Our Pumpkin Turns 2!

So being way behind the times here I figured it was time to update the blog....Here are some pictures from Anneke's second birthday:

On her actual birthday we celebrated with Grandma who was babysitting Anneke that week.  She also spent the morning "celebrating" with her friend Jolene, which didn't go that well.  It turns out Anneke doesn't like sharing her own toys....she's fine with sharing Jolene's everyday, but not her own.  So Mom said there was a lot of crying on Anneke's part.  We'll have to work on the sharing thing.....

 We had some cake with candles, which Anneke really liked this year.  She blew them out all by herself!

 Then on Saturday we had a little birthday party with Grandma and Grandpa, Oma and Opa, and Uncle Nan and Aunt Rachel.  Anneke had a great time spending time with everyone and playing with all her new toys.  Dave and I got her a train set which she is still playing with, thankfully!  She opened some of the trains first and had to drive them all the way around the table before opening her next present!

 We tried a sparkler on her cupcakes which she was not such a fan of.  After the sparkler we put some candles on one and she liked that a lot more.  Unfortunately she was not at all interested in eating one of the Minnie cupcakes that Mommy made for her!  She was too full on M&Ms, jelly beans and chips with dip-dip!



And here's our big two-year old!  Anneke we are so proud of you and can't believe all the things you've learned this year!  You've learned so many words in the last year:  animals and their sounds, colours, and so many others.  You've learned to run and jump and dance.  You love to play outside and have been such a big girl at your friend Jolene's house everyday!  You've become such a big girl!  We love you as big as the sky, our princess pumpkin!

August

So again, it's been a while!  August ended up being quite busy for us and updating the blog clearly wasn't on the top of our list! 

We started off the month with some visitors.  Grandma and Grandpa came for a few days and Oma and Opa came for a few days.

 We went to the Toronto Zoo for a day with our good friends, Tom and Sarah.  It's a good thing we had four adults to chase after one almost-2 year old!  Anneke loved seeing all the animals and making their sounds!  She also loved running all over the place!

 Then we went to a cottage for a week with Mom and Dad V.  We had a great week!  Anneke loved the water and going for boat rides in all the various options!

 And an early Halloween picture:  Anneke figured out how to open my mascara and came downstairs looking like this.  What a little mischevious face!

And now we're back at school and whirlwind has begun again.  I'm only back for 8 more weeks, which makes it a little easier to drop Anneke off every day knowing that it won't be for the whole year.  That's about all we've got going on for now!

Summer @ Home

This was our first week of summer vacation at home.  There were a few moments during the week when we felt bored, but mostly because we don't want to start our bigger house projects until after this next camping trip when we'll have more time.  So there was lots of playing outside, Daddy and Anneke bike rides, playdoh playing, and playing in the pool.  Here are some pics from our week.

Playing with Playdoh....She's starting to get the hang of what to do with it.  She did at one point try to eat it--but it's Kool-Aid flavour, so it probably tastes good.....

 On Tuesday it was quite hot.  So the clothes came off entirely and she was totally satisfied with sitting in this bucket that was a quarter full of water.

 Of course mommy and daddy also had to put their feet into the bucket.

 And then she progressed to riding her tricycle (really all she can do is sit on it unless we push her around) and here I think she's looking for the plane she heard.  This week she's become very attentive to the sounds she's hearing and is very quick to point out hearing a "p" (plane).

We tried corn on the cob this week.  She did pretty well with it.  She got about half of the corn off of it and then we cut the rest off and she was content to eat it off her plate.

 Yesterday daddy decided to put the slide into her pool.  She's not always so sure what to think of it and prefers to put her ball down the slide rather than going down it herself.

 She really likes going on bike rides with daddy.  On this particular day she really wanted to go on the bike, but we had errands to run, so she ended up wearing her helmet in the car and into the Christian Book Store!

 And this is from a few weeks ago, but I haven't posted it yet.  It's from Geertsema family camping.  Anneke was helping us set up the tent!

So that's been our week.  This week we're off on camping trip #2 and hopefully it's as successful as the first one was!

Hilarious

Anneke has known most of the animal sounds for quite a while now.....but for some reason, she's just picked up on the cat sound more recently.  But even more recently, she's learned an action to go with it.  It's hilarious!  We totally crack up everytime she does it!  We have no idea where she learned it, maybe from one of her cousins at camping last week?

Our Little "Helper"

Anneke wanted to help water the flowers today.  She's at the stage where she wants to help with everything.  Which is fun, and messy.  Anyways, she didn't do too bad with the flowers.  She did spend a lot of time washing the wall and watering the grass too--but that's part of the fun, I guess!

Hot Days

Wow!  It's been over a month since we updated our blog--sorry everyone!  Our computer recently crashed so we're working off my school computer and I hadn't gotten around to trying to put up a blog without uploading all my pictures to the computer.  But here it is.

So today, being so hot, we decided to get out the pool for the first time this year.  Anneke had fun in it for a bit.  She didn't last too terribly long, and she wouldn't sit down in it.....maybe it was a bit too cold for her.  And I also pulled out the 2T bathing suit, which is clearly too small, so I'll have to remedy that in the next couple of days!  She mostly enjoyed dumping water out of the pool onto the tarp underneath, but whatever, it kept her cool and occupied for an hour and a half!  (Well, the whole 1.5 hours wasn't spent in the pool, but she kept going back to it.)

Playing

Taking Teddy for a ride in the dump truck.

 Enjoying the beautiful weather yesterday by flying high in the sky!