We made our annual family trip to the State Fair of Texas this past Monday, and Alana had her very first Fletcher’s Corny Dog, and loved it! Now, let me tell you, these are not your ordinary run of the mill corn dogs. No, they are possibly the best corn dogs you will ever have in your lifetime. The lines at the booths are notoriously long and worth every minute! Alana does not generally like the coating on corn dogs, but when we gave her this one she went to town! She ate almost the entire corn dog! A might big feat for such a little girl!

Alana also had some Fried peanut butter, jelly and banana sandwich, and some funnel cake before the day was over, and seemed to enjoy it all. Wasn’t exactly a health food day, but a trip to the State Fair never is. Fisher Price had an exhibition set up showcasing their toys, of course. She loved playing with all the toys, especially the Little People Alphabet Zoo. (I think she will be getting that one for Christmas!) They also had two people dressed up as Little People, so I guess you could call them Big Little People?!?! Alana would go up to them and then when they put their hands out to shake her hand she would turn around and run away. It was very cute.

We had a good time at the fair, and all involved went home with full tummies!

Well. Alana finally had enough hair to warrant a haircut. I actually didn’t think she needed it, but David was tired of brushing her hair to the side . Maybe the bangs were a LITTLE long. So, I took her to CoolCuts for Kids and she got to sit in a cool car/chair, watch an Elmo video, and get her hair cut. They took a picture afterwards and saved some of her hair for her baby book. Overall it wasn’t very traumatic, for either her or me. I can’t wait for her hair to grow so she can get her 2nd haircut!

I have been a neglectful blog mommy. Sorry for not posting any new updates in the last month. Alana has kept me so busy, and by the end of the day when I get a little time for myself before I head to bed, I am just too tired to do anything that requires any real thought. So I sit here on my lunch break at work to post this message, when I still have some energy and brain power left.

Alana just continues to amaze us. She is saying new things all the time and tries to repeat everything. She keeps learning more of her boday parts and can now show you where her arms and belly button are! Her favorite things to play with right now are balls and cars. And anything round is a “ball”, whether it actually is a ball or not. She is eating pretty well now and mostly eats the same food that the adults around her eat. Last night, David made a red pasta sauce and served it over noodles. She just had to have some. It was all over her face, in her hair, but amazingly, she managed not to get any on her clothes! I took some cute pictures which I will have to get posted(hopefully, this weekend). I have also taken some little video clips with my new camera, but I need to figure out exactly how to post those so people can either see them on the web or at least download them.

Anyhow, I better get going so I can actually eat some lunch before my next group of students arrive. By the way, I LOVE my new job!

-Kellie

Alana woke up this morning with a fever and a runny nose. Poor baby got her first cold! She hates it when I mess with her nose, which makes it hard to use the nasal aspirator or even just to wipe her nose. I sure hope this passes quickly, because right now she is a snot machine!

Other than the cold, Lanie is doing very well. SHe had her 15 month appointment last week and is doing well. She weighs 25 pounds, 6 ounces, and is 32 1/2 inches tall. She is right around 90th percentile for both height and weight and still above 95th percentile for head circumference! She is talking away, even though we don’t understand a whole lot of what she says. We do understand “mama, dada, hi, bye-bye, woof-woof, ducky, and down” (which a lot of the time sounds more like “damn”)! I know there are some I am missing but you get the idea. She’s even trying to say her first Norwegian phrase. When we play peek-a-boo, I say “there she is” in Norwegian and Alana is now trying to say it herself. It is so cute! It was also the first sentence I said when I was little too.

Well, gotta run.

-Kellie

Well, we made it home safe yesterday after a long two days of travelling. Alana was a trooper, so good and patient, and made the trip a lot easier than it might have been. We left Aalesund on Wednesday at 10:40, and had to spend 5 hours in Oslo waiting for our flight to London. Unfortunately, the airport in Oslo is too far away from the city, so we had to just be at the airport the whole time. Things went smoothly in London this time around (on the way to Norway we had a terrible time in London and they lost the car seat and stroller, and only recovered the stroller). We arrived in New York (JFK Airport), and because there are no late flights to Dallas, we had to stay overnight. We took a cab from the airport to the hotel, but the cab driver acted as if he had no clue where the hotel was. We were staying at the Best Western JFK, not some no name motel, and you would think that a cab driver working at JFK would know where the local hotels around the airport are. We finally did make it to the hotel, and after w got settled in, we were able to get a few hours of sleep before having to go back to the airport to catch our flight to Dallas. Once again, Lanie was so good, sleeping for most of the flight home. When we arrived at the sirport, Lanie’s Daddy and Grandpa Jack were waiting for us. She was a little apprehensive at first, after being gone for 6 weeks, but after 5 minutes she was back happily in her Daddy’s arms. They lost our stroller again, even though I gate checked it at JFK, so we will wait and see if it gets returned, and they badly damaged our new hard side Samsonite suitcase. This trip has not been the best experience with the airlines I have to say. We did get a new carseat, a nice Recaro, over which David and I will surely be fighting to see which one of us gets to use it, and now it looks like we may get a new stroller as well.

As for our last week in Aalesund, Lanie and I kept very busy, visiting a lot of people and doing some lat minute things I had wanted us to do. On Friday, we drove out to Sjoholt, where Lanie’s great-grandmother is buried. I know she would have loved Lanie. While we were out there we also stopped by the cabin that had belonged to my grandmother. It needs some work, but it is still a very nice cabin. Hopefully by the next time we are there, my cousins will have it all fixed up so we can spend some time there. On Sunday, Lanie and I spent most of the day with Anna and Jessika. We went to the beach at Tunesa, which Lanie loved. She really is a water baby. On the Tuesday before we left, we walked up the 418 stairs to Fjellstua, atop Mount Aksla. Lanie went up in style in a backpack carrier carried by me, then Anne (my cousin), then Ulf (Anne’s boyfriend). That evening, Onkel Steinar, Anne and Ulf came over to have dinner with us. It was so nice to get to spend time with everyone there and I will be looking forward to our next trip, hopefully in 2 years.

I, of course, have more pictures to post, and will be getting to that sometime in the next few days. So check back soon for updates!

-Kellie

Today, Alana got yet another bruise on her forehead. It seems like she has had at least one bruise on her forehead since we have been in Norway. Today, we were walking on our way to Rune and Liang’s house, where we were having dinner. I had Alana in her harness, she lunged forward and I lost my grip, and she ended up hitting her forehead and the side of her nose on the asphalt. She’s a little scraped up, but was more upset that I picked her up and wouldn’t let her walk than she was about getting scraped up. I guess I can’t get too upset over a little scrape, because I am sure it is the first of many. She just doesn’t seem to have any fear!

We had a good time at Rune’s home. We had Seibiff (some kind of fish dish) for dinner and homemeade chocolate pudding for dessert. Lanie wouldn’t touch a bit of anything. She seems to be on a bit of a hunger strike, which the doctor had told us to expect. Sometimes she will eat some cereal in the morning, sometimes she won’t. She occassionally will eat some polser, which seems to be her favorite food here in Norway. Mostly she just drinks her milk.

After dinner this evening, Rune (he is the son of my mother’s best friend, Hilde) brought out a play pen for Alana and Anna to play in. They had a blast. I took some pictures, of course, and will have to get those up the next time I can get over here to get net access.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoy our posts and pictures!

-Kellie