Zoo trip with friends

We decided to meet up with my friend Valerie and her daughter, also Emma's BFF, Morgan at the zoo. It ended up being a fairly nice day, not too hot not too cold and was overcast so we didn't have to deal with the sun. It was a trip with just us girls because Eli stayed home and hung out with JR.

Emma did actually try to feed the giraffes this time but she was still a bit nervous about it. I don't know that she has a favorite exhibit because she is so quiet as we go through looking at the animals. She must be just taking it all in and one day will know what she loves the most! Of course my favorite exhibit is the primate house. The silver back gorilla is such a fascinating animal to me. I can't wait to see how Hailey will eventually react to everything at the zoo. For now, she just gets to go along for the ride in her stroller!

Kayla and Emma at the cool giraffe exhibit.

Emma checking out the big fat pig in the petting zoo exhibit. She did pet it for a split second and that was enough for her!

Emma and her BFF Morgan

Standoff

Who do you think will win?

Puppies and kids

Not sure how either of the kids managed this one since these puppies are so mobile now but they pulled it off!

Just to give you an idea of how tiny these guys are, my mother put up gates at both entrances to her kitchen so the puppies can play on the linoleum floor for easier clean-up. One of the gates goes between counters and the puppies are so little that they can go underneath the counter and escape. So she puts a can of beans in that hole to block them in! Too cute!

Lovin' It

Nana, the kids and I all went up to the Outlets at Castle Rock on Tues to check out the Carters store to see if they had anything good on sale and because Nana had never been there. Of course she couldn't resist buying cute outfits for her grand kids either! 1 of the outfits that she bought from Carters for Emma and Hailey were the same. I can't resist matching outfits for the girls and obviously neither can Nana! Kayla is lucky they don't have the same thing in her size because I would make her match too! :) And since we had cooler weather for a couple of days, they got to wear the outfits since they were pants. Oh and Nana has found a new place to Christmas shop now! She found herself some great deals at a kitchenwares store. It started to rain quite hard so our trip was cut short (plus we had already been there for 3 hrs or so) so I sent a map home so she could see all the stores that are up there. I think we only went into 5 stores so we hardly brushed the surface of what they have!

That look on Emma's face is just too cute! And see that mini mohawk of Hailey's....her hair does that on it's own after her bath.

Emma loves her little sister and I think Hailey is gonna dig Emma too

It's so funny to look at these pictures and see Emma look so big next to little Hailey

All the kids....it was hard to get a good picture because Emma wasn't happy that she couldn't hold Hailey anymore.

Busy!

It has been a while since I have had the chance to do a post because we have apparently been a little more busy than I realized!

On Friday the 25th was JR's birthday. We took him out to dinner and made him birthday brownies. Though his dad gave him a homemade cheesecake which tasted way better than our box brownies so that really ended up being his birthday cake!

In the meantime, my step brother and his family came home from Alaska (he was in the Army) and was spending the week here before moving on to Delta to live there. So we spent some time with them and went to a couple of parks so the kids could all play together along with his mom and my nephew. My step brother's birthday was the 28th so the entire family plus a couple family friends all went out to dinner. Was fun times for sure!

So now we are just going to take it easy for the next couple of weeks before school starts here. Kayla is very much excited for it, Eli, not so much!

Hailey is getting fatter by the day. I took a couple of pictures that I would have loved to share last night but for some reason my other camera is starting to act up so I lost the pictures! Ugh! She is still waking up twice a night but she is doing good on her routine/schedule. And Emma is still doing great with her. Hailey loves to lay on her brothers chest in the morning after her bottle while I eat breakfast with Emma. And of course Kayla is always a HUGE help with both the girls! I don't know what I would do without her!

Emma is pretty much talking in full sentences now. It is sometimes entertaining to listen to her try to form it. She will repeat the words until they come out sounding just right to her. It may take her 5 tries but until it's perfect she will not quit! And for the most part, you can understand what she is saying. Of course there is still the occasional word that you just can't make out though.

A day at the park with friends

I met up with my friend Jessica at our favorite park here in town, America the Beautiful, so that our kids could play and cool off in the fountain. We have been friends since we were in 5th grade so not only did we basically watch each other grow up but we have watched our children grow up. Jessica has 5 children of her own plus my 4 kids so it makes it a little bit of a challenge to try to coordinate our schedules and get the kids together to play. But we were able to do it on Tuesday afternoon. And boy was it a scorcher! Phew I am done with this heat. It has been in the 90's all week long here which seems too hot for me!

Emma on the big girl swing

Allorah hanging out in her stroller....she doesn't like cold water so she wouldn't play in the fountain

Gabby, Zander and Christian playing in the water

Zander, Kayla, Emma, Christian and Eli playing in the water....not really sure why it is fun because they basically just run around and around the fountain kicking the water...guess you gotta be a kid to appreciate it!

Emma followed Zander every where he went! Made it nice to keep track of her since I just had to look for him and she would be right there!

Ready or Not?!

So as I said last night, I was going to work on potty training Emma this whole week. Well that plan came to a screeching halt today. She had a few accidents and either told me after the fact, or went to her potty after the fact. And she would get a bit stressed out every time I asked her if she needed to use the potty. So with those 2 things alone, I feel like she must not be as ready as I had hoped. So we will wait for a while longer before trying it again. In the meantime, it is still 2 sets of diapers for us! :)

Almost Forgot

I decided that I would take this whole next week to work on potty training Emma. We are going to stay home all day and let her run around without a diaper and see how it goes. Since I knew this was going to be happening, I have been pumping Emma up on being a big girl and using her big girl potty. So for the last several days, I have been finding a diaper on a floor and an Emma "missing". She will take it off and go sit on her potty. Friday she actually went potty in it! You can tell because it is a princess potty and it makes noises when it is wet. I am hoping this is a good sign of how it is going to go this week. So everyone, wish us luck! And I will keep you posted on how she is doing!

Cool Water

I learned about a new park here in town last summer but we never made it down that way. So I figured since I had most of the summer off of work, I would take the kids down there. We finally made it today and the kids loved the place! They have a spray park for the kids to run around and play in the water. The only bad thing is that there really isn't much shade for us parents to sit in around the area which wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for having Hailey and not wanting to roast her! Even Emma enjoyed playing in the water despite the fact that the girl was turning purple from being so cold! She did finally decide to get out and stand by me but still wouldn't let me wrap her towel around her. Eli found these giant water gun things to play with and that was pretty much what he did the entire time. Kayla got to follow Emma all over the place and even tried to knock herself out from not ducking when going through this rainbow thing! We will definitely be going back at the kids' request!

They had to check it out before they could really get in there and play according to Kayla

Trying it out

That rainbow thing in the background is what Kayla hit her head on....

And here is what Hailey got to do....

See her purple face! This was on our way out when she finally let me wrap her up

Lazy or Clever

Kayla was helping me this afternoon by washing bottles (we don't have a dishwasher) and when I went into the kitchen to get a bottle this is what I found......
Both of the brushes have suction cups so she had stuck them to the side of the sink closest to her and she would just scrub, scrub and was done! She set up this little demo for us.

Big Sis/Little Sis

My friend Valerie found these adorable shirts for Emma and Hailey when I was pregnant and I couldn't wait to put the girls in them! Too bad they don't make them big enough for Kayla to wear! It was near impossible to find something that a newborn and a toddler could wear that would match. I could get kind of close but that was it. Nothing really cute or special either. But the problem was solved! And you can't really tell in the picture but the pigtails on the girl are actual pieces of string that stick out of the shirt like real hair. OK that is one of those you would have to see it for it to make sense but it is cute!

Happy Birthday Joey!

Friday was my nephew Joey's 3rd birthday and my step-sister had his party on Saturday at Nana and Grandpa's house. The kids had fun just playing and checking out the puppies. It was too chilly to go swimming that day. Then he opened presents and had cake. Here are a few pictures from the party.

Joey starting to open presents. Emma loves her cousin Joey!

Joey loves his baseball gloves! That is all he wanted to play with the rest of the day!

More presents....

Grandpa was a little jealous of Joey's laptop......

Cake time! He didn't want to wait for us to finish singing so he went ahead and blew out his candles!