Natalie's Baptism

On Sunday, February 16th, we celebrated Natalie's Baptism (almost exactly three years after we celebrated Olivia's). Our friend, Paul, came in all the way from California to be her godfather and my cousin Leslee was her godmother. Yusaku's parents, my parents, Sarah, Jon, Quinn, and Erin all joined us for the celebration. The Gosch family had hoped to join us but illness and snow kept them at home. Natalie screamed through most of what seemed to be a very long ceremony, but other than that, everything went well. :)

My mom is Leslee's godmother. Three generations of godmothers/daughters.

Natalie is 6...I mean 7 months old!

Well, I had the best of intentions of trying to stay on top of blogging, but life gets in the way. I started this post when Natalie had just turned 6 months old and now she is already 7.5 months old. Time seems to fly even faster with the second baby. Here are some photos of the past month and half.

She started really hands-and-knees crawling the day of her Baptism, February 16. So now she is a speedy little crawling machine.

friends

 And, she's been pulling up to standing since a week after she started crawling (February 23). I'm afraid it won't be too long until she's cruising along. She stands alone with very little support.

 And...she has her bottom two teeth (though I haven't captured it in a picture yet)!

She is finally excited about eating solid foods and really loves puffs. She loves to blow raspberries and is starting to "talk", by which I mean she makes consonant sounds like "baa baa." Sometimes I hear something that sounds like "mama," but I don't think she's really saying it and meaning it. Soon enough. :)

Japan Trip: Part 5 (Our Day Trip to Nara)

During our time in Osaka, we took a day trip to Nara and had a great time. We enjoyed seeing all the deer and as you'll see below, Yusaku even fed them. Olivia liked them from a distance, but got nervous if they got too close.

We visited Todai-ji Temple and saw the largest bronze statue of Buddha in the world. Yusaku and I had visited Nara on our trip in 2003, but it was great to see it again.

After some tea and snacks, we made our way back. Our train on the way back was filled with school children on their way home from school. I really enjoyed chatting with these two sweet girls below (with Kazumi's help, of course). Those kinds of experiences are what make a trip like this special for me. Sightseeing and eating the food are great too, but making a human connection is even more meaningful. Knowing I will likely never see them again, I asked them if it was okay if I could take their picture to remember them by. They were happy to oblige.

Forgotten Post - Olivia: 21 months

Was just looking through drafts of blog posts that I never got around to finish/post and found this...hard to believe this was almost two years ago.

This picture says it all: sweet, sassy, funny, precocious. Olivia is all those things and more. She had insisted on wearing her rain boots the other day when were heading out even though it wasn't raining. So, why not? I let her.