Our little girl is 3!!!

 In some ways it seems like only yesterday that Anna was born. And yet when I try to remember life before, and therefore without, her, it's difficult. People talk about how "everything changes" with children, and yet even that generalization doesn't quite cover the reality. "Everything" is a surprisingly weak word when you think about it. It's so obviously a well-intentioned exaggeration. What we mean is, things you wouldn't expect to change, or maybe things you didn't know could change. "Everything" is a catch-all for perspective, probably because that tends to change so little. Few things grab you that deeply.

Anna has. Her interest in books that reflects our own introverted tendencies, her plays on words that betray that paternal love of puns (sigh), her honest questions, her stubborn streak, and her love of animals, all familiar yet cast uniquely in her personality--these things cause us to see ourselves, our parents, and our purpose in life differently.

And let's not forget the diapers. Yes. Let's not. The mundane sustains the miraculous, I suppose. It's still mundane, and with a three year old, there's a lot of it.

Still. 3. What an amazing gift to celebrate.

We celebrated the day at home with a small family party.

 

She LOVES her balloons!

 

A perfect tribute to her favorite place--the zoo!

Due to family colds, we had to postpone the friends party for a couple of weeks. It's nice at this age that time doesn't mean much yet. We had 4 guests come to the house to play and do a few crafts. 

 

 

 

 

 And Sophie enjoyed herself, too. She partied 'till she dropped. Right across Daddy's lap.

 Happy birthday, special girl. We love you so much.

Knoxville Symphony Orchestra

One of our favorite library story times of the year has to be the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra visit. Throughout the spring, a string quartet plus a reader travel to all the Knoxville library branches and present a 30 minute story time with music accompaniment and audience participation. Afterwards they invite the children to come up and try out different instruments. Both Anna and Sophie were enthralled. Sophie even got some appreciative laughs at her attempts to sing along. But Anna was in her element during the demonstrations.

Bongos:

Cello: with the bow

and plucking.

I am particularly impressed that they brought a cello just her size.

(I am of course very behind on our monthly updates. We've had one or two things to celebrate around here in the last month or so! I do have photos, and I hope to get them up soon.)

Eight months old

Here are Sophie's eight month photos. She just keeps growing! She is VERY close to crawling at this point. She can wiggle in just about any direction except forward. She gets so frustrated! But she is also very persistent and is clearly eager to start keeping up with big sister, Anna.

I love these two pictures with her little tea cup (Anna gave her a tea set for Christmas). Such a little lady.

Christmas in Michigan

We had a great time with Grandma, Grandpa, and Aunt Rachel in Michigan. The girls loved exploring and chasing the cats, and there was lots of room for Sophie to perfect her rolling skills.

 

Hanging out with Aunt Rachel.

And of course, time for naps. (It's hard to tell in this picture, but Sophie has fallen asleep in the middle of all those newspapers.) I have a series of nap photos with Grandpa, now!

Silent night.

 

Thank you for such a great Christmas!

Fantasy of Trees

This year I attended a holiday fundraiser event for the University of Tennessee Children's Hospital. It's called Fantasy of Trees, and one of our friends from church is heavily involved in planning it. Businesses, organizations, and individuals decorate and donate trees to be purchased by the community. There must have been over 1,000 trees displayed at the convention center, plus live music and entertainment, rides for kids, face painting, craft tables, and one of the highlights for me, a gingerbread house contest. Each gingerbread house seemed more impressive than the last, and just when I thought I'd picked my favorite, another one blew me away. I did not envy the judges. Here are just a few of the entries:

As you can see from the ribbon below, this was a first place winner (though I cannot remember the exact category). The detail on this house is hard to capture on camera. Just as an example, the "stone" walkway up to the front door is almond slices.

 

And here is the inside. The tiny little paintings on the wall were just fantastic. I'm actually not sure how they were done.

  

Here are some others.

 I loved this one for its "modern" flare. Very unique.

And lastly, another first place winner. I could not believe this was really gingerbread and cannot imagine what went into making it.

Between this and the cake bake off I attended last March, I'm convinced Knoxville has some real talent when it comes to sweets!

Seven months

Ho Ho Ho! Here we are at 7 months, and it's been a busy few weeks. Almost overnight Sophie started babbling--"bwa bwa," "ma ma," and "da da." Of course her favorite word is "da da." Nearly everything is "da da." "Ma ma" is reserved for serious distress. She is also rolling, rolling, rolling all through the house. Crawling is not far off. She's pushing up on her hands and just starting to balance with her knees. Mostly she pushes herself backwards, but she'll be keeping up with Anna in no time.