noise

Today was a fairly typical afternoon at the Aupperlee house. Kate has been moving all over the place (starting to crawl a little), having a second tooth come in, and making lots of new noises. This video below was an initial attempt at capturing Kate's "growl," a noise that endlessly amusing us. Drew was running around with his police car making noises, and he ended up being the star of this video. His volume has suddenly increased and he can make quite the noises. You will also notice Kate in the background standing away. She can stand for quite a while and has started to make efforts to pull herself up on things. Kate's mobility is rapidly increasing!

In this video I was more successful at capturing the growls that Kate makes. It's such a weird noise coming from a little girl!!

tights

Those of you who know Jana well know that she is a big fan of wearing outfits that are black or charcoal gray. You're much more likely to see Jana in those colors than in anything pink or brightly colored. Therefore, Jana has been on a quest (for her own amusement) to find a couple outfits for Kate that are black or charcoal gray, yet still feminine. Below is one such find. I believe a friend, who Jana enlisted in the cause, helped to locate and purchase this outfit. Kate wears the dark colors well, doesn't she? Underneath this outfit are Kate's first pair of tights! Kate wore this outfit to church last Sunday and Jana handed me the tights to put on as part of getting Kate dressed. I've never put tights on a little girl, so it was amusing for Kate and Jana to watch me struggle to get them onto those chunky little legs. Kate was very tolerant and we eventually got them on successfully!

similarities

Jana and I have lately been noticing the differences between Kate and Drew. For example, their temperaments are different, the places they put on weight are different, and their hair color and eye color is different. Then Jana held up these two pictures side-by-side and we quickly realized that despite their differences, Drew and Kate are clearly siblings! The picture on the left was taken when Drew was about 8 months old and the one on the right is when Kate was about 7 months old.

In my last post I mentioned that Kate is sitting up and rolling all over the place, but I forgot to mention that she also has a tooth! It's a sharp little tooth, as Jana has found out (ouch!), but Kate has done very well with the teething. We wondered why she seemed a little more fussy than normal and when we felt in her mouth, we realized it was because she was getting a tooth!

new foods

What has Kate been eating lately? Well, we're in the process of getting her on a big girl eating schedule with three solid meals a day in addition to her breast milk, so Jana has been working hard at expanding Kate's range of meals. Pictured below are Jana's efforts to get Kate started on yogurt. As you can tell, it's not a huge hit yet. Kate likes it all right only if it's mixed in with other food. Last week was Halloween, and both Drew and Kate got dressed up for daycare. It was so much fun to see all the kids in their Halloween costumes at daycare (especially because the oldest kids are 3 years old). In the evening, we went to Jeremy and Kristin's house for trick or treating. Kate was pretty excited about her hand-me-down frog suit that Drew wore two years ago. She made for a pretty cute little frog!

Kate has been wearing a suit like this a lot when we're outside, so she was quite comfortable in it. We got a kick out of what she was wearing underneath her suit . . . just a diaper!

Kristin dressed up as a pirate and she grabbed Drew and Kate for a picture. It is not an easy thing to get both kids looking in the general direction of the camera!

In this picture, we got three of us looking at the camera and that includes BOTH kids! Unfortunately, Jana decided to look at the other camera being used for pictures. Doh!

Here is Drew in action. He did a great job going from house to house and getting his candy. He was a little shy at first about saying "trick-or-treat" and "thank you," but as the night went on he did better. After hitting several houses (and getting handfuls of candy from each person) he asked Jana to carry his pumpkin for him because "it is getting very heavy, Mama."

Drew stood out very nicely with the reflective patches on his fireman outfit. We had a hard time finding a costume that he liked, but when we saw the fireman costume, we knew we had a winner. Drew LOVES everything related to firefighting!

Also last weekend, my dad, brother, and I went to the MSU football game. Before the game, as is MSU tradition, we did a little tailgating. My mom, Jana, Drew and Kate joined us for tailgating. Kate proudly showed off who she was rooting for!

It was my mom's first tailgate, and we had a good time eating lots of food and checking out the other setups that people had for tailgating. It's quite impressive to see all the equipment everyone brings and to see all the Spartan apparel!

Todd has been quite adept at avoiding photographs lately, but we got him here when he had a turn holding Kate.

Drew was his usual active self and he ran all over the place. My mom has been knitting away and both Drew and Kate sported new Spartan green and white hats. I don't know if I've posted a picture before of Drew in his winter coat, but you can see his new coat. We think he looks much older than two years old while running around in this coat!

Drew had lots of fun over by this tree with his puppy. There was a nice field by us and Drew made great use of it for running around.

Drew found two sticks and spent quite a while banging on the tree "doing a project." He loves to help around the house and now he uses his imagination to do things like projects on his own. Lately, Drew has been setting down a blanket on the floor and inviting me to sit next to him. He then goes into pretend mode and drives us to Home Depot. We get out of the car together and walk around the living room looking at tools. We then get back in the car, drive past the fire station on the way home, and get out of the car at home. ALL of that is Drew's idea and he goes into pretty incredible detail. Obviously, Drew is paying attention to what we do with him!!

Kate has been progressing rapidly in terms of her physical movements. She can sit up now for extended periods of time without assistance, she's starting rolling to get things, and she's even made some small movement toward crawling. We're not encouraging her mobility too much because it's nice to have her in one place! She's also been standing up holding on to things for extending periods of time, although not pulling herself up yet (thank goodness).

Drew thought Kate needed some toys, so he brought over some toys for Kate to play with. Jana and I like how interactive Kate is becoming, but Drew really enjoys interacting with her. He's our go-to guy when it comes to coaxing a smile from her.

I'm not sure if this is the best picture to see it, but I realized that I haven't posted a recent picture of myself with a beard. After my latest surgery I decided to grow a beard for a while, and I've been thoroughly enjoying not shaving! As you can tell from Kate's face, she's still getting plenty to eat :) We love her cute chubbiness.

On the move

Kate has begun to roll around to get where she wants to be. She has been rolling inconsistently for a while now, and all of the sudden, Kate totally figured it out and has been rolling all over the place. Check out the next few pictures to see a progression of her on the move. She started by rolling a little bit under the couch and playing for a while with the bottom of the couch.

Then Kate decided to give me a show and started to pull up her shirt. She LOVES to pull up her shirt! Any time Kate is sitting around, she grabs the bottom of her shirt, pulls it up to show off her tummy and then proceeds to suck on her shirt.

I took these pictures while sitting on the couch recovering from knee surgery and Drew came over to say hello to me. He got very excited when I let him drink the rest of my cup of water. He loves drinking out of a cup, although we don't always let him do it. It's still so much easier to give him a sippy cup!

Back to Kate, who has moved quite a bit! She reached for that magazine that you might have noticed earlier and grabbed it in her hands. We snapped this picture, then grabbed the magazine before she started to chew on it. As you can tell, Kate isn't that discriminating right now about what she puts in her mouth! She rolls all over the place and chews on everything. Drew is out of that "let's put this in my mouth"-stage, but we constantly need to keep an eye on our little roller to see what she's getting into!

Drew loves helping Jana give Kate her bath in the evening. Drew helps out with the washcloth and he helps by washing Kate's elbows and knees. It's a lot of fun to watch Drew help and to see how excited he gets over helping us take care of his baby sister. I wish I had a video of this to show you because both Drew and Kate were giggling away.

Here are my two favorite ladies! Kate's eyes are well on their way to a very interesting shade of brown, so now I have two brown-eyed-girls to enjoy!

Jana is protecting Kate's modesty, but look at all those rolls of baby fat that Kate has on display! We could put Kate in a tire and sell Michelins! She is such a nice, solid weight now after being rather petite when she was first born. Around each wrist, she's got a wrinkle from all the fat in her arms.

Kate is a snuggler and Jana captured this picture of Kate cuddled in on my chest. Kate has a bit of a dubious expression on her face, but she was quiet and enjoying lying on my chest for quite a while before this picture.

One day while I was recovering on the couch from knee surgery, Jana put Kate down to sit with me. Kate gets stripped down to her diaper for most of her meals because it's so messy, so she must have just finished eating. Kate had a nice full stomach and within a few minutes she dozed off sitting next to me.

The giraffe that Kate is holding here is one of her favorite toys. She loves to put it in her mouth and chew on it. It will keep her busy for minutes at a time (and therefore it is one of our favorite toys too!).

The other weekend we celebrated birthdays in Grand Rapids, and Great-Grandpa Vryhof made sure he got a turn holding Kate. It's not always easy to get in a turn when both Grandma and Great-Grandma are around! It almost looks like Great-Grandpa is admiring the solidness of Kate's legs :)

I was trying to rest my knee (as I've been doing a lot lately), so I snapped pictures of things while keeping my knee up. I've made a lot of use of the zoom feature on our camera so that I can capture all the action around me.

Drew has favorite toys at each grandparents' house. At Grandma Lynn and Grandpa John's house he loves the Lincoln logs and the "marble" set (they're not really marbles, but that's what he calls it). At Grandma Sue and Grandpa Bill's house Drew loves the trucks and cars. Drew is playing here with the old toys that Todd and I had when we were kids. He sets them up in front of the fireplace and gets totally engrossed in his play.

Grandpa Bill and Great-Grandpa Vryhof had a project of putting together a wheelbarrow. Drew LOVES to do projects, so he was all over helping out with the tools. In the picture below, he is helping to put together the wheel.

Drew grabbed a socket wrench and went to work "tightening" all the nuts and bolts on the wheelbarrow. He was a big help!

At times Drew was more interested in his tools than he was in the work that was being done :)

It was fun to watch the three guys working together to assemble the wheelbarrow. It was especially fun to not be doing any of the work!

This is a more representative picture of Great-Grandma holding Kate. She typically gets much more Kate-holding time than Great-Grandpa.

Drew helped my dad and I blow out the candles on our birthday cake. We have started singing "Happy Birthday" twice because Drew loves blowing out the candles after the song.

Drew tucked right into his piece of cake and finished off the whole piece. After a slow start in life with eating sweets, Drew has started to do a stellar job of eating anything with chocolate in it!

After all the work putting it together, Drew went for a ride outside in the wheelbarrow.

Kate is wonderful to hold in her footed pajamas. She's full of smiles and perfect for cuddling!

As much as we love being around Kate and Drew, it was very nice for Jana and I to get away for a night last weekend. We thoroughly enjoyed spending time away with just the two of us. We haven't had time like that since Kate was born! Here is one of the pictures from our trip.