A Little Bit of Everything in April

This month has been very eventful for us. To start out with, me and my law-school-wives-girlfriends had a girls weekend getaway. We headed over to Seattle for the weekend and enjoyed the tulip festival, some shopping, and a bit of downtown Seattle.


Then, during the Get Lit! Festival (writing conferences/workshops put on by EWU), my cousin Deirdre came up and attended some of the events with me. My favorite part of the weekend was seeing the girls so attached to her. Summer didn't want to leave her side!

And last weekend, we got to celebrate Easter and throw a surprise baby shower for Tia Maria all in one! We had a great time with family.
Warming up to Color Easter Eggs: (We just painted eggs with paint brushes and craft paints)

The Finished Products:
The Surprise Shower:

Jeopardy and Delicious Lunch catered by here. (That link will take you to pics of the food we had.)

And even though the weather looked like this a few days before Easter,
we were still able to get some good Easter Egg hunting in:

April was a busy month, but we enjoyed all the moments in it!

Leisure

Song Lyrics: "The wolf is not coming. We all need go the bath tub. Right in the house. Then we watch the movie 'bout the lamb on the 'puter (computer)." Then something about climbing up the tree.



One evening, Claire walked over to the window and slid right in between the glass and the blinds. She fit perfectly, except for one little toe poking out the bottom. It was so cute. Now, whenever she wants to hide, she goes there. (Rhett said I sound like a cartoon horse in this, but I'm posting it anyway.)

Hot Tamales, Friends, and "The Dance Game"

A few nights ago, Rhett brought home a big box of Red Hot Tamales for me. I opened them and had a few, then set them on the counter. The next morning, the girls woke up a bit early. Rhett and I stayed in bed while we heard them rummaging around. Then all went quiet. I was surprised that they were being so "good" . . . until Summer came running in with red all over her mouth and said, "Mom, that snack is bicy (spicy)." I got up and went out into the living room and half my box had been eaten. Around Claire's mouth, a little on her nose, and below her eye, was all red--I thought from the dye in the candy, but when I looked closer, I realized it had welted up from the Tamales. At least she had enjoyed them.
I love how the girls play with each other all day. It is so fun to see them get along and be such good friends.


(I actually went to check on them and they had figured this out. Now they love riding the tricycle together.)




During Spring Break, we borrowed our friend's Wii and their new dance games. Summer absolutely loved the dance games. She would ask to do it the moment she woke up in the morning. We had the Wii and dance games for about a week and a half, and then we had to give them back to our friends. That night, we were saying prayers, and Summer said, (sometimes she gets "Thanks for" and "Please bless" mixed up), "Thanks for we get the dance game back." It was so funny.

Here are a few clips of her doing part of the Jungle Boogie, the Russian dance, and her "Grand Finale."

Miscellaneous

Grandma and Grandpa K sent us some valentines last month. Here's a picture of Summer filling them out. They were the Fun Dip sugar candy packets. Most of them didn't make it to their destinations. Sorry guys.

Just a cute picture of Claire.

A few weeks ago, we got snowed in. Rhett's work called and canceled for the day, and Gonzaga shut down too. That evening, a bunch of us went sledding. It lasted about fifteen minutes. It was sooooo cold! Claire and I actually stayed home, but Summer and Dad had a good time.

Summer
Summer is really starting to sing a lot. She sings quite often throughout the day. Sometimes she'll sing common children songs, other times she'll just make up her own words and music. One of her favorite songs to sing is "I know you onnnnnne daaaaaay." (The Sleeping Beauty song, "I know you. I walked with you once upon a dream," learned from Dad.)

"This yucky thing (pronounced "sing") is . . . uh . . . yucky."

"Uh oh! The big dinosaurs are coming to get us! The big dinosaurs are coming to the door! The other dinosaurs are going to save us. The big dinosaurs are not going to eat Claire. The big dinosaurs are not going to eat my head. The big dinosaurs are not going to eat your head, Mom." (And then randomly throughout the day, she'd run into her room, or come running out of her room--"The dinosaurs are coming!")

At a restaurant, while Rhett was asking for the check, Summer stood up and said, "Hey girl, I want more peaches (mandarin oranges)."

Common Sayings:
"That is soooooo cute."
"That is sooooooo fun."
"That is sooooooo funny."
"It's really (reary) scary."
"That sounds good."

Claire
New Words:
"eh-koo" Thank you
"ook" Look
"Nowm" Down
"Maaaaaaaaa" (sounds like a bleating lamb) Mom
"mama" More
"Daddy"
"Joo" Juice
"ookie" Cookie
"guck" Stuck
"idee" Hiding (Anytime I ask her where anything is, she says, "idee, idee!"

Claire can also say "Potty." We discovered this a few weeks ago after Summer had done her business in the bathroom, Claire said, "Potty. Potty." So I put her on the toilet too, and she went. It happened twice that day, and almost two times every day for the next week. Since then, we've had quite a few false alarms, but we are proud of Claire. She is such a big girl!

We've also discovered that she is highly sensitive to cinnamon. Any time she eats it and gets a little on her face, her skin welts up almost immediately. The problem is, she really likes cinnamon. Guess we'll just have to save those cinnamon bears and hot tamales for mom . . . hehehe.

For Noah

A few weeks ago, Rhett and I went to a Gonzaga game (we got the tickets for suuuper cheap--and they were great seats!). Well, I don't know where everyone got these little white hand towels, but every once and a while, whether cued by the band or something else, everyone would stand up and twirl the towels around. Every single time, I thought of how much Noah would have loved to have seen it!

If only . . .

If only we had a boy and I could crochet . . .
Image Source: from etsy found here.

I don't know if it's legal to post this, even though I added the source cite. Rhett's gone to Moscow to take a test, so we'll find out when he gets back.

Claire's Birthday Movie and Our Daily Activity

Our sweet little friend Lyla had her one year birthday party a few weeks ago, and Rachel, her mom, had put together a little movie of pictures from Lyla's first year. We watched it, and I got to thinking how I never posted this. So here it is--

How do you compact a whole first year of life into two or three three-minute songs? You really can't. That's why this is THIRTEEN minutes long. But it's full of cute clips and good music. If you want to actually read the credits (Claire's one year stats), you might have to pause it as they scroll. I couldn't figure out how to get them to slow down. (You'll notice a jump at one point where Claire has no hair and then she has a ton. We lost some of our clips and pictures when our hard drive crashed.)


Lately, Summer just wants to put her dresses on and dance around. She's talked Claire into doing the same thing. Here's a clip of them "dancing" (running in circles) with their babies. (When Claire says "Baba," it means baby.)

And since Claire needed another baby, we pacified her with the panda.