Growing Up

I was in the middle of making cupcakes for a baby shower this week when I had to stop what I was doing and document my sweet girl. She had chosen her outfit, had me put her ponytail holders in just where she wanted, and sat down to write a list of "at" words for a reading contest she was excitedly planning. (I'm beginning to think she's an event planner in the making. She's planning something everyday...races, parades, parties...)She just looked so old. And I knew that when I thought back someday to the time she was 4 years old, this was just how I'd remember her...

Fourth of July! (OR Reason #2864 to move to our neighborhood!)

We actually did a lot of our Independence Day celebrating on the 3rd of July this year. Every year our community throws an AMAZING carnival and parade, and this year it was a day early. As always, we had a great time participating in the parade and enjoying the carnival.

Grace was very excited to run into her good friend Julia within seconds of getting to the parade "staging" aka "chaos" area. Grandma stopped by to see all of her grand kids getting ready to ride in the parade.
Ready to go!

Goofballs!!

Is it time yet?!?!
And we're off!

Our own cheering section! Even little Lily didn't miss the big event!
Train ride at the carnival

Grace rode a pony. This has historically been her favorite part of the carnival, but not this year! She still liked it, but she found something later that was even more fun! (Charlie, of course, wouldn't come within 50 feet of these big scary animals!)

Do you see the mountains in the background? Seriously, people, if this doesn't convince you to come be our neighbors, I don't know what will. Oh, did I mention that all of this is FREE!??!

Time for some lunch!

Face painting!

Bouncy Houses! (This was Charlie's favorite part!)

And THIS is what topped the horse rides for Grace this year. I can't believe that a year ago she was too timid to go in the bouncy houses. I waited in line for over an hour for her turn, but it was totally worth it to see her grin as she bounced way into the air.

We had such a fun time enjoying all the activities, but for me, the best part was really feeling a sense of community. Everywhere we turned there was a familiar and friendly face to talk with. The kids had friends they were excited to see...both from the neighborhood and those who had made a special trip up to join in the fun with us. I truly felt so blessed to be surrounded by so many great people, and I know I'm always advertising this place, but it really is an amazing place to be!

The next day we spent the evening with family at a barbecue at my Uncle Brooks and Aunt Dorothy's house on Lake Washington. We had a great time, but unfortunately, I didn't capture any good pictures of our time together. I was WAY too busy eating all the amazing food!

Lake Chelan

A few weeks ago we spent a fun weekend in Chelan with Jeff's family. We had so much fun enjoying the sunshine, playing in the pool, and just spending time together. A few of my favorite memories are...

• The night we got to the condo, both kids were beyond excited. I've never seen their energy level quite that high. They literally ran from end to end of the condo, yelling and screaming. They jumped on the bunk beds, looked at every inch of every room, and were just plain wild. It probably didn't help that we fed them Frosties about a half hour before arriving. :)
• The first morning we were there, both kids were out of bed by 5:3o, and Grace had her swimsuit on shortly after asking if it was time to go to the pool yet. We managed to hold her off until about 9:00, but it was a lot of work.
• When Jeff took his shirt off and was just wearing his swimsuit, Grace got a look of shock on her face and said, "Daddy! That's SO UN-BARRASSING!"
• As we packed up to leave, I looked over and saw Grace with tears streaming down her face. I asked what was wrong and she said, "I'm not ready to leave yet!" She cried the first few minutes of the car ride home. It really was such a fun trip and was hard to go home for all of us!

Grace found a pair of water wings near the pool and had a blast being able to "swim" around on her own. (It's true. She's been deprived. She's never had water wings before and has actually spent very little time in the water.) She soon had her own pair of "water muscles", and so did Charlie. The only time they took them off was to sleep or to go in the pool. (Yes, you read that right. They didn't like to wear them in the pool!) Charlie, of course, loved snack time by the pool.
The kids always had lots of people to play with them in the water. Ryan, Lindsay, Grammy, and Bop all spent lots of time pushing them around on their rafts.

Charlie LOVED going for fast "Lightning McQueen" rides...that is until the raft flipped over and Charlie went plunging into the water. Jeff rescued him in about a half a second, but he never did quite recover.

Break time!

On our last night, while everyone else attended a wedding, we took the kids out to dinner. Grace thought it was such a treat to get to eat outside!
Thanks, Grammy and Bop, for such a fun trip! Grace is saving her money so that she can take us all back next year!

Processing the News

We had some big news to share with the kids tonight, and we gave them a clue to the surprise by giving them these t-shirts.

Never in my life have I wished I had videotaped something like I wish I had this. Grace was absolutely hilarious as she tried to figure out what it meant, and neither Jeff or I can remember all of what she said. It went something like this.

Jeff and I: What do you think the surprise is?

Grace: Ummmm...I'm the oldest?

Us:Charlie's shirt says he's a big brother. How could that be?

G: excited, likes she's figured it out He's TWO NOW!

Us: Yeah, but that doesn't make him a big brother.

G: I know! I'm going to get the bigger toy!

Us: No, there's no toy. How could Charlie be a big brother?

This went on for awhile and she said such funny things, but then she was stumped, so Jeff told her the big news. "There's a baby in mommy's tummy. We're going to have a new baby at our house!"

She then erupted into squeals and stopped only to ask, "Where will the baby sleep?" More squealing then, "Do I get to stay at Grammy and Bop's like when Charlie was born?"

We spent some time explaining to Charlie that he was going to be a big brother and he also got quit wound up. They were both running around the room squealing. I asked Charlie if he was excited to be a big brother, and he said, "Yeah! Go now! Go now!" Later in the evening he and I walked to get the mail, but I think he thought we were going to get the baby. When I turned to come home, he said, "No! Baby now! Baby now!" I told him that the baby still had lots of growing to do in Mommy's tummy to which he replied, "Yeah, Charlie's tummy, too," and started rubbing his tummy. The poor boy is quite confused.

Grace continued to be very excited all evening and blurted out many funny things...

"I'm so excited! I'm going to be crazy my whole life!"

"I'm even going to give the baby piggy back rides!" (Oh no, you're not!)

"I'm not going to poop anymore when the baby is here. I'll be too busy being with the baby."

"I'll do all the work. You guys do all the playing."

"I have been waiting for another baby for soooooo long!"

It was so fun to share our exciting news with them and to have them react so positively. I tried to get a picture of the two of them wearing their t-shirts, but Grace was still very wound up. I think they turned out pretty funny though....

Oh, Charlie, this is the most amazing thing!You and I will rule this house!

It will be a dream come true!

And for those who are curious, I'm about 9 weeks along and am due January 31st. Jeff and I are so thankful to be blessed with another little one, and since we already have one of each, we're NOT finding out the sex this time!

Grace and Lily

Grace and I spent the day at a baby shower for my sister-in-law, Lindsay. One of the highlights for Grace was that she got to hold her cousin Lily for a long time! She thought it was really fun to make silly faces, and Lily thought it was pretty funny, too!

Grace definitely likes her job as the big cousin, and pretty soon she'll have one more baby cousin to play with!

A (Very Rare) Trip to the Zoo

I have a confession to make, and there's a good chance it will get me thrown out of the "Good Moms Club." It's a risk I'm willing to take.

I do not love the zoo.

I do, however, love my husband and children, so when Jeff wanted to spend last Saturday at the zoo, I went along with it with only minimal complaining.

I should probably mention that is was the first sunny Saturday that our sun-starved city had seen in some time, so we were not the only ones who had the idea to visit the zoo. Check out the line just to get in! We waited for at least a half hour before entering the zoo.
I was happy to discover that Grace "does" the zoo the same way as me. She likes to look at each animal for about 20 seconds, then she's ready to run to the next exhibit. Those people that stop to read every description and fun fact drive me bonkers. Charlie was trembling with fear much of the time. That boy has a fierce fear of animals right now. At one point a monkey (sorry-I don't know which kind. Like I said, I'm not into the details) which had been facing away, turn around quickly and made a high pitch scream. Charlie matched it with an equally high pitched scream of terror. Only when he was safely in his daddy's arm, did he began to enjoy looking at the animals. Although he did continue to say, "Go home now. Go home now."I love the look of awe on his face in this picture. It's almost enough to get me to take him back to the zoo soon.And then we came to the penguins. We all loved the penguins...even Charlie! He's still talking about seeing them. As we headed to lunch, we had the great surprise of running into Ryan and Kate and their boys. Grace loved running around with Jake to see a few more animals, and Charlie loved the safety and security of sitting in the stroller with Hudson. I love how they're holding hands. I think Charlie was saying, "It's okay, bud, we'll stick together in this crazy place!" These two are going to be great friends. I'll admit it ended up being a really fun day and the kids are still talking about all the animals they saw. Charlie "no like monkeys," but I'm sure that the fact that he's woken up several times this week crying is completely unrelated...maybe.

Sports Sampler

Our local community center offers a class for kids ages 3-5 that lets them try out soccer, t-ball, and basketball. The spring, Grace took this class for the second time and had such a great time! Her good friends Clara and Hannah joined her, and the three of them were the cutest little trio on the court. It was not uncommon for the 3 of them to skip down the court holding hands while the rest of the kids ran, and they always talked their coaches into letting them be on the same team.

Here are Grace and Clara listening to their coach the day of the t-ball game. Practicing walking the bases
Running to 1st after her big (one handed!) hit!

Clara waited for her on first so they could run the rest of the bases together.

Today was the last day of class and the big basketball game. Charlie had fun shooting some hoops before the class got started.
Grace practices dribbling
Grace got the ball pretty early in the game. All of that dribbling practice didn't help too much as she carried the ball down the court being careful that no one stole it from her.
She made a basket! (Sorry for the poor picture, but it is her sticking it in the hoop!)

Once that was taken care of, it was down the the important business of trying to wear her jersey as many different ways as possible.
After the game, all of the kids were given certificates (or awards as Grace calls it) for participating in the class.

The best of friends!