Art fun...

The girls are really enjoying painting right now. I love these painting trays too!

Ruby painted this really fun picture of our family swimming in McCall. I just adore it, but wish she hadn't added the names. Would it be awful of me to color copy it without the names there? I want to frame it. I love it.

Finally a documented smile!

Betsey loves to smile! However, not for the camera. All I've wanted for Mother's Day, then my birthday, then Memorial Day, then Flag Day was a darn picture of her amazing smile! Finally! In the least expected moment...at daddy's softball game, I handed my camera to Mimi and she shot pics over my shoulder...and...see...she smiles!

Thank you, thank you, Mimi! The best gift ever!

Betsey's prom date...

If Bee was going to the prom, Sam McDonald would be her date and this is how they would pose...Bee would play a little terrified and hard to get, and Sam would be bustin' a smooth move on her...

Mimi and I have been wanting pics of our little ones together for almost three months (since Sam was born)! How adorable are they!?

Video: Smiles for Daddy...

The sun came out!

I may have only reached like 75 degrees outside (that might even be a stretch) ten days or so ago, but we northwesterners aren't picky about our heat! If the sun is out, we are exposing as much skin as we dare and hitting the beach. Sunnyside beach in Steilacoom is our fave and it was slammed! We were lucky to stalk some people who were heading out so we could park! Since that blessed Saturday, we have not enjoyed 9 days of rain and dreariness.

Today it was just dreary, not rainy. But still...it was the first day of summer!!! We are ready for more sun breaks. I'm not being unrealistic, just asking for less news about how this year's temps are a consistent all-time low. Come on, sun...no one appreciates you like we do!

Daddy-o

Father's Day was a good day at our house. Ruby and I started by making him a fancy bagel breakfast sandwich to eat in bed. We had to wake Alice up at 9:30 so she could be there for the breakfast in bed part. She's such a late sleeper!Anyway, I got this idea (from my brother Jeff via my mom) to start a notebook of letters between Ruby and Chris in order to both document their sweet relationship and at the same time instigate some writing practice for Ruby. I love the thought of how special such a notebook will be in five, ten, twenty years. Alice didn't want to be left out, so she and Ruby both decorated little notebooks, Ruby wrote a letter in hers and they gave those to Chris that morning. Ruby doesn't want me to read the notebook until it's all full, so I wouldn't be able to comment on how darling her phonetic spellings were and her sweet daddy love that she expressed wholeheartedly in a way that only she can. I wouldn't know anything about that.

I've been thinking about this post and there are two little stories that I think reveal the natural daddy in this daddy.

A few weeks ago, Chris was doing his fancy manicures on the girls. They were picking their polish colors, stickers, all kinds of fancies and he was obliging. Ruby was going to do "tips" and have them a different color than the rest of her nail. Chris reminded her, "tips take a little more time to dry!" and Ruby said, "okay, I just want stickers." Then Chris said, "how about tips and stickers?" I laughed because it turns out that Chris really gets a kick out of doing tips! What lucky little girls!

Another evening, Chris was going to go to Costco for me. He was going to take Betsey and Alice, but Ruby wanted to stay with me because she is passionate about any "alone time" opportunities that come her way. I was thrilled Chris was offering to go to Costco AND take kids with him, but didn't mind at all if Ru wanted to stay and hang out with me. However, he was going to miss Ruby and he wanted her to go with him, because he said, "Anyone that comes gets to have a berry smoothie!" He was BRIBING her to go with him to Costco! I just love that any time with the kids is time he wants. I'd like to hope that I'd be the same way if I didn't see them all day, but I'm pretty sure if I worked as hard as he does and as long as he does, I'd likely not gallivant to Costco with three children at 6 o'clock at night.
We are so lucky to have a daddy like Chris. I have to hand it to his parents for teaching him to be so fun and creative and loving. I sometimes look at the imperfections in the life we are offer our girls and think that maybe all the deficits will be filled by the awesome daddy-daughter relationship they are blessed with.

We love you, Daddy!

Betsey is three months old...

It goes with out saying, but BETSEY is such a joy to our family! She doesn't like to smile for the camera, but she smiles and giggles with any eye contact you send her way. She is a huge sucker. She sucks on everything...her fist even gets sore and red sometimes, which makes her sad. The other day, she latched solid onto Ruby's arm. She loves to nurse and even though she will take a bottle, she definitely misses the real deal and will cry and cry, broken-hearted if she can hear me and I don't let her have a little nursey time.

We have started calling her "Bee" and it really fits. She is a little buzzer...she buzzes and grumbles and makes noises like she's clearing her sinuses as her secondary form of communication (the first being a cry...though she doesn't do that without reason).

She is a great sleeper...sleeping every night all night (8-6) and when she takes naps, she really takes them...her schedule is pretty predictable already (has been since she was just a couple of weeks old).

She loves one song. Ruby was told by a friend that all babies like it if you sing, "Winnie the Pooh" close to their faces, with a really breathy pooh...so that the "Puh" makes a little puff to their face. Anyway, so she tried this and it works every time to make her happy! It has changed into "Winnie the Grunts" because she's a little grunter.

Here are some pics of her on her three month birthday!!!





Love, love love you BETSEY!!!

Video: Three months old...

I want to keep videos separate from pictures and text, because I have discovered how to print my blog and you can't print videos, so those posts won't be in the printed version. Anyway, so here's a sweet video of Bee at three months old. Kind of a tribute to her awesome daddy for father's day, as we took over a dozen videos and didn't get a smile until he walked through the door...

Memorial Day Weekend...

We got to hang out with one of our most favorite families for Memorial Day. We are lucky that we met these folks...almost seven years ago! THE REYNOLDS! Sommer, Ben, Wyatt (7 1/2), Kesley (almost 6), Eden (4), and Talmage (2). Yes, they had four kids before we had three...well before...and our oldest kids are literally two weeks apart in age. We used to live a mile from each other, but three long years ago, they moved (same day as we moved) to Snoqualmie. Boo! It's only forty minutes door to door, but when you have busy kids and school schedules, it's a rare treat to all get together. Okay, so most of you are totally aware of who they are, but this is my family journal so a little redundancy is important.

So we met in Olympia on Memorial Day for some fun at the Children's Museum (if that geography is sounding a little confusing...they were coming from down south, hence the meeting in Olympia thing).

I love me a little Ruby and Wyatt. They have been buddies since they were both nine months, and they practically share a birthday. It is always a good time when they get together to play "spies" or "house" or other fun things like "builder" in this case.

The museum had free clay sculpting in the art room. Dentist Alice did a thorough exam on daddy.
I love my little poser. She and Wyatt spent quite some time seriously working this store...I would hire her in a second if I were a store owner, and it was legal.

It wasn't in the cards to get a great group shot of all the kids...but her they are, minus the 2 year old baby of their family and the 2 month old baby of ours...Wyatt, Eden, Kesley, Alice and Ruby (l to r). So I just barely discovered how to upload more than on pic at a time. I know...I've been blogging for a very long time to not know that. Anyway, I haven't got the uploading in order thing down and so here's BEFORE the Children's Museum at the state capitol building. The Reynolds were maybe twenty minutes late, so Chris took the girls up there to explore, and there was a lot of stuff going on there due to the special day (I was nursing in the car).

They were thrilled to meet a veteran.

It was a great Memorial Day with friends and a chance for the girls to see what the meaning of the day is all about, as there was a memorial service going on and people bringing flowers to a memorial sculpture area. It led to some good conversations about our country's freedoms and why they are so near and dear to our hearts.

Video: Alice the big sis...

Video: Bee dancing...

Ruby likes to do things with Betsey that are a little...grownup. Here is Betsey on "stage" singing to one of Ruby's karaoke cd's.