I’ve set an alarm just once in the past year. Every other morning Tom and I wake up when David starts making pterodactyl noises in his crib. Tom is always uncharacteristically optimistic early in the morning and says, “Maybe he’ll go back to sleep.” But David never goes back to sleep. One of us (usually Tom) rises from
David never hugs me like this. We’re happy to be home. Traveling with a baby is hard; in 9 days David slept through the night just twice. And oh my goodness the stuff. Our car was packed with baby contraptions, brightly colored plastic and bags and bags full of nothing but items designed to absorb
David spent almost our entire vacation stunned, frozen in a mixture of fascination and awe while he watched his cousins. Every morning David wakes up disappointed that, once again, he has to spend his day with his mommy. His boring, lame, all out of tricks mommy. Then we went to Franklin County and every day
David’s first birthday is coming up, and since my sister and her family won’t be in town on the day of the celebration we decided to throw a pre-birthday party with them. I had planned on just making a cake (I needed to do a trial-run of the cake I’m making for his party) and
One afternoon the weather quickly went from, “Hey mom, can we get in the pool?” to “I don’t know, I think it might rain” to “Hold on. Is it hailing? It’s hailing!” Ice is falling from the sky, grab your cameras. These kids are growing up on a tropical island where the temperature rarely falls below
I spy two baby boys sneaking to the back bedrooms to play.
So far this summer we’ve taken a few long weekends here and there, but we haven’t gone on a vacation quite yet. Oh, wait. I’m a stay at home mom; every day is a vacation… For the first part of our vacation, Tom is going on a hiking trip with a good friend. They’re doing
The newest little Krieger is here. Berkley Grace Krieger arrived Sunday, July 1 at 1:30pm; 9lbs, 11oz., 20 inches long, with a full head of black hair and pretty like her mama. Congratulations to Steve and Lindsay and big brother Caleb. And to Little Miss Berkley Grace, welcome.
My sister and her three kids are visiting from Taiwan. She flew from Taiwan to New York with three children by herself (her husband is coming a little later). Then after a brief stay in Vermont to catch her breath, drove to Virginia like it aint no big thang. (Did you know my power was
Recently I was looking through my tag cloud and decided to clean it up. I have a tag for “Virginia Tech” and also “Hokies”. Probably don’t need both. I also have a “natural disasters” tag. I used it when I did an update on the first two weeks of David’s life. Remember those two weeks?
When my grandma (my dad’s mom) met David for the first time, she asked if Tom helped change diapers. She told me that her husband, my grandfather, never changed diapers. Are you kidding me? Tom is a diaper-changing specialist. He changed almost all of David’s diapers for the first two weeks of his life, and
We moved a few plants from our old house to our new one, including three lilies. Our new yard was full of rabbits and in no time they chewed the lilies at the base and left them there looking like trees in a clear-cut forest. Unexpectedly, the lilies came back this year. This time there
This post is just a few days late. Lindsay’s birthday is May 13, which is also Mother’s Day. She was born on Mother’s Day. Hello, best Mother’s Day gift ever. That’s Lindsay for you, she was thoughtful right from the start. She even gave me a bouquet of flowers on Mother’s Day. Normally sister-in-laws don’t give each other gifts on
David’s bath time routine looks like this: Tom and I both bathe David, and when we’re done Tom lifts David out of the bath then hands him to me. I wrap him in a towel, then hand him back to Tom. Tom bundles him a little more, then takes him to the changing table to
We are so excited for Easter. So excited, in fact, that we didn’t mind the loss of dignity that occurred as a result of this photo shoot.
Because IF you have a cat, every now and then you get to open your door in the morning and find THIS: I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, I’VE BEEN MISSING OUT! Have you read Freedom by Jonathan Franzen? If you have, nod with me: Walter would have wanted to poison my cat.
TODAY (if you’re in Taiwan. Tomorrow if you’re in America) is this guy’s birthday. He’s turning three. (He’s been growing that mustache since he was two.) Abram is the middle child, sandwiched between a strong older sister and an adorable little brother. Abram, I can relate. You’ve drawn the short straw. Your role as middle
Though Tom is very romantic, he doesn’t get the prize for best Valentine’s gift. It goes to my sweet niece Eleanora Belle, born on Valentine’s Day. From the start Ellie has been head-strong and smart and beautiful (just like her mama). On her first birthday, my mom and I went to Taiwan with a suitcase
(Dear Kristie, I’m sorry this birthday post is late. You were not late with your birthday post for me. But do you know how hard it is to write a birthday post when you’re eating tortilla chips and watching Madonna get carried around by gladiators?) My sister, Kristie, moved to Taiwan six years ago. Among
This time last year I was in Taiwan, welcoming this little guy into the world. Hello, John Amos. My name is Aunt Amanda. He was just the sweetest little baby. A whole year has passed and he’s gotten much bigger and even sweeter. Now he’s grown into a full-on adorable and rascally little guy who
In case you can’t tell, it’s the middle of birthday season for the Krieger and Southall families. It was my mom’s birthday this Sunday, and David and I made the trip to Franklin County to celebrate. I never thought my family had birthday traditions, but now that I joined another family, I realize that we do.
Have you ever heard of the fish hook? No, not a fish hook, THE fish hook. It’s when you hook your finger in someone’s mouth and jerk back as if they were a fish and you were a hook. It’s one of the worst things you can do to a person, it renders them completely
We drank wine, ate chocolate, and played cards into the wee hours of Christmas Eve. Two notes to accurately set the scene: 1) That small plate of chocolate does not represent the amount of chocolate consumed. The measurement was “brick”. We ate a brick of chocolate. Before the night was over, we were putting chocolate
On the same day David turned a whole four months old, Tom’s dad also celebrated a milestone birthday. We celebrated a few days after his actual birthday, because he was busy babysitting for one of his grandsons on his birthday. Did you catch that? He was babysitting. On his birthday. And what was his lovely
After burning, what? 50,000 calories in the 5k, we celebrated Thanksgiving with not one but two feasts. On Thanksgiving morning David allegedly rolled over. I say alleged because I didn’t see it, Tom was with him. Babies are not allowed to have any firsts while mama is in the shower. After the race we went
Dear Virginia Tech, Today is my dad’s birthday. If you could win out this season it would make his fall of 2011. I know there’s only one regular season game left, but it’s an important one. Sincerely,Amanda WAIT A MINUTE! What’s that? Is this a picture of MYDAD drinking his evening cocktail from a UVA
Twelve hours later, my hair is still wet from Halloween. And, no, it’s not because I went as a mermaid. Who planned the weather last night? Rain on Halloween = major trick-or-treating bummer. I heard the forecast, 50% chance of showers after 6pm, but I couldn’t believe it would actually happen. You see, I’ve been
Happy Halloween!More on Halloween later. We have more important festivities to get to first. This little guy had a very exciting weekend. He went to his first First Birthday Party. The guest of honor was this little guy. This is David’s cousin, Caleb. We have zero pictures of the two sweetest Kriegers together and there’s no
Virginia Tech football… …a family affair. [My sister DID go to UVa…and UVa DID upset #12 Georgia Tech this weekend, which IS sort of a big deal.]
These are David’s keys. They were a gift from my good friend JennyLynn and they have quickly become David’s first and favorite toy. Whenever I shake them he immediately smiles and waves. Sometimes he (sort of) bats at them, and if he ever hits them, he holds on and won’t let go. We play with them at
This weekend David had some special visitors all the way from Southwest Virginia. He met his great-uncle David. All my life we’ve called my mom’s brother “Uncle David” and, when we need to distinguish the two, my brother has been “little David” or (when he was younger) “baby David.” Now that David Andrew is here,
For the past month or so our friends and family have been generously providing us with dinner. It’s awesome. Before David was born I thought making dinner for a family was just a nice thing to do. Now I know how incredible it is. We’ve gotten a few rotisserie chickens, and can I just say: