First Popsicle

Kaitlyn had her first popsicle this week and she loved it! Needless to say, she went straight to the bathtub when she was done!

On the road again...

Yup! We packed up and took another trip to Oregon. My mom was celebrating her 50th birthday. She didn't want a big party, just a small get-together with her family. So, that's what we did. We had a BBQ at Jeremy and Donna's, and she did a great job at making everything look really nice. It was pretty laid-back and a lot of fun! We took both of our dogs, and it was quite a riot with Jeremy's two Schnauzers.
Grandpa and Talon played on the motorcycle. Of course, he thought that was great!
Kaitlyn had fun terrorizing the dogs when they came anywhere within her reach.

Happy 50th Birthday, Mom...
We love you!!!

(All set with his laptop and sippy cup. Nice bed hair, Bubbs!)

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Another reason we made the trip was to meet Alyssa, Chad and Tori's new baby. She's around 3 weeks old and only weighs about 6 1/2 pounds. She's so petite and so cute!
We also got to meet Charity, Dallas and Roxy's baby. She's pretty tiny and cute as well!
Walt and Rachel had Luke dedicated on the Sunday when we were there. Anthony's parents traveled to Oregon so Dad could dedicate him. Luke is getting big and has quite the little personality. What a doll!
Talon had a lot of fun playing with his cousins. Of course, anytime Uncle Chad is around and there is a guitar in sight, Talon's right there wanting to play!
Wouldn't you know, the one week we're there, it got up to 108 degrees in Oregon. A record-breaker for sure! And with the humidity... Uuugh!! The kids spent some time with only the necessities on... a diaper.

Little Drummer Boy clip

Walt and Rachel showed us this clip of their friend's son, Hayden, playing the drums while singing the ABC's. The crazy thing is... he's only 2!! It's pretty amazing!

(If it doesn't work to just click on the link below, you may have to copy and paste it into the address bar)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKXbsSM33Rc

Babyfood

I caught a little clip of Daddy feeding Kaitlyn her baby food. So far she seems to like it okay. When she gets tired of it, she starts spitting it everywhere. Trust me, she can make quite the mess!
It makes me laugh because she looks like a little old lady that's missing her teeth!
It's sure hard to believe my little girl is already 8 months old!!

Go Blazers!

Anyone wanna take a guess at what Daddy's favorite basketball team might be?

Kaitlyn's 1st word

Kaitlyn has officially said her first word. She started saying "Ma-ma" yesterday. It's so cute! She tends to get on a roll "Ma-ma. Ma-ma. Ma-ma...".

I'm on a 4-day work stretch, so Daddy's probably sitting at home with her trying to get her to say "Da-da".

Scones and Sun Tea

I've been on a scone baking kick for a couple of days now. On Sunday, Anthony found a scone recipe he wanted me to try. They were basic vanilla scones with buttermilk. They were super easy and turned out pretty good. Next, we looked online for a good pumpkin scone recipe (Mmmm, my favorite!). We found two recipes and didn't know which one to try, so I combined them, and used some of the tips I learned when I made the vanilla scones. They turned out SO good! I had to make another batch when I got up this afternoon. Bring out the coffee!

Another thing I've been making a lot of... sun tea! I've found a way to flavor it and cut out a lot of the sugar. You'd be amazed how much Lipton tea we go through!

Little Gangster

I dressed Talon in some khaki pants on Sunday. I knew they were big, but didn't notice how big until he kept almost losing them. While running around at Papa and Granny's after church, he kept trying to pull them up by putting his hands in his pockets. I put his hat on him right before we left and he started acting goofy. He looked just like a gangster. It was so hilarious!! The more we laughed, the worse he got.

Sweet playmates

Here's just a couple pictures I took of the kids playing. Kaitlyn was really gettin' down to business with Bubby's laptop.

Fun on the 4th

Talon got to see his first parade yesterday, and he seemed to really enjoy it. I'm still a bit of a kid at heart, (hard to believe, I know!) and I enjoyed it a lot myself. We sat a little ways away from anyone else, so everyone that came by threw candy just for us (basically Talon!). We started putting the candy in his cowboy hat. When that was full, we filled the cup holders of Sissy's stroller, then the seat of his stroller. All the rest of the candy (which was quite a bit), we left for the neighborhood kids to collect. Man, if I would have known parades were so lucrative, I may have begged to go to a few when I was a kid!! :>
Anthony's parents came to watch the parade, then came over and we had a BBQ (consisting of shish kabobs and hot dogs, with a couple of side dishes, watermelon, and pomegranate iced sun tea. YUM!).
Next, came one of my favorite times of the day... NAP TIME! We all took a nice long nap. It was fabulous!
When we got up, Anthony's parents came back to the house, the kids played in the pool, we had fresh strawberry shortcake with ice cream and espressos (and more watermelon!!).
When it got dark, we sat out on the patio and watched the Middleton fireworks. Talon thought the big "pow, pows" were really neat! It was a fun ending to a really great day!

My water babies

This was Kaitlyn's first time in the swimming pool and she loved it! I filled up the pool in the morning so it could warm up in the sun throughout the day, and all I heard every time Talon looked out onto the porch was "bath? outs? (outside)". I have a feeling that now, when I say we're gonna go take a bath, he's gonna head straight for the back door! And this taking a bath with your clothes on... great stuff!

Happy 4th of July!

Hope you all have a safe and happy Independence Day!!

Wii

Jesse and Ruth and the kids stayed to visit a little longer before heading back to North Dakota. One night after dinner, Jared and Jonathan had a Wii Fit competition. It was great fun! Who knew Jared was so good at the Hula Hoop? Talon is very intrigued by the Wii, and loves to get involved whenever he can. You should have seen him trying to Hula with Jared. They were quite the sight. It was hysterical!

(This is Jonathan doing the planks...)
(...and Talon trying his best to do them, too!)