Now for all the June stuff...

June was good. I can't remember anything that happened at the beginning, but towards the end we left for a vacation with all of Mike's family to the Oregon coast. Our original plan was to leave incredibly early on Friday morning and do the whole thing in one day (Mike wasn't as gung-ho with me on that one), but because of a health scare with my sister we ended up leaving Friday afternoon instead.

We stopped for lunch in Idaho Falls. Eleanor needed to nurse, so we just parked in a deserted parking lot facing the gorge and Mike took Mim for a walk to get some wiggles out.

Eleanor and I joined them at a scenic viewpoint, where we watched some base jumpers. We saw the first one go and Mike and I looked at each other- wondering if we had just watched someone commit suicide. Then the chute came out and we were both pretty relieved.

Pretty crazy. I could/would never do it; I'm 100% sure.

Both the girls were total champs for the drive. Mim got pretty whiny about two hours after her bedtime on the way to Boise, but then I remembered popcorn. Eleanor was 3 hours late to bed, but she just quietly sucked her thumb until right when we pulled up to our hotel for the night.

We got to the beach house late on Saturday. We went to church with everybody the next day and then took a walk down to the beach with Kati and Jon & co., which then turned into playing in the water.

Yeah, Eleanor loved the beach.

So did Mim; I could hardly get her to stand still for a picture, much less actually look at me.

We stayed in Kati and Jon's beach house and it had a BEAUTIFUL view. It was gorgeous. Stuff like this every night:

I missed this day trip, because all the missed sleep was really catching up to Eleanor and making her a cranky baby. I stayed home while she slept and Mike and Mim went with everybody to the Clatsop Fort (one of Lewis and Clark's). Apparently Mim was a big fan of these stuffed birds that call/sing/quack when you push on them; here she is trying to hold all of them.

Tidepool day!

{Mike, wearing Eleanor like a boss.}

{She wrote that herself, folks.}

The day before we left (maybe it was 2 days before?) the weather was gorgeous and the warmest it had been the whole time we were there. Definitely a beach day.

{Oh, Matt. I can't believe he's in the MTC now.}

{She really wanted to be buried.}

{Right before we all split up to make our own ways home.}

So, my picture record is woefully incomplete. Some of the highlights I didn't get pictures of:

*Mim's reaction to our "hotel house." She was dead tired in the car, but as soon as we got to the room she got her second wind. Eleanor caught it from her and both of them ran (or crawled, in Eleanor's case) around everywhere just squealing and laughing.

* The dinners. Everybody took a turn and it was delicious.

* Our date. We went out one night to the Wayfarer in Canon Beach (which is where we went 5 years ago when we were out there) and it was sooooooo good. And fun (we doubled with Nate and Rach). Mike got to eat a whole crab, which was pretty much his only goal for vacation.

* On the second day of driving out, we stopped for lunch in Baker City. We had stuff for sandwiches and we stopped in a park to have a picnic. As we were finishing, a parade came marching by (a small parade- a band, jugglers, stilts people, clowns, and dancers) which was cool, but then they turned and stopped in the park and played another song and then announced they were a vaudeville troop that had a show that night and they were going to do workshops there for the afternoon. It was super cool. Mike got a few pictures with his phone; maybe I'll get them added to this post some day.

Here's some stuff from May

Mim did gymnastics for a few months again this year. She loved it.
These are all from their exhibition that was at the end of May.

{She got pretty good at waiting for her turn; which is pretty much the most awesome thing you can ask for out of a 3-year old gymnastics class.}

{They would put the arms up and say ta-da before and after everything. This was pre-vault.}

 

 

 

{Oh dear.}

Hmmmmm. It won't upload the videos I have of all the events. I'll work on it later. First, I want to get to the rest of the May stuff.
Here are some pictures just from around the house:

 She loves setting the table (her stool or the piano bench) and having "pick-a-picks," especially with Mike.

{The chickens. They're giant now. It's Buffy, Pansy, Duchess, Leeroy Jenkins, and Lucille. }

{My cat is tolerant.}

{She insisted on sleeping with ALL her bears on her bed for about a month.}

{She still loves to color, especially with markers. LOVES it.}

 Gross. There's food in her mouth. But there's also teeth! She got those back in May, and now just in the last few days her top 2 have come through.

For Memorial Day, we went to Kangaroo Zoo with some friends. We had almost the whole place to ourselves, which I hadn't expected.

{I have quite a few pictures like this. Blurry and off-center- classic bounce house.}

Mim and Eleanor love to take baths together. So much. When Eleanor doesn't need a bath, they still play like this. It's really sweet.

Other stuff for May:
Eleanor started talking a bit. She knew "mama" and "dada" and "kitty." She's added on to her vocabulary now, but I'll post about it later. I need to get a video of her talking with that sweet little voice.

Easter!

I'm still trying to finish up Mim's 3 year old interview, so in the meantime, in non-chronological order, here's how we celebrated Easter.

On Saturday there was an Easter breakfast at my parents' house followed by an egg hunt, I missed the breakfast because I was teaching, but Mike and the girls made it. I was impressed with him- it was his first time getting the girls out of the house in the morning all by himself. Way to go, Mike!

I got there in time for the egg hunt, which was pretty good. Mim, Will, and Ari were all very excited and took off after all the "hidden" eggs. Mim was not above swooping in and grabbing one that had already been spotted by her cousin, much to Will's consternation.

After all the eggs were found we headed home to get ready for Mim's birthday party and our own Easter Egg hunt. We'll skip that for now- on to Sunday!

This was the first year that I did Easter baskets. Eleanor got baby food (I make most of it myself, but I like having some on hand for when we're out and about) and a ball, Mim got socks, flips flops (not to be worn together), and some bath stuff (she used ALL the bath paints in one hour-long bath a few days later). Nothing too crazy. I can't believe how overboard some people go with Easter baskets- it gets turned into another Christmas, present-wise. Yikes and no thank you.

That being said, I did splurge a little on some Easter dresses. I had plans to make some, but then saw the most adorable little pink dress at Costco- I impulse bought it for Mim, then decided to justify it, it would be her Easter dress. I found one a week later at Target for Elle- not too matchy-matchy, but similar.

{No smiles from Eleanor- she DID NOT like sitting on the grass.}

{This one's my favorite}

I hope you had a great Easter, too!

Oh dear

{Love the little foot poking out of her jammies}

This little stinker has been pulling up for about 4 weeks now. While it's fun to watch her hit all these milestones and grow up, I have to admit that this stage just isn't my favorite. There's too many bonked heads for me to really love it. Ahwell. She's pretty good at balancing, at least.

She loves her daddy