Happy Birthday, Hannah!

Our baby is 2!

We celebrated Hannah's birthday 2 weeks ago.  We had a fun, family (fairly low key) day.  The day before her birthday we were at Sam's Club and picked up some muffins for her breakfast.  After that, every time we mentioned her birthday, she'd say "muff-muff".  As far as she was concerned, birthdays are all about muffins. We had hot dogs for dinner followed by cupcakes (also called muffins by Hannah) and presents.  She has enjoyed her gifts and pushes her new stroller everywhere!

Some things about Hannah:

• Her talking is really improving!  Her vocabulary is really growing and she is using many 2-word combinations.  Many of those start with "no" (ie no bib, no nap, etc.).  We love hearing her talk so much more.  She calls me "mama", Mike "dada", Abby "abba" and Briton "bip".
• She also loves to undress and redress herself.  She gets very creative with her outfits.  (I remember Abby going through this stage.)

• Hannah's favorite foods are yogurt, mac and cheese, hot dogs and peanut butter.  She likes to spread peanut butter on her bread all by herself!
• Hannah's favorite toys are her dolls and doll stroller and our marble run.
• She is a good sleeper and takes very good naps.  We recently moved Briton into the girls' bedroom and set up the bunk beds for Abby and Briton.  Hannah loves to climb up on the bunk beds and be a big kid like her siblings.  I think she wishes we'd let her sleep on the top bunk, but she'll need to stay in the crib for a bit longer.

Hannah is delightful and very loved by all of us!

Broken Arm

About 3.5 weeks ago, I was in the basement when I heard a thump-thump-thump-scream.  I initially thought it was Hannah since I'd been having a hard time keeping her from climbing all over.  When I got upstairs, Briton ran to me holding his arm and told me he'd fallen down the stairs.  I comforted him for a minute, felt his arm to make sure it didn't feel too terribly injured and then asked him how he fell down the stairs.  He told me he'd ridden down in a box!  (I admit that I chuckled a bit.  That is very Briton.)  After a while he was still crying and every time I tried to move his arm, he cried louder.  I ended up taking him to the ER after we got Hannah off with dad (and later the neighbors).  Although not a serious break, the x-rays did show a break right above the elbow and he received a sling.  It was a long day - 5 hours in the ER.  I do really like the pediatric ER in the hospital here.  Everyone there is really great!

Here he is with the splint and sling (alongside the infamous box).  He really hated it and he was exhausted when this picture was taken.

2 days later he got the splint off and had a waterproof fiberglass cast on.  It was fabulous.  It didn't go past his wrist so he could still write, eat and play with it.  I was so pleased that really the cast proved to be a non-issue for any of us.  (The only thing it limited was some of the shirts he could wear.)  Here he is (with the box again) with the new cast.

This morning we got the cast off!  The cast was short lived - only 3 weeks!  Briton was excited to get it off but I think he is a bit surprised at how little he wants to move his arm.  He's still holding it in the casted position, but I am sure the motion and his confidence will come back within the next few days.

Christmas Tree!

The day after Thanksgiving, we took our annual trip to the Christmas tree farm a couple miles from our house.  It was a cold day, but the kids were excited to bundle up.

 

We took the tractor to our favorite variety of trees and found a winner!

 

 

It took a week or so to get it decorated, but we love being all set up for Christmas!