Do NOT feed the animals!

We left for church this morning at 8:00am and just now got home at 8:30pm! Luke's actually still there and may be for quite a while! Why, you ask? The HUGE Malvern Hill Baptist Church Fall Festival, of course! Now, when I say huge, I really mean huge...we were expecting 1500-2000 people, but I am sure that there were a LOT more! It was a great way to get to know our community and it was so fun to be a part of it. Anna Kate had a great time dressing up as a pretty pink cheetah!

Now, in addition to taking care of my cheetah, my job was to register everyone when they arrived. I couldn't really do this while holding the wild animal, so we put her in a cage complete with a warning sign saying "DANGER - Do NOT feed the animals!"
She was quite a hit!

Just havin' some fun!

Here's a few pictures to show you how Anna Kate likes to spend her evenings!

Goin' bananas!

Anna Kate's favorite food is definitely bananas. She does really well eating lots of different foods (even her vegetables), but no matter how full she is, she always has room for bananas for "dessert"! At first we were just feeding them to her mashed up on a spoon, but lately she has had fun picking up pieces and trying to get them into her mouth. She does pretty well, but it's lots of fun to watch!

Bottom Teeth!

I know I just did a post about teeth yesterday, but I finally got a picture of Anna Kate's bottom teeth, so here you go! You will definitely have to click on this picture to make it bigger...

Teeth!

I mentioned a couple weeks ago that Anna Kate's first tooth had finally broken through, but it wasn't through far enough to get a picture. Well yesterday while I was tickling her, she was smiling so big that I had to grab the camera. It's not the best picture, but you can definitely see her first tooth! The bottom front two teeth have also poked through, but I couldn't get a picture of those...so all you can see in this picture are the ones on the top. If you look closely (you may need to click on the picture to make it bigger), you can see the one on the left side (her right) that is about to come through.

Bouncer? Nope, tunnel!

We bought this bouncer for Anna Kate when she was about 5 months old, and she has had a great time using it. She loves playing with all the toys, listening to the music, and spinning around in the seat. Lately, though, I think she has been thinking that it's for babies and since she's such a big girl, she doesn't want to stay in it for long. She would rather be able to crawl all over the house. She did discover a new way to play with it the other day, though, that keeps her quite entertained while I cook dinner. She likes to crawl through the bottom of it like a tunnel! I took some action shots of her so that you could see:

Here I come!

Hmmm...I wonder if I can go through this...

Do you think I can make it, Mommy?

Watch me!

If I can just reach over there...

Hey look, I'm almost there!

Just a little farther...

Plop!

Ta da!

A sacred and holy trust...

I have been struggling a bit lately with Anna Kate's relatively new level of separation anxiety/general clingy-ness to her mommy. Not that I don't LOVE snuggling and holding her, because I do, but it has been hard to not be able to leave her in the nursery for Bible study, or various other church activities, or be able to get things done around the house when she just wants to be held. Anyway, I came across this quote from a 19th-century American pastor named J.R. Miller and it has been quite an encouragement to me, so I thought I would share it here:

"O, that God would give every mother a vision of the glory and splendor of the work that is given to her when a babe is placed in her bosom to be nursed and trained! Could she have but one glimpse into the future of that life as it reaches on into eternity; could she look into its soul to see its possibilities; could she be made to understand her own personal responsibility for the training of this child, for the development of its life, and for its destiny--she would see that in all God's world there is no other work so noble and so worthy of her best powers, and she would commit to no others' hand the sacred and holy trust given to her."

--JR Miller

That is my prayer today - that I would be faithful to the sacred and holy trust which God has given me!

A fun weekend!

We have had some really busy weekends with church and youth group activities lately and have some more coming up, but this past weekend we had nothing planned, so we thought we would head out of town for a couple nights! Thursday afternoon we went to Greenwood to see Luke's family, and specifically his Grannie. Anna Kate had quite a fun time playing with all of Grannie's things - especially her walker! Here's a fun video!



Grannie absolutely loves decorating and dressing up for each holiday, so she bought Anna Kate this black cat Halloween outfit!


Friday we headed over to Clemson and camped there for the night (yes, we tent camped with a baby!) and then tailgated and went to the football game on Saturday. We had a great time dressing up in our Clemson attire and cheering on the tigers. It was especially fun because they won!


It was also fun to just sit around our campsite with Luke's family. Here's a video of something that kept Anna Kate entertained for quite a while...I know I shouldn't say this about my daughter, but the video kind of reminds me of a puppy chasing its tail!



It did get a little chilly in the evening, but Daddy had a great idea for keeping Anna Kate warm!

It sure was a fun weekend!

The Bunny Hole!

When my brothers and sister and I were little, our dad would always tell us to "get in the bunny hole" when he was lounging on the couch. The "bunny hole" was that space between his knees and the couch that was just the right size for one little kid! Anna Kate now loves to get in the bunny hole when her daddy is lounging on the couch! As long as she has a toy or two, she will sit there for a a good while and let him take a little Sunday afternoon nap! She just loves to be close to her daddy!

Update!

So, I when I wrote Anna Kate's 8 month blog post on Friday, I said that she didn't have any teeth yet. However, I'm not sure that was true. You see, she was sitting on her daddy's lap yesterday morning, chewing on his finger (one of her favorite pastimes), and he felt something hard biting down on him. Lo and behold, Anna Kate does have a tooth! But it's not one of the front bottom two. Neither is it one of the front top two. It's actually an upper tooth just to the left of her front teeth! She just had to be different! So I'm afraid she's going to have a little snaggle tooth for a few days until her other ones come in! She doesn't like to open up for anyone to see it though, so unfortunately, I can't get a picture of it. But it's pretty cute!

8 months old today!

Happy 8-month birthday, Anna Kate! You sure have grown up a lot this month! You seem so much older to us just in this past month because of all of the new things you are doing! It feels like you change every single day and we can't even blink or else we miss it! Here are some of the ways you are growing this month:

~You can now push yourself up to sitting from laying down. It's quite the cute little push-up. You have to roll over to your belly, do a full push-up (with pretty good form!), and then pull your little legs under you.
~You can also pull yourself up to standing from sitting! We practiced and practiced for weeks, but you weren't interested, then all of a sudden, you just did it in your crib! You sometimes do it on the furniture in the living room, but it's hard to get a good grip, so usually you just do it when it's time to get up from naps in your crib!
~You have also started to do some crawling on your hands and knees. Granted, your preferred method is still the army crawl, but you have shown us that you CAN do it when you want to.
~Speaking of crawling, you have figured out that when Mommy walks out of the room, you can just follow her! You love to crawl all over the house, following me as I do my housework. It's always so funny to see you poke your little head around each corner!
~You still love to walk to the park every day, but lately you have been wanting to do more than just swing. You love to sit in the sand or the grass and feel the different textures between your fingers and toes. I have to watch you like a hawk though, because you also like to put said sand/grass in your mouth...
~One of the games you love to play at home is to knock two blocks together. You don't just do it the regular way though; you have to put one of the blocks in your mouth and then knock on it with the other block. We're not quite sure why you do it that way, but you do, without fail, and it's pretty cute! Maybe you just need to keep one steady.
~You have tried lots of new foods this month and have yet to find one that you don't like! Some of your new favorites are carrots, yogurt, and mommy's pear sauce.
~You also have started to eat some finger foods and are figuring out that "pincer" grasp with your thumb and pointer finger. You have tried little bits of spaghetti, homemade crackers, sweet peas, banana chunks, and bits of strawberries!
~I can FINALLY see little teeth about to pop through your bottom gums! You have actually had some pretty restless nights the past couple of nights because they are really swollen and bothering you pretty badly. They haven't poked through yet, but I think it will be any day now (at least your mommy and daddy hope so)!
~You can now say "Mama" and you say it constantly! We're working on "Dada" too, and we think we heard you say it once, but you definitely say "mama" and I never get tired of hearing it!
~And speaking of Mama, you have become quite the mama's girl this month. Whereas until now, you were one of the happiest babies in the nursery at church, now I can't so much as think about leaving or else your world ends. So lately, I've been having to keep you with me in the service, or Bible study, or youth group, or whatever I happen to be doing. I do love that you love me, but I am kinda hoping that this is just a phase!
~While you are a mama's girl, and cry whenever I leave the room, the only other person who can make it all better is your daddy. You LOVE your Daddy! One of the new things you have been doing with Daddy lately is a silly pillow peek-a-boo game that you made up. You like to play it while Daddy makes the bed in the mornings (after you snuggle with him for a little while while Mommy makes the coffee)!

Well, sweet girl, we love you so much and love watching you grow up each day. But don't forget that no matter how old and grown up you get, you will always be our baby girl!

And here are your pictures!

1 month old!


2 months old!


3 months old!


4 months old!


5 months old!


6 months old!


7 months old!


8 months old!

Today's photo shoot was pretty difficult because you kept wanting to stand up...check out that mischievous smile!

Baby Doll!

Some people might say I have a little too much fun dressing my daughter...

Some people might be right!

Anna Kate says "Mama!"

So I've been trying to get Anna Kate to say "Mama' since the day she was born, and she finally just started saying it out of the blue this morning! She's been saying it constantly all day, so it wasn't hard to catch it on video. Now, granted, she probably doesn't know what it means (actually today it has meant all kinds of things - I'm hungry, I'm sleepy, I bonked my head, I want up, etc. - but it still warms my heart to hear it from my sweet girl!

Baby want a cracker?

Since Anna Kate's gums have been bothering her so much over the past couple of days, she has really wanted something to chew on. I was thinking that some crackers might be good, but we didn't have any and I didn't want to go to the store. I've been making a lot of my own bread recently and I just figured it couldn't be too hard to make crackers, so I tried it! I found a great recipe online from a blog I like to read called The Nourishing Gourmet. She specifically made these crackers for her toddler, so I thought I would try it out.

First you combine 3 1/2 cups of whole grain flour, 1/4 cup of melted butter, and 1 cup of water with 2 Tablespoons of vinegar into a ball. Cover it and leave it on the counter overnight.

In the morning, flatten out your ball of dough into a circle and sprinkle 1 tsp of salt and 1 1/2 tsp of baking powder on it.


Fold your dough in half and knead it until the salt and baking powder are worked in. Then roll it out flat. For crispier crackers, roll it out really thin (1/8 inch). I made mine a little thicker so the crackers would be a little softer for Anna Kate.


Then cut it into squares/rectangles however big you want. I used a pizza cutter which worked really well.

Lay them on a greased cookie sheet and poke them with a fork.


Bake them at 425 degrees for approx. 10-12 min. Take them out when they are just starting to brown around the edges and on the bottom.


It made about 100 1 inch square crackers. Way cheaper than buying a box of crackers, and no processed ingredients! Perfect for a little baby tummy! But the real test came when Anna Kate woke up from her nap...

Is this a new toy?

Do you think I can eat it?

Hmm, this is good!