Simpsons in Seattle

We're usually pretty up front with Evie about eating veggies and other healthy stuff but juice/smoothies are sometimes an easy way to hide veggies and get Evie to eat them. An even easier sell are popsicles! PohPoh bought a cute little popsicle set where the holders are shaped like a big ring. We fill them up with green juice and wah-lah! Evie gets her daily dose of veggie juice and she's none the wiser. So yummy!

Great Grandma and Great Aunt Daisy battled holiday weekend traffic to come up from Portland for a quick visit to see Nora and Evie. Second cousin Bess also came up from San Francisco, so it was a fun family reunion weekend! Evie and Nora were spoiled with endless treats, chinese food and new toys. Evie even got a new Elsa dress (she's wearing it in the pic below) that she would not take off. We had a great time even though the visit was short. Hope to see you guys all again soon!  They look color coordinated, don't they?

Today was Nora's due date. I really thought she'd be late like her sister and was very surprised at how early she was. We were caught off guard, but we're so happy she's already here! Here's a quick pic of her awake (at 3am). She kinda looks like a tough gal in this photo, doesn't she? happy almost birthday!

Evie sure does love her ice cream! We stopped by Peaks the other day since it was so hot out, and she proceeded to eat up not just my cup, but Poh Poh AND Goong Goong's cups too! You just can't resist sharing with this cute little munchkin especially when ice cream makes her sooooo happy.  When we go, she likes to pick out the pink colored flavors like raspberry or strawberry lemonade, but truth be told is she'll eat just about any flavor. :)

We went in for Nora's two week checkup today and everything is looking great! Baby girl is now up to 6 lbs 9 oz, and is measuring 19.4 inches long. She's still littler than Evie was at birth, but she's healthy and growing right on schedule. She's still struggling with poops, and her belly button hasn't fully come off yet. She's sleeping and eating really well - in fact, she can go to a 4 hour napping stretch and we have to wake her to eat/ Cross your fingers for us that this isn't just a phase and that it's a trend for being a good sleeper! Sweet little sleeper.

On Saturday, we ventured out with the little munchkins for the first time for an all day outing. First up, we went to get dim sum at Top Gun. Evie's always loved ha-gow, but this time she was pretty adventurous and had a great appetite and tried a lot of stuff - she ate 2 ha-gow, 2 siu-mai, dan tat, half a  cha sui sow and half a haam suy gowk. Yummy! Waiting for our table to be ready. After lunch, we headed over to Snoqualamie to the train museum to take a ride on the historic train. It's about a 1.5 hour ride that goes to North Bend and then over to Snoqualamie Falls before heading back into the station. The train itself was pretty rickety - built in 1912 and not very well restored (err…. if you can even call it restored). The scenery on the ride was nothing spectacular until you go to the falls and then it was pretty neat. The train passes the top of the falls and you can see the water rushing down over the side. Since the falls are taller than Niagara Falls, the

There's a lot of snoozing going on here.  She slept through all the noise when the countertop guys were cutting a whole for the bathroom sink today. This was taken on Wed (8/20). She sits in my lap a lot.  Taken on Monday (8/18). Glamour pose! Another one from Monday. This was one of Evie's favorite positions!

We took Nora to her one week check up today and guess what? We have a porker on our hands! She weighed in at a whopping 6 lbs. 5.5 oz. That's 2.5 oz more than her birth weight! They want the baby to be back at birth weight within 2 weeks so she beat that milestone pretty handily. Hooray! So far, she's been better than Evie at eating (she doesn't take nearly as long, although she falls asleep VERY often) but she's not as good as Evie at pooping. Poor thing always seems to have tummy issues - she's very squirmy and fussy when she doesn't burp or poop. The doc doesn't think it's a big problem though since she still has lots of wet diapers, but we'll have to keep a better eye on it now. We'll have another doctor check up (with shots!) next week.

We didn't have our act together with Evie so never took newborn shots of her. This time though, I made sure to book some time with our wonderful photographer, Mary Ann McColl, who took our Xmas pictures last year. Lucky for us she was flexible and came out here because our original planned shoot date was not until September! Nora was a bit fussy during the shoot - she didn't eat (drink) much before and so was a bit cranky and wouldn't cooperate with a few of the shots. She finally chilled out towards the end, especially when she was snug in Daddy's arms. I can't wait to see how the final pics come out! Smile for the camera! Pretty content in Daddy's strong arms! An hour later, she was  in a deep sleep. 

Some new photos of the little girl: Making sure her hair is smoothed back. You talkin' to me? Sleeping beauty

After a few days of rain, it's hot again! We broke out a few bowls, filled them with water and let Evie have a go at her imagination and it kept her entertained for a good solid hour or more. She kept pretending to cook us different foods and would pull herbs from our garden and sprinkle it in her "soups". Sometimes the best toys are the simplest ones! Posing in front of our giant hydrangea Meanwhile, Nora was inside doing a lot of this!

There are so many times that I think Nora looks just like Evie did as a newborn. Oh, I know Nora has a lot more hair and her skin tone is a bit darker, but other than that, they look so alike to me that sometimes after my mom snaps a pic and shows it to me, I have to ask her - wait, is that an old pic of Evie?  See for yourself! Evie and Nora, at 2 days old. I think Nora can stand in for Evie in this old video! Video: https://plus.google.com/photos/117668175145780637148/albums/5619242711169242657/5623322364889980802?pid=5623322364889980802&oid=117668175145780637148

Evie has been so excited about her baby sister's arrival. It's been super cute to hear her talk about how we have to buy this or that dress for baby Nora, or how she's putting aside toys for the baby and how's she's going to share her food with her sister. We were eagerly anticipating how she would react when she actually met her sister and we're happy to say it went great! Here's a few snaps of the moment when Evie came to the hospital yesterday afternoon to see Nora for the first time. She wanted to hold Nora. Love the expression on her face. First family photo

On Tuesday night around 9pm, I was sitting on the couch working on a presentation that I had to do the next morning when I distinctly heard a pop noise and then felt some warm gushing between my legs. I hopped up and ran (well, waddled really) to the bathroom with Scott following closely behind. Yup, my water broke! Lucky for us, Lauren is a great friend and offered to come over to watch Evie while we went to the hospital. She snapped the last pic of me preggo just as we were headed out. Who's belly is bigger? We got to the hospital just before midnight, and by about 5:15am, I was asking for an epidural. This delivery moved WAAAAAAY faster than with Evie. I am lucky we had an awesome nurse named Andrea because once she realized I wasn't faking how much the contractions were hurting, she moved quickly to get the anesthesiologist over and get the room all ready for the doc. As soon as Dr Ruiz, the on-call doc that night, walked in, I was ready to push. Presenting: Nor

We love going back to Phinney to visit our pal Vivienne, her little brother Winston and his parents Jeff and Steph. Evie and Vivienne are thick as thieves and play wonderfully together. Vivienne is definitely more adventurous but Evie more talkative so they balance each other out well. On Sunday afternoon, we met up to play in the South Lake Union Waterpark for some water play. Afterwards, we headed to The Yard, a pub down the street from where we used to live. It was a place on our radar we always wanted to check out and I'm so glad we finally did. I know that if we had stayed in Phinney, it would have become one of our fav spots - LOTS of beer choices and very kid friendly. After dinner, we even walked over to Bluebird to get ice cream. Bluebird was where Evie had her very first ice cream cone several years ago so it brought back some great memories! Everyone loves Uncle Scott! Buddies Marionberry ice cream from Bluebird.

We've been looking forward to blueberry picking season for a while now since blueberries are one of the foods that Evie never tires of. Lucky for us, there are several u-pick farms just a few miles from us here in Bellevue. We've never been to the one at Larsen Lake before so we tried that one this morning. We met up with our neighbors since they have two little ones about Evie's age and we all had a great time. I'm pretty sure the kids ate more than they picked, but that's okay - we still ended up with a lot of blueberries. I see blueberry pancakes in our future! Pit stop to rest and check out all the ducks. Child labor. We had to wipe away the evidence before we paid for our loot.

We went with our pals Ted and Tommy (and their parents Paul and Lynn) to Fox Hollow Farms this morning.  It's a small farm right here in our backyard in Issaquah and I wasn't really sure what to expect. The last time we went to Remlinger Farms, Evie was pretty intimidated by all the people and the rides. Fox Hollow, though, is a lot more rustic, charming and small. It's perfect for kids her age - it has a little petting zoo with baby animals, a pony ride, a nice river-front picnic area, a train that loops around for about 3 minutes, some playhouses and some bouncy houses. She and Ted had a great time. I was shocked that Evie went right up to the animals to pet them, she went into the bouncy house with just a little bit of prodding AND she volunteered that she wanted to do a pony ride. Our little girl is getting so brave! LOTS of bunnies to pet. There were baby goats, baby pigs and horses too. Picnic lunch Meeting "April". The helmet kept

Tonight when I picked up Evie from school I gave her the option of going to the library or doing water play in the backyard. She chose water play so I let her jump around in the sprinkler while I grilled up some grub for a picnic dinner. It was great way to spend a warm evening! The little daredevil jumped through the sprinklers! Sorry, the action shot didn't come out so well. She willingly ate 3 asparagus spears without any prompting. Successful dinner, in my book!

Evie loves riding her Hello Kitty bike so we took her to a bike path along the waterfront at this park called Myrtle Edwards. It was a beautiful but hot and muggy day yesterday but the best thing about this park is that there really isn't that many folks there. It was perfect for her to bike slowly without having to worry about weaving in and out of other bike riders that went faster. We took a rest stop to throw rocks at the water. Taking a break to play Tickle Monster on the lawn.