18 months!

My little peanut is a year and a half now! And she is becoming more and more of a little girl and less and less like a baby. It is amazing to see her grow and change! I was just looking at a picture from the day we came home from the hospital and she looks so different now! I'm not sure where all the dark hair went!

We will go to the doctor in a few weeks to get measured/weighed so I'll post those details later. I measure her much different than the doctor, so the comparisons don't really work. I don't get it- you'd think she'd be the same height no matter what, but I must do it differently (if that's possible!)

Here's the update on life as a 1 1/2 year old Annaliese:

Sleeping: We are still working on the transition to one nap/day. Some days it works. Today it has not. She makes it pretty obvious...this morning she walked around the house sucking her thumb and carrying her blanket everywhere until I put her down at 8:50. It's now 11:50 and she's still sleeping. To be fair, she seems to be teething and that always messes up our schedule. We'll see what the afternoon brings!
              She still goes to bed at 7 every night and usually makes it until 6:30. Normally, she is pretty content to stay in her crib until at least 7 am so I have a little bit of time to myself before she gets up.

Clothes: She is starting to outgrow some of her 12 month stuff...but it definitely depends on the brand. I just pulled tags off of an adorable little outfit that Annaliese got for her birthday and, although it's a 12 mon outfit, it's still a little bit big! Most of the 12 month jammies are getting too small, but only because her feet are getting too big for the footie part. We have moved into size 5 shoes just this week!

Activities: Annaliese loves to be moving! Most of the pictures I take these days are blurry:) She loves putting things away, building with blocks, being outside, walking, throwing a ball, and playing the piano. She recently discovered Brodie's water spicket outside, so we spend alot of time outside getting wet!

I wrote the above earlier this morning; as I went to insert some pictures, I realized that after we came home from our camping trip a few weeks ago, the camera got nicely put away. And that means I had no recent pictures to insert. So I spent the rest of the day taking a few pictures of our daily activities:)

After she woke up from her nap, I decided we should have a picnic lunch outside. It seemed like an appropriate thing to do on Memorial Day:)

 This is Brodie's water spicket...

Her clothes tend to get quite wet while playing at the spicket, so we spend a fair amount of our day just in a diaper!

Maybe we should just skip the first night...

Last year we started a Mother's Day tradition of going on a family camping trip. We head out on Sunday and spend 2 nights camping, hoping that most other people will be heading home when we arrive. This year we went to Kirk Creek Campground, located between Highway 1 and the ocean, just south of Big Sur. Since we were on 'vacation,' we took the scenic route through Pismo Beach and made a quick stop for a cinnamon roll at Old West. Kyle and I have never been here together before!

Annaliese has been here several times with Grandpa and Grandma Hendricks and loves these cinnamon rolls!

From here we headed to the campgound. We did make one quick stop on the side of the road near Hearst Castle to check out the zebras.

Finally we reached our campground and set up camp. When Kyle and I were planning this trip and pondering just how much stuff we would be bringing along, we realized that we needed a bigger tent. That's right...we needed an 8-person tent in order to comfortably camp with 2 adults, a toddler, and a dog. And we needed a bigger vehicle...so we borrowed a suburban! 

As soon as our camp was set up, we ate lunch and enjoyed a little relaxing...

 Apparently Annaliese thought the bench might taste good..she was wrong

Checking out the firepit

 I bought Annaliese some new sunglasses for this trip. She kept them on for about two seconds. Maybe.

 We set up this 'fence' to keep Annaliese in our campsite...it worked pretty well!

 Going for a walk

 Our best shot at a family picture

The view from our site

We enjoyed a very nice, although very hot, Sunday afternoon/evening and then came bedtime. Annaliese was cold and woke up several times. I was cold. Kyle got up to use the bathroom at least 5 or 6 times and Brodie needed to go outside twice. At some point, I ended up changing Annaliese into something way warmer, changing her diaper (it turns out she was the smelly one, not Brodie) and bringing her into my sleeping bag with me! Needless to say, nobody got much sleep!

Monday started out very chilly and foggy, but eventually cleared up into a gorgeous afternoon. We had ambitious plans of going for a hike, but after hiking about 100 yards and finding 5 ticks on us, we decided that a hike might not be a good idea. We headed up Highway 1 for a few miles and found a nice pull-out to have a picnic lunch. Annaliese slept through most of it!

Our second hiking attempt was cut short by way-too-much poison oak covering our path. We decided it just wasn't worth it!! 

 there was a lack of shade in our campsite

 Annaliese's sleeping arrangement...she was bundled up the second night and slept very soundly all night! In fact, we all slept much  better and woke up rested and ready for the day...at 5:45!!

Gorgeous sunset

On our way home, Kyle and I commented on how different camping is now...the relaxing, sit-back-and-read-a-book-or-take-a-nap camping trips are over for awhile! Annaliese was constantly on the move! But we loved it and are looking forward to our next camping trip in a few weeks!!

Annaliese Feeds the Animals

Auntie Kelsey Comes to Visit

Not only did we get to celebrate Kyle's birthday last weekend, we were able to hang out with Auntie Kelsey  for a week! She flew down from Seattle on Friday, just in time to help get things ready for the party! (I think she really came to see Annaliese...it just happened to be Kyle's birthday too!)

Being from Seattle where rain is the norm, Auntie Kelsey was excited to see the sunshine and get outside every day! I think she even went home with a bit of a sunburn:)

 We found a delicious recipe for Honey Wheat Bread...Both Kelsey and Annaliese loved it!

We spent one morning visiting the animals at the Avila Valley Barn. Annaliese loved feeding the goats and sheep! First she watched some other little kids, then she walked up to them, took the lettuce out of their hands and fed it to the animals herself! We decided that we should get our own bag of lettuce after that!!

 Checking out the place!

I had to work while Auntie Kelsey was here, but that didn't stop her from taking Annaliese on a hike to Morro Bay and hanging out at the beach. We were also able to go the beach together one morning...the goal was to soak up as much Vitamin D as we could!

 Annaliese loves the water!

 We ran the Bob Jones Trail into Avila...once we got the beach, Annaliese was getting a bit antsy in her carseat, so she and Auntie Kelsey walked down to the water. Brodie and I stayed off the sand:)

Thirty!!

Last weekend we celebrated Kyle's thirtieth birthday! Kinda weird...thirty means you are actually an adult. Like a responsible, mini-van driving, full-grown adult. It sounds like a whole new stage in life...but I guess we will find out what it likes like for us! (At this point, there is no mini-van. Nor any other major life changes!)

What it did mean was that we got to have a big party! We had lots of our friends and family come to Strother Park in Arroyo Grande to celebrate at the park. We played volleyball, bocce ball, cornhole, croquet, and Apples to Apples. There was even a pinata! 

Annaliese and Kyle making sure the volleyball court is good to go.

Croquet, anyone?

Annaliese and Grandpa

Dinner time...We had a friend cater for us...delicious tri-tip and barbecue chicken!

Instead of birthday cake, we had brownies, ice cream, and root beer floats. It was a bit windy, so it took a group effort and a very quick rendition of "Happy Birthday" to keep 30 candles lit long enough for Kyle to blow them out!

Thank you to everyone who was able to help us celebrate! 

17 months!

It's hard to believe that Annaliese is already 17 months old! The time has gone by so quickly, yet it is also hard to remember what life was like without her around! I've become quite accustomed to all the toys in the living room, the extra loads of laundry, and finding her sippy cups in random cupboards! She is becoming more and more fun every day!

I know I'll want to look back and know what her schedule was like and what things she is doing at this stage, so I will try to put it into words here.

Sleeping: Annaliese goes to bed around 7:00 pm and sleeps until between 6:30-7:00. She will usually play in her crib for a little while before wanting to get up. She has her photo album from Great-Grandma Norma in her crib, so I usually find her looking at everyone and talking to them...you can tell when she flips the page by the timing of her "hi!" and "bye!" remarks!!

              We are transitioning from one nap to two; she's been doing it at the baby-sitter's house twice a week for several weeks now, but it doesn't always work at home!

Perhaps a nap is needed!

Eating: Annaliese still loves to eat! Favorites include english muffins, oatmeal, cottage cheese, cheese of any kind, avocado, bread in any form, strawberries, oranges, tri-tip, cheerios, squeezable pouches, Jamba Juice or other smoothies, and anything that anybody else is eating!

I told Annaliese she needed to finish her breakfast before she could get up and play...so she crammed as much english muffin as she could into her mouth at once!!

Clothes: We have just finished packing away the 9 month stuff...they have finally become 3/4 sleeve shirts and capris...and it was just not a good look:) Most of her stuff is 12 mon or 12-18 mon. She is still loving her size 4 shoes!

But who needs clothes, anyways?

Teeth: 12; 4 front/bottom, 4 front/top, and 1 molar on each side top and bottom. We had our first dentist appointment about 2 weeks ago, and Annaliese is definitely not a fan of having her teeth brushed. She does, however, like the flouride drops she gets three times/week and the new strawberry flavored toothpaste!

Activites: Walking...everywhere! This child does not sit still...it is incredible! She is always on the move, carrying toys, 'vacuuming,' closing doors, coloring, and going in and out of the slider door! She enjoys being outside and going to the park, but she's not a fan of the slide. She likes to climb to the top of the play sets and then crawls around until I go down the slide with her! Annaliese doesn't like the sand on her hands, so she's taken  a few face plants and ended up with a mouthful of sand...but at least her hands stayed clean!

We baby-sat Holden all day, while Auntie Jenn was at work...I think Annaliese has a love/hate relationship with him! She likes playing with his toes, finding his nose (he doesn't appreciate that,) and giving him toys...but she doesn't like him holding on to those toys, sitting in her bumbo seat, or generally taking away any attention from her!

Story time with Daddy