Notes from the Treehouse

It seems time to get a new name for the blog since it's no longer just about "silly-bones". Someone visiting our house a little while back walked out on the deck and said "Oh, look, it's like you live in a tree house". And that very well describes the view. Hence the new blog name.

Here's the new link: Notes from the Treehouse

I've set up emails for those of you that get emails so that they will automatically come from the new site from now one.

Enjoy!

Miss Chievous

Apparently, those graffiti artists didn't quite know how to spell her name ...

Ugh. Will just pointed out that I can't spell her name, either. Will have to correct and repost the photo later :-(

Imperfect

We've already seen what happens when Daddy helps Vivian get dressed in the mornings. Turns out, things are not much better for Annelee when Mommy accidentally grabs a newborn outfit for her and is too lazy to go get another one. Our girl sure is getting big!

Feets

Yes, in our house, it's "feets", not "feet". That was not a typo :) Anyway, I've been trying to get a photo of Annelee's feets to match the one of Vivian's feets at the top of the blog. Not as happy with this one yet, so I will keep trying.


And, transitioning from feets to shoes ... we've been telling Vivian to put her shoes on the stairs rather than leaving them wherever she takes them off. I think she's taking it a bit too far with the time she spends lining them up so that they are arranged just so...

Trip to the Zoo

My parents and I took Vivian and Annelee to the zoo one day. When we arrived, I asked Vivian what animals she wanted to see. Answer: "Monkeys, pigs, horses". I clarified that they did not have pigs or horses at this zoo, but that we would see the monkeys. After first seeing some other animals. Unfortunately, most animals were hiding, sleeping, or standing very far away from the viewing area that day. Not very exciting for a little girl. Vivian dutifully went up to every enclosure, took a look, and then said "I wanna see monkeys".

When we finally got to the Monkey house, we looked at the first ones (can't remember what they were) and I said "Look, a monkey!". At the same time a mother next to me told her son it was a "xxx" (actual name of species). Vivian looked at me and said "No, not a monkey, a xxx". Sigh. Monkeys were not what she expected, either, we think she was looking for chimpanzees, and there were none.

After the monkey house, she got focused on polar bears, so at every enclosure we heard "I wanna see polar bear". That girl is nothing if not persistent.

All in all, the zoo was a disappointment (for the adults more than for Vivian), although Vivian did like the elephants (especially the babies - Vivian claimed they were called Vivian and Annelee) and the polar bear and shark. We skipped the aquarium, but I'm thinking next time, we'll go just there, because that's actually pretty cool.

Naming Of Annelee

As we did with Vivian, we had Annelee's naming ceremony at church while my parents were visiting. Annelee wore the same christening dress that most of the children on my Mom's side of the family have worn. Vivian's name has been added to the list of names on the yellow bow, Annelee's will be added, soon.

Waterbabe

We are continuing to discover various water-parks around Pittsburgh with Vivian's friends. Friday, we went to the Troy Hill Waterpark. Vivian loved crawling under the "water-mushroom" to sit behind the curtain of water!

What Can I Say ...

... she's a cute sleeper ... and I can't stop taking pictures of her sleeping ...

For Grandma Page

All in pink AND the eyes are open!

Da Goils

"Da Goils" - that's what Will tends to label his photos of the three of us. This one was taken in July, I just realized I never actually posted it here.

Size

Someone posted on facebook for Will that we were now allowed to feel that Vivian was suddenly HUGE. I had already been feeling that way before Annelee was born, Vivian is so much a tall little girl now, totally her own person ... but, that person was right ... now that Annelee is here, Vivian seems even bigger. Of course, not all of it is an illusion. Two photos to prove she IS indeed slightly larger than Annelee. Looking at those two photos, it's hard to even imagine that Vivian was that little once, too!

More Sleep

I know my posts of pictures of Annelee sleeping will have everyone convinced that she sleeps all the time, but I just love taking her pictures then. She does sleep a lot. But of course, she is a 3 week old baby, so she does wake up to nurse and look around frequently, too. Here's another sleep one ... note that I have tired of putting a fresh onesie on her after she's been spitting up (or all her onesies were either dirty or not yet quite dry ... you choose :) So you get an almost naked baby today. She's now uncurling her legs a lot more and still has those elastic hips where she can flop them to the side like that and be comfortably asleep.

Eyes & Curls

My mission for today was to get a photo of Annelee with her eyes open. She's been a lot more alert and looking around in the last couple of days and I figured it was now feasible to try. Mission accomplished:



And, while I'm at it, here's a picture of my little curly-head, too. There's one reason to like heat and humidity ;)

Sleep

Everyone has their own favorite position to sleep in. We are still working on finding Annelee's. She's spent the last couple of nights sleeping in her car seat (she doesn't seem to like lying flat all the time and still curls up in a semi-fetal position a lot). But some of her sleep positions look plain uncomfortable to me!

Glasses

While at the pool with Mommy, Daddy, Casey, and Ernie; Vivian tried on Daddy's and Casey's glasses. She was stylin' :)

Sisters

Will brought Vivian into the hospital the morning after Annelee was born. All along, Vivian had been very excited about "Tummyseed", and asked me pretty much every day if the baby had come out of my belly yet. And every day I had pointed to my belly, sighed, and said "No, my belly is still here" ;) We were curious to see how she would react now that the baby had come out.

She was totally excited and immediately wanted to hold Annelee (Will had practiced the name with her on the drive to the hospital, so she already knew the name wasn't Tummyseed any longer). She climbed up on the bed with us and immediately wanted to hold her. She was very gentle with her, just the perfect big sister.

As they were leaving to go home again, Will said "Do you want to kiss Mommy good bye?" In response, Vivian scrambled back on the bed, and insisted that Annelee needed a kiss good bye. Mommy got a quick wave. Looks like the sisterhood has bonded already!

Before and After

So, after my experience with Vivian (where my waters broke in front of a diner), I had this whole late pregnancy thing planned out this time around. I was going to work from home for the last few weeks. That way, there was no risk of my waters breaking in the office. The best laid plans ...

With a week of work from home already completed, Vivian and I were visiting Will in the office after a play date on Monday when ... my waters broke ... in the office. ARGH!

I dragged Vivian to the bathroom and did damage-control with one of Vivian's diapers while Vivian was watching and loudly and repeatedly asked "Mommy, what are you doing with my diaper? That's MY DIAPER!!!!!" I'm sure that left the women in the other stalls puzzling what on earth was going on in my stall! :)

Next, we picked Will up from his desk and headed home to get Vivian taken care of and then drive to the hospital.

Before we departed for the hospital, however, I made Will take a few of those belly-shots that I had been meaning to have him do for a couple of weeks. Talk about last minute! So, this is what I looked like on my last day of pregnancy:



And about 8 hrs and a c-section later, I was holding this in my arms:



Welcome to our family, Annelee Sophia!

Mornings

This is what happens when Daddy helps Vivian get ready in the morning .... :)

Herzlichen Glueckwunsch!

Lieber Grosspapa! Wir hoffen du hast einen wunderschoenen Geburtstag verbracht. Das mit dem Lied singen werden wir fuer's naechste Jahr noch ein bisschen ueben.



Ok, das mit dem Video klappt heute nicht. Muss ich morgen noch mal versuchen :(

Memorial Day Weekend

For the Memorial Day weekend, we headed to Virginia for a fun-packed time with family and friends. We left Friday after lunch, and Vivian only napped briefly in the car. Her ability to amuse herself in the car on long drives continues to amaze me. Although, after the 20th rendition of "Row, row, row your boat", I was ready for her to introduce some variety in her self-entertainment ...

Saturday morning, Susan took Vivian, Casey and I to the Kidwell Farm in Frying Pan Park. Vivian had fun on the tractor ride, and looking at and petting a variety of animals.



We spent the afternoon hanging out on the deck with Grandma, Susan and Casey and a whole bunch of toys that needed to be taken care of.



And we can't forget the rousing rendition of Five Little Monkeys that Grandma got to enjoy!



Saturday evening, Will cooked us a gourmet dinner and John came over to enjoy it with us. Yum. I was too lazy to take photos though.

Sunday started with brunch with the Barbers and John. The highlight for the kids were the balloons they got. The adults enjoyed the company and the great food.



Next, we headed to Linden to Mike & Betsy's pool opening party. Vivian was next to impossible to get out of the pool. It took a whole bunch of adults to keep up with her energy. Jumping in from the side was pretty much the best thing ever, but all other water games, and even just watching everyone else swim and dive elicited equal squeals of delight from our little water-addict.





Mike and Betsy provided a yummy BBQ before we set off on our way home. We were totally convinced that Vivian would fall asleep the minute we hit the road, but of course, she had to prove us wrong (yet again). She stayed awake in the car until 10.30 at which point we were only about 45 minutes from home. We did manage to get her into bed without waking her up and she slept in past 9am the next morning, so that made up for it.

It was great visiting with everyone!