A New Addition

I'll have to change the name of this blog soon!  Anna will finally get to be a big sister sometime around December 20!  We've been trying to add to our family for quite some time and have had some major setbacks.  Finally we got some help from a doctor, and thankfully that worked out well!  We found out last week that it'll be a brother for her, although we've known that pretty much from the beginning!  Anna has been wanting it to be a boy, but I don't know if that's because she prefers boys or if she thinks it means she won't have to share her stuff with him.  It could be both.  Either way, we're all very happy in the Pachla household!  Hopefully it will be good motivation for me to be better about updating this thing.

Delinquent

There's no denying that I've been horrible at blogging the last 2 years.  Anna certainly keeps me busy though, that's for sure!  Rather than trying to catch up for the whole year 2012, I'll just try to highlight the summer that we've been having.  It's been very hot and dry, so that's made for a lot more indoor time than I'd prefer.  We've had our share of bebows this summer (yes, she still calls them that), but we have to make sure to go very early, before it gets insanely hot.  Even then, sometimes Anna complains about the heat and wants to go home before we've been there very long.  Okay, now for June...

We started off our summer with a weekend at the farm in Michigan.  That's a lot more down-time than Anna's used to, but she still managed to have plenty of fun taking walks around the place and playing frisbee, bugging Matt a lot, and playing fetch with the dogs.  I think she really enjoyed the bonfire we had, where she got to roast marshmallows and eat s'mores.

Anna also played her first-ever round of mini-golf on Father's Day!  We went to Haunted Trails, and Anna really loved it!  She's gotten better about taking turns, but she still gives up on herself very easily.  Her coordination is still a little lacking too, but she's working on it.  After we were done golfing, her and Daddy played a couple arcade games and then went on the little roller coaster together.  Then we had a delicious lunch at Uncle Bub's, where I discovered that Anna really has a strong love for pulled pork!

We also made our way to the Children's Museum, which is always a good time.  They had redone a few things since the last time we went, and Anna particularly enjoyed the vet area, where she took care of the animals.  She wasn't as interested in the market area this time around, but part of that might have been because it was really difficult to acquire the shopping carts.  They were being hogged by some older kids, so she couldn't use them for a long time.  By the time she got one, she must have been getting worn out and didn't want to play much at that point.

We also checked out the splash park in Westmont once, which was pretty fun.  Anna didn't want to run off and splash by herself though, and she didn't have any "friends" there to play with, so it wasn't quite the time that it could have been.  If we go back, we'll have to make sure to arrange a play date ahead of time!

The end of June had us moving Auntie Loonie to a new place in Warrenville.  The new place is much nicer than the last one (and quieter), and we enjoyed helping her celebrate!

July brought us to family vacation at Double JJ Resort.  We had a wonderful time!  Anna got to ride ponies, pet and feed the barn animals, ride the barrel train, get her "face" painted (she got it on her arm instead), get balloon animals, make crafts, play in the splash pool/swimming pool, feed the horsies, ride the pedal carts, and play lots of games.  Her favorite game happened to be ladderball.  I swear she could play it for hours.  She also really loved visiting Bubby and Bobby in their room (which was awesomely very near us), where she would play checkers among other fun things, surely.  One night we also took a hayride to the woods, where we roasted marshmallows, made s'mores, and sang songs.  Another day we went for a lovely hike on a deserted snowmobile trail.  On our way home we stopped by a blueberry farm and picked 8.5 lbs of blueberries!  I was surprised at how much Anna enjoyed it, because it was very hot that day, but we all had a great time!  It was a good vacation, and we're hoping to go back next year.

That brings us to August, which has been pretty quiet.  We mostly just play at home these days, although I'm sure we'll do a couple more fun things before going back to school.  Anna starts preschool a week from today!  Hopefully she'll enjoy it, but I'm sad to see her growing up so fast.

Catching Up - September & October

September highlights include a surprise party for Anna's first-ever girl cousin, Maria. Also, it was Auntie Loonie's birthday, and Anna has gotten very good at singing Happy Birthday to everyone. Anna's favorite part of the month was probably Berwyn's Oktoberfest. She called it "The Carnival," and she enjoyed all the rides a ridiculous amount, so much so that she talks about them months and months later. These rides include "Puff the Magic Dragon," (which she rode with Ellie) the "Big Strawberries," and the pony ride. At the end of the month was Maria's baptism, so for Anna being able to visit Marky, Eric, and Maria's house for any reason is good times. They have an astounding number of toys that Anna is more than happy to play with.

For October, we visited Six Flags for Fright Fest. Anna, being 36 inches, can now ride an amazing number of rides! She definitely has the thrill-seeker in her, because she likes roller coasters! Her favorite is probably The Little Dipper. She also rode The Whizzer, but I think that one was a little too scary for her. She loved The Scrambler and all the littler rides like that, and Bubby, Bobby, and I had a blast taking turns riding with her. What fun! Anna has gotten ridiculous use out of her Halloween costume (Jessie), wanting to wear it nearly every single day. I was actually worried that it wouldn't make it until Halloween, but it did. We made a visit out to the pumpkin patch again this year, and Anna got to play inside the big kid play area this time. It's a shame we didn't have more time to devote to that, because she sure did have fun. We had to cut it short though because it was waaaay past her nap time! We visited Starved Rock on a beautiful, mild day, and Anna was able to hike quite a bit! We went up to St. Louis Canyon, where the murders occurred many years ago, and it was very pretty there. Anna had a hard time making the walk back, so I had to carry her a lot of the way. Still, it was a fun time. Then we celebrated Bubby's birthday, and we always have a fun time when we go to her house! Of course, the month ended with Halloween, and Anna very much enjoyed Trick-or-Treating and getting all that candy! Yum-MA!

Catching Up - July and August

This year has flown by, thank goodness. 2011 hasn't been very kind, but Anna has been having a blast. I think that girl could be the happiest kid I know. She's always happy, smiling, full of energy, it is wonderful. Let me try to think of what has been happening thus far. I'll start with our vacation in July that I never got a chance to write about. We stayed at a cabin with Mike and Emily and other Swansons. We went swimming in Mirror Lake, saw how real Wisconsin cheese was made, went for a couple nice bike rides, and I went running for about 6 miles every morning. It was a very laid back vacation, but it seemed to appeal to Anna pretty well.

In August the highlight might have been the Wild West Town. We went there with Bobby, and I think we could have spent about 8 hours there if we could. Anna just loved it. She went on her first roller coaster, there was an adorable playground, pony rides, canoe rides, choo choo train rides, panning for gold, a carousel, a covered wagon, archery, a petting zoo... I mean, you could see why she would have a blast. We also finished (mostly) the upstairs of our house, so we all moved up there. Anna loves her new cloud room, and we're happy having more space. It turned out very nice and matches the rest of the house beautifully.

Kids say the darndest things...

The more Anna talks, the funnier she gets! I swear, some of the things she comes up with sound better than if I tried to make them up! Just last night, I was drinking a Smirnoff Ice. Of course Anna asked, "What's that?" because she asks millions of questions a day. I told her it was booze. She said, "Maybe when I get bigger I can have booze!" That's been her thing too, is saying that maybe she can try something later. She has said the same thing about gum, hard candy, safety scissors, and coffee. She's so funny! I guess she's realizing that there are restrictions, and she's eager to get past them! I can't blame her there, but I wish she wouldn't try to grow up too fast! It's already happening too fast as it is.

She has also been starting to get very interested in watching birdies, playing the piano, art, and "reading" books on her own. This morning she took a little plastic "table" and had her princesses gather around it, perhaps to eat lunch. Usually she has to line them up in a parade, so it was pretty neat to see her branch out and do something different!

Potty Training

It's finally happening! I have been pushing Anna to use the toilet ever since I started summer vacation. I was met with quite a bit of stubborn resistance (where could she have gotten that??) Finally, somehow something clicked with her this week, and all of a sudden she's been keeping her pull-ups dry! It's so amazing! 3 days in a row she's been able to do it, and tonight she even did #2 for the first time! We're going for the underwear tomorrow, and we'll see how she does with that. I'm so proud of her!! If she keeps this up we are going to buy Jessie underwear over the weekend, because I promised her that in a desperate attempt to get her interested! Whatever works, right?

Visit from Unckie Eye

The last couple weeks of June Unckie Eye came to visit us from Germany. We did all sorts of fun stuff with him! First we stayed close to home and did things like shopping and Home Run Inn. Then we had some adventures like going to the Illinois Railway Museum, which was a lot of fun. They had all sorts of trains from different eras, even some you could ride! I enjoyed the streetcar immensely. There were all these different buildings with different types of train engines in them - steam ones, street cars, etc. Lots of information about each one too, which was fun. Some of them were open for us to go inside as well. The other neat thing about the place is that they have all these volunteers who work to restore the place and the trains, so they're adding and renovating all the time. It was a busy and fun day! The next day we went to the Indiana Dunes, where we started off the day with a bike ride. Unfortunately, the trail was very poorly maintained. There were huge pits of water along a lot of the path, and areas of it were quite overgrown. Plus the whole thing was under power lines and along the railroad tracks, which wasn't exactly scenic. I did think it was fun to see so many cattails, because it reminds me of growing up in Alabama. We also saw a deer in the path on our way back, so that was neat. We ended up riding 12 miles, and it is always fun to bike anyway! After that we went to the beach, where we had a picnic lunch and enjoyed hiking up the dunes. It didn't take long, but it was fun all the same. The water was too cold to actually go in, but the day was still fun overall!

Stephen, Bubby, and Bobby also had some adventures without us, like going to Six Flags and Starved Rock. We visited Chick Fil A too, which was very exciting for me. The last day of Unckie's visit was the 4th of July, where we had a nice cookout and just enjoyed each other's company one last time. It was very sad to say goodbye, but we did have some great times with him these past couple weeks!