seriously?! can't you spit up on your dad JUST ONCE?!

EVERYDAY Anna makes it her mission to spit up on me. She had actually kind of grown out of that whole spitting up phase until her most recent growth spurt. Maybe it's because she's nursing more, maybe she just likes to ruin all of my shirts...and pants...and skirts...and shoes. She's so much fun these days, it's fun to watch her grow into a little person.

Here are a few teasers from the vacation so far!
Hanging out at the beach in Italy.








On the train in southern France




Portovenere, Italy

Ciao, Bonjour and Tschuss!

We're having a great time on our summer vacation. Italy started out a little slow for us, but picked up later in the week and now we're hanging out in France - enjoying the mega yacht gawking and spending time on the beach.

This is more of an Anna update than anything, I'll blog about our trip later.

Anna is up on all 4s - and lunging forward. She's been scooting around for the past month or so - mostly backwards, but she's been going forward too and slowly sitting up for longer and longer - now she'll sit up for a solid 5 minutes or more if she doesn't get too eager to go after a toy or just plain bored with herself.

Bath time in France

Anna's laugh

5 month photos

On the move.

Daddy got home just in time! Anna is on the move and it's nice to have another set of eyes around. It's been well over a month since she rolled tummy to back and right after we got home from the states she rolled back to stomach and it's been non stop since then! Now when I put her on her back she rolls to her tummy and off she goes! EEK!

Mom, what do you mean I'm suppose to be on the mat?! See ya later!



Hanging out with dad:










mid-roll

Avocado

We had planned on waiting until we got back from vacation to start Anna on solids, but I had an avocado so I thought we'd give it ago. Our pediatrician suggested waiting until she's 6 months (which is what the WHO also recommends) but he said it wouldn't hurt if we started giving her a little bit just after 5 months to see how she did with it. She's growing and still gaining weight with breast feeding and of course I'm BF before I feed her. No amount of solid foods can replace the nutritional value of breast milk!

The one thing Brian won't eat is avocado, so he didn't seem to eager to feed them to her at first. How can someone go their entire life without eating guacamole!?!! I find it insane! But Anna is smart like her mommy and LOVES them! YAY! ;)

Anna didn't seem to have any problem swallowing and ate a little more than a tablespoon. I've been told a lot of the issues babies have with swallowing solids is from starting them on solids too young with they aren't quite ready. Anna seemed to do really well and really wanted to get her hands on that spoon.

Back to blogging.

Again, I seem to have let down my all of 3 readers by not posting in the past few weeks. Anna and I took a quick trip to the states so Anna could meet her cousins Jack and Madeline before they move to Japan this summer! We are so excited for them and so jealous at the same time! Whew! I can't wait to go visit. It was a quick week but I have tons of photos so please be patient.

Our other big news as most of you may know by now, Brian is home! They arrived in Nurnberg on Friday night around 7pm and we finally got our hands on him around 11pm. Anna was in shock and awe of everything going on around her and had no clue.

Ginger was super excited to see Brian. I can only imagine what was going on in her head "FINALLY SOMEONE TO PET ME!!" Kyla of course was more excited to see me than Brian.