18 months old

This is a little late.... but here is a little tribute to Sarah since she is now 18 months old!

Sarah is the happiest and friendliest girl. She waves to everyone she passes. She evens waves to me every time I walk into the room. So cute! She smiles so easily and tries to catch peoples' eyes to give them a smile.

She loves getting attention, no matter if is good or bad attention. She will continue something naughty just to get the attention, like throwing food at dinner!

She is already a major TV and junkfood junkie. Oh no!

She fits into the little sister role perfectly. She loves to annoy Emily when they sit side by side in the car grocery carts. She leans all over her and rubs both her hands in Emily's hair until Emily screams... and then she does it some more. However she also loves to give her kisses and wants to do EVERYTHING Emily is doing.

Speaking of kissing, Sarah is the best kisser and loves to do it. She kisses squarely on the middle of the lips and will do it repeatedly.

She loves to color and gets really mad if you try to take a crayon or marker away from her, hence the few marks on the wall now. And colors on herself, as you can see below.

She knows alot of body parts and animal sounds and counts to 3. Her pig sound is the greatest. My mom tried to teach her a pig snort, but now she makes this gurgle sound from the back of her throat. I make her do over and over.

Some of her good friends are Olivia (left) and Zoe (right)... and she really likes a lot of Emily's friends too, Kaitlyn, Logan and Simon.

She LOVES getting her picture taken and yells "CHEESE" really loud and gets really close to the camera. It is pretty cute, unless you are trying to take a picture of something other than Sarah.

She will carry on a "converstation" with you for quite awhile, and the whole thing is just complete babble.

She is learning new words every day. Her new favorite word is "MINE" Pretty sure she learned that from her big sister. She plays this game where she is starts to give you something, then takes it back and says, "MMMMMIIIIINNNNNEEEEEE!"

She loves to wrestle and be tickled. If she is on the bed with you, she will just jump on to get a wrestle match going.

She gets pretty excited when she hears the garage door open. She runs to the door screaming, "Daddy! Daddy!"

She loves to dance. She has this cute foot stomping and shoulder pumping move that cracks us up. I even signed her up for dance lessons in the fall.

Sadly, she does not like nursery at church. Well actually she does enjoy it, if we are in there with her. Music time and bubbles are her favorite.

I could go on and on about the cute, funny things Sarah does. We love everything about her. She is so happy and makes us laugh all day long. She is definitely an important part of our family.

Love you Sarah Baby!

Emily's Dance Recital

Emily had her 1st dance recital this week. She has been taking a tap/ballet combo dance class every week since last September. Let me just admit, I was pretty nervous about this recital. Growing up I quit dance TWICE because I didn't want to do the recital. Sometimes Emily is a little timed and can get overwhelmed easily, so I was praying she would make it out on stage. And she did AWESOME!

We had the dress rehearsal a few days before and that really helped her get used to the stage and being backstage without me.

DRESS REHEARSAL

Look at silly Sarah trying to make a "funny face."

Emily and Fallon

RECITAL

Hair and Makeup

Ballet - "The Garden Song"

I love that she looks so confident and is staring straight into the audience.

Hmmm, I am not sure what move they are actually supposed to be doing here. All three of the girls are doing something different. HA!

Tap- "Splish Splash"

Love the cute bathtub props they had. Poor Maire got a little scared and walked off.

Emily really knew the tap routine. I practiced with her every night the week before the recital and it really made a difference. She never looked over at the teacher and all the girls were following her lead. Way to go, Emily!

Trophy, flowers from Aunt Sharon and ballet shoes necklace from Mom and Dad.

So proud of our girl!

We were so happy that Nana and Larry, Aunt Sharon and Grandma and Grandpa came to cheer her on. It made it a very special day for her.

Nature Walk

Recently we took a walk through a nature trail for our latest Joyschool activity. The walk was very pretty and ran alongside a nice creek. Thankfully it wasn't too hot of a day, so we all enjoyed the walk. The kids had bags to pick up anything interesting, like leaves and flowers to make a collage with later.

April brought a ton of fun craft supplies, so all the kids had had lots of fun gluing down their leaves and decorating their collage.

Me and my girls!

Strawberry Pickin'

For our Monday night family activity, we went strawberry pickin with a few friends. The fields were a little picked over, but we had a fun time being with friends, family and the wonderful weather.

These two little girls are such the social butterflies.

They love to spot each other across the chapel at church and wave and yell each other's names.

Even though this was the first time we have been strawberry picking, these girls knew just what to do.

Busted, Sarah!

Check out those yummy strawberries!

Not sure why this turkey was there, but nobody really liked him. I guess Andy was brave enough to get close enough for a picture.

I love this picture of me and my baby! Thanks, Lindsay!

Such a fun family night!

Mother's Day

Mother's Day was GREAT for me. Actually, the whole weekend was great.

Friday night, we had friends over (see previous post). We convinced the guys to take all the kids inside, so Bekah, Jaime and I could hang out by the fire... relax... chat... drink our cokes!

Saturday, I went to the cannery with Bekah and Jaime. Once again, quality girls time. The poor dads were worn out by the time we got home. And that night happened to be our date night. NICE!

Sunday - Andy made breakfast! Then my mom and Larry came over for dinner. I felt so blessed to have my sweet girls and my mom with me on Mother's Day. My mom is the absolutely the best mom and friend. And of course, I am a mom to the best girls. However, I am still working on becoming the best mom myself.

Oh, and mom and I both got certificates for 90 minute back massages.

Can't wait to cash those in!

(Sadly Sarah was already in bed and didn't make the picture)

Hangin' out in the yard

Andy has been working hard in the yard this year. He cleared out a path to the pond and lined it with rocks. Then he got all the brush cleared out, so we now have a beautiful view of the pond from the house. We had a few friends over to enjoy his hard work.

Hanging out by the pond... and campfire.

Look at these big girls!

Boat ride with the dads.

Yes, it does look like it was midnight, but it really wasn't that dark out.

Throwing rocks in the pond is always a favorite past time.