Last Days As An Only Child

Before Natalie arrived we tried to make sure to do a few things with Anastyn to give her some extra attention before her world as an only child forever changed!

We went to eat pizza, one of her favorites, at a new place that was very good. They also had good bread, another favorite.

We played outside and got a few extra laughs in while the weather was still nice and warm.





I love these two pictures above. She somehow always manages to wear her sunglasses upside down, I love it!

We got a few cuddles in before Natalie arrived.

And snuggled with piggy, too, in an attempt to take a nap at the hospital... it didn't happen!

P.S. Ignore the date on these pictures, my camera was set wrong for a few days! oops!

Natalie's First Bath

Natalie: One Month

Natalie is one month old today! That is so hard for me to believe, time really just goes so quickly. Her well-check appt. isn't until Monday, so I don't have stats, I will post those later. She is really a pretty good baby. She eats every 2 hours during the day...usually goes 3 hours at least once or twice. She has been sleeping 3-5 hours at a time during the night. She has started smiling a little...today I was singing to her and she started smiling at me and gave me a little coo, let me tell you, that just melts my heart! I can already tell she is going to really love Anastyn. Whenever Anastyn talks to her, kisses her, or walks/dances by she usually turns her focus to Anastyn.

On the other hand, Anastyn is such an awesome big sister. She comes in every morning and is always excited to see Natalie's eyes open. She will exclaim, " She looking at me!" She must kiss and hug her before every nap and before going to bed, and Natalie gets many other random kisses throughout the day. Anastyn usually says "my baby sister" instead of calling her by name. I am not sure why, but she will say it occasionally. She gets a kick out of Natalie passing gas, burping or going to the bathroom and is always happy to help by bringing a diaper, burp cloth, pacifier or blanket. She has really just been so sweet to her and loves her so much. I can't wait to watch them grow together, it should be very exciting!

Due to my lack of blogging I have so much to say and catch up on from the last month, but I will leave that for other posts. I am finally starting to adjust a little to having two little girls. We are starting to get into a little bit of a routine and I usually can get them both to nap together for at least 1 hour - giving me time for a shower and a bit of cleaning. Every day gets better and I am really looking forward to warmer weather when we can get out a bit more.

I took a few pictures today to document Natalies one month birthday. The one at the top shows a hint of her little smile. And the following pictures tell more of how she really felt about our little photo session! She really looks so much like Anastyn did, but there are a few little differences. I really just love both of my girls and am so glad God blessed us with two healthy, beautiful, sweet babies...and fairly good sleepers as well ;-)

I really love this pout face. This may be cruel, but sometimes I just let her cry a little longer so I can see this little pout. I didn't quite capture the full frown, it gets a little bigger still...but this is basically it...I just think it is the cutest face.

I love how she was stretched out across this calendar. ( I stole this idea from a blog I love to read called Under the Sycamore. Hers is a thousand times better, but I liked the idea and you will love her blog)
Stretched out showing us how big she is getting already!

She is officially done with this photo session and showing me that pout I love again! ( I took a lot more, she was a trooper!)

Hopefully, I will get caught up on a few things that we have done this past month. For now I am headed to bed to get my first few hours of sleep before Natalie is ready to eat!

Introducing...

Natalie Reese

7 lb. 14 oz.

11-17-2010

4:09 pm

I am a little behind on posting about the arrival of our new, sweet, little girl, but we have been keeping quite busy with our 2 little girls and Thanksgiving festivities. I will be sure to post a little more about her arrival soon, as well as some pictures. Every thing went very well with the delivery and Anastyn is adjusting to her new role as big sister. As far as I can tell, she loves it! She is very sweet to her baby sister and gives her lots of hugs and kisses. We are so blessed to have two healthy and happy little girls. Can't wait to post some more pictures.

Fall Happenings

Since I am clearly not going to get it together enough to do separate posts on all that we have been up to lately, I thought I would at least post a few pictures to show you what fun we have been having!

Anastyn made this candy corn "Boo" and painted the paper bag pumpkin at our fabulous babysitter's house. I thought they were adorable, of course!

Ready for church with her baby. She is getting ready to take good care of her baby sister!

We have taken some good naps!

At the annual Fredendall Fall Festival (a wonderful little fall tradition my mother has started) Anastyn tried her luck in bobbing for apples.

Londyn, Skylar and Lincoln waiting to bob for apples as well. Lincoln REALLY wanted in that bucket!


Anastyn also played a game where you are supposed to put your hands behind your back and eat a donut off of a string. Anastyn loved this game and was determined to get that donut!




We ate lots of good Halloween/fall themed food and snacks.

She loved walking my aunt's dog around the yard. She played with her for a very long time while the other kids played more games.

We went on a hayride. Here is Trent, Kesha, and Malachi. Londyn and Alexis in the background.

She "drove" the tractor after our hayride at the farm.

And Mr. Lincoln flashing his big grin! He loves the camera!

Halloween 2010

This year our church decided to do a trunk-or-treat and have a chili supper fellowship. We had a wonderful time and Anastyn fared quite well in the candy department! Her little pumpkin hood didn't last too long, but she did pose for this one picture for me, big smile and all! We really love this little pumpkin! I think Anastyn was a little sad to see this holiday go, though. As we drive through the neighborhoods that were once completely decked out for Halloween she keeps asking, "Where all the pumpkins go?" She is very concerned and apparently the answers I give her aren't good enough because she keeps asking ;-)

Pumpkin Patch 2010

We decided to hit up one of our local pumpkin patches on October 9 with our friends. Anastyn got to go with her friend Mya and the girls had so much fun sliding down slides, seeing the farm animals and playing in the corn boxes. They took a little tractor/train ride and ran around the hay maze. It was a beautiful day and we had such a wonderful time. Here are a few pictures from our day.

This was our attempt at a family picture. Anastyn really didn't want to have any part in taking a picture with us, the only way we could get her to sit there was to put that pumpkin in her lap.

While we were taking pictures of our friends' family Anastyn was over to the side posing among the pumpkins. I thought it was cute.

Running around the hay maze.


Cheesing for mama.

There are two of these pictures (I only included one) both I thought were hilarious. Anastyn looks like she is really getting into it on this one. Mya was trying to fit her entire upper body through that little hole on the second one.


I thought these little "train" cars were cute. Each horse had a different name and the girls enjoyed their tractor/train ride.

We are hoping these girls remain good friends through the years. They are so cute together and really love one another.

Daddy waiting to catch her at the bottom.

One of the hundreds of times she went down these slides.

The girls would have played in these corn boxes all day.

I hope everyone is enjoying their fall and the beautiful weather we have been getting! We sure are!

Bedtime Prayers

Before bedtime Anastyn and I have been saying our bedtime prayer. Anastyn used to repeat everything that I would say during the prayer and then I would ask her who she wanted to pray for. She would then list the entire family. Lately, I have let Anastyn do more of the talking and helping her through the prayers. She has really started branching out away from just thanking God for people and naming other things that she is thankful for. It is so sweet to hear from her. Recently, our church purchased a new building and we will be worshipping at the new building starting today (Oct. 6). She went with our babysitter to the new building on Tuesday to help get some things moved in and set up for services. So, that was on her mind as we said our prayers last night.

Her prayer went something like this, " Dear God, thank you to new church building, thank you to new class, thank you to Maddy's class (Maddy and Mya are the children of some friends of ours), thank you to Mya's class, thank you to Norma's class, (at which point I helped her move on), thank you to baby sister, thank you to mommy, thank you to daddy, (she continues to list all of her cousins and grandparents), thank you to food, thank you to piggy, thank you to Jesus, (and I helped her wrap it up) in Jesus name, Amen.

Instead of saying thank you "for", she says thank you "to" (which I think is cute). And she often thanks for her blankets and Dora and boots, and lots of other things that she either has done that day or things that she has heard us pray about. She has almost always started to say thank you "to" keeping us safe and for her food. I love this part of our night. She rarely leaves anyone out either, she could go on all night naming the people in her life that she loves and is thankful for!

"I wanna go school..."

On the way home from the babysitter's house Anastyn and I had a little conversation about her day that went something like this...

Me: Did you have fun at Norma's house today? (our babysitter)

Anastyn: Yeah

Me: What did you do?

Ana: I play wif Rachel...and Norma... and play wif Cody. (the dog)

Me: Did you see Brandon? (the babysitters son)

Ana: No, he at school. He play golf.

Me: Oh, I think maybe he was running (Cross Country practice)

Ana: I wanna go school.

Me: You do? What do you want to do at school?

Ana: Ummm...Eat. (That's my girl!)

Me: What would you like to learn at school?

Ana: Ummm...bout Jesus. (melt my heart)

Me: You learn about Jesus at Sunday school, don't you?

Ana: Yeah!

Just a little conversation that I would like to remember. I just thought it was funny that the first thing she thought she would like to do at school is eat...especially since she is not always a great eater. Also, I love that she said she wants to learn about Jesus...the goal is to keep her on that path. I just love, love, love this precious little two year old!

Camping Trip

A few weeks back (ok, maybe it was the end of July) we went camping with some good friends. They have two precious little girls whom Anastyn simply adores. She loves playing with them and they had such a great time running around outside and floating on the river for the weekend. We also got to go on a little nature walk through some trails near our campsite. We endured a little rain and some very hot weather, but it was such a great weekend! Anastyn got to eat roasted marshmallows, which are definitely one of her favorite things. And we had all the watermelon, cherries, oranges, and dried fruit we could eat. It was sooo good! The only hiccup came after Anastyn went to bed. She woke up a couple hours later and was fully convinced their were bugs in her bed, fish swimming in the tent (which she referred to as the tunnel), and she had gotten a little burn on her lip while eating a marshmallow, so she also was talking about her burn. She could not go back to sleep. This was about 11:00 pm and she was wide awake...eyes peeled open. I put her in bed with us, but she would sit straight up in bed every couple of minutes and scream that the bed was dirty or she had seen a bug or a fish swimming by. I don't think she gave it up until about 4:30 am and that was only after taking her to the car and putting her in her carseat. Needless to say, we were all a little exhausted the next morning! Here are some pictures of Anastyn and her friends and some of the fun they had.

See...just precious, aren't they?

Playing a little tug-o-war

Some fun with the inner tubes

A little balance beam entertainment

Some rock climbing

And some down time...I really just like this picture for some reason, I love her messy hair

all pulled up!

Close the Door!

Anastyn has recently started sleeping in a toddler bed and has been doing sooooo good! She stays in bed all night every night, it has been great! I also love that she can get up by herself in the morning. She always comes to find us and is so happy, she has startled me a few times because she comes up behind me so quietly in the mornings. She has a little more difficulty going down for naps, she stays in bed, but it takes her a little longer to wind down and fall asleep. Ahhhh, the excitements of a 2 year old!

When we put her down for bed, we always close the door at night so she doesn't hear noise from the living room or have any extra lights flooding her bedroom. When we go to bed, we open her door so she can get out by herself, if need be. I guess she has grown accustomed to this and likes to have her door shut when she is sleeping. Twice now in the mornings, as I have been getting ready for work, I hear her door shut loudly. The first morning I went in to check on her and she was crawling back into her bed and looked at me very matter of factly and said "door close, mommy" then layed her little head down and went back to sleep. I guess she doesn't like the morning distraction! She does love her sleep and apparently wants to get up on her own terms!

This morning the same thing happened; however, this time I knew she had done it and just left her alone. It makes me laugh though that she actually gets out of bed and closes the door and goes right back to bed. Gotta love that sweet little girl! I do have pictures of her in her big girl bed, just haven't taken them off my camera yet. Maybe one of these days!

Our Trip to the Zoo

Anastyn loves animals of every kind. She is so curious about them and loves to watch them. So what better place to go than the zoo! It is so great living so close to the zoo. We can go for a few hours see what we want to see and be home before nap time. I think St. Louis has one of the most beautiful zoo's. The walkways are mostly shaded, the animal habitats are easy to see, and I always enjoy our time there. If you are up for a little bit of a walk (I figure you walk around all day, what is another 5-10 minutes of walking from your car), you can park for free and there is no fee to enter the zoo. They have some attractions that you pay for (which we have not done yet) but I have seen where they have passes that you can purchase for one price and do multiple things that have fees (children's zoo, train ride, sting ray pool). One day we will do those things, but for now, Anastyn enjoys walking around looking at the free sites! It was a gorgeous day and we went in the morning, so it hadn't gotten too hot yet. Luckily, after a different brand of sunscreen purchase, we had no breakouts from our sunscreen this year, unlike our zoo trip last year. It is hard to see from those pictures but her eyes were so puffy all day. Here are pics from this year's trip.

Another classic zoo picture where you enter the zoo. I love looking back and seeing pictures of us as children in this exact same spot at the zoo.

Getting a nice ride on daddy's shoulders

Checking out the fish and looking for the hippo. He was MIA that day.

The classic zoo picture


She loved climbing up on the rails to get a better look

Loving on her mama for a picture. This is when she started saying cheese for all of her pictures!

The lions were very lazy that day.

I LOVE this picture!

Anastyn likes walking on anything that requires her to balance. She is always climbing up on the curb or anything that resembles one.

Maybe she gets it from her daddy?