Finally

....new pictures, we had to apply for college for Anouk, so we were a little distracted..... :-) JK After my mom left, we noticed that we didn't have time to post pictures, so we are finally getting used to it. Our nanny Delia is wonderful, and we have all gotten used to each other. Our share family is working out great, and their 1-year old son Miles is a lot of fun. This is grandma's last feeding before she left for home, we were very sad:


Some more pictures of Anouk, one of them during her 2nd Giants game, which they won again.....


We went on a short trip to Hollywood for a conference a few weeks ago, and Anouk did great on her first flight, she was not whiny or anything. We stayed at a great hotel right next to the Kodak theatre, and went to Santa Monica for a stroll along the famous Venice Beach, with Anouk sipping a Frappucino:


One night after the conference sessions, Sabine took Anouk for a swim, showing off her new bathing suit; the pool was nicely located with views of the Kodak Theatre:


And some more pictures from the last few weeks, some with the jacket and hat that Sabine knitted herself:

Just Anouk

It has been a while since the last posting, so instead of me writing a lot, I will just post some pictures of Anouk, which is what everybody has been asking for anyway:

With "boyfriend" Oliver on 2nd date

On the railing of our patio enjoying the lavender


Not always laughing....
Holding her own bottle

holding her own glass.....
First banana fudge breakfast


On the ferry back from Sausolitos

Summer int he City

The summer has been fairly cold, even for the City, but some days turned out nicely. Anouk does not seem to care too much about this though, since she is not picking out her clothes yet. The dutch grandma came back after Sabine's parents left, and she brought a little trumpet elephant for Anouk. Since she is now holding on to everything and also putting anything that she can get her hands on in her mouth, it makes for some cool pictures:

She has also started babbling, it is just unfortunate that we are not smart enough to understand what she is telling us..... Maybe you can help us:



Here are some more pictures of her reading, laughing, and chilling at Stacey's birthday party with Jen's hat that she bought for her in Finland:

More grandparents...

After Anouk's Dutch grandmother left, her German grandparents arrived. Similar to the previous visit, they also arrived with an entire suitcase full of gifts and presents for our baby-girl. Besides enough clothes, Anouk now owns her own little library with books in German, one in Dutch and others in English. Multi-cultural girl!

The grandparents are clearly enjoying Anouk and she seems to have a good time with them. She grew quite a bit in the last couple of weeks and she started 'talking' (we are just not sure which language she is actually talking in...).

Grandma had knitted a hat for the 'cold' winters in San Francisco (or maybe more for our trips to Tahoe), but Anouk still needs some time to grow before this one will fit. Meanwhile grandma and mom are knitting more stuff (baby clothes are great to knit, because of their fairly small size, they go super fast).

We also met up with Shannon who had visited Europe with us in 2007. Shannon was thrilled to see that Anouk's hair looks kind of reddish and gave us a little preview of how Anouk might look once her hair grows longer.

For my mom's birthday, we went to Wine Country and enjoyed great weather, nice company and good wine.

The next change of grandparents is coming up again as the Dutch grandmother decided to come back and help us out for close to another two months. She will be surprised to see how much Anouk has changed since she left four weeks ago...

First trip to Yosemite

I am behind on the blogs, so here are the pictures from our first weekend in Yosemite with little Anouk and my mom a few weeks ago. We rented a house with our friends Ed and Adriana, and I had planned to hike to Vernal and Nevada Falls on Friday hoping to avoid the crowds...... A lot more people were having similar thoughts :-( In addition, it was about 90 degrees in the Valley, making the hike pretty strenuous. The waterfalls were beautiful though, and my mom enjoyed the scenery: this is us in front of Yosemite Falls, and me with Vernal Falls in the background.




The last part to Vernal Falls seemed a little slippery, so we backtracked and hiked up to Clark Point, with amazing views of Nevada Falls, where we had to change Anouk's diaper with a beautiful backdrop:



The next day, we went up to the high country on Tioga Road to avoid the crowds. We hiked up to May Lake with Ed and Adriana, and had beautiful views of the surrounding mountains and the wildlife (marmot) along the way.


We made it to the lake, and with Mt. Hoffmann in the background and snow on the ground, it made for a beautiful lunch spot.



We hiked around the lake through some snow fields to look at the waterfalls coming down from the top of the mountain.





We also stopped at an overlook with views of the Sierras:




Pictures of Anouk will come later......... :-)