What about the dogs?

Several people have asked how our furry children, Simon and Betsy, are handling their new little sister. At first, they weren't sure what to make of her. The first time she cried, Simon cried too. Later, the dogs ran the other way. Now they take her in stride.

Betsy's maternal instincts have emerged; she frequently checks on Katie in her Moses basket or her carrier. She also quickly learned to enjoy the new baby stuff around the house. (That's a nursing pillow below.)

Simon, on the other hand, usually keeps his distance. However, he is starting to take more interest in Katie, particularly in her socks and her diapers -- as it turns out, he's a pretty reliable dirty diaper detector.

Katie gets social

We were sad to see Nana (Anne's mom) leave on Sept. 11 after spending a wonderful four weeks with us.

Left to make our own fun, Anne and Katie are keeping active. Katie was an angel at a couple of moms' group meetings. She also had her first play date last week with Lachlan, born just a month before her. Lachlan's mom, Liz, brought lunch and visited, and Lachlan tried out Katie's toys while Katie napped.

Katie, Anne and Sriyesh also helped Riley celebrate her first birthday. It was a beautiful fall evening and Katie had fun watching the big kids play.

Katie also has kept busy at home. Last week she started to gurgle and coo, with her favorite sound right now being "aaaaaaa". "Uhhhh" is a close second. She also started noticing her hanging toys, and she loves to swat at Mr. Parrot and Mr. Monkey, as well as the elephant toys on her jiggly chair.

Katie has been working hard on increasing her neck strength. She really enjoys pushing back off of our chests and looking around (reminding Anne of a little turtle).

We're also having a great time singing and dancing with Katie. Anne helps her do the hand motions to her old camp songs, and Sriyesh favors dancing to more contemporary tunes. But never fear -- we're still making time to cuddle.

Click below for more photos of Katie.

Katie's 4th-6th Weeks

Fun with Katie

Katie is starting to stay awake more during the day now and sleep more at night. That makes for more time for fun during the day. Today, she tried on her shades and took in the great outdoors.

She cracked us up with the expressions she made and how cute she looked in her sunglasses!

She also enjoys hanging out on the soft, fuzzy cow that was a gift from her friends at Penn. Do we see a modeling career in her future?

Katie doesn't cry all that often, but when she does, Sriyesh has developed a guaranteed-to-calm dance that he should patent.

Meanwhile, Anne is finding her niche in feeding, cuddling and reading to Katie.

We've also worked on commemorating Katie's birth. We named a star in her honor with the International Star Registry and preserved her two-week-old handprint.

We can't believe it's so tiny!

Check out our second album for more cute pictures!

Katie's 2nd and 3rd Week