she refused to nurse/take a bottle so I didn't think she understood what it meant, and then tonight she made the sign without prompting and she drank the bottle I made in a hurry!! Yay!! She also is attempting the "more" sign but has her own version where she puts her hands together instead of just her fingertips. I'm impressed that she's learning so quickly and can't wait to introduce some more signs!!

Look what we brought home from daycare!!!!

Joy- Anna's got hand foot mouth disease. Yuck. A virus that you can't do anything for and lasts for 7-10 days. She has a low grade fever that peaks at night and is irritable at mealtimes and when she's sleepy. She also has a heinous rash on her legs and bottom, with a few spots on her torso, arms, and hands. I called daycare today to ask if there had been any cases and the woman said, "Oh yeah, we had a case last week. We've got everything going on now- bronchitis, ear infections, runny noses, it's really bad." So does this mean the kids AT SCHOOL have all this crud or are they all at home (like Anna) since they're sick? And I never saw a sign about it, maybe due to the fact that Anna didn't go to school on Thursday or Friday, but still- I would've kept her home if I had known it was going around! SO now I can't take her to school until her temperature is less than 100 for 24 hours...Tonight it was 100.1...geez. I can't say I mind staying home with her, though. Let's just hope tonight she sleeps better than last night- up at 10:30 for an hour of screaming and then again at 6:30 for breakfast. We also think she might be teething so that doesn't help. Poor baby.

On a positive note, she looks like she'll be crawling any minute! Today she started moving backwards, which I heard they do first sometimes! So now we really need to babyproof the house!!! We need to get the house safe for when the nephews come up at Christmas, anyway! Sean is a moving machine! I can't wait to see the little guys!!

So we're home safe and sound from our 2 states in 2 days trip! We covered a lot of ground, Anna got to meet Emily and Ellis and their spitzi cat Mitzi (I know she's sweet to you, Em, seriously), and we were able to meet up with Kevin, Meighan, and Sean for dinner in Chapel Hill. We also got to spend some quality time with Mimi and little bit with Pops! It was a great weekend- long enough to visit with everyone but not too long to miss Daddy!
The road trips (we travelled 3-4 hours everyday) went well. Friday afternoon had some rough parts, as Anna freaked out at the gas station when I had to use the men's room *yes* men's room. The ladies' room was out of service...and there were no other options...so anyway, after a few minutes of sobbing uncontrollably, we were able to get back in the car and scoot. Luckily my car is just the right size so that I could reach back, grab a toy out of her bag, and give it to her while driving. Every time I opened her door, a couple of toys would fall out, but oh well! A little dirt never hurt anyone, right?

We are glad to be home now, and having a few adjustment issues with naptimes, but I honestly expected a lot more, so I can't complain...what I will complain about I have to post in the next entrance....

Anna says Mama! I didn't believe it the first time we heard her say it, but now she says it a lot!! I love it! We first heard her kinda whisper it this past weekend when Aunt Lori and Uncle Chris were visiting, and now she says it in the middle of babbling. It is adorable, but at the same time frustrating because she says it mostly when she's tired and fussy, or when she doesn't think she needs a nap and I put her in her crib. So when's she's crying "mamamamamma", do I go back and get her because she's calling my name?? Maybe I should have taught her "dada" first....Hahaha!! We're working on that now.
Both of us are feeling a lot better so I'm really looking forward to our road trip starting tomorrow!

Halloween pictures from Anna's cousinsSean the Frankenbaby (who also was a lobster)

Braxton the tiger (who also was a lobster!)

I just had to share these adorable pictures of these handsome little men!!

Before the game....Go Steelers!!



During the first 4 minutes, Denver scores 14 points...

After the 5th turnover...where's the channel changer???

Oh the poor Steelers...it's hard being a fan this season!! I can't say we've enjoyed watching many games so far, and with Ben almost always being questionable about playing, most of the time we think he should be pulled out to regroup. Geez. What a bummer.

On a positive note, Anna's cold seems to be getting better. The humidifier is helping, and her appetite is better. Her cough isn't as bad today, either. I'm still debating whether to take her to get her 2nd flu shot tomorrow. I think I'd like for her to be feeling better before she gets it. I've got the crud as well, and I hope we're both much better before next weekend!! Anna and I are headed to NC on the way to SC for Emily's baby shower. We're planning on staying over in Greensboro with Mimi and Pops on Friday evening and then heading to Columbia on Saturday morning for the shower. Emily's never met Anna, and I can't wait to see her beautiful baby bump!! I'm also looking forward to seeing her new house!! I'm a little nervous about traveling alone with Anna, as the last time we did so she was only 6 weeks old. I'll try to schedule the driving times during her nap times, so we'll see!!