Move-Up Milestone

Today Anna Kate moved up from her infant carrier to her "big girl" carseat! She just cackled the entire drive to church this morning.





Milestones like this make Mommy a little sad... it's hard to say good-bye to that infant carrier! But Anna Kate went from fitting in it like this (riding home from the hospital on July 14, 2007) to fitting in it like this. And this photo was taken over two months ago, the day before AK turned one! It's just the last photo I could find of her in her infant carrier.





And so the time had come. Trying to get a picture of both kids in their big carseats... not as easy as it sounds. I was plastered up against the inside of the windshield while the car was in motion! We'll have to start looking for new carseats for Michael's car, because we took Wesley's spare carseat out of the Camry to use for Anna Kate. Yes, we got both of these leopard print carseats for Wesley. At the time I was so immersed in decorating my jungle/animal prints-themed nursery that I failed to see the lack of masculinity in leopard print. I have since been informed by many testosterone-infused males that the leopard print does not pass the macho muster. I'm sure Michael has always been among this group, but he knew I'd pull the "Did you carry this child inside you for 9 months and give birth following an excruciating labor?" card. Now I can even pull the natural childbirth card. Even better.





Anna Kate pumping those little legs and enjoying her new view! Flashback to Wesley's first ride in his "big boy" carseat. This was in my pre-minivan days (before I became officially un-cool), so Wes got to sit right over my should in the Camry. He laughed and clapped. Anna Kate did not clap today, but she kept yelling, "Yay!" The photo of Wesley was taken October 29, 2006. We had just returned from our trip to Europe, and we had been holding off on graduating Wes from the infant carrier until our trip was over. Wesley was 14 months and 13 days old. Anna Kate is 14 months and 2 days old today.





Another photo from Wesley's first day in his big boy carseat. We had Trunk or Treat at church that evening, so Wesley wore his Halloween costume. He was pumping those little legs, just like Anna Kate. And look at him now! Wesley actually asked me to take his picture (rare for a boy that runs from the camera 90% of the time). I had the camera and was snapping away at Anna Kate, and I guess Wes felt left out because he said, "Okay, now do Wesley."

Wes started walking only 5 days after his big carseat promotion. Highly unlikely that Anna Kate will follow in his footsteps (literally), because she refuses to even stand alone and has zero interest in trying to walk. Wesley walked all over the place holding on to my finger for months before he suddenly took off solo, and he would RUN with his little push walker. Anna Kate will occasionally walk with the same push walker when she's not too grumpy to be a good sport, but she walks at the pace of a 100-year-old granny, leaning on the walker for dear life. AK can take steps while holding my hands, but she starts crying as soon as I try to make her do it. Miss Temperamental... she's just not interested if it's not her idea! Anna Kate is definitely still focusing on verbal development. She's begun to string 3 and 4 word sentences together. She loves to say, "It's a _____ ." It's a baby, it's a ball, it's a this (this is her word for anything that she doesn't have a word for!). She's also started to make requests in full sentence form, i.e. "I want juice." I think having an older sibling definitely makes a big different in speech development!