Rock star in the making

We went to family night at the Arboretum tonight and had a great time! We packed a picnic dinner and went to watch The Little Miss Ann Band perform. Anabelle really had fun dancing around to their songs and was quite into the show. It is really entertaining to watch a bunch of kids jump and dance around to live music. At one point the singer asked for volunteers to come up and sing "Twinkle, Twinkle". She choose an 8 year old as her 1st singer. After that she asked for another, Anabelle immediately yelled out "me, please!" and the singer said, " I don't know you are a little young. Is your Mom here?"  So I held up my hand and gave the thumbs up. The singer said, " ok, come up here"  You can't tell from my video but she was up in front of quite a large crowd and she rocked it! I was shocked by how fearless she was. I love it, so proud of my little girl!

Slow down please

Charlotte is 5 months old today and this is about the time when I would like things to slow down just a bit. It seems like every day brings a new development or milestone and it just goes by too fast. So Charlotte, could you please slow down just a little bit? Thanks :)  

Here's the latest news on Miss Charlotte

* She has now mastered rolling both ways

* She can sit up pretty well, but with a pillow behind her, she still likes to dive bomb for added excitement

* She has become more tolerant of being on her stomach

* She isn't crawling, but she scoots around

* She has discovered her toes and can almost get them into her mouth

* She loves to attempt to eat anything she comes in contact with

*She is a drooling machine!!! (we do a lot of laundry around here)

*She has a tooth popping through on the bottom!

* She has starting eating purees, so far she likes sweet potatoes and bananas and doesn't like peas

* She goes to bed around 8 and wakes up somewhere around 1 for a bottle, then back to sleep till around 5 has another bottle and if we are lucky goes back to sleep.

* Naps are not consistent or predictable at all, I'm sure we'll get there someday... I hope. Most of the time she wakes up, plays about an hour, eats, then plays another hour and then naps for "awhile". This could mean 40 minutes or it could mean 3 hours- you never know :)

* She likes taking baths, and has graduated from the bath lounger to the mini tub insert where she can sit up.

* She loves to look at books, be sung to (itsy bitsy spider is a favorite), dance around, be tickled, and play with her big sister.

Here are some pictures form the past month:

A new doll, she loved it right away!

Thankfully she has gotten better about sleeping in her car seat, we are on the go a lot!

She has started to play with the toys attached to her car seat more often.

Time to start whipping up some baby food. Here are some sweet potatoes. I typically by fruits and veggies, fresh or frozen, and I try to do organic. Then steam them and throw them in food processor. Puree till smooth, pour them into these baby food trays, freeze,then pop them out and store them in ziploc bags. Just take out what you need each day. Each cube is about 1 ounce.

 

Loves watching Anabelle

She could hang out in this hovering position for quite awhile, just waiting to pounce!

Bath time!

Hanging out on the patio, enjoying the summer weather.

Anabelle picked out a book about teeth for Charlotte to read.

My brother Michael took these pictures of the girls this weekend. I thought they were amazing and had to share. He and Aunt Steph also gave the girls the dresses they are wearing. Thank you!!

Snippets

Lots of random pictures just laying around so I thought I'd stick all together in one big post. Here are some snippets from the last month...

Anabelle and I having fun with self portraits.

Watching the fireworks on the 3rd of July at Ribfest. John and I celebrated our 7th anniversary that day and didn't even get a photo together. Good thing they'll be a few more anniversaries down the road for photo ops  :)  Here's Anabelle  sitting with Daddy.

Even Charlotte liked the fireworks.

Our good family friend Bonnie came for a visit!

Charlotte is pretty smiley lately- love it!

John and I had a night out to attend the wedding reception of a good friend from college, Brett and his beautiful bride Maureeca.  We had a really fun time!

Brooke and Jason 

Apparently something was funny :)

Brooke, Erin, and me

The Guys: Justin, John, Eric and Jason.

Charlotte has been on the move. She sits up with support and then when she flops over on her stomach she is starting to move around. It's more of an angry scoot right now, she's not happy about it but she kinda "inchworms" her way around. Not far by any means, but she can definitely move around a bit. She'll be crawling soon.

She has also been hanging out in her exer-saucer. She basically outgrew every other sitting contraption that we had. She can't safely be in her bouncy seat or bumbo chair anymore since she can touch the ground and roll and her legs are super-human strong. So the exer-saucer and high chair are the only places I can safely put her if I need to get something done. Hopefully she'll get better at sitting unsupported soon, so I can just plop her down on the ground with some toys.  But for now she loves this thing. 

Trying to fit her whole hand in her mouth?

A weekend of music

A couple of weekends ago John and I had a weekend full of music. On Saturday we went to see Jimmy Buffett play. We have both seen him quite a few times and so by now we have this tailgating thing down. We went a little simpler with sandwiches from Jimmy Johns and then everyone brought a dish to share. This year we also decided to leave the baby pool at home, it's too much work and too much of a mess. It was sunny and 100 degrees so the most important thing was a canopy to shade us and lots of cold beverages. We had a great time!  Joe, Kari, Darcy, and Eric joined us.

Sunday we took the girls to Ribfest in Naperville to see ZZ Top. Initially, I wasn't so sure I would enjoy the music of ZZ Top, but then John refreshed my memory on all of their hits- I was pleasantly surprised. It was hot, still around 100 degrees, but we found a shady spot to sit. Charlotte and I were able to sit on the blanket and hold down our spot while John and Anabelle went and got all kinds of goodies to munch on. The music was good, the food was good, and it wasn't too crowded. We all had a great time. It makes it even better when you can walk home- Ribfest is only about 2-3 blocks from our house.

We started with cheese fries- so yummy. By the end of this Anabelle looked like she had taken a bath in cheese.

This was so funny, as soon as ZZ Top came out on stage Charlotte just raised her arm like she was truly rocking out. She stayed that way for quite a while. 

Time for some ribs, usually I get a pulled pork sandwich , but this year I got ribs too and I am so glad. They were delicious!

Joe and Kari tried the huge watermelon drink- yum!

Dancing the night away to ZZ Top

Despite the heat these guys still dressed in their full garb- covered head to toe!

Ice cream time

Anabelle loved eating everything, she definitely needed a bath that night!