Hoppy Easter

We had an exciting Easter weekend!  On Saturday, we took the kids to a pancake breakfast where they could meet the Easter Bunny.  Amita was pretty pumped about it... Ansel just didn't want it interfering with his morning nap.  She loved the "big bunny" and talked about him all weekend.  The fun continued at home where we dyed eggs for the first time before heading to Saturday night church.  And then this morning after a double bath, Amita was thrilled to discover that the Easter Bunny had, in fact, visited our house and hidden eggs!  We had a fun morning finding all the eggs, as well as the Easter baskets (vintage ducks that Aaron and I had as kids!) and cooking a huge ham dinner with all the fixin's for lunch!

Here's Amita when she had almost cleared her plate at the pancake breakfast!  Not to worry... those sausages didn't go to waste!!

Here is Ansel wearing a vintage sweater of Aaron's.  Amita wore it last year... but I was worried he'd be too big for it if we waited another year!

Amita helping me dye eggs.

The first egg found in the hunt!  She was super excited to find them all over the house!

Here's the Easter ducks filled with Easter goodies.  Funny that Aaron and I both had such similar baskets growing up!

Amita trying her first hard boiled egg!  She really liked it... although she was a bit disappointed that the yellow stuff in the center wasn't cheese.

Amita showing off some new paints that she got as an Easter gift.  She was very excited!

And let's not forget that it's still the NCAA tournament.  Ansel was sporting a b-ball themed outfit for the occasion!

Start Your Engines!

This weekend was the start of the Indy race season (as everyone knows!) and it was Ansel's first official race!  We commemorated the event by dressing everyone in their Indy gear and grilling out brats... regardless of the snow coming down outside.  Everyone had a lot of fun watching the fast cars and I think Dada was excited to have a new race fan to share his passion with.

Amita really enjoyed eating brats for the first time.  Since she has Aaron's taste buds, it's not surprising that she LOVED them and kept asking for more!

Here's our littlest race fan decked out in his race car pants.  I have been waiting a while to bust these out... but the big shocker was that he actually fit into them (12 month size!) already!!!

Purple & Green

Last weekend we celebrated two of the saints days.  March 16 was St. Urho's day (basically the Finnish version of St. Pat's).  The traditional colors for that day are purple and green, so both the kids were decked out accordingly.  Ansel actually "borrowed" a purple shirt that Amita wore during her first October... you math wizards will note that she would have been more than 9 months old then.  There was a little room for Ansel to grow in it, but I don't think he'll fit it by Halloween this year!!  His green shirt was another hand-me-down: Amita's first Christmas onesie!!

Amita seemed to really enjoy the holiday.  I never managed to capture her standing completely still.  She was on the go all day helping Dada with groceries, getting gas for the car, cooking, and going to church.  She was in great spirits with energy to spare right up until bed time!

On Sunday, we celebrated St. Patrick's day by wearing green.  Not a whole lot of beer drinking this year... my how the times have changed!

Home of the Whopper

Ansel had his 4-month checkup today and he impressed everyone with how much he's grown in two months!  He tipped the scales at 15 lbs 14 oz and 27 1/2 in long!!  I will point out that Amita was 11 months old before she hit that weight... He's going to be quite the bruiser, I think!!

Meanwhile, Amita loves all sorts of toddler activities like coloring and dancing and she is really working on her vocabulary.  She has new words and phrases every day now and I am amazed at all the words she knows to songs.  Some of her new favorites include: delicious coffee (only the pretend kind, not the real stuff), rain rain go away (helpful with all the precipitation we've had lately), and today's most popular word, whopper (my word to describe how big Ansel has gotten)!

Here's Ansel having some tummy time with Baxter.  Don't worry, Bax, the camera adds 10 pounds...

Here's Ansel playing on his playmat... note the stow-away behind him burrowed in the blanket!

The whole gang together on the couch.

One day, Amita announced that her monkey needed a snack, grabbed my nursing pillow, and sat down to feed him just like baby Ansel does!

Amita modeling Dada's slippers.  She is so proud of herself as she walks around in them!

I didn't think anyone in our family could grow a mustache...

All About Dada

Dada is a popular fellow at our house.  Amita has been requesting him lately for everything from playing with her to scooping her food and all sorts of stuff in between.  He's definitely a barrel full of monkeys and she usually gets tossed in the air when he's around, so I don't blame her.  I try to hang out with him any chance I get too... he's fun!!  The above photo is of Dad hauling both kids around.  Who needs a gym membership when you have these two weights to carry!!

We have been settling into our routine with me back at work full time and the kids are adjusting quite well.  Ansel keeps growing and getting stronger and is hitting all his baby milestones: holding his head up, growing teeth (I know, overachiever!!), etc..  Amita has been working a lot on vocabulary and now she loves action verbs.  She will call out who is doing what at our house all day: Mama wash, Amita dance, Dada sneeze... you get the idea!

Here are a few more photos of what we've been doing recently.

This was the only reasonably still photo I could get of both kids playing.  Ansel is finally big enough for his jumparoo and he like to hang out there... but Amita is also very enthusiastic about it and likes to "help" him jump and shake, so one of us usually needs to mediate the situation.

Amita gets a kick out of holding her baby bro.  She also hugs and kisses him lots!  Her latest has been to try to lift him like she sees Mama and Dada doing.  We have definitely been discouraging that one since he is about 2/3 of her weight already!

Amita loves dancing... especially with Dada!  But if you're in the neighborhood, stop in and ask her to do the robot.  She's quite good!

Here's the kids watching racing with Dada.  Amita loved all the cars!  Someday soon, Dada will have a shadow with him at the race track!

Here's our big boy practicing sitting up in his Bumbo chair.  You can see why our arms are getting such a workout from this one!

Here's Amita making her very own pizza.  She wanted to be like Dada so she put black olives on hers just like he did!!