Colman Family

Anna’s First Birthday

 

Anna turned One Year Old today!! Wow! She’s such a joy. We love this little girlie!!

Father's Day

 

Our kids are so blessed to have such a great daddy. =)

Grandma Anna

Well, long story short, I had to put baking powder in Anna’s hair this weekend. A shining moment for me (cough cough), but what a cutie!

Day Out with Thomas

We traveled to Strasburg, PA this weekend to see Thomas the Train. My parents drove up from WV and met us there. It was a nice time! Here are some pics . . .
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tiny Talk

Whenever Daniel says something cute, I think, “Oh, I will never forget that! It’s too cute!” But, alas, I forget. =) So, I’m going to start writing them down . . .

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I always call Daniel and Anna, “My Little Cuties.” So, the other day . . .

Daniel: “Mommy, you’re a cutie.”
Me: “Oh, thank you, sweetie! You’re a cutie, too!”
Daniel: “And Anna’s a cutie, too!”
Me: “She sure is!”
Daniel: “But Daddy’s not a cutie.”
Me: “What? Sure he is!”
Daniel: “No, Mommy. He’s an engineer.”

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Yesterday, Daniel and Anna were playing on the floor in the dining room while I was cooking dinner. I heard a thud, so:

Me: “What was that??”
Daniel: “That was me. I fell down and broke my crown.”

Daniel’s 3rd Birthday

 

Our little boy is 3 years old! Wow! We had a great time celebrating this weekend . . .

On Saturday, we went to the Safari Park in Natural Bridge. We were really impressed (thanks for the idea, Lindsay!), and Daniel and Anna had a great time. Though Daniel enjoyed the zebras, giraffes, monkeys, etc., his favorite thing was “those cutout things” (meaning these things with the cutouts for your face—we didn’t know what to call them.) =)

For his birthday today, we gave him a Radio Flyer scooter. He’s pretty happy with it. We had a special dinner outside with our good friends, Bill, Ellen, and Hannah. It was a beautiful evening celebrating our little boy’s big day. And it blessed my heart tonight when he told me, “I liked my birthday!”

Pool Toys

 

Poor Anna usually doesn’t get to play on the deck because she gets splinters when she crawls on the wood. But, last Sunday, Gil tried something new . . . he put a blanket inside our empty pool and filled it with toys. It worked great! She had fun with it for hours!

Rainy Days

We’ve been having lots of beautiful rainy days. It’s been great for our garden and our yard. Everything’s thriving!

Even Anna’s enjoying the rainy days. She loves watching from the back door.
 

Safety Glasses

 

There are pictures of me and Gil wearing them, too—but I won’t share those! We (well, I, for sure) look particularly unattractive in them =)

Cutie Pie Anna

Gil took this picture of Anna yesterday. What a sweet girl!

Our Hay Bale Garden

 

We’ve decided to do a mini garden this year—just tomatoes, cucumber, basil, and maybe some peas and strawberries. A few years ago, we tried hay bale gardening (it works great!), so we’re doing it again! Since our ground is just hard clay, it’s a great option for us. The hay bales retain water well, and the roots have plenty of room to grow.

Daniel had so much fun helping us with the planting and the watering. I look forward to seeing his reaction when we get to actually eat from our garden. Nothing like it! =)

Works for Me Wednesday: Roomba

I’ve been wanting to blog about our wonderful Roomba for a while. It was my Christmas present, and I absolutely LOVE it! When the kids are downstairs playing, I set the Roomba to clean the bedrooms and bathrooms upstairs; and when we’re upstairs for naptime, the Roomba cleans downstairs. It’s lightweight, does an awesome job, is easy to clean, and is so quiet I can even talk on the phone when it’s on nearby. It definitely works for me!

Daniel’s Jokes and Anna’s Steps

Daniel's Jokes
Daniel’s been learning a few jokes. (Knowing his Daddy, is it any surprise?!?) Here are two, but they require subtitles =) . . .

Why is 6 afraid of 7?? Because 7, 8, 9.

Knock knock. Who’s there? Aybe. Aybe who? A, B, C, D, E, F, G

He keeps us laughing all the time =)

Anna's Steps
And here’s a video of Anna using the walker. I love how she looks so proud of herself.

The Kiddos

Anna’s cruising along the furniture now, and she does really well with her walker. She’s also going through an “I want Mommy, and only Mommy” phase. Daniel never did that, so it’s actually been kinda nice.  I enjoy all of the cuddling.

Daniel’s doing well, too. He talks all day long, doesn’t shy away from complex sentences, and asks lots of questions. And he’s recently started enjoying jigsaw puzzles. He’s up to 35-piece puzzles, but we think he’s ready to upgrade to 50. He likes to do them over and over until he’s mastered them =) He's our little learner!

9 Months

Our sweet little Anna turned 9 months old this weekend. She surprised us on Friday by saying, “Mama!” And on Saturday, she said “Dada” (only once, but I’m sure I heard it!) I haven’t been able to catch either word on video, but I did get some cute babbling. I’ll post that, for the grandparents’ sake =)

Amen!

I love watching Daniel dance and sing. Here’s a little clip of his cute little If You’re Happy and You Know It, "Amen!"

Little Lady in Red

   

 

Our sweet baby girl is 8 months old! She’s started pulling herself up, and yesterday she clapped her hands for the first time. She seems to understand more of what we’re saying, too—simple things like, “Look at Daniel” or “Are you ready to eat?” She’s growing up so fast!

Oh, and when I was taking these pictures, Daniel kept saying, “Queen Anna” and putting the teething ring “crown” on her head =)

I Want to Do Something FUN

This was Daniel’s mantra this morning (over and over and over!) And it’s no surprise, I suppose, considering that we’ve been snowed in since Sunday.

So, we’ve played Red Light Green Light up and down the hall. I get the easy job of sitting at one end, holding up the red/yellow/green papers, while he runs up and down the hall. Nice =) Even Anna joins in, though she mostly wants to play with the papers.

Then, I laid down some drafting paper in the kitchen and brought out all the stuff for making corn bread. I let Daniel help as much as I could manage, in between warnings of, “Don’t touch the raw egg,” “Keep the measuring spoons on the paper,” and “Don’t open that.” It was fun, though, and he did a great job following directions.

Less than an hour before Gil comes home from work, and the kids are both entertaining themselves well. Hopefully tomorrow we’ll make it out of the house, though =)

Day Trip

   

We took a quick day trip to DC today. Just for a few hours, but long enough to drive past some monuments, take the Metro, check out the Air and Space Museum (and get a nifty airplane toy for Daniel), and enjoy a beautiful afternoon walk back to Union Station to get the car. The kids are wiped out after so much activity and no naps, but it was well worth it =)

(And I'm sorry to our DC-area friends and family, for not making time to see anyone. We have some plans to be in DC soon, so we hope to do our visiting then!)

 

 

Mirror Mirror

 

I brought a mirror upstairs from the basement today, and the kids seemed to really enjoy it!

Snow Day

I brought the snow inside today =) Daniel loved using real snow with his snow plow and dump trucks.

Jose Artigas

Daniel and I were looking over our pictures from last year's trip to Uruguay. He has fun pointing out different family members. "Ah, Abuela!" "Sofia!" "Toni and Cuqui!"

In one of the pictures, he saw the great Jose Artigas, Uruguay's greatest hero. The George Washington of Uruguay. The great military leader. The victorious one who fought for Uruguay's independence from Spain and Argentina. The one who, according to Daniel, looks like he's carrying a pom-pom.

Crawling!

It's official! Anna started crawling on January 22nd—exactly 7 months old =) Here's the video . . .

Transitions

Daniel has been gracious about giving up his "baby" things for Anna. Baby toys, crib, infant car seat, and now the high chair. Such a sweet boy and a great big brother!

Anna's finally ready for solid foods. Until recently, she wasn't really interested. So far so good! Rice cereal, oatmeal, carrots, and apple sauce seem to have won her approval =) Green peas, not so much!

Like Sister, Like Brother

Just wanted to do a side-by-side comparison of the kids, to see if Anna looks like Daniel did at her age =) Plenty of similarities!

Sitting Up!

Anna is pretty much able to sit without support now. I'll keep the Boppy around her, though, just in case =)

Happy Baby

 

Anna was so giggly tonight! We caught some of it on video . . . =)

Sweetie Pies

 

A tender moment we captured during our time at Grandma and Grandpa’s house over Thanksgiving . . . =)

Our Sweet Anna

Anna is really starting to get around! She’s rolling all over the place =) She’s starting to show more of her personality, too. Gentle and quiet, yet strong and determined. Loves people and loves attention. She’s delightful. I can’t get enough of her =)

Swiffering

 

Daniel loves to help me around the house whenever he can. He's a great little helper. But his all-time favorite “chore” is Swiffering. =)

Growing Up So Fast!

 

Officially Mobile
This happened way sooner than I expected! Anna is mobile at 4 months! Today she rolled from one end of the room to the other  =) Time to make sure the house is definitely baby proofed!

    

Big Boy Bed
We have officially transitioned Daniel from the crib to the Big Boy Bed. He loves it! And he doesn’t seem to mind that Anna is now using “Daniel’s crib”—as he likes to remind us. I’m so glad I didn’t buy a second crib (she’s been using the Pack-and-Play until now).

Family Pictures

Just wanted to post some updated family pictures . . . =)

 

Milestone Updates

Since this blog is essentially our baby book for the kids, I realized I’d better post a milestone update. Otherwise, I’ll never remember when these things happened =)

Daniel—2 years and 3 months
Daniel still sleeps really well. Goes to bed around 6:30pm (without a fuss) and sleeps until around 7:30am. And he takes a good 2.5 hour nap in the afternoon. Many thanks to Dr. Weissbluth, and to Heather who recommended his book! We have a well-rested little boy!

He eats pretty well. We don’t let him have sugar, so he doesn’t even know to ask for it yet =) His favorite meal is (Tyson) chicken nuggets. They’re so easy (and surprisingly healthy), that we end up eating them for lunch several times a week. He won’t drink milk (he gags whenever I try to give it to him), but thankfully he loves yogurt and cheese. To drink, I give him water with a little apple juice, and he devours it. He seriously drinks like 6+ sippy cups of it a day. He puts me to shame in my goal to drink more water!

He can recognize all of his letters (uppercase and lowercase) and numbers 1-10. Can count from 1-10 in English and Spanish (though he still forgets tres). And is starting to learn how to count items—but I think he hasn’t quite got the concept yet.

He loves his books and loves learning new words. He pretty much tries to say everything he hears, but he’s not articulate enough yet for everyone to know what he’s saying. He speaks in sentences, but doesn’t use articles yet. And, like his Daddy, he loves to play with words.

He has very good dexterity. We noticed this when he was little, when he would use his thumb to expertly spin the spinning toys on his exersaucer. He’ll be a pro with our trackball mouses before long =)

I keep his TV watching to a minimum (an hour at the most). He loves Word World and Super Why. And occasionally he gets to watch his Mighty Machines DVD.

He also loves to exercise. We’ve been going to a local indoor track, and today he walked a mile (with breaks, of course). He loved to declare to the other walkers as they passed by, “Daniel exercising!”

He loves people and other kids. I need to get better about getting him out with kids more often. It’s so easy to fill our days with errands. This fall he’ll return to the toddler music class, so that’s a start =)

He seems pretty laid back about everything, but he gets very scared when he hears unfamiliar sounds—especially from toys that make sounds. Within seconds, his whole body will start to shake. We expect he’ll outgrow it soon enough. In the meantime, we try to be accommodating.

He hasn’t learned how to jump yet (his feet don’t leave the ground), but he tries. I bet that will happen soon.

Whew—I think those are all the major milestones I wanted to cover. =) We think he’s delightful and such a pleasure for us to be around. He’s a blessing!

Anna—10 Weeks
Anna is also a good sleeper. Can put herself to sleep, which is a HUGE blessing. She already sleeps 8 hour stretches at night (started last week). And I’m learning to recognize her sleepy cues, so I can put her in bed for naps before she gets overly tired. At this age, Daniel was seriously sleep deprived—so I’m glad that we learned a lot since then, and are making sleep a priority for Anna.

She smiles a lot and laughed out loud for the first time yesterday when I was brushing her hair. She loves having her hair brushed =) She enjoys baths, but still looks at me like, “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?!?” She doesn’t take her eyes off of me the whole time—haha.

She’s strong and is growing well. She’s in the 50th percentiles. That’s so different from Daniel, who is still in the 5th percentiles! She rolls over from her belly to her back and is gaining better control over her head/neck.

She has a very sweet voice. I love hearing her coos =) Our friend Holly said to her, “You have a little song in your heart, don’t you?” I loved when she said that. I’m going to claim that for her. =)

Anna is such a blessing to us. We love her so much.

Anna and Daniel

Just wanted to post this picture of Anna and Big Brother Daniel =)

 

Three Weeks

 

Anna turned three weeks old on Sunday. Everyone says the first six weeks are the hardest, so we’re halfway there! =) 

She’s actually doing really well—I shouldn’t complain =) Sleeps pretty well, even though I need to feed her every 3 hours at night (every 1-2 hours during the day). And she can already roll over from her belly to her back! She’s gaining weight so well that the pediatricians keep commenting about how remarkable it is (she gained 6 ounces in 2 days, and an additional pound 7 days later).

Daniel seems to be adjusting well. He likes to “help”—which we have to be careful about—and he loves to give her kisses. He’s also surprisingly protective. Like, if he’s playing and doesn’t notice that I’ve moved her to a different part of the room, he gets startled and says, “Baby Anna?!?” =) Even right now, he’s pointing upstairs and telling me, “Feed Anna!” She’s still sleeping, but it’s probably about time for her to eat. Ah, sure enough . . . she just woke up =)

Anna Elizabeth Colman

We are so excited to announce that Anna arrived this week =) She is absolutely wonderful! I want to upload a bunch of pictures, but I’ll have to get to that later. In the meantime, my dad has posted some pictures and a video on his blog.

Anna Elizabeth Colman
6-22-08, 3:59 AM
6 lbs 8 oz
17 ¼ inches

We’re so thankful that my parents have been here since Saturday. They’ve been helping with everything, which gives me time for some much-needed rest. We’re especially glad they were here when I went into labor, too, so we could rush to the hospital. If we’d had to drop Daniel off or wait for someone to arrive to watch him, Anna would have surely been born at home (or in the car!) We got to the hospital with only minutes to spare!

I look forward to posting more pictures of our sweet girl. It’s wonderful to see that we can so quickly love her as much as we love Daniel. What a precious gift she is.

Daniel’s Birthday

Daniel celebrated his second birthday last weekend. Even though we kept everything (very) simple, he had a great time. My parents came for a visit, and we went out to eat for dinner. But the real excitement came near the end of the meal, when a fire truck drove up to the restaurant (they were picking up dinner—thankfully not fighting a fire). We took Daniel outside to look, and one of the firefighters let him sit in the driver’s seat and hold the steering wheel. He was quiet the whole time, but as soon as we left (and for the rest of the evening), he kept saying, “Daniel sit fire truck!” “Daniel steering wheel, fire truck!” Couldn’t have asked for a better birthday surprise =)

Daniel seems excited about the soon arrival of his little sister. During lunch the other day, he looked me in the eyes and said, with complete conviction, “Baby Anna, sooooon.” Thinking he might know something I don’t know (like an exact date and time—that would be nice!), I tried to get more info out of him, but he wasn’t talking =)

We’ll post an update when she arrives!

So Sad!

We have a wonderful cherry tree in our back yard.

 

Well, had a wonderful cherry tree. We suspect that the weight of the cherries, plus the recent rains, were too much for the poor tree.

 

It tipped over (at about a 45 degree angle) onto the deck but didn’t break—so it’s somewhat possible that we can still save it. Just need to find a way to hoist it back up and anchor it into place.

In the meantime, Gil spent the early evening cutting back the branches and cleaning off the deck. It's so sad! We really liked that tree, and I was starting to consider what to do with all of those cherries!

Lunch Date

We took Daniel to the park today for lunch—it was such a beautiful day! We enjoyed taking some more pictures . . .

Almost Two!

Hard to believe our little baby boy will be two years old next month! He continues to be an absolute joy.

He’s talking all the time and trying to repeat everything we say. And he has a great sense of humor—even making his own play-on-word jokes already (so much like his Daddy!) And every night, when we say his bedtime prayers, he insists that we pray for all the men who drive trucks =)

It was a beautiful day, so I took a chance at getting some pictures. Daniel was disappointed at first, when he realized I wasn’t going to spend my time pushing him around in the car . . . but he got over it quickly and surprised me by pausing periodically to pose for the camera =)

Here are the pictures. It amazes me how he can look like a big boy in one picture, and like such a little boy in the next! In the pictures where he’s looking up, I think he must have seen something in the tree—since he was so happy about it. I was too busy snapping pictures to try to figure it out! I loved seeing him so happy.

And Baby Anna (Anna Elizabeth) is doing great (we decided to start telling people her name, since Daniel can say it now) =) Hard to believe she’ll be here in about 7 weeks! I’m still having morning sickness most days, so I have an extra reason to be looking forward to her arrival!

Daniel's New Car

And because I like to always have a picture at the top of the blog, I’ll post this picture from yesterday =) Our neighbors blessed us with another toy that their boys have outgrown—and Daniel couldn’t be happier!

April 16th

Thanks to so many for your thoughts and prayers as we reached the anniversary of April 16th. It was difficult to revisit those memories, but the day itself felt somehow redemptive. I think it’s because it was so opposite from the way it was a year ago—the day was beautiful, peaceful, and healing.

And the 10:30 ceremony on campus was so beautiful, too. Governor Kaine gave a really great message—it was about how, when we realize the brevity of our lives and really keep that fact at the forefront, we’ll focus on what’s most important, rather than getting consumed with the unimportant. (How true, yet how difficult!)

Even though we’ve been dodging the media for the past year, we agreed last week to tell our story to the local Harrisonburg newspaper (Daily News-Record) and to a local Christian radio station (WNLR). Here are the links to the newspaper articles:

‘I'll Be Home In A Little Bit' 2008-04-16

The Road Back 2008-04-17

Uruguay Trip '08

We had a nice time on our trip to Uruguay this month. Daniel had a *blast*! He loved getting to play with his cousins and see so many new places and people. He even picked up a few words in Spanish—like “rica la papa” (=yummy food) and “chao chao” (=bye bye, even though his version sounds like, “cow cow”!)

He especially loved playing with his cousin, Sofia. We stayed with her parents, Toni and Cuqui, which gave Daniel and Sofia lots of time to play together. Since we’ve been home, he keeps talking about “Fia” and gets excited whenever he sees anyone remotely resembling her.

I think Daniel and I have both been changed by the trip—mostly because I learned to let go and let him do things he doesn’t get to do at home (like play in the dirt and stay up late!) It seemed silly to come home and use the baby gates, since he did pretty well without baby gates during the trip.

He’s also starting to say two- and three-word phrases, like “more please,” “big truck,” and “more banana please.” He also learned to say, “bug bites”—unfortunately because he got so many, all in one night. A mosquito must have had a feast while we all slept. He still kinda looks like he has chicken pocks. Thankfully, they don’t itch and are starting to fade.

And Baby Colman also had her first trip to Uruguay! She’s been kicking away and seems to be doing great. It was a little tough for me, traveling at 6.5 months pregnant, but perhaps I’ll time it better next time =)

Here are the pictures . . .

It's a Girl!

We got to peek in at our sweet baby girl today =) She’s doing great! We can’t wait to see her face-to-face! She’s very active and her kicks are getting stronger and stronger =) I love this stage . . . having an almost constant reminder of the baby’s presence, thanks to those sweet little kicks.

She’s at 20 weeks and is due June 25th, 2008. Another June baby!

We’re so excited! And we’re sure the next 20 weeks are going to fly by!

Snow Day

Daniel enjoyed the snow this week. And we got a great laugh out of his “A Christmas Story”esque bundled self (“I can’t put my arms down!”) The snow was too deep for him to walk in, so we had to clear a path on the deck. His favorite thing was going down his slide and landing in the snow =)

We thought it would be a great idea to have him make a snow angel. He didn’t agree, but at least we got a good snow angel out of it =)

Daniel -- 19 Months

Daniel is 19 months old and continues to be such a joy. Even though he’s teething (four teeth at one time!), he’s had a great attitude and rarely fusses.

He’s still enjoying learning his alphabet, and he’s saying more and more words every day. It’s surprising how much he’s paying attention to, when we don’t realize it. Like, Gil and I will be having a conversation, and Daniel will be playing with his toys—but when he hears a word he can say, he excitedly speaks it out. It’s fun to see him learning so much so quickly.

Daniel loves getting together with other kids . . . so we’ve started going to story time at the library, and toddler music class at a local university, and play time at the rec center, plus nursery time at church on Sundays and getting together at friends’ houses—whew!

He’s such a boy. Loves trucks, cars, trains, planes—anything with an engine (or “gin-gin” as he says). For Christmas, we got him a model car, and it’s been his constant companion ever since.

The weather’s been beautiful, so I’ve been taking pictures. I’ll also include a few from Christmas . . .

Learning Early

Our little Hokie is catching on fast ;) Here’s a video . . .

First Snow

We had our first real snow of the season this week. When Daniel saw the snow Wednesday morning, he started pointing at it and calling it “night night” (his term for “blanket”)—I guess it was a “blanket” of snow =)

Christmas Tree

We put up our Christmas tree on Sunday. Daniel seems pretty excited to see a tree inside the house =)

He was even more excited to see the train under the tree! Here’s a video . . .

ABCs

Daniel has started showing an interest in letters lately—even just in the past two weeks. So we bought him a LeapPad Fridge Phonics on Friday (“A, A, A says ‘A,’ and A says ‘Aah.’ Every letter makes a sound …”) Very very repetitive, but it must work! He’s already learned seven letters! Here's a video . . .