The Lutz Family Blog: June 2012

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Wedding Time

After much anticipation, wedding weekend has come and gone! We have been looking forward to this weekend since 2010. We were excited to celebrate Lauren and the amazing women she has become, anxious to see what Emma would do walking down the aisle, and THRILLED to welcome Wei Chi to the family (although, we've already thought of him as family since the first time we met him). The event was spectacular and I'm so excited to share future family events with a new brother/uncle. The kids did amazingly well with the walk down the aisle, but also with the late nights, weird naps, and many new people. They are such good kids. The only thing that I regret about the whole thing is that we don't get to see the Wongs when they gets back from Aruba. I got a little spoiled with all this family time. Now for some pics. We may be getting the professional pics eventually, but wanted to share what I have now.

Papa and Sam at the Rehearsal Dinner

- at a local Chinese restaurant where we had NINE courses of authentic chinese food, including lobster and jellyfish.

Sam and Emma practicing. They walked about like this the next night, but Emma had her basket and Sam his rings. They were very focused on their important job.

The happy couple, kicking off the party on Thursday night

My little princess in her special Chinese dress from the Wongs

Lauren also had a special chinese dress, custom made for her and Gorgeous!

Aunt Lolo allowed Samuel to "preach" during the rehearsal... she's so good to him.

Sisters

One of my handsome dates

The Sweetest little flower girl...

Aunt Alyssa and the little lady

The Tea Ceremony

This is a chinese tradition where the first act the newlyweds perform as a couple is to serve tea to their elders, and we give them a gift in a red envelope. Here we are waiting our turn. It's been so fun learning about the different cultural traditions.

First picture of the Pfister/Lutz/Wong Pfamily

Another picture of the family

Such a fun celebration! I loved being a part of so many details of the event!

Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Vegas baby

Okay, so this was a long time ago, but I still want to record it on here for my own records. In may, we were able to head out to Vegas for a long weekend. Bud had a conference to go to, so I tagged along. It was quite the experience. I had never been before, and the lights, the activities, the magnificence of the hotels and the pools was a lot to take in. I loved seeing it and experiencing it, but as Bud said, three days is plenty there. I look forward to going again sometime, but have no desire to return earlier than next conference time. We thoroughly enjoyed the pool, had a magnificent time at the over the top parties (tied to the work stuff), and really had a great time just the two of us - sleeping in (me at least) and finishing conversations. We also got to meet up with friends from college that live there. Good times! Thanks so much to grandma and grandpa lutz for watching the kids! They had a blast too.

See my tattoo? It's fake, but it sure scared Samuel. He does not like birds or butterflies, so he wasn't sure about the bird on my leg. :)

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

18 Months Old

How is it possible that my little baby girl is 1.5 years old?! She continues to be quite a character, quite a handful, and quite a joy to us everyday. I often stop and laugh at the circumstances that Emma puts us in... screaming through an entire shopping trip, running the other way and laughing when I tell her to "come here," crying because I didn't immediately give her a clorox wipe to "help" clean, and getting everyone to join in on a dance party in the kitchen. We sure do love this little troublemaker and the excellent dynamic she brings to our family.

So, on to her recent developments...

- We have reintroduced the phrase "use your words" into our everyday language. She often grunts, but is able to use words to explain what she needs. If she doesn't know how to say it, she will show us. I love when I can interpret her grunts!

- She's getting into jumping. Although, she doesn't get off the ground, she is so proud of herself when she "jumps." She also enjoys "jumping" from the coffee table to the couch like Samuel does... really she just holds our hand and kind of falls onto it.

- She LOVES swimming. We have only been twice so far this year, but she cried when it was time to go both times. She loves jumping off the side, floating on her back, and splashing. She also has little fear of the water and wants to do everything brother does.

- She's a big fan of dancing. She plays music and sways back and forth, but most of the time she looks for "Baba's" (Papa's) hands to hold onto and dance.

- She is loving her Papa lately. She cries when he leaves for work and always wants to dance with him.

- Loves shoes and can put a few pairs on by herself.

- She loves to go "side." (outside)

- Emma is quite the expert at getting her way, especially at the store. She starts off sitting in the cart, when she's had enough of that she starts to climb out. Since I can't let her do that, I put her in the back of the cart. She wants me to give her a "Na" (snack) right in the cart, sometimes I oblige, other times I pick her up. She will stay in my arms for a minute, then throws herself backwards so abruptly and with such strength that I have to catch her with my other arm. I hold her with both arms (can't push the cart of course) and she does the worm, arms up and squirms to where I physically can't hold on to her. So, she gets to walk... which means everyone else in the store knows her name as I'm constantly saying, "Emma stop, Emma come back, Emma no touch, Emma Jean, listen and obey." Boring story, but for my own records. :)

I hope to get some more 18 month pictures sometime, but with our upcoming travels it might not happen till 19 months... poor second child. Here's some from our trip to the Arboretum with Grandma and Grandpa (more on that soon). She was a hambone!

Playing in the creek, licking the creek water off her hands...

Not even standing still to put her skirt back on...

I couldn't even catch her on camera... and this was with my fast lens/settings. :)

Video of her "tricks"...

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Chicago

Two days after getting home from Nashville, I reloaded my suitcase for Chicago. I got to attend a bridal shower for Lauren, learn how to bustle her wedding (yay!), be with my mom on mothers day, and have a day off mommy hood on mothers day. The kids stayed home with Papa again. I loved seeing Lauren in her wedding dress, stunning!! Can't wait for the big day. I also enjoyed spending time with "uncle Wei chi," we have been calling him "uncle" for a year and a half, but it will be official soon!! so excited for them to start their life together.

Monday, June 4, 2012

We are Young by Fun.

Lately, Samuel has been requesting music to fall asleep to at nap/bed time. I usually turn his iPod music on with something childish and/or uplifting. However, he doesn't always nap anymore, so when that music is over he gets up and has figured out how to turn on his clock radio. The radio is apparently set to a pop station because he started singing this song the other day. I asked him where he heard that song, "It's on my radio."

This is how Samuel hears the song, not a lot of it is intelligible, but part he sings repetitively goes...
When the bar closes
And you feel like falling down
I'll carry you home
Tonight
We are young
Set the world on fire
We can burn brighter
Than the sun

Good thing to remember... he is listening to everything. :)

Saturday, June 2, 2012

Nashville

We decided somewhat last minute to take a "weekend" trip to Nashville. It ended up being a really long weekend, thankfully. I wasn't ready to turn around and do the drive again to soon after arriving. It's supposed to take 13 hours, so we thought we would leave at noon (after Sam's school) and get in at midnight (we gain an hour going). I think we pulled in at 4:30AM, Philly time... oh well. At least all trips end eventually. :) My dad took off work Friday, so Bud and I had a whole day to ourselves! We toured lots of Nashville restaurants over the weekend, Bud played golf, enjoyed the hot tub, the kids and I went to the zoo and enjoyed some time just playing at the house. It's amazing how entertaining new (to them) toys can be. I love watching them play with my old toys... my old fire truck and space station were the biggest hits for Sam. I never was a girly girl. :)

On the way back, we broke up the trip a bit more, stopping for a long dinner in Knoxville with Bud's "best man" and his sweet family. We then drove till about midnight and stopped at a hotel more than half way home. The kids were much more pleasant on the slower trip home.

I guess I didn't take too many pictures at all, and took way more of Emma than Sam... Oops! :)

Anything to keep them contained...

Mmm, Ice cream!!

This is how we kept Emma from getting into mischeif at dinner... she liked it.

The kids love morning cartoons on Gigi and Dodo's bed...

This play area at the zoo is fabulous for my clumsy one year old and my three year old who loves to pretend he is an ice skating hockey player. They loved flopping on this mat, tackling each other, and of course falling down on the "ice" because apparently all hockey players do is go really fast down the ice and fall down.

This is a copy of a picture we took of Emma about a year ago. She didn't care to be sitting in the hippos mouth as much this time...

The original...

But, they loved running down the snake's throat...