Almost a year with Lily ...

... and still her name is missing from our blog title! I need to look into changing it, but it might mean I have to start a new blog. I'll see what I can find out.

I can't believe Lily will be a year old in less than two weeks. Where has time (and my tiny baby) gone?? Life with her is such a joy and we couldn't imagine not having her with us. I look forward to seeing her happy little face every morning! She has 4 teeth now, with two more trying to break through. She eats and sleeps well. She crawls like the wind, but is not walking unassisstedly yet. I guess she figures she is safer on all fours, especially with big brother pushing her over all the time. I do wish she would start walking, though. She is full of energy and wants to explore wherever we go. Needless to say, I am not crazy about her being on dirty floors all the time, putting whatever she finds in her mouth. Lily says "Mama", occasionally"Papa", and she loves to say and wave Hello and Good Bye. She goes crazy waving whenever I take her out the front door or open the window, be there an audience or not.


Her first birthday we will spend in Rostock with my parents and grandmother. We are leaving in a week, and will not be back until May 18. We have a wedding to go to in Hanover on May 17. After Lily's birthday Neil will go back to work for a week and then join us in Rostock again. We are hoping that the air up north will do Finn's lungs good. Right now he is sick again, and although it has been worse his lungs are not good either. So we are back to inhaling and other treatments.


Finn is quite the character these days. He pretend-plays a lot now. Most days he is not Finn, but a "mama cow". I guess gender is not a topic yet. Sometimes it's quite funny. A typical conversation from the other night:


Neil: "Come here, Finn!"
Finn: "But I'm a mama cow!"
Neil: "Okay, come here, mama cow and take this medication. It will help you make nice milk."
Finn: "But there is still quite a bit of milk left in my udder."


Ha ha :-). Other times it's not so funny, like when he can't say he is sorry to Lily because cows can't talk. Or when he bites my leg because he is a crocodile. He sure has his moments. But most days he is a lot of fun to be around and we think he is the greatest little boy on earth! Here he is a jaguar sleeping in a tree:

And here he is just a little boy running from my friend's dog :-)

Pictures

Here are some pictures from last week. We visited Munich, the zoo in Nürnberg, went for a walk along the Danube in Ingolstadt, saw the bird show at Rosenburg castle and had fun at home, too!

Visitors come and gone

From April 12-20 we had dear visitors: Neil's cousin Heidi and Auntie Toni from Canada! We had a great time together and the kids enjoyed all the extra attention. Finn was especially impressed by the fact that Toni used to have TWO combines on her farm and still has three tractors plus trailers. We are planning a long Canadian vacation next spring/summer and will definitely have to go see Toni on her farm in Luseland, Saskatchewan.
One day we all took the train into Munich and visited the Botanical Gardens. In one of the green houses they had fish, and one of them was HUGE. He was also either mean or hungry, and I shot this little video of him. It was quite the experience!

It was time for a change ...

... of our living room, that is!
We all went to IKEA last Saturday and this is the result: new couch covers, a new rug and a play area for the kids. It looks quite different, but we like it! And the kids think their little storage shelves that double as play tables are cool. There is much less clutter now, and I was SOO ready for that!

Then, Lily finally finally finally cut her first tooth! She hasn't had it easy. She's been teething on and off for many months, being miserable and in pain, but they just never broke through. Now there are four showing through her gums at the top and yesterday the first one actually cut through. I can't feel any bottom ones yet though. It looks like soon she will have the 4 front ones on top and none on the bottom.

Here are a few pictures:

Finn wanted blue couches, but they didn't have many solid colors. This red is pretty bold, but we liked the fabric best (corduroy).

All the clutter is gone, yay! I am considering putting a "No trespassing" sign up.

And this is where the clutter is hiding, thanks to IKEA shelves and plastic boxes.

Doesn't he though?!

Early in the morning, with big brother still asleep, Lily is wasting no time. This is her chance to play with all his toys and no one is going to yank them out of her hands. Eureka!

The little copycat

Lily is so funny. You know how they always say babies learn by imitation? With her that is absolutely true. I notice it much more now than I noticed it with Finn. Probably because Lily imitates Finn most of the time, and it is just SO obvious. It started months ago when I saw Lily pick up a toy phone that Finn had just dropped and babble into it. Now, when Finn is safely out of sight Lily will pick up his toy tractors and play with them just like he does, complete with making the sounds. Watch her:

Other things I find not so funny. For instance: Finn had to show Lily only once which button to push to start the dishwasher or that it is a lot of fun to play with the knobs on the stove. The cool thing is that this will make Mama come running, wagging her finger and shouting "Nein, nein!". Well, guess who is wagging her finger back at me with an impish grin on her face. I have also caught the two of them standing in front of the stereo, Finn gladly showing Lily which buttons to push without touching them himself because that is a big no-no. People keep on telling me how nice it is to have two children so close in age because "later they will play together so nicely". Yeah, right. Do you mind if I send them over to YOUR house to play once in a while?

What else is new? Neil's birthday has come and gone. He is 33 now, just like me. He didn't have to go to work since Easter Monday is a holiday in Germany. We had friends from church over at night for a little bit of a celebration. My sister Ulli was still here with us too.

Finn is still getting used to not sleeping in a crib. It is a bit of a struggle and after some desastrous naptimes we decided to give up on trying to make him nap. Now we do a "quiet time" in his room, and of course he doesn't fall asleep. Which does NOT mean that he is not tired, though. Maybe when the novelty has worn off he will start napping again. For now he will go to bed earlier at night. He is better about staying in his bed at night, but is still quite fussy. It makes me a little sad for him. He used to love his bed and snuggling up in it, even if it took him a long time to actually fall asleep. Now it is like he HAS to come out because he CAN.

Except for a bit of a runny nose both Finn and Lily are healthy for now, believe it nor not. Neil took a day off today and just left for Munich with Finn. They have to go back to the children's hospital where they did the bronchoscopy to have Finn's lungs x-rayed. The doctors wanted to do that when Finn is healthy, to have a comparison, so this is their chance. Who knows how long Finn will be well. I don't know if I mentioned this before, but Finn is on asthma medication and cortisone now. I am not thrilled about him having to take that stuff every day because of the side effects, but his doctor is hoping it will prevent Finn from getting pneumonia almost every time he catches a virus. Hopefully in the summer we can wean him off it.

Last weekend we took advantage of the nice weather and went exploring in a nearby forest. Kristin and Karl will recognize it! We also went on a short bike trip, with Lily in the trailer and Finn in his seat on my bike. I am SOOO longing for warm weather!!