Happy Fall Y'all!

Just some pictures I snapped of the girls on the wagon in front of our house this afternoon (but mostly of Claire b/c we took similar pictures of Melanie with the wagon during her first fall). Enjoy!

Claire's shirt says "Cutest pumpkin in the patch" just in case you're wondering ;)

Halloween pictures will be posted soon, but seeing as we traipsed over half of west Wichita, there are a lot of pictures, so I'm not going to attempt that before bed. You'll just have to learn to be patient ;)

Introducing...

I would like to introduce to you little miss Gianna Elizabeth, born October 21st weighing in at 5 lb. 5 oz. and 18 inches long. She is the daughter of our good friends Amy and Michael O'Crowley, and needless to say everyone that has been privileged to meet her is absolutely smitten - I know I am! In honor of her abundant cuteness I asked Amy if I could share a few pictures from my first visit with her, and she said yes, so let the unabashed baby admiring begin!

See those itty bitty fingers?
Her daddy is totally wrapped around them already :)

Momma love
They are so cute together!

She doesn't know it yet, but Gianna has the most perfect parents God could have chosen for her! She is going to be one blessed little baby :)

Listening to her little coos and gurgles is just about the sweetest thing you ever heard!
I think they're extra cute to go with her teenie tiny body.
That and the fact that I don't have to hear the accompanying cries at 1, 3, and 5 in the morning probably helps bump the cuteness quotient up a few notches ;)

I'm so excited to see Miss Gianna grow and come over for play dates with Melanie and Claire. Hooray for new friends!

Good job Amy and Michael!
You've got my seal of approval (like you were really holding your breath for that one, I'm sure...)
Two very enthusiastic thumbs up!

Hide and Seek

Matt introduced Melanie to Hide and Seek yesterday, and she loves it! She's been a big fan of sneaking around and hiding recently, so the idea of an actual game centered around this activity was a real winner with her!

It was really cute to watch them, Melanie with her quick counting and gleeful searching, and Matt with his silly hiding places that Melanie would often copy when it was her turn to hide and his diligent "looking" for Melanie despite her painfully obvious hiding places that she often gave away before he "officially" found her. He even incorporated Claire into the game (she gave away his hiding place more than once!). Enjoy the slideshow of one of these simple pleasures of youth. I'm sure if you'd like to come over Melanie would be more than willing to play with you too :)

Leaves

Since the leaves are no longer on our trees they are much more accessible to a certain

8 1/2-month old that seems to hang around here quite a bit.

As Matt puts it, she has one major question in life right now.
"Can I eat this?"

Fortunately today we were in the front yard (the sun made it the warmer place to play in the afternoon). The back yard is a thick blanket of leaves. We're going to have to invest in a rake, and then teach Melanie the joys of jumping into the piles of leaves. I'm sure there will be a post on that soon :)

Would you care to try some?

No Claire, don't eat that!

Melanie seems to have developed a penchant for decorating recently.

Or at least rearranging stuff. It's pretty cute.

I'm not sure what Matt did to get the picture to look like this, but I like it, so I thought I'd share.

Michelle!

We took a quick trip to see Michelle this past weekend (Charles was back here in Wichita for their goddaughter's birthday party, so we didn't get to spend any time with him. Maybe next time our schedules will coincide a bit better). We hadn't been up there since Melanie was 6 months old, so it was high time we made a trip. That, and she was having a CHOCOLATE PARTY (yes, my friends, such a thing does indeed exist) and she has a new house for us to see, so what more motivation could we need?

We drove up Friday afternoon/early evening and that went very well since neither of the girls had taken a nap, so they just slept basically the whole way. Very nice indeed. The drive back wasn't nearly as easy, but we won't focus on that.

We went out to dinner at Famous Dave's at the Legend's shopping plaza on Friday, where Melanie made us take her to the bathroom about 50 times (or maybe it was 6. I lost count) which is her favorite thing to do when she gets bored or thinks you aren't giving her your undivided attention. Trying to have an adult conversation? "I have to go potty!" Feeding the baby? "I have to go potty!" Taking too long grocery shopping? "I have to go potty!" (And by too long I mean more than 10 minutes) Updating the blog? Well, you get the idea. I'm glad she's starting to learn, but she's turning into the toddler that cried "potty!" All in the name of independence and not going to kindergarten in diapers, eh?

Anyhoooo, went to dinner, came back to the Buford Estate, slept, got up, made A LOT of food for the chocolate party, Dove Chocolatier lady got there and set up her stuff, listened to her spiel, ate A LOT of food, played outside a bit, made a toddler cry when we said it was time to leave, drove home and here we are! Thanks for having us Michelle! We'll have to come another weekend when we have time to shop :)

Oh, how Melanie loved "Beasy" as she referred to Beanie.
They were quite the site to watch together. I have a video I will hopefully post soon. (I need the technical support of my sleeping spouse for that one.)

Melanie was very sad to leave "Shell and Beasy" but is excited to go visit again.

I was able to finish knitting this hat during the ride up and back.
It was intended to be a smaller size, but it isn't, so I'll just have to make another smaller one for the original intended recipient. It matches Melanie's jacket from last year that still fits her, so I guess I should say it matches Melanie's jacket for this year. Anyway, it seems she has inadvertently gotten a new hat for this year.

Modeling while eating her before bed snack.

When she realized what was going on she decided to give me one of her new "See, I'm smiling for the picture!" grins. I'm hoping this passes before we get our Christmas card pictures taken. Oh my, how priceless those would be!

Just some pictures of our day-to-day life recently.

Melanie loves playing with her car on the deck, so I took Claire's bouncy chair outside so she could enjoy the nice weather too while I unloaded the dishwasher.
Sadly, all the wind we've had lately has made most of the beautiful leaves fall off of our tree :(
It was nice while it lasted.

After the dishes were done we moved into the yard for some more outdoor fun.

Dad joined in when he got home from work.

We have a running, jumping, kicking action toddler.
Not sure what we're going to do with all that energy once cold weather really sets in. Probably pin it up inside until spring, when we'll go outside and explode, which would be better than exploding inside the house, but still not very much fun to clean up.
Any suggestions for keeping toddlers from exploding during the winter?

Stealing some of Melanie's drink

Climbing in the empty trampoline pit.

The Big One encouraging the Little One to join her in some mischief.
They really are quite the pair.

I had already dried Claire off and had gone to get a new diaper and came back to find this.
It's like the trouble she can get into multiplies while she sleeps!
(fortunately she isn't tall enough to get in on her own yet, but she does have a good amount of upper body strength, so we're keeping our eyes peeled just the same)

Melanie asked Matt to take her picture, but then she wouldn't look at the camera and just pouted into my shoulder for quite a while - something she seems to be doing a lot lately :P
We finally tricked her in to smiling though.

Our Weekend

We had a rather uneventful weekend in the Stockemer household, but that's just how we like it from time to time!
Saturday we took the girls to the park because I forgot Melanie had been switched to the Saturday tumbling class and forgot to take her (Shhh... don't tell her... she still doesn't know!) It helped alleviate some of my guilt and allowed us some nice outdoor time. The temperature was nice with a bit of a breeze and we were able to store up on vitamin D since the sun was out. As an added bonus, my friend Amy met us there so I got to chat with her while Matt ran around with Melanie.

It was chilly enough for Claire to wear one of her cute fall hoodies and a cozy knit hat.
(No, I didn't knit her hat, but for $3.50 I'd be hard pressed to buy the yarn to make one just like it!)

Claire's first time in a playground swing

Are you sure this thing is safe?

Who cares?!?! This is fun!
Weeeeeee!

Melanie slidin' along

Mom and Claire

Melanie and Dad swinging

The climbing wall from a Melanie point-of-view.
Kinda helps put the size of things in perspective, doesn't it?

This is one of the trees in our backyard.
I just love how bright the colors are so I thought I'd share it with you :)
It's nice to be in a house that actually has trees that change colors in the fall. We didn't have very good luck with the trees we planted at the old house. (I think we managed to keep one alive out of four that we planted while we were there :P ) Hopefully the new owners have better luck than we did!

Sunday night we had Matt's family over for dinner and some play time since we've all been so busy recently. This gave the girls some much appreciated play time with their grandparents and Aunt Katie and Uncle John. Can't wait to do it again!