Warm Weather

A couple weekends ago we kicked off the summer season at Josh&Ashley's house for a little Hermann birthday party. 

The kids took turns pushing each other on the swing, and Henry Boy pretty much owned the hammock. 

It made me wanna get a little baby hammock for his room - he  l o v e d  that thing. 

I also finally got a picture of what he does when I'm holding him: Rests his hand on the back of my head and gently plays with my hair. 

Stoppit. Melt my heart. I love you!

That little sweetheart also took a liking to his Uncle Matt, which is great. 

Because we're still trying to convince Annabelle that he's actually very nice. And not just tall and scary.

We grilled up some brats, drank pink lemonade, and had a huge bowl of the best chip dip. Ever.

I took a million pictures of my people, and not at all of any food.

But believe me, it was delicious.

We ended the night with a yummy ice cream cake and Happy Birthday wishes for our sweet Uncle Drew.
It was our first real summer night, and it was lovely.

Welcome, warm weather!

Hailey&Henry

These cuties are just 3 months apart, and we like to joke that they're the 

"Annabelle&Maddy - New Edition." 

And with their similar personalties, you could also call it the "Sweet&Mellow edition."

(I'll let you know how "sweet and mellow" they are around age 2 though.)

Aren't they both so adorable?

My kids have been blessed with so many cousins, and I really hope that these two grow to be good friends.

And I have a feeling Henry will be passing up little Miss Hailey in size in about 3 seconds. 

Aaand, done. He's bigger. ;)

Five Months

Well Henry Boy, you rolled over.

Straight up!

One second you're on your back, and then !BAM! you're on your tummy. It seriously happened over night too. I woke up next to you one morning, and that sweet little face of yours was hovering over mine as you were miraculously on your belly.

I thought, psh, it's a fluke. But then you did it again. And again. And again.

You're a roller, dude.

(You can kinda scoot, too. Take it easy, k? We're in no hurry for you to grow up.)

I let you try oatmeal this month, and you not only ate three bowls of it in a day, but you would have gladly eaten the spoon too. Anytime I had to refill that spoon, you were piranha-hunting it with your mouth wide open. You're fast, buddy. And you  l o v e  food. You've since had avocado, blueberries, crackers, and strawberries. All that food threw your system for a loop though, and it shut down for a week. No poopy diapers for a week, s i g n  m e  u p! Just kidding. It actually kinda scared me. But as of today it rebooted, and we are back on track :) 

Happy baby, happy mama.

Sometimes when you're playing, I sneak up on you and start saying your name in my crazy-baby-talkin' voice. As soon as you hear me, this beautiful smile spreads across your face and you start to look around to find me. It's kind of like the baby version of hide'n'seek.

Kinda.

You continue to remind me of a little grizzly bear that wants to dunk his head into a bucket of honey. Or blueberries. Or anything edible.

Actually, if you could work on your grizzly growl I may start introducing you as my bear cub.

And I'm considering re-theming your room to the "bear cave."

The current hot air balloons just might come off the walls this week.

Daddy says you've gone from "world explorer" to "w i l d e r n e s s  man."

I like it. My little bear cub.

And you're so cute and sweet and happy and everything I'd hoped my little boy would be.
I squeeze you every day and beg my lucky stars that you'll stay a baby forever.

You've created this special spot in my heart that leaves me feeling  s o  honored to be your mother.

And as much as I truly want you to stay my squishy little baby forever, I know that you need to grow bigger and stronger. 

Because you're a special boy.

And you're going to do special things.

You're my one Henry Boy and I love you so.

q u o t a b l e s

My mom kept a journal full of all the funny things we'd say growing up, and I always l o v e d reading through it. Lissie once got dressed all by herself (I think she was about 3) and came down the stairs to announce: "I'm a rainbow!" Sure enough, she had every color of the rainbow on. And once when I was about 3 or 4 I was watering a flower and had noticed that there seemed to be more water in the vase than I had remembered putting in and decided my flower must have spit some of the water back out. Haha.

I love that my mom wrote down the sweet and funny things we'd say and do.

And so I'm trying to do the same for my kids.

And this list of Annabelle's "q u o t a b l e s" is really really long.

Enjoy.

Anytime she senses it's time for her nap or time for bed she says: "Don't wanna take a map!"

When I ask her to go potty, and she's already gone, she replies: "I went go!" 

(I  l o v e  her own conjugation of verbs!)

She'll often walk into the room saying: "Pee-Prise!" (meaning: surprise!)

For a good little while she'd refer to her toothpaste and toothbrush as: "Pee paste and Butt Brush"

(not really sure where that came from, but it makes me laugh every. single. time.)

She loves to get her fingernails and toenails painted and will ask by saying: "Point ya noils, mama?"

She loves to sing and has at least 6 or 7 primary songs memorized.

When she wants you to repeat yourself she says: "What say me?"

She likes to quiz me on my animal noises. 

When she's trying to get Henry's attention she'll repeatedly go: "Buddy. Buddy Boy. Henry. Henry Boy." Until he looks up at her.

She pronounces Daddy/Dada as "Doddy/Daw Daw" 

Chapstick = Tockstick

When she's going potty she often says: "Mommy, no touch my poopy!" I have no idea why she's so concerned about me doing that.

She'll sometimes let me know that she has a "spicy poopy."

(lovely)

She  r e f u s e s  to go potty by herself, even though she can totally do it. Instead she'll stick pillows between her legs and dance around until I finally give in and help her. It's a daily battle.

She calls the "kitchen" a "chicken."

She once told me she was going to feed Henry milk from her boobie.

(Oh dear.)

Ever since she's been able to pray by herself this has been her prayer, without fail:

"Dear Heavenly Father. Thank you for mommy, daddy, Tom, Gus. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." I've since tried to teach her to include Henry, or the food, or her bed etc. So now when I say prayers she'll often correct me if I've forgotten Henry, the food, or my bed. It's great :)

When she's trying to get my attention she'll say: "Mommy! Listen! Mommy! Listen!"

When she wants me to turn the DVD player on in the car she always says: "Turn it hard."

(That one took me a while to catch on to.)

She walked into the bathroom the other day saying: "You gotta squeeze your poopies, mommy. Squeeeeeze! Mommy, get it out!" I wasn't even going to the bathroom.

If I ever call her "honey", she corrects me and says: "I not honey!"

She likes to shorten words and will call her "blankie" a "blank" instead.

 Obviously, blankie is much too long.

She likes to brush my hair (more like pull out my hair) with salad tongs and always finishes by saying: "That's better!" 

Thanks, sweetie ;)

Nine times out of ten she's dreamt about kitties or puppies when she wakes up.

She calls popcorn "crapcorn."

Everything is cute: the cereal box, me doing squats, me writing my grocery list, the mail, the breast pump, a case of water bottles. The list is endless. Literally.

As we've been getting ready for Aunt Lissie to come stay with us this summer, I asked her where she should sleep and she replied by saying: "In Grandma Lisa's arms!" Haha. 

Once while I was being silly with her she asked: "Um, I have a question. Are you cray cray?"

Whenever she finds Jake's deodorant, she puts it on.  E v e r y  t i m e.

Tape = "stick"

She heard some birds chirping one morning and said: "Mommy! Birdie is screaming! Aww."

While we were in Seattle she came up to me and out of nowhere said: "Mommy, I just wanna be so good!" (Did Mimi pay you to say that?! Music to my ears!!)

When she can't get off the potty she says: "I can't get my potty off!"

If she wants a little bit of cheese, or candy, or anything she'll say: "I have tiny bit bit bit?"

One day I told her how blue her eyes are and she said: "No, my eyes are pink!"

She sleeps with B (her panda) and baby Lissie every. single. night.

She is crazy, silly, and adorable.

And every day I'm thankful that she's mine.

Sand In Your Toes

On our last day in Washington we packed up the van and picnicked at the beach. It was the perfect day to spend outdoors, and the kids loved it.

Seeing Annabelle run up to the water and have it brush up against her toes made me want to plan a trip to San Diego asap. She's such a water baby and spent most of our day there splashing in the waves. 

She also, at one point, pulled down her pants and started peeing. Haha. She got so used to doing that on the side of the road, that she just assumed it was the new way of life. Pretty awesome ;) We spent most of our afternoon there letting the kids play in the water and building sand castles. And it was lovely to say the least.

Seattle, I love you!

Pretty much every time Jake goes out of town, I wish one of my sisters could be shipped to me. Or I daydream about visiting them. And this time when Jake left for Kiev, I was especially achey for some sister time. And lucky for Marie, her place is the only realistic option. So the day before Jake left, I started brainstorming. Who could make the roadtrip with me so last minute?

When Marie suggested Tiff&Treena I was sold. They were the PERFECT roadtrip buddies: They're giggly, chatty, and adorable. I practically wanted to hire them to come with me. And I probably should have, cause for that week we spent together each of my children had their own personal nanny.

 It. Was. Bomb. (Thank you, Tiff&Treena!!)

We started our long trek on a Thursday afternoon and as soon as we were all in the car together, we wanted to bust open all our snacks. ROADTRIP!

When our hair got greasy. And our makeup smeared from exhaustion. And we ate a 10 lbs bag of peanut butter m&m's. And Annabelle spilled milkshake all.over.herself. And peed on the side of the road every ten minutes. And we still had 3 hours to go and felt so close, but then realized we still have  t h r e e hours to go. We just yelled out R O A D T R I P and that made it all better.

We stayed the night in Oregon on the way there (take note: that is a smart move ye Washington-bound road-trippers!) and got to Marie's Friday afternoon. And from then on life was bliss. Annabelle was in cousin heaven. Henry was maybe put down once the entire 5 days we were there. And we stayed up late and laughed. A lot. 

We went shopping, took the ferry into Seattle, ate yummy food and treats, jumped on the trampoline (I need one!!), went to the most beautiful beach, and just enjoyed being together. It was one of my favorite trips. I had to remind myself extra hard this time to bring my camera when we went out and about. Whenever I'm with Lu or Marie, I just let them take all the pictures and then I go home with none. I learned my lesson this trip ;) But only partially, cause I only have pictures from our day in Seattle and at the beach (which I'll save for another post).

I noticed that Liam is in 90% of all my pictures, and am therefore dubbing him most cooperative kid to take pictures of. He is such a little sweetheart! He let Annabelle love on him whenever she wanted to. And he adored little Henry and spent a good 30 minute of our ferry ride holding and kissing him. While we were in the car on our way to the ferry he rode in my car and sat in the same row as Henry. A couple minutes into our drive he perked up and said:"I'm pretty lucky, cause I get to sit right next to Henry!" Gasp. Can I keep you, little Liam?

We had lunch on the ferry, and the little toddlers ran free. (I'm certain we were a fun circus of crazies to watch.) Once we docked, we walked to Pike's Place and let the kids choose a pastry from the cutest bakery. Annabelle got a jumbo cinnamon roll, and ate the w h o l e thing. Henry slept most of the day, and we hiked up two San Francisco-like hills to get to some shopping, just to realize it was all for nothing.  Again, we probably looked pret-ty awesome pushing two double strollers full of a million children up a mountain. 

Workout: Check!

We found a playground in the middle of the city, bought some yummy hotdogs from a street vendor, and just sat for two hours while the kids played. It was just what we needed. :)

On our way back to the ferry we stopped at Ivar's and got fries to feed the seagulls. I now feel like a true seasoned Seattle-goer. Bring it on.

The girls each took turns getting their arms, face, and legs tickled by Aunt Tiffy on the way home. They both practically fell asleep in her arms and I'm fairly certain our day in Seattle would have been a throbbing headache, had we not had Tiff&Treena. (T h a n k  y o u!!)

It was a beautiful day.

I love Marie, and I love her babies. 

And I loved every second of being in Seattle.