Feb./March Update

Woah. I didn't realize it's been over a month since I last posted. There's a lot to catch you up on, so hold on to your pants.

Toward the end of February, we went to Lawrence, KS to visit my brother and his family. We had such a great trip! My brother is an architect and has designed and is in the process of building their house. The pictures are on my parents' camera, but let me just tell you that he is AMAZING! Their house is going to be incredible. I will be sure to post pictures as soon as I get them. We had a wonderful visit with them. Everyone is doing well. Amy is controlling her MS with diet and is feeling great! Here are some photos of our time with them.

I just love watching Scott with Sophie. He's a great uncle!


Our trips to Lawrence are always action packed! Oskar & Poppy are full of energy!

Another action shot.

Some other updates on our little Sophie:

1.) She is 6 months old! How did that happen?! Our little girl is getting so big!

2.) We have introduced solids and she is LOVING it! We started with rice cereal, of course, and have since added sweet potatoes, peas, bananas, and prunes. Now, if you're a mom, you'll probably understand the order of these things towards the end of the list. Sophie loved sweet potatoes, but hated peas, so we moved on to bananas. The bananas were a hit but then she got a little plugged up. Actually, a LOT plugged up. We're talking nothing coming out for nearly 4 days, which explains the prunes...which she actually likes a lot and certainly did the trick.

2.) Sophie is gaining more interest in Rudy every day. She likes to pet him and is definitely curious about what he's all about.


3.) Sophie enjoys watching the computer screen and TV. She could sit and watch for as long as we allowed her to, but we try to keep it brief!



4.) She has learned to get up on all fours, rocks back and forth, and is sure to be crawling soon! It's fun to see her learn new things every day with this. She's getting more and more adventurous.



5.) Bath time is still her favorite activity and you can't keep those toes out of her mouth!

6.) She sure loves her mommy & daddy and separation anxiety has definitely set in!!


And there you have it! Hopefully it won't take another month before another post!

5 Months

Sophie turned 5 months old on the 5th of February. I just can't believe how fast things are going. We started her on some rice cereal last week and she's loving it. I was secretly hoping that she would hate it and we'd have to wait another month or so, but she was showing all the signs that she was ready and she certainly was indeed ready.

Here are some pictures we took this morning at home. It's a beautiful day here in STL, so we're planning on taking a trip to Forest Park. Hopefully we'll have some pics to share of that later.

I like this one. Her expression is priceless.

Remember all the hair she was born with? Gone.

This one's just for fun.
Matt and I were invited to a surprise party for a friend and it was a black tie affair. We've never been to anything like that before, and it was pretty fun. Just to get all dressed up and go out on the town just the two of us was nice.

A milestone

It's official. Sophie is rolling over. She's done it a few times before in the past couple of weeks, but it was sporadic and unpredictable...and sometimes a bit assisted. No more, my friends. Whenever we put her on her back she immediately flips to her stomach. Her little arm will occasionally get stuck, but she figures it out eventually. When did our little girl get so big? She is so fun these days; laughing, giggling, and generally very happy and easy to please. We had a great weekend with her and I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a snow day tomorrow.

For Your Viewing Pleasure

Rudy & Sophie. He's so sweet with her. You can't really tell, but she's reaching up and "petting" his neck.

It's never a question where we'll find Rudy in the winter. This is his absolute favorite spot from the day we turn the heat on to the day we turn it off for the season. The most ridiculous/hilarious part of it is that he sticks his nose in as far as it will go. This shot doesn't capture it very well, but it is SO funny! Does anyone else's dog do this?!

All bundled up to go to church. Baby it's COLD out there!

This might be my all-time favorite picture that we've taken so far (aside from the pics Erin got of her). It's she stinkin' adorable?!?!

I love it so much, I thought I'd post it twice. HeeHee.

Christmas (Part IV)

Our final Christmas celebration for the year was with Matt's grandparents here in St. Louis. All the grandkids and the great grandkid went over and had a lovely dinner together.



Lots of laughs and stories...as usual. Every year Grandma Meyr wraps up a gag-gift for all of us. Last year she couldn't find where she put them, eventually found them later, and this year we got to open two! All of us have to open them at the exact same time. This year's goofy-gift was a wind-up toy that flips over. Matt and I got a monkey. Sophie enjoyed watching him do his thing.


The gift she had for last year was HILARIOUS! Have any of you ever seen one of these? It's called the Nun Chuck, and it catapoltes little plastic nuns from a "gun." This is what one website says about it: "Just load a nun into the catapult and pull the trigger to send a sister sailing. Great for working out your repressed Catholic school memories. Watch out, this one can become habit-forming!"
Very witty. I realize that this may be very offensive to some people, but overall we though the little gadget was pretty funny!



So that wraps up our Christmas extravaganza! All four parts of it! Phew! It was WONDERFUL to see so many family members and get some quality time with everyone, but I'm also a little relieved that January is here and life has slowed down a little bit!

Christmas (Part I)

So I finally got the pictures off of my parents' camera from our Christmas spent together. We gathered together on the Saturday before Christmas at my aunt & uncle's house. My brother and his family had just come in town and it was GREAT to see my babies. Okay, so they're not really babies anymore, but I just can't get enough of my Poppy & Oskar.
This is a picture of my grandparents with all of their great-grandchildren...minus Hannah, who was sleeping at the time. Sophie is all swaddled up, because she should have been sleeping, too!

My cousin, Dan, came straight from the airport. He is in his first year at West Point and was glad to be home for a while!
This is my brother, Scott, and my cousin, Kyle.

That night we all spent the night at my parents' house. It was pretty fun to have the whole family under one roof again. That just doesn't happen very often anymore. Sunday morning we got up and had our family Christmas together. Matt & I gave hooded towels to Oskar & Poppy. They LOVE hooded towels and refuse to take a bath without one. I thought they would like them, but I had no idea how excited Poppy would be! She wore it on her head for the rest of the day.


This was taken after their bath on a different night.

The highlight of Christmas morning, however, was the gift my parent's gave Oskar. I need to back up a little though. Last year at Christmas, my dad set up his old electric train around one of their Christmas trees knowing that Oskar would love it. He is absolutely infatuated with anything that has wheels, especially trains! Little did we know that Oskar would spend every waking minute in front of that train. Here is a picture from Christmas in '07:


That is pretty much where we could find Oskar the entire time he was here. Running the train.
Well, my dad wanted to get Oskar his very own electric train this year, and spent hours researching the perfect train. He found one that is almost identical to the one he grew up with as a kid. You guys, I just can't explain it, but it brings tears to my eyes every time I think about how special this is for my dad and Oskar. I just think it's so cute and will create a lifetime of memories for this little man. Just look at these pictures. PURE JOY!

Opening the train

Setting it all up. 3 generations of Trettels. Those boys love their "engineering" toys! It runs through all of their blood!

Manning his very own train! He had it all figured out in less than 10 minutes.

She's so silly.

Scott left on Sunday afternoon, but Amy & the kiddos stuck around for a few more days. (Scott is pretty much building their house by himself right now, and he needed to get some more work done on it.) It was great to have a few days to goof around and play with Poppy & Oskar and catch up with Amy.

Poppy was pretty interested in Sophie & Oskar thought she was hilarious. He cracked up every time he could get her to smile.

(If you are following my blog at all, Amy is doing well and is managing her MS with diet and excercise and it seems to be working really well! She's feeling good and hasn't been having as many symptoms lately. Keep praying for her health and for a cure!!)

So that's the Trettel Christmas in a nutshell. It was a blast! Looking forward to next year when Sophie is a little more aware of what's going on!

Surprise!

It was this exact day last year when my world turned upside down. We found out I was pregnant. On the way home from an evening at a friend's house, I needed to stop and get some pantyhose for work the next day and randomly decided to pick up a cheap pregnancy test, too. Just for fun. Because I'd never taken one and thought I'd get a shock out of Matt. I honestly did NOT think I was pregnant. The test was $3 and it was more for a joke than anything else. So around 10:30pm, while Matt was doing laundry, I "took" the test. It turned to a plus sign immediately. I just kind of stood there in shock. Then I went and showed Matt. I can't really remember his reaction, to be honest, but I'm pretty sure I got that shock out of him that I was expecting...just in a different way. I got on-line and researched the most reliable pregnancy tests out there, because I was sure I must have gotten a faulty one...remember, it was only $3. Then we ran out to the drugstore and bought a 2 pack of the "best one out there." I took another test that night...it was positive, too. (I didn't know at the time that there's no such thing as a false-positive with pregnancy tests...only false-negatives.) I didn't sleep all night, my mind was racing, and I took another test in the morning. Still positive.

The rest is pretty self explanatory. Sophie arrived about 9 months later.

On Monday, Sophie Grace will be 4 months old. We went to the doctor today and she weighs 13 lbs 2 oz and is 25 inches long. That's the 40th percentile for weight and 80th for height. She is growing and healthy and all smiles these days. I am amazed and humbled at the precious gift God has blessed us with. Little did I know last year that my life was not turned upside down, but right-side up. Everything has changed, and it has changed in all the right ways. 2008 was full of surprises for us, and I have loved every minute since September 5th at 11:34pm with an amazing husband and this little angel God has decided to share with us. I'm looking forward to all the surprises and blessings God continues to bring us in 2009.