Beautiful Weather

Since it was so beautiful last weekend (and will be this weekend), Anna and I took the opportunity to go for walks outside. For the first time, we tried her sitting front facing in the stroller without her infant seat. She is to the point now that she hates the infant seat in the stroller because she can't look around, but I was not sure about putting her in the other way because I had visions of her sliding out of the bottom of it. It all worked out though and Annalise loves riding in it and taking in all of the sights!!!

Waiting to leave


A pretty smile

Blowing raspberries

5 Months Old

Where has the time gone? April 22nd was Anna's "5 month birthday". In honor of that, here are 5 things that I love about my little chick-y.
*I love the sounds that you make when you are really excited about something (her daddy says she sounds like a wuki from Star Wars, so we call them her wuki sounds).
*I love how you smile at me when I come in the room after you wake up.
*I love how you laugh when daddy rips apart cardboard soda boxes.
*I love how you giggle when I kiss your belly and sides.
*I love all of the joy and happiness that you have brought to my life.

Anna's First Easter

We had a great Easter weekend. On Saturday, we had a dinner at our house and on Sunday we went to Easton and had dinner at Stan's sister's house. I did not get too many pictures on Saturday as it was difficult to cook the meal and take pictures. I did get some pictures on Sunday though because I was not the one doing the cooking!

Waiting patiently to see what the Easter Bunny brought

What's this?

A new tool bench...

... and a yummy book

Anna and her cousin, Jen

Another gift...she is good at pulling tissue paper out of bags

Yeah, more tissue paper! She is always more interested in the paper than the gift

Working off her Easter meal with some reverse abdominal crunches =)

Anna and Grammy

Anna and Gram
(this was actually taken a few days before after my Kappa Delta Pi meeting, but since I didn't really get any pictures on Saturday, I decided to put this here)

Anna's Easter presents
Thank you everyone!

Easter Eggs

In our excitement of being first time parents, we often think of things that we want to do with our daughter, without really thinking of her age. For example I have the memory of carrying her at 2 weeks old around a tree farm in the freezing cold to get our first "family Christmas tree". At the time it sounded like a nice thing to do, but in reality when the moment came I could have cared less about the darn tree as I spent the entire time doing three things:
1. Making sure she was still breathing. This is funny now but I did it constantly when she was a newborn because I was certain that the moment I stopped checking, she would stop breathing.
2. Making sure I was not loosing my grip on her because we had so many layers on her. I was afraid she would slip down inside the clothes and then --see #1 above.
3. Praying that I would not trip on any sticks and vines as we were walking that would make me fall and smash my baby girl. Also of course, tripping and smashing goes along with losing my grip on her and the not breathing idea.
Okay, so fast forward to now, we have another great idea. We are going to dye eggs! Needless to say that Stan and I dyed the eggs, all but 1, which we were going to have her do. We got to the last one, her egg, Anna's big moment, and for some reason I thought "Oh, I will give it to her to drop into the dye cup." I then, following my same brilliant pattern of thinking, I gave her the egg which of course she threw on the floor and it cracked in many places. Being one for follow through, I stuck it in the dye anyway even though no one will be able to eat it. Sooooooooo, everyone take a lesson. 4 1/2 months old is too young to be handling and dying eggs. =) Seriously, I don't know where I get my ideas sometimes.

Our attempt at dying eggs.

Anna waiting for her egg to be taken out of the dye.

This was Anna's egg. You can't really tell in this picture, but it is cracked all over.

A Girl and her Dragonfly

Anyone who knows me knows that I have a strange obsession with bugs of any kind (always have, can't explain it), but especially Dragonflies. So, when Stan came home from work with a stuffed Dragonfly that he had bought for Anna, it was a hit! Anna really likes it because the wings on it crinkle and when you squeeze it, it buzzes. I am hoping that Anna will pick up on my self-proclaimed dorky love of Phylum Arthropoda =). As you can tell in the following pictures of her initial interaction with the Dragonfly -- it sure gets a lot of love "Anna Style"!

"What is this?"

"Hmmm, nice shiny wings."

"Oh, the wings crinkle when I bite them!"

"Does the abdomen crinkle too?"

"What about this side?"

"I'll stick with the wings!"

Skippy + Petey

Last Friday, we went to visit our friends Emily and Mike we could meet their new "quality pre-owned dog" Petey that they rescued from a no-kill shelter. All I have to say is, "What a great dog"! It is hard to believe that a dog who is so lovable, sweet and well behaved was in an adoption center for over a year. Yes, we still love their other "quality pre-owned" dog Skippy too, who was up to his usual mischief and kept stealing Anna's stuffed monkeys and was attempting to hide them in his crate!

What is this?

What is this?....

Oh wait, I see something.....

Oh, it is a pretty baby girl!!

This is one of Anna's favorite games as of late. She likes it when you put something over her and she pulls it off. Of course the ring of monkeys has to be in on the fun too.............. =)