Oh...look another post! Halloween Hannah!

Hannah is so interactive and talkative and sing-ative... lol - if that's a word!
Today she's been opening doors around the house. I didn't know she could! She's been reaching for the knobs for awhile...and today she can open and close the doors. Our little smarty pants.

So life is still very busy. Hannah finally got her 18-month check up last week! Her head circumference is in the 75th percentile...while her length and weight are around 50%. She's our petite cutie.

C&Scame over last Monday on Columbus day and we had some fun dressing up the babies in Halloween costumes & taking photos!

Hannah refused to wear her duck costume (which is too big anyways b/c we got it last year at the after-H sale). S on the other hand, happily wore the dog costume that his grandma sent him.



Then Hannah came along...


and had to wear the dog costume...


AND she wanted her nose painted too...



Then she was very very content to just sit there on the chair...




Then I asked her to do the dog sign...


Back to the stare...where she looks like a sad little puppy.


Here S put on Hannah's duck costume and they happily wore the other's costume.





check out these pudgy cheeks!

the tail was just tooo cute!


So I don't know what we're REALLY going to dress Hannah up as for Halloween...
we'll just have to see...


Mommy has had a lot going on. With each passing weekend in the month of October, her stress levels decrease a bit. 2 weekends ago, she finally finished processing the beach wedding AND her symphony audition was over with - a HUGE amount of stress-relief. So now it's one more wedding (almost done), an engagement session, and a family session to finish processing. The verdict is still out on if mommy's going to do more weddings - they're fun and stressful at the same time. She loves taking photos, but hates post-processing.

This past weekend, mommy gave a talk in Stake Conference, topic: temples...and so now that pressure is off. It actually went rather well and she was glad to have the opportunity. Another bit of stress gone.

Also after this weekend (from emails), there were a few cancellations of scheduled things on her calendar for the rest of the weeks of Oct...so yay...a few less items to deal with.

Today mommy has rehearsals for the Brahms Requiem, performance tomorrow night with the Corpus Christi Chorale. Later this week, she's going to San Antonio to help out at Deseret Book's Time Out for Women and Time Out Life Seminar. She totally needs it! Mommy Needs a TIME OUT for her! Take a step back and take life all in.

She wants to just enjoy Hannah, enjoy her life, and not be stressed due to spreading herself thin.

She likes taking photos...so here's some more...all un-post-processed. just straight out of camera... taken on October 8th - the day before she was 20-months-old.!! (I was busy and didn't get around to taking photos on the actual 20th-month-day).




Caught in the act... Hannah likes to get into mommy's stuff...




Hanging out with her hippo.


The same morning...she wanted to change clothes...she likes choosing her own clothes and changing clothes now. She is a little princess...

And she always likes to lay on the backdrops in the studio


Another one of her favorite things to do now...is hide behind curtains.


her little hands & toes...


This weekend A-Yi Cristy started staying with us b/c they had scheduling issues with her house that she was living at for her rotations here. Hannah loves auntie Cristy... we have lots of photos from this weekend with Aunt Cristy...but for another post. Saturday was a bday party amongst a ton of other things...
and Sunday after Stake Conference, we went to Cole Park and played on the playground. lots of fun!

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I returned from the Brahms rehearsal...and I feel great! I'm happy, not stressed. I love Brahms. The rehearsal went well...the chorale sounds beautiful. I love playing pieces like this.

Happy 20-months!

yay Hannah!

...i didn't post...but happy 20-months Hannah!

She loves playing with her keys & plastic spoons.


these were taken on the 9th of October 2008

Another moment from the life of Hannah...

I wanted to try to post more regularly...yay...so here goes...

Today Hannah got a pair of shoes today...from a neighbor whose child is 3 months YOUNGER than Hannah, but her feet are one size larger... :) She had shoes that we bought her, but somehow we lost one of the pair...must be lost with my keys also... we basically couldn't find either after our Houston trip awhile back.

She's not napping well...

She loves singing & she hums... attempts to sing ABC and says 123, and repeats other songs & tunes that she hears. Does all the signs for "Popcorn Popping" and "head shoulders knees & toes"

She says lots of words/phrases:
"shoe" (one of her favorite words)

"animal" is "an-ml" (sorta sounds like el-mo)
"hippo"
"bug"
"doggie"
"mao" for cat (chinese for cat)
"moo" for cow
"wu gui" for turtle (chinese for turtle)
and some more animals...which i cannot remember... one of her favorite books right now is this animal book full of cute drawings of animals

of course she says "book" a lot

body parts include:
"elbow" is "el-pol" (sounds like elbow and apple)
"ankle"
"knee"
"nose"
"eyes"

"thank you" = "day dew" or something to that extent
"please" = "pease = "peas" = "pee" (these all sound really similar)

"on"
"off"
"box"

people include: daddy, mommy, a-ma, a-yi, and her friends' names (stanley, anya, addy, ella)

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and of course here are some photos.

The story behind these is that we were trying to get photos of daddy. But Hannah insisted on lining up and being right beside daddy doing what he was doing. over and over. it was quite funny. she'd just stand there and not budge, next to him. they'd look at each other...then she'd move...and end up right next to him again.





these are not the same photo...it's what she was doing...and i wasn't using continuous shutter either. these are of her over a period of a few minutes just standing there next to daddy. we finally got some without her...but then she was back again.

...and Yes, that is a toilet paper roll holder from the bathroom...she likes to take things apart.

and here's a shot of daddy when he was staring at our backyard... (we have a really sad looking back yard - in a nutshell)...so he's probably contemplating, should we...? or not? (spend more money on it...or fill in the blank of whatever he's really thinking)?

Family Fun...

Auntie Cristy has also been with us since last Sunday. She's here doing a rotation. Hannah LOVES Ah-yi/A-yi. She says "ah-yi, ah-yi" over and over again. at first she also said "ah-ma" wondering where ah-ma was...

General Conference was good this weekend. It's nice watching it on our new screen. There's always tons to hear and it's a spiritual uplift. I want to start going over and re-watching some everyday.

This weekend, Isaac & I shot our 2nd wedding together - this time without Hannah :) Last week's with Hannah was just a 1st AND a LAST time. We really enjoyed working together this weekend... it was a huge par-tay. We just were sad we couldn't stay longer to play, but we had to go home to Hannah.

So here's us...taking photos of each other... :) (these are unedited of course...the white balance is off) Isaac has the 24-70mm f2.8 and I have the 50mm f1.4. FUN!




And last week... well... I was a lot more stressed out last week...and Isaac was too...he was sore afterwards b/c I loaded him up with stuff like a packmule... (Hannah, equipment etc) but he was such a good sport about it. He's VERY supportive & I really appreciate him!

(we were in the edges of each other's photos on these...so I thought i'd crop...)

A moment in the life of Hannah

Hannah's finally going to get her 18-month appt next week... (I had to change it).

But for fun...here are some photos from a little bit ago...the 25th of Sept.
She's so cute!

These were taken by daddy. None of these have been edited, the square ones were cropped. The backdrop was left up from a bridal shoot I had done earlier in the week. Hannah likes going to the "studio" room and lay on the backdrops.



She likes to hang out in the room. She puts herself up against the wall...and we just had to take a pic. We got her to wave. Her wave is this tiny, but fast back and forth motion - very cute!




Now these are laying down... like I said, she loves to lay on the backdrops...




She loves to give kisses and touch noses.





And a side note about the little tiny sleeper that's too small for her. Laundry was just backed up a bit... and she's been choosing her own clothes recently. She'll pull out stuff and fuss to wear it. Yesterday she had on a pink dress, green bottoms, and a tan footed sleeper (on as a coat). She did this all of her own volition.

Life.

you can visit my musings blog to read about my stress from Thursday afternoon.

get ready for a stream of consciousness about Hannah.

Hannah...she's a cutie. I love her to death.

She's had the runs...from her nose and her bottom. Not fun. I feel for her.

I'm bad. I haven't taken her in for her 18month checkup. I was so good for all of the other ones. I've procrastinated. I've been busy and haven't scheduled. Plus that particular Dr's office ALWAYS takes up a whole half day b/c you're waiting wating waiting. So it was nice when the NP from the pediatrician's called to notify me that flu shots were in. So I scheduled her 18 month appt. early 1st thing in the morning next Tues.

She's a very musical child. She dances, she wiggles, she sings, she has rhythm, she does signs. Today we learned shapes...and did lots of puzzles.

She loves playing with other kids. Neighborhood kids. The past 2 evenings daddy's let her run around the street and culdesac with no shoes. Just her cute little barefeet...running...her little uneven pattering of feet on the pavement. cute. cute. cute. cute bottom wiggling. cute arms waving back and forth.

She helped herself to the motorized toy cars today at Stephanie & Mike's. She went up, pulled them down and climbed on. She loves cars. She likes to drive. I have video from a few weeks ago of Hannah driving for the 1st time. All the kids wanted to help Hannah drive.

Yesterday she almost fell down into the drain/gutter/hole thing. She liked the cover b/c it was round and she was spinning and spinning on it. It was fun for her, then she lost her balance. She went head 1st and her skull was about to crack on the pavement and I grabbed her leg and lifted her up and saved her from an impact - scraping my knee in the process. It was not good for my heart - it skipped... so glad she didn't hit her head.

She already hit her head at last weekend's wedding. The worst fall ever. Splat in the middle of the reception. It was late...she was off balance standing on a chair...and the whole thing went toppling, and you could hear her head hitting the stone/brick ground. ouch. HUGE swelling. The whole wedding reception stopped and she was the center of attention. I picked her up and she vomited all over me and the table. yes. vomited.

The bride was a Doctor, her maid of honor a PA. so of course, they rushed over...and we took Hannah into the hotel room. We were all worried she had a concussion. It was pretty bad. I was worried about her. I felt bad about the wedding... I still needed to photograph the cake cutting.
So while I was upstairs in the hotel room, Isaac photographed the cake cutting. Thank goodness! but yikes...

that's the FIRST and LAST time that we take Hannah along! Even if the bride is super duper nice and says we can bring her.

The drive home wasn't the most fun. We were both really tired. So we took a lot of breaks and didn't get home until 3am. Yeah...South Padre Island is sorta far away.