The Thinker

The artist contemplates her work...

Anna has recently experienced the joy of combining two of her favorite activities--coloring and taking a bath. We've tried bath markers, bath finger paint, bath dye, but nothing beats good, old-fashioned bath crayons. We may have a future Monet on our hands...

Heart + soul

So many boys, so little time! In addition to flirting with the birthday boy, Anna also spent time playing a little Heart & Soul with her "other boyfriend", Matthew, at Owen's birthday party. She's so fickle...

Eat your heart out, Paris

Paris Hilton just wishes she looked this adorable with a puppy in her purse...

Anna is going through quite a "girly" phase right now. She loves purses, sunglasses, bows in her hair, and looking "pretty". Let me tell you--I'm not complaining! As the natural maternal response to this new interest, I have of course basically set up a bow factory in our dining room. Now let's just hope this isn't one of those 1- or 2-week phases...I'm not sure Lily is going to be too thrilled about being adorned in tiny bows if Anna loses interest in them.

Making beautiful music together

Anna's good friend (and future prom date), Owen, turned one this Sunday, so she decided to play him a little birthday tune...

MORE junk food...puulleease??!?

My lifelong friend, Emily, and some other girlfriends from college were in town a few weeks ago, so we met them at Chick-fil-A for lunch. Not only did I have a great time hanging out with old friends, but Anna got her first fast food! I've been a bit of a hippy with her eating over the last year+, but am starting to try to relax a little. Needless to say, she was happy for the "break" from her flaxseed and whole grains! She LOVED the chicken nuggets...I'm afraid I may have created a monster.

More fun pics from the playdate coming soon...

(Sorry for the delay between posts recently...work has been insane the past few weeks and I haven't gotten much free time for blogging...)

Waterbug

We just thought Anna enjoyed the pool last summer...she is LOVING it this year! She attempts to "swim" (really just humoring us and letting us motor her around on her tummy), and drinks as much pool water as her little tummy will possibly hold. Yum. She's even put her head under a few times (not entirely sure if it was intentional, but she seemed to think it was fun!). 500m butterfly...Olympics 2024...gold medal...I could see it.

Hats off to you...

Anna showed off her "new" hat this weekend while Nana was here to visit. We didn't want to rain on her parade and tell her that this was actually her sun hat from last year. We'll let her bask in the joy that is a 15-minute short term memory.

Not only does this hat protect her from the sun and look pretty darn cute, but it also provides an excellent accessory for her new favorite song--head, shoulders, knees and toes (and, eyes and ears and mouth and nose...head, shoulders, knees, and toes....seriously, we can spend hours singing this every day).

At the zoo with Nana

Nana came and visited this past weekend...Anna was so thrilled to see her! We went to zoo on Sunday to check out Anna's newest favorite things--animals! Last time we were there she didn't quite get the concept of the zoo, but things had definitely changed this time. She loved seeing the animals, and showing off her new animal noises to Nana.

Our Little Book Wormie

One of Anna's favorite activities is "reading" (read: rapidly flipping through) books. Many times a day she'll sit down and one-by-one take every book out of her book basket and read each one. In case you're looking for a recommendation, she strongly endorses "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" by Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle. It's a light read and would probably be good by the pool this summer.

Pretty in pink

I just thought this was a pretty picture of our little angel...

Happy Father's Day, Daddy!!

Happy Father's Day Daddy!! We hope you have as much fun today as we did making your gift...

Daredevil in the making...

We've been venturing down to the Kemah Boardwalk more often these days, where Anna loves to ride the carousel. She also gets just about as much joy out of watching the "big kids" ride the bigger rides. They have a ride that flips upside down called "Pharoah's Fury"...Anna just loves to watch it and thinks its hilarious when the kids on it scream as it goes upside down. She points and screams along with them. Not sure the 12 inches that the horse on the carousel moves up and down actually warrants screaming, but we're happy to let her live vicariously through the "big kids" at this point...

Cute on wheels

Clear the road--Anna's got her first set of wheels!

She had so much fun "driving" at the Children's Museum a few weeks ago. So many buttons to push and dials to turn! She's actually gotten quite into driving in general these days...the jungle gym at the playground has a few steering wheels on it, and she spends a majority of the time that we're at the playground as the "captain" of the jungle gym...

Not bad hair, just a good nap...

It takes some seriously intense napping to result in hair like this...

Bubbles!

Anna's new favorite word--and activity--is most certainly "BUBBLES!". We ventured to the Children's Museum on Friday, and she was quite pleased to discover that, not only could she create bubbles in this wonderful tube-like apparatus, but she could also select their color with the buttons on the floor! Needless to say, she loved the Children's Museum...

Thanks for the sandox, Daddy!

Anna had such fun this weekend playing in the sandbox that Daddy built her! This was a bit of a belated birthday gift...we had actually gotten it in March, but decided to wait until the springtime yardwork was done to get it set up. Anna is definitely intrigued by it. She's still not exactly jumping in head-first, but she's warming up to it more and more every day and enjoying trying out her new "sand tools". She's not interested in getting all dirty in the sandbox yet--she tends to enjoy watching me cover myself in sand more than she enjoys getting it all over herself. Hmmm...maybe she's the brighter of the two of us?

Happiness

Grandpa AND cheese??!? Does life get any better?

Happy Mother's Day, Mommy!

We just wanted to wish Mommy a very happy Mother's Day! Anna shared some of her Puffs with Mommy this morning (seen here), followed by brunch and some shopping for Mommy. This time next year, Anna will be making pancakes for breakfast for Mommy, right?

Take time to stop and eat the bluebonnets

Even though we missed taking pictures in the "peak" of bluebonnet season and so were left with a fairly meager patch of flowers for our backdrop, Anna didn't seem to notice. She loved sitting in the flowers, and particularly loved attempting to sample their culinary yumminess. Let's hope bluebonnets aren't poisonous?!? She did manage to pick a few (which is illegal, for you non-Texans)...let's hope no state troopers were loitering outside of her school watching this photo shoot. I'm not sure Anna's tough enough yet to do well in state prison...

Wanna join my picnic?

Does it get any more fun than a springtime picnic/tea party with REAL FOOD?? We decided to take advantage of the great weather we've been having recently and have a little beach towel picnic in the backyard yesterday. Goldfish crackers and peach-mango chips taste much better eaten in the grass off of a plastic teaset...