29 months and 1 week old!

We have officially been home from the hospital for a week and are starting to fall into the daily routine with two children. Daddy took all of last week off of work which was very nice as he was able to spend a lot of one on one time with Brody. Things are going good so far this week with me being home alone and next week Jackson will be back after I have taken these past two weeks off. I do think it will be good for Brody to have his cousin back as they are like brothers and it will give him someone to play with.

Last weekend (the weekend we got home from the hospital) we decided on Sunday to leave Briana at Aunt Kari's for an hour while we took Brody to the Mississippi Valley Fair to spend some much needed one on one time with him. Our favorite thing to do at the fair is eat and that is just what we did. Brody had a corn dog, cheese curds and lemonade, a toddlers dream meal. We walked around and checked out all the animals and also got to see some baby chicks being born which was neat. Brody seemed to like the baby chicks the best. It was super hot but we had a fun time. We have been staying home for the most part since Briana was born but this past weekend Uncle David came in town to meet Briana and wanted to know if we wanted to go to Mean Mel's (my parents restaurant) for dinner since he hadn't tried it yet. So we went there on Friday night and on Saturday we had dinner at Grandma Candy's. On Sunday I spent some time with Brody and took him over to Kari's to play outside with Jackson. You would think those two had not seen each other in years as Jackson was hugging Brody and Brody had his arm around Jackson (they have been by to visit the baby a lot so they have seen each other almost every day since I have taken time off).

Brody continues to amaze us with how smart he is. I know I say that almost every post but he continues to amaze me daily. And as a teacher I know when the things he is doing are advanced for his age and that is definitely what I see here. He now knows all the letters in the alphabet, can count to 20, can recognize numbers 1-10 in any order, can count backwards from 10 to 1, has recently identified zero (he calls it "cero" or "sow"), knows/identifies the following shapes: circle, square, triangle, rectangle, oval, heart, star and octagon (yes, octagon!). We painted for the first time this week and he is very into coloring. I got some of the Crayola Wonder color markers that only work on special paper that we tried last week. He also loves stickers and sticking them on paper or himself. We have been spending a ton of time outside as we finally have broken the heat wave and our temperatures are in the upper 70's to lower 80's. We have been going for lots of walks and playing in the backyard.

Briana is doing very well. Brody is adjusting to having a new baby in the house and honestly he is really into doing his own thing and doesn't seem too bothered by her. From time to time he will cry a little when she cries but this seems to be getting better. Yesterday he sat on the couch with me while I was holding her and snuggled with us and we have noticed him looking for her a few times and once he knows where she is he will go back to playing. Already showing the signs of a protective big brother. Briana is eating well and she gets up around twice a night which is similar to what Brody did at her age. She does not really want to go to bed until around 10:30 or so, so that seems to be the time of night where we have a little bit of a hard time but she is starting to stay awake more time during the day so that should help. I am on Briana time and just go by her schedule. She is such a sweet little baby and we really do cherish the times she is awake as she is so alert and attentive then.

We have had tons of visitors over the past week but this week seems to be settling down. We are so thankful for all the visits, calls, cards and gifts we have received since our little lady was born. She will definitely be very stylish in all of her very cute new outfits! We are so very blessed! Thank you everyone!