Evie and Annalise Taller: July 2009

Welcome Amanda Elizabeth!

So, for those of you following the blog, just wanted to let you know that Kathleen and Scott welcomed a baby girl on Tuesday morning about 5:20 am.

Amanda Elizabeth weighed in at 5 lbs, 1 oz. She was 18 inches long. I checked her out today for myself. She was about 4 lbs, 12 oz, when I held her, but she is strong and not on any assistance except for under the warmer to keep her body temp up. Otherwise, she is eating like a champ!

They are going to keep her in NICU for a while until she can keep her temp up. Mom is doing well at the hospital and will be going home on Saturday.

Congrats Kathleen, Scott, Mike and Andy!!!!!!

Just Stuff

I left a couple broccoli plants in the garden and they are still producing enough for us to eat. Probably because of all the cool weather and rain that we have been having.

Annalise assisted me in picking some broccoli. Then she decided to eat it straight from the garden. We had just returned from the pool and she wasn't full dressed yet--but out of that wet swimsuit.

We started working on Tessa's birthday present. Don't let her see this, Uncle Kevin!

Evie has started to show an interest in basketball. Not a big surprise because, after all, this is Indiana. She is using Jim's old ball and we lowered the hoop for her. Her form isn't the best, but she can get it through the basket. Tomorrow we start ball handling drills.

Here she is practicing her dribble.

And here is Annalise just being a goof.

I wish there was a way to set this video to the music from Hoosiers.

Par Tay

It was a flurry of activity this weekend at our house. We started out on Friday morning with phone call from our good friends, Kathleen and Scott. At 32 weeks pregnant, her water broke and sent her to the hospital. Of course we were concerned about her well being (she is fine--no baby as of yet, keep your fingers crossed that she can keep it in for a few more days!), but that meant that we picked up her hosting duties for our small college reunion! So we had 2 families staying with us on Friday night--4 extra adults and 7 extra kids. It was a blast! We all bunked up and put the kids in sleeping bags all over the place. Everyone did pretty well--except Annalise who was up at night because of a storm. Because of all the visiting and feeding of children, we didn't take many pictures. Sadly, this is all I have of our reunion.

Kids (and one mom) all around the table for pancake breakfast!

Here's the other side of the table--Thanks for visiting Klings and Reeves. We REALLY need to do this more often!

Then we started preparing for our next party to say good bye to our neighbors who are moving to Chicago at the end of the week.

Here's Annalise's pinata that she made and stuffed full of candy.

And Evie's pinata. See, kind of looks like a Purdue football helmet.

These kids got into the swing of things right away.

And this little guy was caught double fisting watermellon slices. He had a lot of watermellon on that white shirt.

There were push ups for dessert. Evie and her friend who is moving.

And in the grand tradition of the Seibert Campouts of the 80's, I had lots of activities planned for the kids. We had a water balloon toss.

Which turned into chaos. Check out those really big kids....

This dad better watch out for his little girl!

Annalise shows how wet she got from the balloon.

Even though there were 14 adults milling around, situations such as this managed to happen.

Then it was pinata time. Instead of blindfolding them, we made the kiddos spin on a bat before taking a swing.

Everyone got a chance to hit the helmet.

And when the candy fell, chaos again!

We will miss you Byrne Family! Safe travels to your new home!

For Aunt Becky

Aunt Becky said that she wasn't going to update her blog until she saw some action from the Indiana branch. So here you go, some pics that I took a week or so ago to get you caught up.

The girls getting ready for Ballet. They have their big recital next week. I can hardly wait to see a bunch of preschoolers prance around in their pink tights.

The girls were at Grandma and Grandpa Seibert's the past week. That's why I don't have any new pictures. While they were there, I kept busy cleaning up the house for the arrival of my college friends. They arrived on Friday and spent the night. We had 9 kids and 6 adults staying here. It was pretty fun. I have some pics that I will post, but I am having trouble uploading them right now. Look for them later.

We are hosting another party on Sunday for some of our neighbors who are moving to Chicago this week. That party will be a "pitch in" or "Smorgie" or "potluck" (depending on where you are from). At this upcoming party, there will be 7 families with a total of 18 kids! To keep everyone busy, we are planning a couple activities. One party game we are planning is to break some pinatas. About a week and a half ago, I enlisted the neighbor girls to help Evie and Annalise make pinatas. I have to say, it was messy, but went rather well. I didn't have to do a single thing except go blow up another balloon when one popped during paper macheing.

Everyone worked really well together.

You can see the intense concentration, and the flour and paper pulp on Annalise's face.

Jim and Evie painted them with the only spray paint that we have--black and gold. They look a little like a Purdue football helmet. We'll take some pics before they are smashed.

Hamilton County Fair

We went to the Hamilton County Fair. It is a true 4-H fair with lots of projects, animals and tractors. Not much in the way of fair food or rides, but that's ok with us. Gives us the true fair experience. We'll be spending lots of money at the State Fair in a couple of weeks anyway.

Of course we visited all the animal barns (all 4 of them). The favorite was the combo pigmy goat/bunny/chicken barn. There were lots of baby goats to look at and pet. They were all very friendly, but Annalise restrained herself from kissing them this year.

We found some tractors to sit on.

Ananlise couldn't quite see over the steering wheel of this one.

And couldn't reach the pedals either.

Evie and her yearly JD 5000 series picture.

They are almost too big to fit in the wheels. We'll have to find bigger tractors at the State Fair.

There were some food boths. While mom and dad enjoyed the pork producers lunch, Annalise and Evie chowed on a hot dog from the Methodist church ladies.

Our favorite 4-H project this year. It's called "model construction". Kids can build a model using their toys or combinations of toys. This is one that a dad had to have helped with. It's a model of the IU/ Purdue football game. It even had the camera strung across the field. Lots of attention to detail, but missing the Boilermaker Special Train and the Giant drum. You can see it won grand champion.

And watch how this baby goat harassed it's mama. Sometimes, I feel like the mama goat.

We live with a celebrity

So Evie finally got up and got the mail for me this afternoon. When she came in with the normal stuff, I sorted it pretty absentmindedly. I tossed a post card to her about the upcoming Tour de Carmel. She said "hey mom, that's me!"

Yes, indeed, that is her eating a snack in the corner. Now she thinks she is famous.

By the way, if you want to come to Annalise's birthday weekend, bring your bike!

Church Festival

We met up with the Brays at our Church Festival.

We all ate a big meal of carbs to gear up for jumping in the inflatables and playing games.

Annalise got her face painted.

Then she jumped a lot in the toddler train.

We also visited with the Butler Bulldog. Annalise DID NOT like Hink to be near her.

They won some masks

Annalise really liked her mask.

Here they are showing off some of their loot. It was a great night!

Annalise was really tired the next morning.

Garden Update

As summer wears on, we are harvesting our daily meals from the garden. Today, we decided to dig the potatoes because the tops were almost completely dead.

Here's the littlest gardner with part of our crop.

We also have 6 heads of red cabbage to start eating! Yeah!! We love stewed red cabbage!

And the delicata squash are coming along. The vine threatens to take over the entire west end of our yard.

We have also been eating our purple green beans about every other night. Up until tonight, we were alternating between beans and broccoli. Tonight, we picked the last of the broccoli so it's beans from her on out.

Until our giant tomato plants ripen. Next year, we could plant a hedge of them.

Some of the tomatos

Goes to show that your soil makes a difference. I bought the tomatoes that are in the garden and the one pictured above at the same place and planted them on the same day. This one is pretty scraggly.