Blog | Brianna
Just like her big sister, Mackenzie arrived a few days early. Unlike her big sister, however, she did not make me endure 24 hours of labor, and she did not wake me up in the middle of the night! Instead, Mackenzie was kind enough to wait until a little before 7 AM before letting me know she wanted out, and I was only in labor for a little over 8 hours (with only 12 minutes of pushing). I am so glad I took my doctor’s advice and didn’t dilly dally in getting to the hospital - that enabled me to have an epidural for the last 3-4 hours of my labor. YAY! At birth she had a perfectly round little head full of dark hair. We shall see if it stays dark or turns lighter like Brianna’s did. For now, I will probably put these posts both on the “Baby 2″ page and the “Brianna” page, at least until we figure out how we want to catalog these things.
As predicted, she exceeded the 8 lb. mark…
Big sister Brianna was super excited to meet her, but not much interested in holding her (still hasn’t, though I suspect she will soon).
One day old:
When Brianna came the next day (one day old), she and Mackenzie exchanged gifts - matching orange Bla Bla monkeys! She was very excited about her new Bla Bla monkey AND about the smaller Bla Bla monkey she gave Mackenzie. We let her play with both for a few days, but then told her we needed to put Mackenzie’s aside so it would be ready (and in good shape) when Mackenzie is ready for it.
On day two, they made us leave the hospital (I could have used another day or two…). Here we are getting ready to go. Mackenzie has dark hair, just like Brianna did at birth.
Had to add the matching hat!
Home at last.
At four days old we set out for the first time to see her pediatrician. It was exhausting, so she took several long naps in her favorite spot - on her tummy on the boppy.
We made it through the first week with lots of help from Mimi and Tatie Kat (we have been fed quite well as Tatie Kat’s guinea pigs!). We have only had one truly bad night, and Mimi helped quite a bit with that one giving me a reprieve for a couple hours. At one week:
It has been a strange month, filled with good stuff and bad. B started her new year with a trip to Monkey Joe’s with her buddy Hawke. I don’t have any pictures of that - they just don’t stay in one place long enough! Tatie Kat also came back from her trip to MI and spent a few more days with us (and cooking for us!) before she headed back home. It was definitely nice to have her around to help - my bronchitis was certainly not improving, and B had lots of fun playing with her. I tried several homeopathic/pregnancy safe remedies, but after a particularly bad weekend, I broke down and headed to the doctor. I am finally feeling more like myself, and am definitely enjoying the sleep I am getting (for as long as that lasts!).
Our most recent visitors (Nana, Poppa, and Tia) just left. They came to visit and to help work on B’s playroom. Their timing was great as I was still recovering from bronchitis, and we definitely needed the help! B’s aversion to cameras these days makes it difficult to get many pictures, but we did sneak in a few. She and Tia successfully built a tower using all her blocks - she is getting so tall that she can now finally reach the top (just barely)!
Yesterday we set everything up for B to paint the rubber duckie Tia gave her for Christmas. She started with orange (anyone surprised by this?), and decided to paint one of the wings orange.
Then, she opted to paint the other wing red, which she subsequently changed to pink (gave us a bit of a chance to show her how colors change when you mix them).
Then she moved on to yellow (all rubber duckies are yellow, don’t ya know…). Initially she worked very carefully to keep the yellow off the wings.
But then, she decided the whole thing needed to be yellow.
But THEN, she changed her mind and decided the duck needed to be green…all of it…
For some reason, her favorite eye color these days is red she swears the baby will have red eyes…), so she painted the duck’s eyes red!
All done!
We had to take a bath early because she was so excited to play with her new duck in the bath.
Brianna was practically the perfect balance of super excited but not crazy about Christmas. She put her ornament on her countdown tree every day and was excited when it was finally Christmas Eve, and then promptly slept until after 8:30 on Christmas morning. Perfect!
As soon as she came down stairs, she wanted to see what Santa put in her stocking.
One of the items left by Santa was some play lipstick…gee, thanks Santa! She swears she only gets it on her lips. Here is her first attempt:
Sometime later in the day after who knows how many applications…
After her third or fourth attempt, Jason started cracking Joker jokes, especially when she pouted when we pointed a camera at her (why so serious??).
Only after she went through her stocking, and only after various bribes/threats would she stand next to her ornament tree and smile (here she is holding the hippopotamus she asked Santa to bring her).
After a quick breakfast, she started opening her presents. Let’s just say she is much faster than she used to be. BUT she was also content to open only about half before starting to play with some before we took Tatie Kat to the airport.
With her new sleeping bag…
and guitar…
and bilibo…
Sweet picture with Tatie Kat before leaving for the airport.
When we got back, she said she wanted to wait until after he nap to open more presents, but then changed her mind and declared she would open that big one in the loft before her nap. I did not see her face as I was helping her pull off the wrapping “bag,” but I heard her little squeal when she saw the kitchen!
Jason took most of the pics, so hopefully I will have some more to share once we get them off his camera. She had a great day!
I haven’t posted anything for more than 3 weeks - I am not even sure where the time went. We have all been so busy! Jason finished up a game at work (translation: he has been slammed), I have been finishing up several applications in the wake of the personnel changes at work (translation: I have been slammed), and then there is Christmas and all the business that goes with it. I haven’t taken many pictures at all, so I don’t have much to share, but here are a couple of cute ones.
Here’s B with her new Reindeer glasses (which she thinks are very silly!).
We do not have any pictures of B with Santa. She is fascinated by Santa, and particularly by her elf (”Football”), but when it comes time to actually sit on Santa’s lap (or basically get anywhere near Santa), she is a no go. So, we settled for some jammy pictures in front of the tree.
She is very excited there are only two days left!!!
I know - I am late with the Thanksgiving post. Sue me. 
We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with Tatie Kat coming for the entire weekend, and B’s buddy Hawke and his parents coming for Thanksgiving dinner. After all the hustle and bustle with the “big dinner” was over, we decided to basically relax, decorate for Christmas, relax some more, and make gingerbread boys/girls! B helped with every phase - I love how she has flour on her cheek and her tongue is sticking out while she pours the flour into the mixer.
After the dough chilled during her nap, it was time to roll out the dough and cut the cookies!
Rolling out her dough…
Measuring the thickness of her dough…
Cutting the cookies…
The mess was sooo worth the fun she seemed to be having!
After the cookies baked and cooled, we moved onto decorating them. She dictated that all smiley faces were girls and all angry faces were boys. I have NO idea why.
She had a blast, and I can’t wait to make more Christmas cookies with her!
Is there a better time to go to the zoo than the fall? Maybe we would have had a few more things to see, but the weather was perfect and the zoo was only minimally crowded with groups of school children, so I think we chose a perfect time! Tia took B to the zoo for her birthday “memory gift,” and graciously included Nana, Poppa, and me as well. This picture is way out of order, but it is one of my favorite of B from that day.
I took most of the pictures of B, but my FIL took most of the excellent animal pics you will see here with his spectacular lens!
We started with the alligators - it may not be a good year for the football gators, but we certainly enjoyed seeing some real gators taking a mid-morning snooze!
After that it was on to see the seals, who were playing around and having a marvelous time! B spent more time here than anywhere else in the whole zoo - if we had let her, she may have stayed right here all day!
We also saw some buffalo…
…before moving on to see the giraffes. While B spent a whole 5 seconds looking at the giraffes before declaring she was done, to this day she will declare that the giraffes were her absolute favorite. Go figure.
When we got to the chimp area, they had lots of statues of various chimps. Up until this point, B would not really get on or interact with the statues, but the chimps won her over.
How do you do sir?
Thanks for the ride!
Of course, there were also real chimps - nap time!
Once she got on one statue, she was game to check out pretty much any statue in the place. The elephants were a particular favorite since they had some elephant statues just her size.
We also checked out an indoor section that had a rain forest…
..and a hop scotch area (fun with Tia!)…
…and one of those board things you put your faces in - B just LOVES them (with Nana)!
She had a wonderful time and just plain wore herself out - napped pretty much the whole way home!
Brianna’s friend William had his 4th birthday party this past weekend - a BUG themed party! Luckily Brianna is all about bugs lately, so she was good with this. She even said it was her favorite birthday party ever! So happy…
First they made bug hats (see later pictures - she put as much orange on there as possible). Then, after following their link on the spider web (ribbon), they each found their own bug catchers - quite useful to have when you need to go outside to find and catch some bugs!
Of course, then they were famished and had to have some bug snacks (ants on a log, worms in mud cake, antennae, cocoons, beetle juice, etc.). Check out one of her favorites - her spider ring!
With the birthday boy!
Last year, B was very shy and would only go up to each door if we carried her, and would only say trick-or-treat and thank you if we prompted her. Fast forward to this year - she marched up to each door, rang the door bell, said her “lines” and quickly moved onto the next house. She loved everything about trick-or-treating! While I could have done without the rain, I am not sure she even noticed. The next morning, she told me she wanted to do it again, and was quite disappointed when I told her she had to wait a whole year. She thinks each season should have trick-or-treating…
Here are some pics from her big day. The day started with lots of fun at school, including games, a Halloween party, and a Halloween parade.
Getting ready to go…The sweet witch…
The scary witch…
With Grandma and Grandpa…
With Mommy and Daddy…
Can we go yet???
Yay, Hawke (the great white shark) is here!
We only stayed out about an hour (I think she could have gone for at least another hour), but she got a pretty good take. As she kept commenting, “my candy is heavy!”
So, as part of Brianna’s membership to the local kid’s museum (thanks Nana and Poppa!), she was invited to their annual pumpkin carving party. So, we picked out a pumpkin and off we went. Along the way she realized “carving” meant cutting. “I don’t want to cut my pumpkin!” Perhaps she has seen a bit too much of the Great Pumpkin…
Anyway, when we got there we discovered there were lots of options, including just using other things to make faces on the pumpkin. She was thrilled!
Getting ready to “carve.”
Jason and I helped her secure all the items to the pumpkin, but she picked everything out, and told us where to put them. Side A (named “Jason”):
Hiding from the camera…
Side B (named “Brianna”):
She had a great time, and was even more thrilled to have time to play at the museum before and after the party!
We recently took B to our local fair. Last year she was too small for most rides, and quite frankly, not interested in much other than the merry-go-round (though after some encouragement she did try and seem to enjoy a few others). This year was a whole different story. She pretty much wanted to ride everything, and if possible, she wanted to do it by herself. No encouragement required.
We started with the merry-go-round (which she rode twice). As you can see, she is already looking ahead to the next ride…
Next she wanted to do the little boat ride (”all by myself!”).
After that, she moved on to the jalopy ride (again, “all by myself!”). In the first picture, she is objecting to all the pictures I am taking…
Then came the slide…the gigantic slide (~50′ in the air) that I was convinced she would not go down. She wanted to do this one by herself too, but she is not yet big enough. She almost pitched a fit, but finally acquiesced. Three times!! She went down this huge slide three times, and would have gone more if we had let her!
Then came the interesting part. Her next ride of choice was the Kraft Macaroni & Cheese equivalent of the teacups (or the strawberries) - aka a roundy-round ride. Jason refuses to ride on anything that goes round and round, especially with me (admittedly, I’ll spin that thing like a crazy person). But, B insisted on riding it, I am not allowed on that ride right now, and B was not big enough to go by herself. What is a Daddy to do? Why ride the ride of course (although he did not tell her that the “steering wheel” in the middle would make the cup spin…)!
Then she headed off to another one - a fire engine that rotates high up into the air. I was shocked she wanted to do that one too, but she loved it!
By this point, we only had enough tickets left to ride one more ride (much to her dismay). She chose a worm ride that she had to ride by herself - both Jason and I are considered to be too tall to ride it.
To distract her from her disappointment about the end of the rides, we took her over to the games and told her to pick one. She picked fishing, and won two fish. She was so proud!
She did GREAT (and that includes walking at least 15 minutes to and from the car), and had a great time! Best fair experience ever!
