Birthday!

Anika turned 1 on October 6th which was a Tuesday. We were all set to have her birthday party that Saturday, but Mary came down with the flu, the Dr.'s thought it was H1N1. Luckily neither Anika nor I caught it from her. We had to re-schedule the party for a later date, it was a good thing that on her actual birthday we did a small little celebration with just the three of us.


We re-scheduled the party for the 25th. The cake was re-ordered and they sent along a special little cake just for Anika.


Anika loved her cake, she devoured it and wanted my piece as well.
Surprisingly she stayed pretty clean. (I will post the video when I can, for some reason it won't upload it, it might be too large)


Here she is looking at Elmo and not sure what to make of him.


This is what a sugar hang over looks like. She was heard muttering to her self "I will never do that again".

Some recent pictures

Trying to get ready for chili fest left me little to no time to put towards organizing any photos. I have uploaded a bunch from September through the first week of October to a web gallery.

Here are a few of my favorites:

For some reason when she sleeps she likes to sleep with her behind up in the air
Loving bath time
Playing with her toys
Looking cute in her hat
She loves her Grandpa

I'm one year old!

Anika turned one today. They had a party at day care where apparently she devoured her piece of cake. We are having a birthday party for her this Saturday, but of course we needed to celebrate today as well.

Here is a photo of her wearing her party hat
Of course there needs to be a birthday cake, or cup cake in this case.
There is no picture with lamb this month. Anika is on the move and she just wouldn't sit still for the photo.

Lately she has been trying to climb the stairs. She would get up to the 2nd stair, look back at you and dive into your arms. Today, she decided that she is a big girl and just kept motoring up the stairs until she made it to the top. She is a crazy little girl.

State Fair

Mary had workshop this past week from Mon-Thur. I took a vacation day on Friday, we dropped Anika off at daycare and headed to the Fair.

Everyone has their favorite foods of the fair, Mary and I are no different. Mary goes for the Tom Thumb mini-doughnuts, for me it is a Pronto-pup. We also had walleye on a stick, a cone of Sweet Martha's cookies, pot stickers and also a couple of new foods. Caprese on a Stick which consisted of cherry tomatoes, fresh mozzarella balls and basil leafs, topped with oil and balsamic vinegar. My new favorite food at the fair beer on a stick. Yes, beer on a stick. Leave it to Summit to find a way to put beer on a stick. You don't believe me, just check out the photo below.

The three beers they put on the stick were the Extra Pale Al, Oktoberfest, and a new one Red Horizon. I walked around with them while we looked at other fantastic fair offerings. I had about half a dozen people ask me about the beer on a stick, not one of them asked me how tall I was. Usually I get that many people commenting on my height during a trip to the fair. I guess I need to start carrying beer on a stick around.

Mary found it interesting that people are always trying to find a way to put food on a stick, yet at the fair the caramel covered apples come in a bowl.

Anika at 11 months

There has been plenty of crying in the Zilge household lately. No, it isn't Mary crying because school started up again. That would be Anika, she is on the move. She has started to crawl and pull her self up on furniture. Which also means she is falling and bumping her head.

We are trying to get Anika ready for the upcoming football season, so far the two-a-days have been going well.

A weekend up north

Mary, Anika and I headed up north on Friday to spend a weekend with the Trzynkas, Strattons, and Olsons. We rented a cabin on Kimball Lake, just north of the Brainerd area. The cabin was more like a mansion (the pictures tell it all http://www.northlandcabincare.com/rental/kimball_lake/index.htm). The 15 of us had a great time.

Anika was the youngest one up there and she was just starting to crawl, so she had a tough time keeping up with the rest of them, but she still had a great time.

There was plenty of fishing off of the dock and the kids caught quite a few small sunnies and a couple of bass. Lexi is quite serious about her fishing

They were told they couldn't eat supper until they caught it...these three went to bed hungry.

Anika wasn't quite sure about the lake water, it was actually quite nice.


I wonder if kayaks come in an XL?

Now this looks a little more comfortable.

Some views from the beach

There was an attempt to all 7 of the kids to sit still for a kids group shot...as you can see it went well.
We finally did manage to get a group shot together.

10 Months

Here is Anika's 10 month photo.

Every month I post the photo and she always looks so darn cute and cuddly. But, these photo shoots don't always go as planned.

Here she is bored with the process
She also wasn't happy when her dressing room didn't have the right brand of sparkling water

Anika update...

I don't know how we are going to get Anika to use utensils to eat with, she doesn't even use her hands to eat.

Mary's freind Skye, who has been teaching in India the last couple of years, brought back a couple of outfits for Ani. Her she is in one of them.

She just loves her duck tub. She splashes like crazy when we press the beak and it quacks.


Enjoying a little pool time. We are definitely going to have to get the pool out this weekend since they are talking about high temps.

Baseball at the Dome

Last night we went to the Dome to watch Paul, my brother-in-law, and his baseball team play a game against a Lakeville mens team. What a great opportunity for these guys to play on a major league field. You could tell they were as excited as a nine-year old getting his first dog.

Here's Paul covering 2nd base just like Alexi Casilla.

Paul and Tom managing the game from the Twins dugout.

Cousin Finn's birthday

Last Sunday we went down to Shakopee to celebrate our nephew Finnegan's birthday. Anika loves playing with her cousins. The boys had fun with the shark pinata.


Sam and Theo's new puppy also enjoyed the pinata...maybe a little too much.
Grandpa Tom and the two new babies

Anika and her Uncle Marty

Overheard

While I was at a happy hour for a co-worker who was moving to Colorado, the waiter happened to mention he was moving that weekend as well. Turns out he was moving to Minot, North Dakota. Asked why he responded "I am not a big city guy, if I have a bad day in ND, I can drive out 10 minutes and shoot animals"

9 Months + random photos/video

I am a couple weeks late posting this, Anika turned 9 months back on the sixth. Here is her monthly photo with Lamb


Her last check up she was 27" and 19lb 12oz.

She loves being outside. Here we are playing out in the back yard and she is being silly.

Some photos with grandma Sue and grandpa Tom

Anika has also picked up a new job as a product tester. Measuring cups can take a beating, she will make sure they can stand up to it.

Neglected blog...neglected no more

Summer is just flying by and Anika is changing by the minute. She is just starting to show interest in crawling. For a while there she only wanted to try to stand, if she was put on her stomach she would immediately flip to her back. The other day Mary left the room for a second and came back to find Anika had pulled herself up on her play garden center and was standing. The excitement was followed by the realization that things are going to be quite different when she gets mobile.

Backing up a little bit, I was on vacation from July 3rd to July 12th. That first Friday we went to the MN Zoo with my parents. Anika had a great time riding around with grandpa Mel.

I am not sure if she enjoyed the animals or not, it seemed like she spent most of her time looking at all of the other kids that were running around. The zoo brought back the African Safari exhibit this year. You can feed the giraffes.


The trip to the zoo also was a good chance for me to try out my new telephoto lens. This was at the max 300mm.


This guy was a camera whore. He/She kept walking up and down the fence line showing off for whoever would pay attention


While I was on vacation I also saw a couple outdoor concerts and went golfing. My birthday was the 8th. My mom and I share the same birthday, this was a milestone one for her, she turned 70. She and a friend of hers, Jackie Briggs, both turned 70 this year and decided to have a party together.

Here is the birthday girl with her Ani. Aren't they cute

It was a good week plus off. Even though we didn't go anywhere it was nice to just relax around the house.

Summer begins...

Everyone keeps asking if Anika is crawling. Not yet. She has decided that crawling is just too predictable and she has found a better way to get around. She is still trying to perfect it, but future parents will be fielding questions such as "Has your baby started to 'Anika' yet?" Just watch and see the craze that will be sweeping the nation.


The last few nights she when I have been trying to put her down to sleep she has refused to lay in my arms like she always has. She wants to be sitting upright, so basically she has been falling asleep laying against my chest. While this has been sweet I am worried that this will lead to some weird sleeping disorder later in life where she no longer uses a bed, but just sleeps in a Lazy-Boy.

She also hit the 8 month mark back on the 6th.

Anika's uncle Paul, aunt Sue and cousins Sam and Theo came back from their 5 month stay in Ireland. She has loved seeing them and loves to hang out with Theo.

Enough about her, we know the real reason you come to this blog, Mary and me. School finished for Mary on the 8th, but she is back teaching a week long class this week. She will be teaching a Taiko and African drumming class to kids from Lakeville and Burnsville students.

Later this month she and her high school girl friends will be going to Chicago to celebrate their 30th birthdays (I am such a good husband, I could have pointed out that it is actually their 4oth birthdays).

My big summer plans include not building a garage. That should free me up to golf more than once this year. So far I haven't gotten out on the links, but that will change this Saturday as I am re-instating the Golfing, Grilling and Gambling day.