ABCZ

10 months later, the first words out of Anna's mouth, each and every morning, are STILL, "Can I please come snuggle my brother now?!" Those two melt my heart.

I expect there to be many more of these as time goes on, but today is our debut ZACH-ISIM!! Despite the fact that Anna proclaimed his first word spoken many months ago, I think we have a real contender now. And, as I go through my day now, it is to the constant critique of my 10 month old saying, "Uh oh!!!" He's probably right!

This morning, Curtis left a lottery ticket with $1 in coins taped to the front door with a sweet little note for Anna. When she saw it, she said, "Yeah! Daddy said he'd give me $1 OR a lottery ticket, and he gave me both!" When I asked why he said that, she said, "Well, I don't know. We were playing, and Daddy's back popped, and he said it was the sound of him getting old, and I said he wasn't old at all! Then he said that."

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Yesterday in the car on the way to school, Anna and I were playing "Name That Song That I Am Humming". She would hum a song, and I'd call out the name of it. When she started humming "Itsy Bitsy Spider" I didn't call out the name, but started doing the hand motions to the song, instead. She immediately said, "Close! It WAS "Itsy Bitsy Spider", but it WASN'T the Spanish version." ????????????

...he'd be Sideways BOY!!! Such a cutie.

Curtis and I were talking about finding a baby sitter so that we could go see Avatar while it's still in the theater. It seems that our usual babysitter were all going to be tied up. So, he said, "It would be good if we could find someone who you see every day, so they know Zach...you know, like...Starbucks." Smartass.

Although, I admit, I got 8" cut off of my hair last week, and when I went to my 'usual' Starbucks drive through, the barista said, "Hey! I love your new haircut!" So...maybe he wasn't too far off base.

We had a great time with some of our closest friends last night, ringing in the New Year! There were great drinks, good food, crazy games of Cranium for the grown-ups, kid movies and sleeping bags, party hats and noise makers, champagne and a chocolate fountain. We all had a blast. Of course, the BEST pictures will be reserved for future leverage, but here are some highlights!

My favorite moment (other than a kiss from my sweetheart at midnight) was when the kids were running around the lawn at midnight, after fireworks, crashing around chasing each other with silly string. All of a sudden, several of them smacked straight into the ladder set up for fireworks in the middle of the lawn and they all went down in a heap. There was this total silence as all of us surveyed the damage and then Anna piped up with, "Well, I sure didn't see THAT coming!"

Happy New YEAR!!!!!

Anna was watching Ratatouille today (while Curtis and I may or may not have been napping with Zach to recover from our 2:30am bedtime on New Year's Eve). She really took to the idea of being a 'food critic' like the character in the movie.

Later, I made Anna lunch. We had leftovers from the party last night (taco meat, cheese, olives and chips) and I made her a special drink. We were out of apple cider from last night, so I poured apple juice and sparkling soda into a plastic champagne glass and dropped a maraschino cherry into it. *I* thought it was cute.

After she finished her lunch, I found this on the table:


You can click it to see a larger version, but it says:

"Well, the drink was not the best thing I tasted. But the lunch, well, I loved the lunch. The cherry in the [drink] was prety good to. I gess I'll tell my friends to come here. But next time I would like to be impressed with the drinks. From, Anna."

Always a critic...