Emelia laughs

Oliver is still enjoying his role as big brother.  Most mornings when he wakes up the first thing he asks is to hold "my meya" which is what he calls Emelia.

For her part, Emelia is learning to tolerate her somewhat overbearing big brother...mostly.

It is hard to tell in the two pictures above, but Emelia is getting pretty rolly-polly.  In fact, I've started calling her chub-a-lub

because she has so much chub-to-love!

Exhibit A.  Belly.

Exhibit B.  Thigh. Rolls.

Exhibit C.  Chins.

I can't believe how fast she is growing.  She is already over 16 lbs and isn't even 4 months old yet! I love her little smirk in this picture.  It is so emblematic of her personality.  Oliver was always grinning and laughed easily.  Emelia smirks when she is amused and chuckles when she thinks something is funny. 

She was really laughing this weekend and now

I have about 100 pictures just like this:



Emelia's First Trip to the Zoo

As far as Emelia was concerned her first trip to the zoo was rather uneventful, she spent the entire trip buried in her stroller, asleep.

I think Oliver rather enjoyed himself, though.

He got to ride a tortoise.

He saw really big polar bears...

...and giraffes...

...and got to hang out with Grandpa Mike.



I call her hunny bunny

We went and saw sharks!

We recently invested in a membership to Sea Life Minnesota.

Oliver loves the sharks!

They are all he can talk about for days after we visit: "I go see sharks, mama?"  It is really hard to avoid going to Sea Life MN any time we go to the MOA.  And, he seems to think all malls have sharks.  Recently we went to Roseville and as we walked in the doors Oliver said "This a mall, Mama?" I said yes, and he replied "I see sharks?"  I had to explain that there were not sharks at this mall, and Oliver decided that it was a yucky mall.

Auntie got him a shark hat, here he is modeling it, along with his new shoes!

I just love watching his face light up every time he sees a shark.

(Personally, I prefer the tortises.  You can see one in the background)

I think Oliver was less impressed with this guy:

Jeez Papa, this guy is ugly!

I did manage to get my favorite threesome to slow down long enough

to take a nice picture.

Well, two out of three isn't bad...

Ello Bandy-ions

I don't have any fun pictures to share for this post, but rather a few cute things that I wanted to remember.

Tonight Oliver and I were outside.  I decided to do some general cleaning up of my flower gardens--something that has been neglected this year with the arrival of Ememlia.  Oliver saw me "playing" in the dirt and since he's 2, and a boy he asked if he could help.  I said "please do" and he started repeating me saying "Ollie peas to help."

The first task I assigned him was to pick all the dandy lions.  We talked about the fact that they are yellow, and are called dandy lions.  In his cute pre-school speak it came out as 'ello bandy-ions.  He kept saying "I found another one ucky 'ello bandy-ions, Mama!

After the bandy-ions were all picked, he started collecting pine-cones but kept referring to them as pineapples.  He'd say "pineapples bery ucky" and I'd try to explain that they were called "pine cones" and were yucky, but that pineapple is yellow fruit and is yummy. 

He wasn't buying it.

And just for fun, here is a picture of Oliver with a strangely dirty face (?).

Who's who?

Let's take a trip down memory lane, shall we?

Granted, one is about 3 weeks older than the other in these pictures, but I can't get over how much they look alike.

The top one is Oliver, the bottom one is Emelia.

This is my new favorite picture of Oliver...

It captures him perfectly--half sweetheart, have trouble maker. 

I think this picture must have caught him transitioning between his two selves.

And my favorite picture of Emelia.

For now.

She is smiling at herself in the mirror.  One of her favorite activities.

And my babies together.  They make my heart melt.

"It not working"

Lately any time I take out the camera Oliver flashes his cheesiest grin. 

I was trying to figure out how to take videos on my new camera the other night, because I wanted to capture Oliver dancing along to "The Voice" but I got this instead: