16 months old!

Hi everyone! Sorry I've been a blog slacker lately. This pregnancy has me worn out! I'm at 15 weeks and praying that it will get easier soon. The morning sickness has turned into afternoon sickness, which isn't fun when I'm stuck at work. Speaking of work, I got a promotion =) I'm transitioning to my new role in mid October. Currently I'm a marketing associate for the Healthcare division at GOJO. I'm moving to Product Management to be an associate product manager for our group that focuses on developing wipes. I'm very excited for something new!

Anson turned 32 this week. I think he had a good Birthday week. Tuesday my parents took us out to eat at Hartville Kitchen, and then Wednesday, Jeremy & Renee took us to out to Fridays. He's going to get a GPS but hasn't yet because our computer is really acting up and we're still trying to decide what to do with it.

This weekend has been pretty busy too. Friday evening we went over to Gigi's to see Uncle Bob and Brigitte. Many other family members that we don't see a lot were there, so it was really nice. Then, last night, we drove down to Mansfield to see Chris, Kim and AJ. They drove an hour North and us an hour South so we could see them. It was a great idea and wasn't that far. We should really do that more often. We haven't seen them in months. We are going to have a bonfire on Oct. 4 so hopefully they can come back up for that.

Below are some random photos and videos I took of Lily. She's growing up so fast. I can't believe she's 16 months old already.

This first one is one night when she crawled up onto the couch (yes, she can do that now!) and was drinking her milky.

Hurricane Ike in Akron????

Here is a quick video of the what hurricane Ike brought us. Fortunately everything looks like it will make it through the night.

First Pictures of the New Baby =)

Randomness

We had a great long weekend. We started it early with an afternoon date on Friday. Anson and I went to lunch and to see a movie - Tropic Thunder. I didn't enjoy the movie much. It's a guy movie! But, it was better than being at work.

Saturday we cleaned the house, and Saturday night I went out with my girls to dinner and putt-putt. We were celebrating Mindy's birthday.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MINDY!!

Sunday we took Lily swimming. We wanted to go back to Griffith's Park but we drove all the way there and the pools were empty! So, we ended up going to Clearwater, which is double the price to get in. The water was sooooo cold. We didn't stay long. Lily was shivering. Sunday evening we went over to Anson's cousin Matt's new house in Tallmadge.

Monday we had a cook-out at my parent's house and then went down to Jill's for some volleyball. We had a packed weekend but it sure was fun!

Here are some updates on new things with Lily...

She is quickly learning how to use her fork to feed herself.

Yummy hot dogs and apples.
Nothing really special about this pic...she's just cute!
Lily and Colton at Matt's house on Sunday. Colton is so sweet. His mom, Teri, said to Lily "How are you doing sweetie pie?" So, Colton sat down, put his arm around Lily and repeated "How are you doing sweetie pie?"
We successfully weaned Lily off the bottle!! She's now drinking her evening milk from her sippy cup. Last Thursday was her last bottle (sob, sob).

Next are a few silly videos. Lily loves to spin around, make herself dizzy and then fall over.

This video is Daddy tickling Lily and Lily laughing really hard!

And finally, we taught Lily how to tickle back. This video is her tickling Daddy. She's really cute because she usually screams when she tickles someone.

Girl's Night...celebrating Mindy's birthday!

This sundae was free - can you believe it? Lone Star is the place to go for your birthday!

15th Month Check-up & the Fair

Today I took Lily to her 15th month check-up. Everything is going well! She is growing just right...a little too fast for my liking, though. Here are her stats:


Weight: 21lbs, 3 oz = 25th percentile
Height: 30 3/4" = 60th percentile
Head = 80th percentile


Our next task is to wean her off her night bottle, which I am not looking forward to!


Here are some photos from the Portage Co. Fair from Saturday. We went with Jeremy & Renee. It was a lot of fun and Lily enjoyed touching some of the animals.

15 Months on Earth...Amazing!

It's amazing how much a little baby learns in just 15 months here on Earth. Lily amazes us everyday. She is learning and growing so quickly!

She shakes her head no at everything! We've been encouraging her to shake her head yes but it doesn't always work.

However, last night Anson took Sampson to the park. I thought I heard him pull into the garage and I asked Lily "Is Daddy home?" She shook her head no. Then, a few minutes later, I heard Anson for sure, and repeated the question. This time she shook her head yes. I was so impressed!

Lily says "apples, apple juice, up, doggy, mama, dada and nana."

She loves books and picks up on things really quickly. We bought her a new book on Sunday and I read it to her only a few times, showing her where the fish, lobster, dolphins, etc, were. Then I asked her where those things were on the pages and she pointed right to them. Again I was amazed.

Lily definitely has her likes and dislikes. And, she's not afraid to voice her opinion! She has little tantrums on a daily basis.

Lily loves to climb on her toys. The higher, the better. The wobblier, the better. In the photo below, she's standing on her rocking giraffe.

Last night at dinner, Lily pointed to where we keep our bananas. Anson asked her if she wanted a banana and she shook her head yes. So, Anson gave her a banana and she ate it. That's was really neat because she was able to tell us what she wanted =)

Lily will go get her binky and her blankie when asked. She will also bring you toys - Elmo, Abby, Baby, Froggie, Bunny or Care Bear - when asked. She recently learned how to make her Care Bear sing and she pushes her hand over and over and over and over...

That's all for now. Her 15-month check-up is on Monday.

Jetskiing

I'm a little behind on posting, but better late than never. Here are a few photos from jetskiing last Sunday. We really did take Lily out, and Anson got us up to about 20 mph. But, she started fussing so we took her back in. She's not too fond of her life jacket.

Holding Mommy and Papa's hands.
Just chillin in her Dora chair. She amazed us all because she sat in this chair for a long time. She really liked it.
Playing with Uncle Jamie
Taking her water shoes off.

Babysitting...Daddy Style

This past Wednesday night, I had the pleasure of baby sitting Lily and Jen and Ken Waybright's son Zachary for about 4 hours. Mae had left that morning to go to Ottawa Canada for an overnight business trip and Jen needed someone that she trusted to watch Zachary while she went to a Tastefully Simple Party. Originally Mae had told Jen that we both would watch him, but eventually remembered that she was going to be out of town. I said that I would still do it, as 2 toddlers didn't scare me. I got home around 5:20 and quickly downed some food because I knew I was going to have to feed Lily as soon as Mae's parents dropped Lily off at 5:30. I got her food ready and then she was home. I fed her and cleaned her up just in time for Jen to arrive at 6 to drop Zachary off. He hadn't been fed yet either, so she told me what to give him and then she quickly left so she could get to her party. Here is a couple of pictures of him getting ready to eat dinner at the Cross household.

Yes... Don't I look so innocent...

Quit taking my picture...Do you know how many times my picture has been taken in the last 15 months????? GEEZ!!!

After dinner, I cleaned him up and then moved him over into the baby cage area so that the 2 could play together. Overall, they did quite well together. Neither one of them have a concept of sharing yet because as soon as one of them would pick something up, the other one was trying to take it away so he or she could play with it.

See what I mean....It was like this all night long :-)

This Elmo chair sure is comfortable...

The night went relatively quick. I didn't do much besides just watch them and make sure they didn't hurt themselves. I changed both of their diapers before putting them both into their pj's. As the night wound down so did their happiness. Lily started crying and then Zachary did. Zachary started grabbing my 2 index fingers and would pull me because he wanted out of the play area. I let him run free for a little bit so he could go see Sampson in the other room. At one point I was holding both of them on the couch and they were both laying their heads down on my chest. It was very cute, but it did not last long as both were not comfortable.

One last picture before Lily headed up to bed and Zachary's mom came to get him. Both of them would laugh when Sampson would go by and especially when he would lick their fingers from the outside of the play area.

That about wraps up my evening with the 2 toddlers. It certainly gave me plenty of practice for when there are more kids in our household. Hope you enjoyed the story, pictures, and videos.

Anson