New York City

Between Christmas and New Years my friend Emily and I took a train from New Jersey into New York City for the day for some sight seeing and shopping.  In the words of Em "It was a great day until we almost DIED!".  It is a long story that involved a plastic horn, the Macerena (I don't know how to spell that),  an insane possibly intoxicated taxi driver named Pedro who was screaming R rated phrases from the taxi.  It is one of those "you had to be there" kind of stories but it was HYSTERICAL (I am laughing out loud as I am typing this) and slightly frightening at the same time. Anyway, I barely took any pictures other than Home Alone related photos because Annalise loves those movies and other things I thought she might want to see.  It was a great day!

 The line to get in FAO Schwartz

 The Plaza Hotel taken for Annalise from Home Alone 2

 The skating rink in Central Park that was in Home Alone 2

 We went two or so days before New Year's Eve and they were actually testing the ball.  We watched them move it up and down a few times and test the lights.  It was neat.  They were also already setting things up for the New Year's celebration.

The tree in Rockefeller Center

Street Fair 2011

Today Aunt Emily and I took Annalise to the annual Street Fair.  Anna had a good time taking in some sights and eating chocolate covered pretzel sticks.

 Anna's scrumptious pretzel rod.

 After we waited in line to ride the ponies and Annalise freaked out and would not get on.

 Kisses for my sweet baby girl =).

Being cute.  Love this girl.

Anna's 2nd Birthday Party

On November 20th, we had Annalise's 2nd Birthday Party at the Lighthouse social hall of our church.  In addition to the enjoyment of celebrating Anna's birth, it was also great to see some friends and family that we have not seen in awhile!  This year it was also great fun including her on some of the decisions for the partya and shopping!  Anna specifically requested peanut butter ice cream for the party (how she even knew about peanut butter I have no idea), so on that day that is what she got.  She seemed to like it but interestingly she has not even mentioned it since and she was mentioning it daily before then. In any event, Annalise really enjoyed playing with all the other kids, and of course the cake and presents!

 A view of the adult guests --- all the kids were over playing in the other part of the room at this point!

 Scoping out the cake

 Getting a closer look!

 Enjoying the cake and the peanut butter ice cream

 Mr. "Tato" Head from Rammer, Shira and baby James

 An adorable outfit from Jason, Kristin, Caden and Abby 

(Anna loves clothes as much as she loves toys if not more so!)

 The awesome tent from Emmy and Mike!

 Hanging out with baby James after the party

Annalise just loves him and talks about seeing him all the time!

A Visit From Baby James

On Thursday, our friends Rammer and Shira and their son James came down for a visit. It was a great visit even though we were not able to go to the fair! Annalise just loves babies and was sooooo excited to see "Baby James".  She was very gentle and was so proud of herself that she helped to give him a bottle.  She also helped to changed his diaper by handing the wipes, etc to Rammer and she also helped to burp him!

James used Annalise's old Exersaucer while he was here.  It kinda made me sad because I can remember not too long ago how she loved it so!  Now she says "That for babies."

Being helpful with feeding James.  I have to admit I sooooooooo miss having a little baby around.  I just breathed in his little, cute, adorableness!

"Am I doing this right, Mommy?"

(I didn't know I was in these pictures, hence the fact that I am just talking and not looking at the camera.  I thought that he was just taking them of Anna and James).

So proud of herself for being such a big helper!

One Last Time

Last night we went to Knoebel's with the Smiths for the last time this summer.  We had a great time!  One thing though that occured to me again last night is how much Annalise has changed this summer.  Last weekend I took Anna to the park and as I was watching her play it really hit me how much her playing and physical abilities have advanced in such a short time.  I thought back to the beginning of the summer and how shaky and somewhat nervous she was about going on the playground equipment and then last week I watcher her zip around with ease on most things there.  Well, last night at Knoebel's I thought back to the beginning of June when we had her there for the first time of the summer.  At that time she was a little impatient waiting in line because at 18 months she just didn't get she had to wait.  She never carried on, but I definately had to keep her occupied while waiting.  Also, back at the begininng of the summer she didn't really understand that she had to get off the ride when it was done either.  Again, she never had a fit or anything like that but she used to try hold on so I couldn't get her out.  Back then (a whole 3 months ago), she was afraid of certain rides and was really preoccupied by the little stones that cover part of the park and I spent a lot of time cleaning off her hands.  Well, fast forward to now and again, like my realization at the playground last week, she has grown so much this summer!  She gets it now that she has to wait in line, no more holding onto the rides when I get her off, no more preoccupation with the rocks and while she was afraid of one ride (the frog hopper) once she got on it, she wasn't afraid to actually get on.  It makes me kinda sad when I think about how quickly she is turning into such a big girl!  Anyway, here are a few pictures of our fun!

It took about 1/2 hour to 45 minutes for us to get two slices of pizza!  While we were waiting Anna pointed out many things to me.

She started by showing me the pretty flowers

Then I got her out of the stroller because it felt like forever and Stan was still not back and she continued pointing out rides.

and pointing out more rides

and more rides

and then a little bouncing

and finally some pizza!  We would've gotten something else but we never thought the line would take that long to get through!  It was one of those things though that once Stan had already waited so long he wasn't going to get out of line!

Anna and Aidan on the Frog Hopper

One thing that is tough with Anna is the fact that she is so tall so even though she is only 21 months old, she is a little over 36 inches tall and therefore is tall enough to ride all the rides over in the kiddie part even though she is not yet even 2 years old.  I have not let her ride anything that goes up in the air because I don't trust that she won't decide to stand up when she is up in the air.  I made an exception to this with the Frog Hopper (for those who are familiar) because even though it goes up in the air I couldn't see anyway that she could get out of it and she was asking over and over to go on it.  It started out fine but then she quickly decided she didn't like it.  My poor babe had to stay on it though until the ride was over.  She didn't cry while it was moving but kept saying "All done!" which was hard for me because I could hear her from the ground.  Anyway after it stopped she did start to cry but quickly got over it.  As we were walking away though she asked to go on it again.  I told her I think we should wait till next summer for it =)!

Over the Frog Hopper scare and lovin' the fire trucks!

Meeting Baby James

On Wednesdasy and Thursday of this week we visited our friends Rammer and Shira and got to meet their adorable baby boy, James, who was born the beginning of June.  It was a nice visit and Annalise was really good with the baby!  She just kept saying "Hi-ya baby James" over and over again while helping to gently rock him in his swing.  She really didn't show any signs of jealousy when I was holding him although when I was feeding him a bottle she did ask me for a bottle for herself.  I reminded her that bottles were for babies and that she is a big girl.  That seemed to be enough for her because she didn't mention it again.  Anna even carefully laid her beloved doll baby on James while he was in his swing.   I do have to say though that the visit showed me that I am not ready for a second baby until Anna is at least 3 years old!  I just can't imagine having a newborn with a 20 month old!  Annalise occupies soooo much of my time and attention at this age that I have to give major credit and applause to those of you who are obviously so much braver than I!  At one point I was giving James a bottle (which I loved doing and I completely fell in love with all his newborn cuteness) and trying to read Annalise a book and keep her occupied.  Whew, it was tricky!  Anyway, enough of my rambling (which I know I do so well) here are some pictures:

Adorable little James

I just love how much hair he has!

James' brother, Cisco (don't know if I spelled that right)

Honestly one of the best dogs I know!

Anna decided she wanted to put her feet in the pool.

She went on a step that was too low though and got her shorts soaked!

After her shorts were soaked she said she wanted to get in the pool.

I put her suit on her but I questioned how long she would last because she is not really a fan of our pool unless it is at least 88 degrees (which fortunately has been most of the summer)!

I was right, she got out.

She did end up getting back in though for a little while.

The berry lover was in all her glory because they have blueberry and huckleberry bushes at there house!  She ate soooooooooo many berries while we were there!  Amazingly she didn't even get a belly ache!  Here is is eyeing up the blueberry bushes.

Eating some blueberries

Havin' fun

Helping to rock James

Here she was sharing her most favorite doll ever (I am pretty sure she has had it since she was born or shortly there after).  Anna walked up to James and said "Here James" and put it on him.  Notice though she is keeping an eye on it =)

Stitting with "Uncle Hammer" -- as she started calling him