Anne's Early Birthday Party

We celebrated Anne's b-day a couple days early so that her Gma & Gpa Jensen could be there to share it with us. I think I enjoyed the whole thing more than she did. One of the funnest things about being a mom.I couldn't decided which cake to get I just decided to buy both. She loved it too.

Yes, she did love it.

Gpa Jensen picked this shirt out for Anne and she absolutely loves it. It says Bayern-München (Bavaria-Munich). They are my dad's favorite soccer teams. Jared is a fan of their rivals, so this causes some very light-hearted competition. My dad said that she picked it out herself while we were sight-seeing with them. Anne went into a gift shop with my parents and I guess she picked it.
My mom bought this doll. Anne loves her dolls and has to always have one when she goes to bed at night. This one is to help kids learn zippers, buttons, pockets and buckles.

My Grandpa made these doll beds for each of the great-granddaughters. He designed them himself, we just painted them and made the bedding. My mom and I spent several hours yesterday making the bedding while the men stained and assembled it. She immediately had to put her new baby in it too.

Alicia was a little upset that the bed wasn't hers and that Anne wouldn't let her get right in there and play with it. But she has one of her own that we will try to have done for her birthday too.

Fashion Statements...or Disasters?

Just practicing for my mermaid costume next Halloween. Mom did this one on accident. Notice the wonderful hair style fresh from a night of sleep.

Maybe wearing food on your face wll become the fashion. With that adorable smile who could resist?

This is one of Jared's shirts for work. She just put it on and was walking around with it. This reminded me of what I would do with my dad's shirts.

Anne does get very creative at times and she loves to tease others. This was one of those times.

Grandparents are here

My parents are finally here and we have already had lots of fun together. Oh course there were some bumps in the road to get them here. Jared and I drove the 3 hours to get to Frankfurt to pick them up. Since they came in at 7 am we got a hotel there the night before. We waited at the airport the next morning for 1 1/2 hours before we found out that we got the dates wrong. They were coming the next day. Well, it didn't make much sense to drive all the way home and then back again, so we stayed up there and had a free day together with no obligations at all. I can't remembe the last time that happened. It was wonderful.I finally found my camera again so have been taking a lot of pictures. Here is one of my mom and Alicia in Nürnberg having the bratwurst that are special to our city.Grandma and Grandpa brought a suitcase full of things for us. Alicia and Anne got alot of things from Disney World. This is Alicia's Nala stuffed animal.
Anne liked helping me unwrap gifts and try out all the new things. Like this wonderful bib.

A Happy child is a wonderful child

We found the source of Alicia's orneriness 3 days ago. She cut her first tooth!!! I am so excited to finally have this milestone behind us. It is amazing how much happier she is now. My days are going so much smoother now and I am not so worried about being a bad mom anymore. I can't wait until we can actually see it in pictures.

Speaking of pictures...sorry there hasn't been many new pictures for awhile. I can't find our camera. Hopefully I find it soon.

Breaking News

The Headline: Baby strangled by sister with mother's bra!!!

This is what flashed through my mind when I heard Alicia yelling and turned to see what was wrong. It all started yesterday at the early hour of 6am when both my girls woke up. They should have slept longer, but I guess this was just an indication of how the day was going to be. The day before I had the last day of my class for the next 2 months, os this was my first full day home and let's just say that it wasn't the smoothest day. I spent most of it keeping the 2 girls from killing each other. Alicia can't stand it when Anne gets too close to her or when she even touches her. And Anne loves provoking Alicia. I got some things organized, mostly just kept the 2 away from each other and listened to them scream all day long.

The climax of the day came when they got into my underwear and bra drawer (sorry to all you guys reading this). They pulled everything out of course and threw it on the floor. Anne likes to hang my bras around her neck and walk around like. I guess she decided that Alicia wanted it too and put one around her neck. Then she must have changed her mind. I heard Alicia's typical "Mom, get her off me!" scream and turned to see what was wrong. I saw Anne trying to pull the bra off, but not too successfully. She was close to choking Alicia instead. The thought ran through my head of how was I ever going to explain this to the police. Once I had saved Alicia I was able to find the humor in it and had to tell Jared and my mom the whole story. Thought you might enjoy it too.

Playtime with Alicia

Alicia loved playing with this talking Barney. I am not a fan of Barney, but this was given to her uncle when he was young. She was playing with it then suddenly it started talking, she was so confused she looked around to try to figure out where to voice was coming from.

She got a hold of the book in the shelf and enjoyed playing with it all. I hope this is a sign of things to come...maybe an avid reader?

Alicia learned to to wave and to pull herself up onto furniture. It is the cutest thing to see her do both. She spends a large amount of her time waving at those around her. She loves when you wave back. She will break into the biggest smile. I was fortunate to be able to catch both skills in action here. I love her blue eyes.

25th Birthday Gift

Jared took me to Leipzig for my birthday this last weekend. He served there during his mission. It is in East Germany, a little over halfway between Nürnberg and Berlin. It really is a beautiful city, but unfortunately like most of the cities in East Germany it is rundown, has several abandoned and boarded-up buildings and a lot of grafitti. But I was amazed at how well kept up and beautiful the buildings and parts of the city were that had been maintained and restored. The inner-city was beautiful. There is alot of American influence and you can tell.

This is one of the man-holes in the city. They are all over there. I thought it was so unique I had to get a picture.

Jared found this when he was serving here. When you rub the handles the sounds waves cause the water to ripple. A very fun toy. I had never seen anything like it before.

I think the Bahnhof (train station) in Leipzig was my favorite thing. It was absolutely HUGE!! The two levels below this one have shops. There is over 120 shops there, a regular mall. It is such a beautiful building too. One of the biggest train stations in Germany.

This is a monument that was built in memory of the 100,000 people that died in the war in 1813 with Napoleon. In this picture you can't tell how huge it is. But the man next to it is so handsome and wonderful. Jared and I walked up everyone of the 500 step to the top. Of course, I made Jared buy me something pretty for that.This is a statue of Bach outside the church where he played the organ and was Chorus Master for so many years. The organ is still there. The windows you see behind the statue are stained-glass and about him. His house sits right next to the church.

As you can see we had a lot of fun. We missed out girls though. Since we have been home Alicia has slept through the night each night. That is good news for me, especially since I have a cold now.