Okay, so we're supporting Obama . . .

Check out this YouTube video . . . a good friend of ours shared it with us and we thought we'd pass it on to our readers.

Congrats, Erin & Ben!

We want to wish our sincerest CONGRATULATIONS to Erin & Ben (two of Anja's Godparents pictured in yesterday's post) on the birth of their son, Harper Gene Hoffman. Everyone is healthy and in good spirits! Can't wait to see him!

Anja's Got Quite the Vocab!

Anja wakes Papa on Saturday morning to read one of her Elmo books.

Anja's vocabulary has expanded quite a bit in the last month . . . she picks out words and isn't afraid to repeat, repeat, repeat. Today she surprised us with "heavy" while lifting vegetable broth cartons back onto the shelf. Yesterday she surprised us with "Bucky!" as she pointed to Bucky, the University of Wisconsin's mascot. (Imprinting, imprinting, imprinting! Now, if only she'd say "Cobber!") A few weeks ago it was "shadow" while pointing to her own. She's saying numbers, letters, makes the best animal sounds (she does a mean cock-a, as in cock-a-doodle-doo), and associates like crazy. She's just plain fun.

Here's a smattering of photos from the last couple of weeks. Enjoy!

She's been interested in putting on her own socks and shoes on lately.

Our little rock star reads with her shades on too!

She's into wearing hats around the house . . . this one from Krista, our favorite dentist living in the DC area!

Anja attempts playing the harmonica . . . after a few tries she got a couple of notes!

Could we have a budding musician in our midst?! She looks like a pro! Here she is with two of her Godparents, Erin in Ben who are expecting any day now! (And with Eva, their Weimaraner, who Anja loved!)

Hey Elmo . . . pass me a fork!

The past few weeks have been really busy, but I'm not sure with what! Our days have been quite uneventful, which explains the lack of posts. Apologies to our loyal readers!

The three of us went to Sesame Street Live a couple of weeks ago, courtesy of Erik's Dad who scored some free tickets. The first half was a little scary for Anja, but by the second, she was able to point out the guy who is on all of her food boxes/cans, and in some of books that my Sister's family bought her for Christmas. Who's what guy? It's everyone's favorite: Elmo.

A couple of tips for anyone out there looking to see the show: 1) Remove your child from the auditorium just before intermission--it will save you lots of cash! $8 for a helium Elmo balloon--come on! (No, Anja didn't get one!) 2) Bring earplugs, or ask the sound guy to cut everyone a break by lowering the volume. That being said, it was fun to get out and offer Anja a completely new experience!

On the home front, Anja has been practicing using a spoon and fork . . . it's going to take her awhile but she's getting the hang of using something other than the her trusty hands! The only problematic time is when she decides it's fun to dip the spoon in something, say, apple sauce and fling her arms up quickly. It gets a laugh, obviously more so on her end! Here she is, trying out both hands to see which one works better.