Big girl bed

We finally took down the crib and set up the big girl bed.  Just rearranging the furniture brought a new level of excitement to this little girl.  She was so proud of the fact that she gets to sleep in a big girl's bed.  And she has been doing great with staying in her bed/room when it's bed time. 

 The only thing we need to work on now, is getting her to keep the bedroom light off. We've never had a two year old that can reach the light switch!

Goodnight kisses for Daddy!

Growing up

Every Monday night we have Family Night.  We look forward to this night together to sing, pray, learn something and have treats together.

 

Last week, even though our sweet little one was sick again with the stomach flu, she was SUPER excited for family night.  When mom announced it was time, our littlest ran over in front of the fireplace and said, "Welcome to Family Home Evening!" with the biggest grin and energy she could muster.

 

McKinley loves her Nursery class, cheers every Sunday morning for church with a "YAY, CHURCH!", and has even begun saying prayers (repeating after whoever is saying the prayer) on her own.

 

Her enthusiasm for church puts a huge smile on our faces.  We hope she always remembers that she is a very important child of God.

Christmas Break 2012

This year, we began Christmas break with a trip to the cabin.  The kids were begging to play in the snow and we thought it would be a good way to spend some uninterupted time together.  We did all sorts of crazy things. 

We decorated gingerbread cookies at 6:30am and ate them for breakfast.  (We needed something good to do while Dad tried to catch some sleep after stoking the wood stove all night long.)

 We played in the snow A LOT!

 Getting ready for a trip down the sledding hill.  She LOVES the snow.

  Baby Girl and Big Brother

 And our littlest loved to drag her gloves through the snow on the sled rides until her hands were freezing.  Dad would give her his gloves and take her little wet pink ones!  It became a fun game.

It was a great trip.

Best sisters

These two girls have become the best of friends recently.  Often little sis "helps" big sis during homework time, and big sis can be found playing dolls or barbies with little sis.  This morning they were playing peek a boo and giggling like crazy!

Play date

Our two year old was invited to go to the Children's Museum with a family friend last week.  Our littlest is a huge fan of the hostess, so we new she would be thrilled.  I was a bit nervous about sending her off mostly because it was the first time she has done something like that, but she had a great time being a big girl.

 We packed her very own backpack for the diapers and wipes, and then a lunch bag with snacks.  For the next few days she could be found toting both of her new accessories around.

Pumpkins and Princesses 2012

We began our Halloween festivities with a visit to a family friend's pumpkin patch about a week before the holiday.  Everyone picked their own pumpkin and we ended up with some big lunkers!

After a tractor ride around the farm, we weighed our pumpkins on the Richter scale and packed up for home.

When it came time for the costume part of Halloween, our littlest chose a princess dress!  We got some good mileage out of it immediately.  Then she wore it at the church Halloween party that we got to spend with Kayla and family, and finally on the real Halloween day itself.

She still can be found wearing her princess dress at least once a week.  Typically we slip it on over her clothes and once it is in place, she immediately starts "pinning" (or spinning).

 

This last photo is from this week.  We like to think of our princess as a very well-rounded girl.  Not every princess plays with cars.

Birthday #2

To celebrate turning two we met Kayla and her family at the local ice cream shop.  We made our BIG ELMO fan a cake that she couldn't resist (and was actually quite concerned about when it came time to eat)!

Blowing out the candles all by herself!

Kayla brought M a baby doll with a stroller and for the next few days, M was connected to it!

We also watched the birthday girl open presents and took some time to visit together and hold the baby boys.

 

 Kayla, Kalen, Kinley, and Dad

 So excited to hold Kalen!

Funny faces

Happy Birthday Love Bug. 

 It was really nice to celebrate Kinley's birthday with Kayla.  We always like to say, "You can never have too many people loving a child" and we think our little ones feel the same way.





Baby Boys

Our sweet girl has been talking so much lately. She amazes us with how quick she is to repeat new words that she hears, or formulate words that seem pretty advanced for a not-yet-two year old.

 

Over the summer, we got to spend a little bit of time with sweet girl's birth mom, Kayla.  After the visit we talked about the babies that Kayla was expecting and when Kayla delivered her precious twins, we got a sweet picture with the news.

 

I pulled the photo up on my phone and handed it over to the little miss.  She kept carrying it around, looking at it, and saying, "Kayla".  It was pretty precious.

Kayla allowed us to visit the boys while they were in the NICU.  I was a little nervous about the way little miss might be with the boys, but she just stared at the boys.

 Right after the boys were born, was Canadian Thanksgiving.  Everyone in the family LOVES Canadian Thanksgiving.  In fact, our boys were asking if we could have another Canadian Thanksgiving later in the week.  And who can pass on Martinelli's?  Certainly not little miss.  She wanted every last drop!  Everyone found that hillarious.  She, on the other hand, was very serious about it.

 We're getting really good at silly faces these days!

 

Summer Outdoors

Our summer has been non-stop since school was released in mid-June.  So far we have totaled 5 camping trips, 1 trip to NM, and a few other fun activities.

First was Memorial Day camping:

Fishing derby

Funny face family picture







Waking Daddy up in the trailer



Then it was off to Westport for a charter fishing trip:

Those that stayed behind played on the beach and got blizzards and taffy!



Next was a trip to NM:

 Little Miss LOVED the caves at Bandelier Natl. Monument.

 4th of July games- Trying to dunk someone

 We did lots of swimming and teasing of jumping off the diving board.

Next up was our first family reunion camping trip of the year in Carnation, WA.  Then we went on our church campout, and last was our other family reunion camping trip at Alder Lake.  Alder Lake is located about 45 minutes from Mt. Rainier, so we took advantage of the opportunity to go hiking and see the sites on the train.

 The smallest hiker soon figured out she could stand on the backpack bar to get a better view.

 We got to ride the Mt. Rainier Scenic Railroad with Grandma, Grandpa, and cousins Summer and Abby.



Probably the biggest excitement on the last camping trip was that McKinley didn't need to have a baby gate on the side of her bunk while she slept!  She really wanted to be like the big kids, so we told her that she would have to stay in her bed and she did it!  It probably helped that she was exhausted, but we are thinking that it might be time to pack up the crib soon.

Mid summer we got to spend some time at the pool with Kinley's birth mom too!

School starts so soon.  Our summer is quickly winding down with soccer picking up, birthdays and family visits.  Everyone has wondered where the summer has gone.  Mom and our littlest girl will be sad when we have to send the big kids off to school.  I'm amazed at how fast the big kids have grown.  In no time at all it will be time for the smallest bird to fly off to school too.