Babies

Please note: There are no babies at our house.

My girls absolutely LOVE babies. They will always ask to hold babies. Two of Emily's friends like to talk about their new baby siblings on the way. Emily has just started to talk about baby brother. Um, there is no baby brother. But she carries around her little doll (a girl doll) and calls the baby her "baby brother". :) Oh dear. I'm wondering if she's said something like this in primary. lol.

Happy Father's Day

I loved the Matt and Mandy in the Friend magazine this month. It's perfect for Father's Day. So this makes a nice little tribute to the fathers around me. First to my Dad who is a wonderful dad and set such a wonderful example for me, even in what kind of a man I would eventually marry. To my husband, for being a wonderful husband and father. He is always doing things for me and for the girls. And to Nathan's Dad, for showing Nathan how to be a wonderful husband and father.

Language

I loved the article in the Ensign by Elder Callister of the Seventy titled "Our Refined Heavenly Home". I loved the whole thing, but one part of it right now keeps coming back to me. In it he spoke about language we use (I am taking this somewhere, I promise.) Here are two quotes that are going through my head right now.

"Britain’s Ben Jonson said: “Language most shows a man. Speak, that I may see thee.”2 Our language reveals our thoughts, virtues, insecurities, doubts—even the homes from which we come. We will feel more comfortable in Heavenly Father’s presence if we have developed proper habits of speech."

"In his biography on Ralph Waldo Emerson, Van Wyck Brooks relates that Emerson was invited to speak at the commemoration of the 300th anniversary of the great poet Shakespeare’s birth. After proper introduction Emerson presented himself at the pulpit and then sat down. He had forgotten his notes. He preferred to say nothing rather than words not well measured. For some, it was Emerson in one of his most eloquent hours."

If we lived in a perfect world perhaps we would always measure our words very carefully, always say the right things at the right time, and never take offense (it probably helps that a perfect person would probably never give offense probably even accidently).

It makes me think about Thumper in Bambi when his mom asks him, "What did your father tell you this morning?" Thumper in reply tells her, "If you can't say something nice... don't say nothing at all"

Why could something so simple turn up to be so difficult? Here's to thinking before I speak and being slow to retaliate.

On a lighter note, if you haven't read what he wrote, read it. It is great. I especially liked his music section and what he said about a diet of musical french fries. I definitely need to improve my diet food wise, but my musical diet is great. :)

Fun Being Home

We had a nice little party yesterday. We took our pool and put the slide in it. Here's some pictures.

Daddy with his girls.

The girls splashing around.

Meredith figured out some strange twist so she'd land on her tummy. I don't have any idea why a child would do such a thing, but to each his or her own I guess. Emily of course is going through the wonderful age of being afraid of everything. Meredith in the meantime is completely fearless, which scares me to death. (Turn the volume down. Sorry, I guess I'd forgotten to be a little quieter since I was right next to the microphone.)



Emily had to be "helped" down the slide. (Again, turn down the volume.)

The Birthday Song

We ended up singing "Happy Birthday" to Meredith 3 times. After the first time she asked us to sing it again. Her smile at the Birthday Song was so cute we couldn't resist singing it again. Then at the end of the 2nd time we realized Emily was singing it with us. So we sang it a 3rd time. Emily starts out well and then gets a little bit camera shy so you can't hear her as well, but here's the video I took.

V for Volcano

It was time to try something new for playgroup. How about someone else hosting? Erin did a fabulous job! I'm so sad that they will only be here for the summer. But, we'll take them for as long as they'll stay. Erin and her two little boys made this awesome volcano for the letter V.

The kids, needless to say, LOVED it!

Here is a video. The kids asked for it again, and again, and again. Then I realized, "Hey, I need to get a video of this." So, for the fifth time around we got a recording of it. They also had the coloring pages for the letter V and a printable homemade book about Volcanoes found on Crayola's website. For our snack Erin made us lava smoothies. We also had vegetables, and letter v's out of rice crispy treats.


Thank you Erin so much for all of your hard work. For next week we're headed for Chuck E. Cheese for the letter "C". I'm so excited!

Coming Home

We went to Utah last week for Nathan's Brother's Wedding. Whew, what a mouthful. It was a fun, extremely busy week. We got to visit some old friends and craft and go to the temple twice. Here are some pictures of the girls on the way back. I took this picture because I thought it was a very interesting position.

Here's Meredith in one of her more quiet moments. She and I are kind of into a chest clip war. She pushes it down and I push it back up. Drives me crazy! Look kid, don't you want to be safe! So I mentioned this to one of my friends and she told me she just pulls off the road and won't go until her child puts the clip back. Definitely going to try that one. Luckily the chest clip wasn't very interesting on our trip back so we didn't have to pull over.We survived the trip with several wrapped toys, lots of food, one movie (yea, we did it with only one.), one nap per kid, a couple of coloring books, and a little bit of crying and screaming. But we're HOME.

Meredith's Pre-Birthday

We were visiting family when Meredith had her birthday, so we gave her the birthday present that couldn't travel so well a few days before her birthday. We also made her a 2 pancake (Nathan did it this time). She loved to be sung to and loved all the attention.



I know it's shady but the temperature was perfect. It just doesn't get any better for swimming. The girls weren't shivering when they got out and the water comes out of the hose fairly warm so we don't have cold water. But, the water keeps us cool. Like I said, perfect for swimming, but not much else. The swimming pool did not work out for us. We have a slight incline (so slight we couldn't even tell until we put the swimming pool back there) in our backyard. We returned it for a different pool. This was our first attempt at a non-inflatable swimming pool. I hate blowing them up just to do it again the next day or just to have them pop on us.

This was what I actually wanted to get for Meredith's birthday but I didn't think I'd find a good deal before her birthday. We did, but we just gave it to them. Daddy came up with this configuration and then took the picture.

I'll have to post actual birthday pics when I get them.

The Band Aid

Today is the day to catch up on the blog. For those of you who have seen us recently you've probably had Emily tell you a couple of times about her band aid. She was helping me sew and decided to hand me the iron with both hands. She left her hand in cold water for a very long time, which surprised me, and then insisted upon a band aid. I didn't know quite what to do because I was trying to get her to hold some ice on her hand. It wasn't working too well. So this was what we got.

Meredith is Two!

Last Saturday I realized I only had a week till Meredith's birthday. I couldn't believe it! I thought I had an extra weekend somewhere in there. I didn't. We were able to come to my parents house to celebrate Meredith's special day. It's been a wonderful busy day. Since it's been a busy day, I'll just have to post pictures later.

Happy Birthday, Meredith! I love my sweet, mischievous little two-year-old.