Random Anna

Anna is a busy happy girl. She doesn't really sit still, unless she is sleeping. I try to take pictures when I can, but sometimes we are having so much fun I forget. Here are a few random things that Anna does that I have taken pictures of lately.

Anna loves to put her boots on all by herself, sit at the window, and watch for Devin as he is coming home from work. A new twist on this activity is that she likes to talk with him on the phone as she is waiting for him.

Anna loves to help me cook. She loves "tasting" even more. No matter what I am cooking she will say, "taste, taste!" She is getting to be quiet the licker!

Anna loves to sew. I miss the days when I could put a blanket and some toys on the floor and Anna would play and I could sew. It is very important for Anna to "see" what is going on. She is really good about sitting still as I sew.

A few other popular activities are running around with a bucket on our head, trying to fit the bucket on Dad's head, and kissing noses.

Add reading books, going for walks, and playing at the park and it is no wonder that when the day is done sleep is our favorite activity.

Anna's First Bike

Anna has been experiencing a little bit of "wheel envy" lately. All of her cousins have bikes or scooters or something with wheels. She loves sitting at the window watching the neighbor kids ride their bikes and scooters up and down the sidewalk. She has even gotten to the point that when she sees a bike she will say, "Bike! Anna Bike! Anna needs bike."
Devin and I talked a lot about getting her something with wheels. My big request was that we should get her something that she can do on her own. After pushing her around on different things I really didn't want to spend my summer bent over pushing her so she could go. I wanted to get her something that she could do all on her own.
Devin has a friend at work who got a Strider bike for his little boy. We both were interesting in this type of bike because there are no pedals so the kid just pushes along and they can learn balance first. There are little foot rest in the back so when she starts to push herself along more she can put her feet up and just glide. We decided to give it a try.
Anna's bike came today. No shocker that Devin HAD to get the orange bike. :) Here is a video of Anna's very first ride.

Yup, she fell down and she goes pretty slow, but this was her very first time. The interesting thing was that by the time she made it down the sidewalk to the mailbox she was already figuring out how to turn it and would catch herself every time she started to tip over. She was going pretty good by the time we got back by our house.
The best part is that when she had to go inside she cried and cried, "bike, ride bike!" And as soon as she woke up from her nap she said, "bike, ride bike!"
We'll take more video after more practice. For now, she loves her bike and mom doesn't have to bend over to push her. YEAH!!!! So Anna loves to run, loves to ride a bike...now all we need to do is get her swimming and we can train for a triathlon together. :)

Hiking the "Y"

Yes, I've lived in Utah all my life.  Yes, it's true.  I've never hiked the "Y"...until now.  We didn't have a lot going on Saturday so we thought we go for a hike.  The "Y" seemed like a good short hike that would still get Anna home in time for her afternoon nap.  We packed a lunch and had a great hike.

When we got up to the "Y" we had to keep a close watch on Anna.  She just wanted to run around everywhere and we really didn't want her to fall down the mountain.  She must have had a good time because she fell asleep on the way back down. 

It was a really fun hike.  I'd like to do it in the evening to watch the sunset.  It would be really pretty.  The view of the valley was amazing!

Binky, Broken, So Sorry

From the beginning we didn't want Anna to become too attached to her binky. At about a year old the binky started staying in bed. This has worked out great. She only had the binky at nap time and bed time, and only in the crib.
We decided that at 18 months the binky would go. We are a little slow, but she is now a binky free girl. Thanks to Google and lots of friends and family, we decided that the best way for the binky to go would be for the binky just to break. We figured that would be something that she could understand. So we chopped the rubber part off both binkies. (Truth be told we chopped the first one and were going to try it out, but Anna ended up dislocating her elbow that night and we just didn't have the heart to chop the other, so she had two more nights with the binky. We were really glad we had a back up binky that wasn't chopped.)
Then when it was nap time or bed time and she would ask for binky we could just hand her the broken ones and say, "sorry it broke." She had lots of fun playing with them. They work so much better with her animals when the rubber part isn't in the way. She did really well. She would just go to sleep (after much talking now that she doesn't have a plug in she can just gab away until she wants to go to sleep). For a while when we handed her her binky she would say, "binky, broken...so sorry." Too cute!!! We really didn't mind her falling asleep holding the silly things, just as long as she wasn't sucking on them. She doesn't even care to hold them now. After several nights of them being shoved into the corners of the crib they are officially gone.
Our next big step is switching to a toddler bed before number two shows up. We have time and I'm not ready to give up afternoon naps. But for now, big step number one is complete. We have a binky free child. YEAH!!!!