Kate's Day with Lombardi

Once the likes of Aaron Rodgers, Donald Driver, Charles Woodsen and Clay Matthews had their day with the trophy, it finally became Peanut's turn. Enjoy!

Food, Food, Food

As I mentioned in our previous post, we received approval from Kate's doctor to start feeding her real food. She stated that we could start her on watermelon, Kraft singles, bananas and more! We thought we'd ease Kate into the process by starting her on watermelon and cheese. At first she wasn't too fond of the watermelon, but liked it more as the week went on. Like a true Wisconsinite though, she loved the cheese right off the bat!

She continues to be a great eater for us, having the right portions of fruits and vegetables for lunch and dinner in addition to either watermelon or cheese. She has also been doing great with her sippy cup and we've found that since she's been having such nutritious meals, she's been drinking less formula before her naps and when she goes down for the night. It's great to see her making such progress! Enjoy the following pictures of our little Cheesehead during her mealtime adventures!

Have You Seen My Carrots?

You Want Me To Eat This?

I'm Not So Sure About This

Showing How Well I Use My Sippy Cup

And We're Back!

Sorry for the long absence - we were having computer issues which didn't allow us to post anything.

As I write this, I can’t help but think that Kate will be 10 months old tomorrow. Everyone told John and I that time flies even faster when you have kids and boy they weren’t kidding. It felt like we were just at the hospital yesterday as I can still hear my doctor say, “It’s a girl!” and vividly see my hospital bed surrounded by John, my parents and his parents.

Given how fast the past 10 months have gone by, it’s no wonder that February felt like it was here and gone with a snap of a finger. We experienced so many wonderful and exciting things this month. Kate has kept us rather busy and on our toes as she learned to pull herself up on the furniture and anything just slightly within her reach. She also continues to chew on everything since another tooth popped up right next to her first one. Needless to say, her kisses are turning into opportunities to utilize those chompers.

Given that she’s in her 9^th month, she had her routine check-up with Dr. Schacht. She definitely gets her height from her daddy as she is in the 82^nd percentile at 28.75 inches long. She now weighs 21 pounds, 10 ounces which is in the 86^th percentile and her head is in the 42^nd percentile. We were thrilled to hear that she’s thriving and thoroughly enjoyed this appointment since there were no shots. Hooray! We also got Dr. Schacht’s approval to start Kate on real foods. We attempted that this week and will talk about it in our next post so stay tuned! Until then, enjoy some pictures of Miss K.

Check Out My Cute Legs as I Stand On My Own!

I Like To Chew On My Blocks....

My Hand...

The Page On My Musical Table...
And the Remote Control. Are You Sensing A Theme Here?
But I'm Still A Happy Baby Even When I'm Teething!

Super Bowl Champs!

The other day, I found myself reflecting on how good it is to be Kate. For the most part, she gets to do whatever she wants, everyone tries to entertain her at all times, her meals are almost always spoon-fed right to her......and on top of all that, all she knows is the Green Bay Packers as Super Bowl Champions! Needless to say, it was a great night two Sunday's ago. After the big game Shelly was sweet enough to drop my brother and I off Downtown where we met my parents for a post game celebration! The streets were absolutely nuts! Filled with thousands of screaming fans, cars with their windows down and their inhabitants high-fiving everyone they drove by and to top it all off, Green and Gold Fireworks later that night! The last time the Packers won the Super Bowl I was 14 and a shade too young to enjoy the festivities of downtown, but I certainly wasn't going to miss it this time and I'm thrilled I didn't. Here's a couple of pics from our experience!

Smile's All-Around

Celebrating with New Friends

The Amazing Ice Sculpture on the Streets Downtown

Needless to say, we had an absolute blast and it was so much fun to watch the Packers' inspired run through the playoffs!

Since then, Kate continues to keep us more and more busy. The word "mobile" doesn't being to describe her lately. When we put her on the floor she's simply....gone! She crawls anywhere and everywhere and is having so much fun exploring her house. The only way we've been able to slow her down lately is by "bribing her with Mom's Valentines Day Chocolate."

Like Mother, Like Daughter

Kate's New Valentine's Day Hat from Mimi!

Other than that, Shelly and I have just really been enjoying the winding down from the holidays. It's been so nice to be able to spend some quality time with Kate on the weekends. It seemed like things were so busy that we didn't have much time to just sit back and enjoy the time with our little lady. So, that's the news as of late. We hope everyone is doing well and GO PACK GO!

Happy Birthday to Our Favorite Guy!

Kate and I wanted to wish John a very happy birthday today! As we all know, he received the best present yesterday - the Pack heading to the Super Bowl! The real cherry on the top though would be the Red Wings winning the Stanley Cup!

In addition to celebrating his birthday with a Packer win, he also got to spend the day with Kate. She has had a nasty cough and runny nose the past few days and we thought that it would be best for her to stay home from daycare. So, daddy and daughter got to spend the day together as daddy enjoyed his birthday holiday! When I got home from work today, I asked John if Kate had given him a lot of birthday kisses. He replied with, "No. Just a lot of snot and drool.". She did give daddy a birthday present that we were both shocked by -- her first tooth! Hence, the drooling. We are both so excited for her and so proud of all of her accomplishments thus far.

Not only are we proud of our little lady, but Kate and I are also so proud of John. He is the greatest husband and father and we both couldn't imagine a day without him. He is so supportive, understanding and patient with us and we beam with pride when we call him husband/daddy. John, you are the glue that holds this family together and we would be so lost without you. Thank you for giving us our daily laughs, taking such great care of us and loving us the way that you do! We love you so much and we hope you had a wonderful birthday!

Love,

Your Two Girls

Christmas, Crawling & More!

Once again, we have to apologize for the delay of this post. Things continued to be crazy since the holidays came to a close and then early last week our Laptop decided it was going to take a dive, hence Shelly's lack of Facebook and Virginia Burch Blog time. :)

Anyway, we had an absolutely wonderful holiday season that we were able to stretch out over the course of a couple weeks. With Chris, Kari, Andrea and Jeff heading to Germany for the holidays, we paid a visit to West Bend the weekend before Christmas to celebrate with Chris, Kari and Greg's Family. A big thanks to Uncle Greg & Aunt Laura, Brooke and Charlie for Kate's new toy, ornament and puzzles. Kate loves them all! On Saturday afternoon, we headed back to GB with Chris and Kari who stayed the night with us and we opened gifts both from them to Kate and vice versa.

We had a wonderful time and it was so nice to have them spend the evening with us in Green Bay. They gave Kate some wonderful things and we hope they enjoyed Kate's gifts from her as well.

The following weekend we spent Christmas Eve with my family and the VanAsten crew. The day was filled with food, fun games, and great company. Later on that evening, we opened gifts and per usual watched "Christmas Vacation" as a family. I may have seen that movie 100 times but I swear, Cousin Eddy gets funnier every year! Thanks to Mimi and Papa Joe for the wonderful gifts for not only Kate, but for Shelly and I as well! One other gift that needs to be mentioned was one from Kate (actually from Deb, Joe and my cousin Andrea). To say it was a DVD slideshow of our journey since Shelly became pregnant until Christmas time, simply doesn't do it justice. I've only cried a few times in my life and yet both Shelly and I were fighting back tears throughout the whole video. I'll have to work on getting it uploaded so we can share it with you all. A special shout-out to cousin Andrea, as I know how much time it takes to put something like that together and to Mimi for putting all that time in to getting video and pictures.

Later that evening, we headed home and awaited Santa's big arrival. We woke up and it was clear he had visited.

I remember last Christmas when Shelly was pregnant with Kate and I couldn't even begin to fathom how much things have changed in such a wonderful way in 12 short months. Well, Kate had a good night sleep and was fired up to see all the presents under the Christmas tree.

She was so excited to get at the presents, she decided to chew her way through the wrapping paper.

Santa brought her some wonderful gifts and a few weeks later she still seems to love them as much as the day she got them. Kate also did a wonderful job picking out gifts for both Shelly and I. Kate & Mom gave me pictures and frames from a Red Wings themed Peanut. The pictures included Kate wearing nothing but a diaper, my Red Wings hat and one of my Red Wing shirts. Adorable to say the least. Kate and I gave Shelly a brag book that consisted of pictures starting from the day she was born all the way up through Christmas.

Once we opened all of Santa's presents, we opened those from Kate's godparents (Uncle Scott and Aunt Jen), Uncle Jeff and Aunt Andrea. Thanks so much to all of you for thinking of her on this most special first Christmas.

After opening presents, we headed to church and then back to Mimi and Papa Joe's house for a relaxed Christmas day. We had a wonderful time laying-low and enjoying each others' company. After all the excitement of the past 10 days, both Shelly and Peanut were beyond worn out and in need of a nap.

Once Peanut woke up, she was happy as can be and kept us all entertained until dinner time.

If the following video doesn't make you laugh...I don't know what will. It's amazing how a baby can have all the toys in the world, yet a simple bag can get the following reaction. Once again Kate doesn't fail to entertain.

After a wonderful dinner we all sat back, watched videos and then spent the night over at Mimi and Papa Joe's. It was a wonderful Christmas filled with so many memories we'll never forget.

As if that wasn't enough to make an entire blog post about, we do have some very exciting news. Last Friday evening after Shelly and I had just gotten home from work, we were in the living room and all of a sudden we witnessed Kate go from laying on her stomach to finally sitting up on her own! We'd been working on that for the past week and all of sudden it just came to her! We were extremely excited for her and we both let out the biggest cheer, to which a huge grin came about on her face. It excited us even more so because we've read that once a baby learns to do that, it typically means they are going to learn to crawl within the next week or two. Well, it most certainly didn't take that long. Less than 24 hours later, Shelly, Kate and I visited our good friends Aaron, Cassy, Tony, Melissa, and their little boy Eli at Aaron's mothers' cottage. We typically get together with them every year around this time and in the middle of the afternoon, Kate decided it was time to become mobile (via the crawl, that is). Shelly and I could hardly believe it, but Kate spotted a book a couple feet in front of her and all of a sudden took off! We were so excited and at the same time so thankful we were both able to witness these two huge milestones. We'll obviously post some video very soon of our little mover.

Well, I guess that finally gets us caught up. Thanks to those that made it through this novel of a post! :) Take care and we promise we'll be more diligent with the updates.

A Wonderful, Heartfelt Gift

A little more than a month ago Shelly and I decided it was finally time to purchase a brand new washer and dryer and since everything's on sale the week of Thanksgiving we made our purchase. For years we've wanted to "finish off" the laundry room with things such as cabinets, a hanging rod, etc. and given the recent purchase, the time had finally come to pull the trigger.

We called upon the big guns for a project like this....Deb Weiland! She came over and worked out a plan with us and then basically became the contractor given this is what she does for a living and not to mention her vast amount of contacts in the area. She was able to design a beautiful room for us and we were so excited to move forward! Over the course of two days the people she contracted out for us came in and did an absolutely beautiful job! In fact, Peanut even helped out by testing the durability of the drawers before the counter top was installed:

Upon completion of the frame-work and the cabinets, Shelly and I took off for the weekend only to return home to an absolutely beautiful room that had been completely finished! Not only that, on Christmas morning a little surprise was waiting for us. Joe and Deb gave Shelly and I a box to open which contained the invoice marked "Paid In Full." Mom, we can't begin to tell you how thankful we are for your labor of love. We know how much time you must have spent on this project and its not something that goes unnoticed. Words can't begin to describe our gratitude to both you and Dad for this most wonderful gift. Without further ado....our new Laundry Room: