Snow Day Part II
And Finally… After we came in to warm up… This is how Hazel felt about coming back inside:
Snow Day!!
For those of you who live in colder climates, I’m sure this post isn’t very exciting, but bear with me- we are excited about the first major snow here in Virginia in over 5 years. Yes, you read correctly- we have not had more than 6 inches of snow in over 5 years. It just doesn’t snow here, with the ocean and all the rivers surrounding us, it is difficult to have just the right conditions for snow- but today, we have SNOW and plenty of it!
I’ll start by posting some pictures from our morning venture into the white stuff (since these pictures were taken we’ve gotten an additional 4-5 inches!). After the snow pictures I’ll post some pictures from earlier this month and the one shot we got of our Christmas tree before all the presents got opened. We’ve lost our plug n’ play card reader so uploading pictures isn’t as simple as it has been. That’s my excuse for not posting very often! I’ll also try and scan in the big ultrasound pictures of baby duo later this weekend (since we’re snowed in and have nowhere to go!)- all is going very well with our little bun in the oven and we got a very thorough ultrasound last week (and a TON of great ultrasound pictures!).
(Having a little trouble getting the snow pictures to upload, will post more of those later)
Tickling her reflection in the oven…
An upset little Christmas Elf running away from her Aunt Sarah
Happy New Year!
It’s been a while since I last posted, and it seems that I’m posting much less frequently than I used to. I have a list of excuses for not posting, but I won’t bore you with them- most involve chasing Hazel around and keeping on top of things here at home! Since I last posted, almost a month ago, we’ve had quite a bit of fun.
Christmas this year was celebrated with a full house of out of town family- Grammy and Grampy, Uncle Preston and Great Grammy, Aunt Sarah, Uncle Andrew, and all the usual suspects who hang out here in Yorktown. We had so much fun spending time with everyone that we only took about 5 pictures over the entire holiday! (shame on us!).
Of course this was the best Christmas ever- Hazel absolutely loved the Christmas tree, seeing all of the neighborhood houses all lit up for the holidays, and our trips to the Celebration in Lights and Busch Garden’s Christmas Town. She learned to say Christmas Tree, Snowman and Merry Christmas before it was all over, too!
Christmas morning was so much fun- Hazel slept in until almost 8 am, and then came downstairs to a full house and the most presents I’ve ever seen under a tree in my life!
Here is a quick video of Hazel inspecting “under” the tree on Christmas morning:
Christmas Morning 2009 from esther benoit on Vimeo.
We spend the entire day opening presents (it took us until almost 5 pm to get through them all, but we took it slow and enjoyed the day). Hazel got a kitchen and shopping cart that occupied her most of the day, and have occupied her ever since! Everyone was so generous and we were truly thankful to be able to spend the holiday with family- it was a fantastic Christmas.
Duo seems to be doing well- we had a quick OB appointment on the 17th of December where we heard duo’s heartbeat for the first time (153 bpm, loud and clear!). I’ve been feeling much better and have just recently started to feel the baby move around in there. I’m also finally starting to show just a little bit, which is always nice. It seems like the second half of the pregnancy goes much quicker than the first- and with as fast as this first half has flown by, we’ll have this next baby before we know it! I am almost 20 weeks along (19 weeks and a few days) and we are scheduled for our big ultrasound on the 19th of January, following a routine appointment on the 18th. We are not going to find out if we are having a boy or a girl as we enjoyed the surprise with Hazel. The naming process has begun, and we’ve got a few names we really like for both a boy or a girl- more on that in a future post.
I’ll leave you today with a few videos, starting way back in October- I had a few on the camera that I never uploaded and I thought they would be fun to put up here.
Hope everyone has had a great start to 2010- looking forward to all the new things this year will bring!
At the pumpkin patch from esther benoit on Vimeo.
More October fun from esther benoit on Vimeo.
Shopping in Mama’s shoes from esther benoit on Vimeo.
These last two involve our new learning tower- a contraption that allows Hazel to safely help in the kitchen (we had one too many standing on chair accidents for our liking and decided this was worth the investment!)
Making Dessert from esther benoit on Vimeo.
Licking the Beaters from esther benoit on Vimeo.
Filed under Hazel, Pregnancy by esther | Comment (0)Big News!
We’ve been waiting until our first appointment today to announce the news that Hazel will be a big sister before her second birthday!
We are pregnant with baby number two- henceforth referred to as “duo.” At our first appointment today we had an ultrasound to find out how far along we are and to make sure our little embryo is doing well. So far all is well, and we are about 8 weeks along. Our estimated due date is somewhere between May 28 and June 4, 2010!
While the doctor was looking around during the ultrasound he gave us a thorough tour and showed us the c-section scar, all sorts of anatomy that I’m sure many of you don’t want to hear about and then… he mentioned that we had a double yolker. After this, he got a bit quiet and looked around more thoroughly. We were pretty lost at this point, having never heard of a double yolker (he’s very casual, so we had no clue what he was talking about!) so we asked the obvious question, “what are you talking about?” Well- it turns out there were two eggs in there- thus double yolks. So far it looks like there is one embryo in there, but there is a small chance we could have another baby hiding behind duo!!! Jered and I were absolutely thrilled, shocked, amazed that we were so close to having twins- the fact that the possibility still exists still baffles us! The chance of a second baby hiding out behind the one we saw today is pretty slim, but it is definitely still a chance. We will know more as the pregnancy progresses- so for now, the title of the blog will be “…and duo makes four,” but if there’s another one in there, well hot dog, we’re going to need a van!
In other exciting news, Hazel is talking up a storm- she has a new found love for monster noises, Cookie Monster in particular. She doesn’t actually watch Sesame Street, but has a few books that we read to her using our best monster voices. In true toddler fashion she has taken to mimicking everything we do, including talking like Cookie Monster- absolutely adorable! In addition, Hazel has made best friends with a stuffed monkey- monkey goes everywhere with Hazel, and tears ensue when he accidentally gets thrown overboard when she’s jumping around in bed (another favorite activity). Our girl is so full of energy and curiosity and loves to play and explore all day long. She loves being outside, around animals, with other kids- the more activity, the better!
Her sense of humor is rapidly developing- she is such a little ham. We recently learned that chickens say “mmmm” (surprisingly they say the same thing as blueberries and icecream) and that monsters say “Yum Yum Yum” I’ll try to capture it on video, but she’s a hard one to video lately- too fast to keep up with and too interested in watching the videos on the camera to actually let me record any new ones.
Well, that’s a pretty big update for now. We’ll scan in the ultrasound pictures this weekend and post them on here. So far, duo looks just like Hazel did at this stage- a little blurb on an otherwise black and white print, but we know all is well when the first thing the doctor says at the sight of little duo is, “My goodness, look at that HEART!”
We couldn’t be more excited.
Step by step
Hazel is starting to walk. Today she took three steps without holding onto anything, and she is now pulling herself up and standing unsupported for minutes at a time. I just can’t believe our little girl is walking! She holds our hands and moves forward- albeit kind of awkwardly, but she is so enthusiastic about walking. Little by little she is growing more independent and day by day she gets more and more like a little kid and less and less like our little baby. This is all going so quickly!
In other exciting news, this weekend while we were reading stories to Hazel we pointed out a kitty in one of her books (Goodnight Moon). She got so excited and started to pet the page. I thought it might just be a fluke and kept reading until we came to another page with kitties on it- I asked Hazel if she saw the kitty and again she got super excited and pointed to the kitties on that page. She is starting to understand what things are and you can just see the little wheels in her head turning. All of this is so amazing to watch- and it’s incredible how quickly things change.
Filed under Pregnancy by esther | Comment (0)Our climber
Hazel has taken to climbing on things lately, and I caught her in the act. A few days ago she decided to climb up onto her toy chest so that she could reach our tv and push all the buttons. She definitely keeps us on our toes!
A few of my favorite things so far this week:
Hazel is walking forward a few steps at a time holding onto just one of our hands- it is so sweet!
The weather has been gorgeous lately and we’ve been able to dress in short sleeves and no socks!!
Hazel is absolutely enamored with all animals. She cranes her neck to see every dog, cat, bird and squirrel in our neighborhood.
And my most favorite thing right now, and possibly of all time, this face:
Inside Outside Equilibrium Day
Tomorrow marks Hazel’s inside-outside equilibrium day. She will have been on the “outside” as long as she was on the inside, which is pretty crazy to think about it. We’re not talking about prison here, folks, we’re talking about gestation. Hazel is 9 months old now and tomorrow marks 40 weeks since her birthday- my pregnancy was about 40 weeks so all in all our little Uni/Hazel has been around for 80 weeks now!
We had a lovely visit with Grammy Jane last week and Hazel already misses her very much. We got a few really sweet pictures of Hazel trying to rob Grammy of her jewelry. Our daughter the jewel thief:
This is what happened when Grammy put up a fight for her earrings. I think Hazel won.
While Grammy was in town we went down to the river and enjoyed some unseasonably warm weather. Here is a rare shot of Hazel with me!
Hazel with her Papa, eating a pine cone.
Hazel discovers grass.
and by discover we mean eats…
She gets sweeter every day.
Hazel has really started “talking” a lot lately. She now says “Haaaaaa” whenever she waves, and BaBa when she waves goodbye. This morning when I went to get her out of her bed she waved at me when I walked in and said “Haaaaa.” Now that’s a surefire way to melt a Mama’s heart!
We got a package from Aunt Sarah on Monday afternoon and Hazel was thrilled to discover she has a new friend, Camelia, the pink camel. I’m not sure I have mentioned this on our blog, but my sister Sarah is deployed to Iraq right now and recently learned that she will be moving over to Afghanistan in the next month or so- we are very proud of her and extremely anxious for her to come home (she was deployed this February and will be gone a year). Sarah was so thoughtful in sending us a package- we thought it was supposed to work the other way around with us sending her all the care packages, but that’s just how Sarah is, always thoughtful, always generous, always putting others first. Here are a few shots of Hazel with her new best friend, all the way from the desert!
Thank you Aunt Sarah!
And finally, (this is getting to be quite the lengthy post!)- Jered and I just learned that we will be having our first “weekend” without Hazel tomorrow and Friday night. I was originally scheduled to attend a conference in Charlotte, but at the last minute my presentation was cancelled by the lead presenter and I decided not to make the trip- to make a long story short, our hotel reservations are non-refundable, so we decided to go afterall. This morning my mom generously volunteered to take Hazel for two days so that Jered and I could have a mini-vacation, just the two of us. We are both excited and very very nervous to leave our girl for more than a few hours, but we are so thankful to get some time for each other. Thanks mom, for letting us have a little holiday to mark our 10 year anniversary! We’ll post more about how that goes when we get back (wish us luck!).
Filed under Pregnancy by esther | Comment (0)9 month appointment
Today was Hazel’s 9 month well-baby appointment. Her weight gain has slowed down considerably- she has moved from the 75th percentile to the 50th percentile for weight, and is still around the 50th percentile for length. She is growing perfectly for her age- it’s a little strange for us not to have a really chubby baby anymore. Ever since Hazel started crawling and cruising she has thinned out so much! Her head, however, is still in the extremely large category- 85th percentile!! It takes a lot of noggin to snap and clap and cruise around. Hazel is growing extremely well and even impressed the nurses and doctor with her snapping, waving, babbling and general excitement.
In other exciting news, we bought plane tickets today and Hazel and I will be making a trip to the passport office next week. My dissertation research has been accepted as a paper presentation at the Association for Moral Education’s annual conference in Utrecht this July. We will be flying to Amsterdam at the end of June and spending two weeks in Europe!! It was a major decision, but after talking it through today we decided this would be one of the last times we would have a real excuse to go to Europe- and we both realized how much easier it will be to travel with just one baby, once there are other little ones around we may not even consider traveling long distances for quite some time. So we are going to Europe! We are traveling with Hazel in our laps since a child’s ticket costs the same as an adult ticket and we are already flying in high season- but we got great flights. We will be flying into Amsterdam, attending the conference the 1st-4th of July and then driving or taking the train to Germany where we will visit my mom’s side of the family, staying with my Oma. We also plan to do a few day trips and Heidelberg is definitely on the agenda. July will be here before we know it and we still have plenty of details to iron out, but we are incredibly excited to take Hazel back to where Jered and I first met. How appropriate that we are going back to visit, this March marks the tenth year Jered and I have been together- hard to believe how quickly time passes.
Pictures (for Grampy)
Hazel now loves to cuddle anything that is soft. She loves stuffed animals.
Here she wrestles an alligator. And wins.
This is one of Hazel’s many crazy expressions.
And here is another (if you look closely you can see what we think is her first little tooth peeking through)
And that last post wasn’t all fiction- she really does snap. We are trying to get it on camera, but it’s hard. She can snap her fingers, and usually does it when she is eating something delicious.
Still loves chasing that cat…
Our sweet girl is 9 months old tomorrow. Time sure flies.
