Summer Activities

We have been playing hard since summer finally decided to show up in Utah. Swimming, parks, barbecues, friends- it has been a busy few weeks.

At a barbecue a couple weeks ago the weather turned bad so Sadie and her friend Ella found new entertainment- jumping on the bed. (Sorry Brooke and Seth)



By the way, Sadie loves Ella. She's a little obsessed and it is occasionally creepy. She asks for Ella all the time. She calls most of her friends Ella during playdates.

Aunt Alicia came to the Highland splash pad with us.

Sadie was a little hesitant at first.

Maybe she was just worried about Elise. But once she made sure Elise was alright, she settled right in.

This may be the picture of the summer.

Hunter came and played one day too. These two spent hours chasing each other and giggling. Sadie was so sad when Hunter moved away, but she's so happy he's back!


We've also spent a lot of time swimming with the Dunns. Sadie loves any opportunity to see Ella.

Snack break

Cooper and Elise hang out in the shade while the girls swim

Nana

Nana-- (as in my mom) not to be confused with 'nana (as in banana)-- came to visit. One day Sadie kept saying "Nana" to her, so she asked if she wanted a banana. Sadie forcefully pointed at herself and said "Sadie" and then pointed at my mom and said "Nana". Geez Mom, get it right.

If it seems like my mom was just here, she was. My little brother Matt is starting at BYU this week so she got him all settled and stayed to help me out. My parents are officially empty nesters. 30 years of children at home is over.

We had a busy week- long walks (I'm talking an hour plus), the park, aquarium, Chick-fil-A play place, swimming, and visiting BYU campus. It was so great to have my mom here to help. I would not have attempted most of it alone. Unfortunately I didn't end up with many pictures with my mom in them. Sadie hogged them all. Typical.

Aquarium
Sadie just kept talking about fish and boats the whole time.



Sadie didn't seem to care much about this frog, but since then whenever we talk about the aquarium she mentions the frog

I don't really care for aquariums much but the penguins were really cool

Sadie's souvenir- a fish-shaped lollipop

Too bad it got all over everything

BYU Campus

We visited Uncle Matt and made him carry Sadie across campus and take us out to lunch. Gotta love Dining Plus.

Swimming

It took Sadie about an hour to be willing to really get into the pool. She played on the steps or ran around the edge and leaned over dangerously for the first while.

Then Nana covinced her to get in. The next thing I know Sadie is using someone's massive turtle float and happily floating away as my mom pushes her around.

The next time I looked Sadie had grabbed this shark float too. She has not stopped talking about those floaties since. Thanks random grandpa at the pool who let us use them!

My mom's visit was great. I got to sleep in every day. We got to go on a date. Sadie got to do fun things. Thanks for coming, Mom. And for not hating my children even though Sadie is a bit of a brat right now and Elise screams whenever someone other than me tries to hold her. And for not hating me since I am more than a little grumpy when I don't sleep well. Sadie's going to be sad when she realizes you are gone.

Next up....Meredith arrives today!!!

RAP

This post is a RAP- Random Assortment of Pictures. I love acronyms. Especially acronyms for no good reason. The high council speaker at church last week used multiple acronyms like this. Awesome. My mom just left today so a post on that is forthcoming, but here is my RAP.

Hoarding behind the curtains- a new favorite activity


Group snuggle, or Sadie insisting on being in every picture I take?
You decide


Special drinks (ice water from Sonic)


Resting
Daniel must be exhausted from all those middle-of-the-night feedings. Oh wait, I do those. (Not that I am bitter about it or anything)


Peaceful

Attention-hog older sister, but a good size comparison

Bizarre smiles
(Despite what it looks like, Daniel did not karate-chop Elise's head off)

Ah, yes, the old, two legs in one hole method.


Observing strange antics

Imploring mom to get the strange girl off of her

And so ends my RAP

Oh, and this video makes me laugh.
Favorite page: "I'm her mother!" "No she's not"

Goof

Life with Sadie is quite the roller coaster. She makes me laugh a lot. She makes me mad a lot. She tires me out. She is becoming such a big kid! She remembers everything. I'll tell her casually what something is and the next day she'll point it out. Recent examples: clouds, ants, and airplanes.

Evidence of her goofiness:

More self-portraits


The aftermath of her breakfast
Make sure you note the doll stuffed in the cup


Just a little light reading

Evidence of her big-kid-ness:

The other day at the park she was climbing up all sorts of structures and going down big slides all by herself. I was shocked.

Action shot on the baby slide

Unfortunately, I am not a smart mom and I forgot to put sunscreen on her

Fortunately, Sadie didn't even notice her bright red shoulders.
Besides, I think she would trade a trip to the park for sunburned shoulders any day.

One Month

Elise is 1 whole month old. I still feel like I got hit by a truck most days, but I decided to just get used to it. In fact, yesterday I had the most productive day yet. Elise was so tuckered out by the busy day that she didn't do her normal fussing all evening and she slept a lot of the night. I am pleased to report she only ate at 8:30 PM, 12:45 AM, 4:45 AM, and 7:30 AM. It was glorious. I hope the pattern continues, but I won't hold my breath.

I did a little photo shoot with Elise (I use the term photo shoot loosely- I think you have to have a decent camera and some picture-taking skills to call it a shoot)

Content

Smirking

Done taking pictures

Really done taking pictures

And finally, so we can chart her growth. I am copying the idea many people have already had. I plan taking a picture of Elise each month on this cute blanket.

So here we are at 1 month

On this day in 1987...

I mentioned the other day that Sadie seems to be developing a personality more like mine. Here is part of a journal entry my mom wrote about me when I was 2 1/2.

April 21, 1987- "You are a little doll, but much more stubborn than your brother and sister. Your father calls you "The Boss". You want your own way more than the others, and are very determined to get it. You will cry for hours if you are denied what you want. If you ask for a cookie, and I say no, heaven forbid. You put your hands on your hips and start yelling at me "I want a cookie. I want one. Give it to me." and screaming and grabbing my hand to take me to the cookie jar."

Hmm- sounds familiar.

Zoo Trip

Well, we are officially old. We went to the Hogle Zoo on Saturday with our two kids. A real family outing. Sadie was so excited about it that she let me do her hair, climbed into her car seat willingly, and gave me her best smile on the way there.

We've been trying to teach Sadie about animals more lately. I bragged about how she knows letters and numbers, but when it comes to animals she is mostly indifferent. Over the past few weeks she has gotten sheep, cow, lion, pig, frog, turtle, tiger, monkey, and cat down. She already knew dog, horse, fish, bird, giraffe, and duck before. Let's see- that brings us to a grand total of 15 animals. That means we only need to teach her....lots more animals.

Our first big time sighting was elephants. Sadie loved the baby elephant (not pictured)

I know she recognizes elephants but she won't say it yet.

Another exciting exhibit was the monkeys- AKA monkey monks
Sadie likes to add the first syllable of an animal's name to the end of the name. For example, piggy pig, monkey monk, etc.

I included this picture since there haven't been any of me since Elise was born

The most exciting sight was the tiger

Sadie LOVED it. She ran around jumping and yelling "up!"

Elise did all her animal-observation from the stroller

(Margaret- please tell Booker we made the all-important trip to the zoo with Elise)

We saved the best things for last- the merry-go-round and train.

Sadie was so excited to get on the carousel, but once she actually sat down she got really nervous.

She had a death grip on Daniel and half-cried while saying "fun" the whole time
There are no train pictures. I had a very small window of time to get a picture. The first one I took was too early and my camera didn't have time to recover to take another one before Daniel and Sadie had passed me. I only came out with pictures of those sitting in front and back of them.

It was a very successful day. Sadie fell asleep in the middle of eating her lunch on the way home. That has never happened before.

BIG NEWS- not only will Elise have one best cousin, she will have two!
It's a great year for John babies.