The best thing about Grandmas....

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves :)

I'm pretty back logged on my personal photo editing. I have whole days of pictures from the Colorado trip that I haven't even touched! Our summer is off to a great start, but it just seems to be whizzing by. Gabriella and Juliana seem to have fallen into a groove of getting to bed late (probably a combination of staying light longer and us being busier in the evenings etc...) and then sleeping in. Jonathan, who is home with the girls in the mornings now, doesn't mind the sleeping in so much, but the later bedtime means less time for grownups to have to themselves in the evenings. While their bedtime has moved back, my bedtime has moved up. I'm up at 6-6:30am to get to work these days and I'm a need my 8+ hours of sleep kinda girl.

Speaking of sleep, I'm off to bed.

Italics

I love the inherent drama in almost everything Gabriella says. Today I bought Gabriella an American Girls book at the consignment store. We already had a few "Kirstin" American Girl books from Goodwill and today we happened across one we didn't have so I bought it for $1.50.

When we went to read the new book for a bedtime story Gabriella said to me, "Mommy, I'm so very glad we got this book because the old Kirstin books we have are just great, but this one is going to be wonderful! So, thank you. Thank you Mommy, for getting this book for me.

You are so very welcome, my dear

Gabriella and Ethan

Gabriella looooves her new cousin Ethan.




and I have to admit, after watching her carefully hold him and pat him and reflecting on what a great big sister she is... I got a small twinge. I mean, Gabriella really is a great big sister. Maybe, just maybe, someday, in the future... she should have another baby sibling to help love on. Or maybe not, because that would involve me having to actually be pregnant again. And have morning sickness again. And I'm pretty sure I would never make it out of the house with three children to get ready. Either way, we are definately good for now. I'm content to hold other people's small babies. Ones I don't have to be responsible for at 3am.



Ethan seemed to be pretty fond of Gabriella too. He loved watching her and as you can see, she was able to put him right to sleep.

So what did Juliana think of this small cousin? Lets leave it at the fact that she wasn't much impressed. Sure, she liked to pat him and say "niiiiiiiice," but when it came down to it she was not so thrilled with the attention that he pulled away from her small cute self. Especially when he pulled away her Mom and Dad's attention. And especially when her Dad dared to call him by our family pet name for babies..."bubba." Indeed, Juliana was quite ready to remind us that she is still our Bubba.

We're Back!

We're back from Colorado. Did you miss me? Ok, now certainly someone will feel the need to point out that we have in fact been "back" from Colorado for nearly two weeks. Details, details. Anyhow, we enjoyed a great week long stay at Jonathan's parents' home. While we were there we hit up the Denver zoo, Garden of the Gods, climbed up part of Castle Rock, did some shopping and I took some rockin pictures of Jonathan's little sister and her new little guy Ethan. Oh and somewhere in all of that I did a lot of new baby holding. You know me, I never pass up a chance to hold a new baby.

I could give a lot of reason's for my two week post-trip blog haitus like... the start of my summer programs at work, trying to get the kids out of the house and into the sunshine,
all the editing I've been doing on Ethan's pictures... but I suppose that really isn't necessary. Instead, I'll just offer one lone picture of the girls at the Garden of the Gods.

I promise they weren't really perched precariously on a really big rock only inches away from a steep chasm. It just appears that way. Or maybe they really were... It was two and a half weeks ago after all, I can't really remember.

I'll probably have lots more Colorado pictures up in the next week or so. Unless of course I drop off of the face of the earth again.

Bright & Cheerful

Thank goodness I have such a great husband. About a week ago he agreed to my whim of stopping by a little spot that I thought might be a fun photo location for a super quick photo shoot. He helped me wrangle the children a bit, making it possible to actually get a few pictures of... wait for it... both of them together. The time of day wasn't quite great for lighting, but we made do and for such a short impromptu shoot, I thought the results were pretty darn cute. I love the bright colors. These just shout "summer" to me.

Some chubby baby thighs for Aunt Amy....

Gabriella was in quite the silly mood. Here she is pretending to eat Juliana's hair.

Gabriella was also in a very affectionate mood...

LOVE this one...

Juliana's 15 Month Update

Juliana had her 15 month check this morning. She weighs 24lbs 12oz and is 31 1/4 inches long. That puts her in about the 75th percent for both height and weight. She is a big girl!

We talked over developmental stuff with the ever wonderful Dr. Sarah. I told her that Juliana has about 20 words outside of names (not all of them are super clear.) I got a lovely little speech from Dr. Sarah about Juliana still being quite ahead of the game and that I should NOT use Gabriella as a frame of reference for speech development (Gabriella had clear sentences at that age.) It is a bit shocking when I look back at Gabriella's records and see what she had for language at the same age, but I guess it is just so clear to me that Juliana has great comprehension and has her own little brand of genius that I haven't really worried about it. Juliana is a problem solver. There are little gears turning in there all the time, observing, figuring things out, making plans to dominate the world... Ok, maybe not the last one, but I wouldn't be surprised.

Juliana seems to do really really well with fine motor skills. Dr. Sarah was pretty surprised when I said she can put a cap back on a marker. Sarah said we should watch out for her figuring out door locks. She wasn't kidding.

Juliana was a very mad girl after her vaccinations. She ripped the band aid right off just to show me what she thought of the situation. Thankfully, a "guck" (duck) sticker helped atone for some of the ordeal.

Mothers Day Outing

Hmmm... who is that person standing with Gabriella?

Oh, it is me. Mother of the cute girls and charming husband that appear frequently on this blog. I need to be better about handing the camera to Jonathan and making him take pictures of me with the girls.

This is such a typical "you have got to be kidding me" Gabriella look.

"DUCK!"

This was the highlight of Juliana's day. She played with the dead leaves in this tree planter in the most boring little nook of the whole place for a good 20 minutes until we finally had to drag her away.

The kids were tired and just plain DONE by the end of the day. Although... I think Juli probably would've gone back and played with those dead leaves some more...