I Can Jump

Priceless: Watching your son realize that he just learned how to jump...and jump...and jump!

Emme's Two Week Stat's!

Today was Emeline's two week appointment. She has actually gained almost a pound...weighing in at 9.4 pounds...born at 8.6 pounds. She's at the 80% for weight, 93% for height at 21.5 inches...born at 20 inches and 38% for head. Doctor said she's doing great and looks really healthy. Emme's been sleeping well at night, giving me a total of around 7-8 hours a night...broken of course. She breastfeeds about every 3-4 hours at night and 2-3 during the day. She hiccups a lot...and likes to stare at us and track us already. Just started the soothie pacifier today and for some reason I was apprehensive about it, but she likes it. She's a big time soother by sucking. We are having so much fun watching her grow each day.

Zackary is still struggling a bit with Emeline's arrival but he loves her and just hates to see her cry. He's developed a rash that comes and goes all over his body from one bump to several. We are trying to figure it out...allergy or anxiety. It's fun to watch him explore Emme's toes, fingers, face, hair. I can't wait for the point where she will be able to interact with him more. That will help!

Constantly Changing

How you doing? He has learned thumbs up along with much more slang terms and it's so funny. He is changing and growing up so fast and so much. Just in the last week of me being busy with the baby stuff he has started talking so much more, developed a whole new burst of energy and grown I swear another couple inches.

Dad and Zackary have been spending a lot of time together. "Beach" or "Park" are two of his favorites. They have so much fun playing in the sand or looking for dandelions.

His personality is bursting with joy, comedy and more of a two year old frustration on occasion. He screams, whines, runs all around and just has endless energy.

We have to look for pine cones (this is only a quarter of his collection that he lines up!), snails, worms, dandelions, flowers or any bug for that matter. I love his nature side...nurturing that side of him is important to me as my stepfather taught me about animals and nature to a point of it being a huge part of who I am. Wonder what his next fixation will be...trucks probably!!!

It's a GIRL

January 28, 2011...5:30am exactly...8pound 6 ounce baby girl, Emeline Carolena is born. She is such a gem. The labor and delivery went beautifully. My recovery is going well. She eats, poops, sleeps, burps and cries! All as a baby should do. Zackary is such a sweetheart with her. He gets very upset when she cries not understanding what is wrong with her. I feel bad for him but he is getting a lot of attention and loving sister Emme. He says Emme all the time, it's too cute! I had been practicing her name with him though before the birth and Emerson if it was a boy. So he had the names down! We are so excited we have a girl and feel like our family is complete!

Car ride home from the hospital. 5 minutes flat and she was asleep! We had to go buy some girl clothes because we didn't have any...and I have a feeling that having a girl is going to be dangerous for my wallet!

Fish, Otters and Lions

In the midst of our stagnation (waiting for baby number 2) Ben and I decided to get out and take Zackary to the Long Beach Aquarium for a morning. He loved the fish, sea otters, and sea lions. He did not love the shows and demonstrations that were inside the Aquarium. I think it was to loud for him and he was confused what was going on. The sea lion show outside he was okay with and enjoyed them performing. He was clapping with excitement when they jumped up! He had fun walking around checking everything out and wasn't shy with trying to touch the sting rays and sharks (he just couldn't reach them very well!!!). He could have cared less about the bird exhibit they have! I wish they had Penguins. Two hours was a perfect amount of time to be there and a fun outing for us all.

Wrapping up 2010

We bought Zackary a Imaginarium Train set for Christmas. The first one we bought was defective. Ben had to box the whole thing back up and go exchange it for another. What a pain. The second one fit together perfectly and Zackary was so happy Christmas morning to see it next to the tree! He didn't quite know how to take all the presents and commotion going on, but towards the end of the day at my sister's house he finally realized how fun it is to open gifts and would clap his hands and say "yaaaa" real loudly each time he opened a gift! I thought, I should start doing that too!

Here we were explaining how we leave food for Santa and the Reindeer. Zackary calls Santa "HO HO HO" and our Elf on a Shelf is named Elf. He keeps looking for him every morning. I tell him he is back living with Santa now at his house and secretly watching him when he doesn't know it! We don't feed Zackary a lot of sugar so Santa and the Reindeer got a carrot, some crackers, milk and one chocolate covered raisin!

The week of Christmas we took Zackary to our local garden center that goes all out for the holiday. He of course didn't care about the surrounding huge trees covered in Christmas lights, all he wanted to see were all the fountains they had going throughout the place. He had fun though.

Family pick...Zackary kept doing a devil look in each shot...little comedian.

Thanksgiving.

Winter Time

The first time Zackary tried on his rain boots he was cracking me up. We were at Nordstroms and he was picking up his feet like they weighed a ton and walking around modeling them for us looking like he had never walked before. Now he's used to them. It's fun looking for puddles after a good rain because his love for water is still in full affect! As you can see above he loves bringing along his rakes, golf clubs, popper, or lawn mower on EVERY walk we go on. He drags them along the whole way and only for maybe a dandelion, snail, or pine cone will he put them down!

A week before I knew we were going to our local mall for Santa pictures I started telling
Zackary all about Christmas. He's still a little young to really understand but he loved hearing about Rudolph (and singing the song), Santa Claus, Christmas lights and what Christmas time is all about. He has a Christmas picture book, so we go through it and talk about all the pictures. When it was Santa Picture time he did so well. He ran up to the house gave Santa some high fives, sat in his lap and let us snap away! The picture we bought is priceless.

They have a huge Christmas Tree at the mall and all these presents underneath it. Good Kodak moments!

Two more pregnant months to go!!!

Grandma and Zackary.
After we grabbed these pictures Zackary found a drain hole and started jumping on it. These 3 kids around his age thought it was so cool and joined him but also started following him around. He did not know what to make of it...but he allowed their playful behavior!

Update on Zackary: 2 years 3 months old!
He says Aqua still instead of water! And we aren't allowed to say water either...he corrects us.
He's babbling way more-sometimes sounding like he's speaking Asian and I think he can say good-bye in German and good-night in Italian!
He loves to hum Jingle Bells and This Old Man.
Sesame Street and Mickey Mouse Playhouse are still his favorite TV shows.
He has developed a sudden burst of energy...and wants to be moving all the time-that is where Dad comes in after work! My energy level is around the play-dough level!
Nap time has shorten to approx. an hour. Bedtime still great 6pm to between 5 and 6am.
He kisses my belly and hugs it all the time. Every time we go somewhere he makes sure that we say the baby is coming too!
He leaves all the Christmas presents alone under the tree but plays with the ornaments occasionally. And he loves to find the Elf every morning but doesn't understand what the significance of Mr. Elf is yet.
And you should see his new dance moves....can't put into words, just to cute.
He does push ups with Dad. He is quite the character!
He likes to make animal sounds and his wolf, peacock, horse, fish and lion are pretty spot on!