Baby & Me (again)

Kate & I had a great time at Baby & Me today. She absolutely loves the music and songs we sing, and she loves doing the read-along. Today, we were reading a book together about animals and the sounds they make, and she pointed at the panther and said, "Kitty!" Well, yes, that is a kitty, but not like the one that sleeps on our bed! And during the free playtime afterward, she really seemed to have a great time playing with the toys the library provided, and she's so nice with all the other kids. I mean, yeah, sometimes she'll try to take a toy someone else has (which is developmentally appropriate, from what I've read, although you still want to teach them it's not the right thing to do), but I'll say to her, "No, sweetie, that is Mary or Amelia or Ainsley's toy; why don't you play with this one instead?" and she happily obliges; no temper tantrum or anything. (Keeping my fingers crossed that continues as she gets older!) Then, we got home and she slept for almost two hours; I was in heaven! I was able to do some work AND housework; perfect!

After she woke up, we went to lunch with Tracy and Rori, and Kate always loves seeing them. Kate sits in high chairs now instead of her little infant carseat when we're in restaurants, and I can't believe that just a year ago, she wasn't even born yet, and now she's sitting in highchairs and feeding herself crackers and little pieces of fruit. Where does time go?

Here she is before Baby & Me in one of her new Valentine's outfits from Nana:


A close-up of the shirt; so pretty! And is she a baby Dan or what?




Plotting her escape...


Mama's little helper... although I must say, her help is more of a hindrance ;)

Baby & Me

On Friday, Kate and I started a Baby & Me program at Sun Prairie Library. It's a 10-week program for babies birth to 15 months, and she had so much fun. There were about 10 other babies in there, evenly split between boys and girls, and most were around Kate's age (the youngest, though, was 10 weeks; it's crazy how little he looked compared to Kate!)

Kate sat so nicely and "sang" along with all the songs, and when we did the read along, she didn't even try to eat the book (what an improvement from when we used to do Book Baby when she was 8 months old!) Afterward, we had free time, and she loved playing with the toys the library provided. She of course gravitated immediately towards the musical instruments (bells, tambourine) and began playing with those. And she's so nice with the other kids too; she always acts so happy that there are other little people around!


Kate found this ribbon and put it on her head; she's so funny.


A close-up of her shirt; I thought it was appropriate seeing as it's now February


Such a beautiful baby!


Here she is on Friday night. She & Dan went to Radio Shack while I went to the gym. I'll give you one guess as to who this coat is from....

Staying warm and cozy

On Wednesday the 2nd (my mom's birthday), we stayed in most of the day due to the blizzard warnings (although most of the bad weather was on Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning, so we were actually able to go to the gym as a family on Wednesday night). I love this outfit Kate is wearing; I got it on clearance ($5.00!!) back when she was only about a month old, and I can't believe now she's big enough to wear it. She looks so good in red; such a pretty baby.




Trying to escape yet again...








What? I'm not getting into stuff I'm not supposed to...


Ok guys, I'm ready to go to the gym!

Kate & Addy

On Thursday, we went to lunch with Meghan and Addy. Little Adelaide is such a doll; she is just adorable! And it's so fun to see a "little" baby again; Kate looks like she's practically a toddler next to Addy! We went to Sprecher's to eat, which is always delicious, and then we hung out at their house afterward. I wish I had gotten a picture of the two of them together; it was so cute to see. Little Addy was playing on her activity mat, and Kate reached out and held her hand. (Awww!) Next time I will be sure to get some photos (so I guess the title of this blog post is a bit misleading... sorry about that!)

Anyway, here is the outfit she was wearing when we went out; I love this outfit, and again, it is so appropriate for February.




She always tries to arch herself off the chair now; it's hard to get a good picture of her sometimes!


She coordinates quite nicely with the chair and the pillow

Hooray for the Green & Gold!

Even for a football non-fan like myself, I have to admit it's pretty exciting that the Packers won the Super Bowl. We went over to the Hines' for Rori's family birthday celebration (her friend party was last Saturday), and that was a lot of fun. Then we stayed afterward to watch the Super Bowl; so exciting!


Kate & Great-Grandpa at Rori's party


I love this photo of the two of them




My green & gold butter spritz cookies that I made in honor of the Pack; they turned out quite well, if I do say so myself


Kate, Rori & me; as you can see, I got bangs, although this is not the best picture of them


Kate was fascinated by this scarf of Great-Grandma's, so I put it on her, and she left it on! Go figure; she won't wear hats when it's 10 degrees, but yet she'll leave a scarf on for hours on end.








My beautiful goddaughter. Can't believe she's 8!


Sacked out on Daddy for the first half of the Super Bowl. She was so tired because she refused to nap during Rori's party, since she wanted to see what was going on.

Go Pack!

Ok, so we're not the hugest football fans in the world (well, we're really not football fans at all) but how can you resist cheering for your state's team when they're in the Super Bowl? Plus, it's a chance to eat some really good food, so I'm not seeing a downside here...

Here's Kate in her Super Bowl outfit. Yes, I know it's technically a St. Patrick's Day shirt, but we don't own a lot of green, so this is the best we could come up with. Plus, she looks adorable!

Such a funny girl!

Kate got a hold of Dan's hat the other day and put it on by herself. She's so funny!


She looks like one of the seven dwarfs!










She could be a shepherd in the church play... if we went to church