Bienvenido A Miami!

I just got back from a long weekend with my best girlfriends in South Beach, Miami. It was a fabulous getaway, complete with (ridiculously expensive) fruity drinks, lots of laying around the pool and beach, delicious meals and just catching up on each other's lives. I am so glad to have these women in my life!

I did miss Amelia and Sean terribly though! I missed my Mia so much that I joked I felt like I was missing a limb. I made Sean keep her up so that I could say goodnight to her when I got in. Sean did fantastic and kept Mia busy and happy while I was gone (not that I was worried).

Here's a look at a few of my favorite photos from Miami.

Alexis took this photo, and I think it is really cool. We had lunch at the restaurant where Top Chef 4th runner up Jeff is the executive chef. See below.

Us with Chef Jeff

All dressed up!




We all turn the big 35 this year, hence the celebratory trip!



Love the flops!

Myself!

The most common word to come out of Amelia's mouth lately is "myself". She is so independent and wants to do EVERYTHING herself. Climb into her highchair, strap herself in, wash her hands, get dressed etc. etc. She's even started showing interest in potty training-woo hoo!

She loves to be with other kids and I think she'll really enjoy her "pre-pre" school 2 mornings a week this September.

We have a lot of fun things coming up this summer. Plenty of local beach visits, a week in Charleston, SC with the McB clan, zoo trips, water parks, pools and more. I have a 4 day trip to South Beach, Miami coming up with some of my oldest and dearest friends and I'm very excited about it! A little anxious to leave my baby for such a long time, but it will be so nice to have a conversation without constant interruption :)

And now for a few new photos of Miss Independent. Happy beginning of Summer everyone!

Strawberry Time!

Like the pumpkin picking, I've been eagerly awaiting our first strawberry picking experience. We managed to make it to the field before the rain came, and we filled our buckets and bellies with delicious berries! My goal has been to make strawberry jam, and there are currently 4 jars resting on the counter, hopefully "setting". We'll see...

Sean found the perfect berry....

And then ate it!

Mia and Ben picking berries.

She liked it for a while.


But when she started getting muddy

There was a minor meltdown...

Thankfully, it all ended well!

A few photos

Just some recent shots from the past few weeks. I'll try to get more organized soon!

A neighbor friend offered to take some photos of Amelia with her awesome camera. She emailed this one to me as a preview. LOVE it!!

Up to no good.

Mother's Day pose :)


Our favorite part of the National Zoo was seeing the Orangatuns walking over our heads.

Mia and Ella, her buddy from Spain!

Hi Mom!

I've been a big-time blog slacker lately. I blame Facebook, the (mostly) nice weather, and a week in DC/SoMd away from computers!

I'll update soon with photos from our National Zoo/Monsoon adventure, visits with friends, and general Amelia silliness.

Happy Belated Mother's Day to all the Moms! XOXOXO

Smell the Roses

Time has just been rushing by and I realize I haven't blogged in a while. I can't believe it is almost May! We've been in our house for almost 5 months and we are settling in nicely. We're meeting lots of neighbors and are happy to see that there are several little kids nearby for Mia to play with :)

We've done a bit of yard work and hope to fix up the backyard by summer so we can enjoy some bbqs!

Grandparents McB visited last weekend (during a freak heatwave!) and spent some quality time with Mia. She's always so confused after they leave, and asks for them for a few days after she wakes up. She's also got some sort of a virus and has had several accidents this past week (slips and falls galore). Poor thing.

A few miscellaneous photos below. Check out our baby birds! Hope everyone is well.

Grandma and Mia reading. Note the cheek bruise as a result of one of her numerous falls lately.

Mama and baby mourning dove on our front porch.

Some of my roses! They are blooming in full force! I picked up some rose pruning pointers a few months ago at the Norfolk Botanical Garden and looks like they paid off.

Our Easter

Hope everyone had a beautiful Easter weekend! We had a nice visit with "Gah-Maw" (Amelia has moved on from "Mah-Maw") in Md., complete with wax Easter eggs, tulips, Easter mass and egg hunts :) It was fun to dress Mia up since she's been stuck in jeans all winter! A few photos below, and lots more on website later!

Girl's Weekend

I didn't have a girl's weekend per se (that is coming up--MIAMI, end of May, can't wait!!), but my Mia and Alexis's Maddie spent some wonderful quality time together this past weekend. Team Engel (minus Zach who was enjoying Grandparent time) came down for a brief visit and it couldn't have been more lovely! Mia and Maddie got along famously and were just so adorable holding hands and (mostly) sharing their toys.

The Beautiful Ladies:)

Just Ridiculously Cute

Mia likes swings better when Maddie is around

Being Goofy at Lunch....

Raincoat

We've enjoyed a few nice Spring days but we haven't been doing anything too exciting lately. We have some special visitors coming this weekend (yay, Team Engel!) and hopefully the weather will continue to be nice.

I was remembering that this time last year we took our first major trip with Amelia. We spent a week in Ireland and absolutely loved it! I also can't get over how much she has grown and changed this year.

April 2008, Ireland

Almost April 2009, Virginia

Apparently we've gotten our money's worth with that raincoat! Gotta love that it has fit her for more than a year!

Happy end of March! Beware of April Fool's Jokes :)

Mama's Mia

I realized I haven't done a purely "brag about Amelia" blog post in a while, so here are a few updates about my little princess. I know that all parents feel this pride and delight at their children's accomplishments, so please bear with me. The novelty hasn't worn off yet, and the blog is such a good outlet :)

TALKING:

She amazes us everyday with her growing vocabulary and comprehension. We've had some funny moments where Sean or I will know exactly what she's saying while others have no clue. Other times she'll say the same thing over and over again until a light bulb finally goes on and I know what she means. Yesterday it sounded like she was saying "bacon, bacon" repeatedly and looking at me expectantly. She has yet to experience the wonders of bacon, so I knew that couldn't be it. Finally I realized she wanted a BLANKET for her baby doll. Oh. She has also begun calling me Mommy (so cute) but right now she is screaming "MOMMY" at the top of her lungs when she should be napping (not cute).

SINGING:

She seems to enjoy music class and library time, and will happily practice songs at home. Seeing her perform "Twinkle-Twinkle", complete with hand movements is ridiculously adorable. I keep trying to get it on video, but she clams up as soon as the camera comes out. Stay tuned.

TEMPER TANTRUMS:

Yep, they are here. The other day we didn't give her juice when she asked for it. She'd previously had a ton of juice for lunch and we wanted her to have water or milk. She let out an ear-piercing scream and hurled her cups of water and milk at us. Then she flung herself on the floor and cried. Lovely. I hope the tantrum phase passes fairly quickly, and I'm sure it will given how fast the past 20 months have gone.

Happy almost Spring everyone :)

Beach Weather in March?

This crazy Virginia weather went from 20 degrees to 70 degrees in 3 days time, but who's complaining?? We took advantage of a gorgeous weekend and went to the Oceanfront on Saturday. It felt so good to walk barefoot in the sand and enjoy a relatively empty beach! Mia liked the beachfront playground and braved the slide solo! If only it would stay like this for the rest of the year...

She means business!

Hugging?/Pushing? buddy Ben

We'll take what we can get!

It finally snowed yesterday in Norfolk! We have been passed over numerous times this winter, and even North Carolina, and our friends in LAS VEGAS have had snow! We only got a tiny amount, but it was enough to introduce Amelia to the stuff. We went on our daily walk up the street, hugging the trees, picking up sticks and looking for birds. She tasted the snow and made tiny snowballs. Not the great sledding and snowball fights that our friends in Md are experiencing, but we'll take it:)

Yes, that's all we got...

Cold, but she doesn't want to come in!

Relaxing with a snack later on