Outnumbered!

Come March 20, 2014 (or thereabouts), the adults in this house will be outnumbered!

Are we scared? Sometimes. Excited? Yes. Going to find out the gender ahead of time? No. Matt's already outnumbered anyway. :) We'll take what we get!

A post without pictures

Yikes, it's been more than a month since I last posted. I think one reason I delay posting is because I feel that in order for it to be a worthwhile post, it must have many fantastic pictures. Which means I need to take those pictures. And harder still, find the patience to load them onto my computer, a process which always seems mind-numbingly laborious to me, probably because it reminds me of how disorganized my pictures are and how I have way too many on my phone and laptop and I really need a backup solution in case either device ever crashes ... etc. etc. etc.

As I type, Anna Kimball is screaming her head off in her crib, which is new for us. Emery never did this and we thought that was normal. Maybe now I'm beginning to realize that Anna Kimball is the normal one who occasionally and vigorously protests bedtime and Emery is from Mars.

The girls have been playing together more frequently these days and with a touch more peace and harmony. I love this development and though I sometimes feel sorry for Anna Kimball having to deal with Emery snatching her toys so often, I realize she's very fortunate to have someone to play with in the first place.

Emery starts ballet next week. I don't have grand hopes for her to adore it or for this to become her life's passion. She'll likely be reserved and spend more time watching everyone else prance around than doing the moves herself. I just can't wait to see her in a leotard, tights and slippers every week!

OK, time to console AK. Which never works, so why do I try???

And I lied. Here is an irresistible picture of our ballerina.

To Michigan and back

As usual, we headed up to Michigan for the 4th of July week. This year we drove and leaned heavily on digital entertainment for keeping the girls quiet and happy during the 10-plus hour drive. I decided that portable DVD players and iPads are like epidurals - though generations previous never had them and got along fine without, if they could do it over again, they'd take the DVD player ... and the epidural.

I'm happy to say the girls did wonderfully in the car. In fact, I think they even have been whining more at home this week than they did in the car. What's that all about? Isn't there some kind of "everything is new again and I'm going to be happy and easily entertained at home for a least a week" thing that's supposed to happen when you get home from vacation?

I guess not. Anyway, here are a few snapshots of our week:

This was taken almost as soon as we arrived - we simply moved Anna Kimball from the prison that was her carseat into an almost equally torturous lifejacket ... and she didn't mind one bit! So happy to be outside and on the water I think.

Chairs are a BIG obsession these days ...

Stopping for a sweet treat ...

On this cool, rainy afternoon I went down to the little beach Matt's parents have set up by the lake and found Emery in nothing but her underwear singing "Jesus Loves Me" to a pile of sand. Totally normal, right?

Our bottomless pit adored our favorite restaurant in Fenton, demolishing her french toast faster than you can say "We love Michigan in the summertime!"

The water table provided plenty of entertainment and also helped Anna Kimball with standing and sitting on her own.

All of us!

Other highlights of the trip included Anna Kimball learning to climb up and down the stairs, and then realizing she would rather be carried since all that climbing is too much work, finishing strong in the Fenton Firecracker 5K only to be bested by a high school freshman who sprinted past me at the end, getting an overnight with Matt at the Detroit Athletic Club, enjoying my first cronut and eating way too much ice cream. Or wait, maybe that's not possible?

We're a little delayed

 ... and not just with Anna Kimball's walking. Emery has been in a big girl bed for more than a year now. Granted it is a BIG big girl bed that takes a little care to get in and out of (i.e. climbing onto a bean bag at the end of the bed).

Still, Emery has been capable of doing so for some time now. But never once has she gotten out of bed during nap time or at night. She always waits for me to come get her.

Last night, though, her loud crying woke me up and I was puzzled as to why it was so loud. I rushed to her room only to find her right by her door, weeping that she wasn't tired and couldn't sleep.

I realize this is par for the course when it comes to having children. I only laugh that it took Emery this long to figure out her independence. And will now prepare myself for the night in the not-too-distant future that she actually makes it all the way to MY bed to announce her insomnia.

Strawberry picking

We are in Charlottesville right now, soaking up as much Henny and Papa/cousin/R&R time as we can. This little visit has come on the heels of the first three-day stretch Matt and I have had apart from the girls ... ever. And when it was just Emery, we only went away on two separate occasion for less than 24 hours each time.

Clearly, this trip was overdue. And is it bad to say that I wasn't really ready to come back?

Anyway, back to strawberry picking.

Poor Anna Kimball couldn't really participate since picking strawberries does require walking legs. She was a good sport, though, and was rewarded by some strawberry ice cream at the end. 

Will scoot for ice cream.

(Must credit my talented sister-in-law for these amazing pics!)

Miscellaneous

Whenever we go to Whole Foods, we try to park by the same bench that's right under a speaker. Usually there's some fairly upbeat music playing and Emery has gotten into the habit of wanting to dance on the bench while I pack the groceries into the car. I'm finding this so comical these days, especially since I know her little antics won't last forever.

Anna Kimball, well, she's been giving me a few gray hairs recently. She fell off Emery's bed a few weeks ago and it's taken her a very long time to get back on her feet again, quite literally. Just when I was about to take her in for x-rays, she started bearing weight on her left foot again, much to my great relief. She's still nowhere close to walking, so she gets her thrills in other ways ... this week, the playground swing just made her morning.

I don't have any pictures of this, but Anna Kimball is also in the stage where she points at everything. So when I go to get her from her crib in the morning or after nap, she immediately points at the door. I don't know why I find this so endearing - maybe it's because her pointing is silent, unaccompanied by whining or long-winded demands ... though let it be said, she finds plenty of other opportunities to show me her displeasure throughout the day! Maybe it's because I love realizing that she actually knows what she wants and can communicate it and that even though she still seems like a baby in so many ways, she is growing up!

Our living room has a new name

According to Emery, our living room is actually the "fairy room ballroom." She's been referring to the living room as such for a few weeks now and I can't help but laugh as I find myself quite seriously referring to it as such, too. As in "would you like to read your stories in the fairy room ballroom?" Or "go check the fairy room ballroom for (fill-in-the-blank) that is lost."

Apparently life in the fairy room ballroom is rather exhausting (as is a temper tantrum that kicked things off to a great start that morning) - Matt found her asleep like this shortly before her nap a few Saturdays ago.

Yesterday I was getting a little desperate for ways to entertain Anna Kimball, or rather ways for her to entertain herself, so I pulled out a big basket of toiletries and hoped for no peppermint oil baths on the bed, contact solution in the hair or soap in the throat. The result? No disasters and blissful baby, which makes for a very merry mama.

All I have to say about this one is ahhhh ...