Summer is winding down :(

Oh summer, why do you take so long to get here and then fly by so quickly??? I feel like you just got here!! I really don't want these days to end- I am so enjoying them with my favorite people! Here is what we have been up to, this last month of summer!

One day a couple weeks ago we went to Sinke's to see my cousin Betsy, and of course for train rides!

Hope had her first caboose ride and loved it!! I, of course, was a nervous wreck and almost had a heart attack when she started getting up on her knees while on the bridge!! This little girl is our fearless one! 

Betsy gave Hope a hooded towel that she made with Hope's name on it (and J has one, too, from when he was a baby that he still uses!).

When I print out pics, I will send you this one, Betsy! :)

Just a regular trip to Meijer! Not a huge Meijer fan, but you can't beat a 1 cent pony ride- I even let J ride twice.

Bath time! And I couldn't help myself.

This guy has been guarding our front door for over a week! Kinda cool, but also creepy when it turns its head to look at you and rubs his front legs together.... like it just spotted its next meal!

We were given fresh celery from friends at church who have a celery farm, and we got fresh green beans, zucchini, potatoes, onions, and carrots from our church's garden to create this yummy minestrone! So good!

A big issue with Hope's new mobility is her getting into J's stuff! This was one of his solutions. 

This girl makes us laugh every day!!

Sweet boy loves his family so much- he drew all of us and put these by his bed! (L to R Daddy, Mommy, Molly, Hope). I asked why he didn't draw himself and he said, "Well when I'm laying in bed I already AM myself, so I don't need a picture!"

We had a quick visit from our good friends from Iowa, the Paulsens. They stopped to see us on their way back to Iowa from Canada. Cody and Hope got to meet again! We may or may not already have their marriage pre-arranged.  J had a blast playing with his buddies Tristan and Pierce, too. It was SO good seeing friends from back home!!!

A pool day last week- our fearless one loves the water!

J is loving the pool,too, and getting so much more comfortable in the water!

We joined the masses and did some school supply shopping! Blah. But I love that what J picked out is totally HIM. He was set on a Star Wars folder and TMNT ear buds. But when it came to his notebook he decided right away on the baby tigers because they are "just SO CUTE!" 

My parents came for a little visit this weekend. Friday night we headed to GH to Diekema's for beach time and dinner.

This boy was definitely in his happy place!!

Today was HOT so we brought a picnic to the pool!

And we ended our time together at dinner in Saugatuck. I let J be our dinner time photographer. He chose Grandma and Grandpa (and our drinks) as his subjects.

I think we all feel the same way about saying good-bye AND summer winding down! (Sorry dad, I couldn't resist!) :)

 This coming week brings J's Kinder Explorer Camp, which is so exciting! He will get to meet his teacher and classmates and spend 3 mornings with them (before school actually starts the day after Labor Day). J is currently down with a tummy ache, sore throat, and 101.3 fever, though. So we're hoping he bounces back to his normal self by Tuesday!! 

 

 

 
 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

9 Months!

Hope is 9 months old, as of July 24! How?! How can it be that in 3 short months she will be a whole year old?!!?! I just can't.

We had her 9 month check-up on Monday, and she is doing great! I was reminiscing about J's 9 month appointment- where he vomited all over the place AND had an ear infection. Good times. Hope's  appointment was much less eventful, and we are so thankful that she is such a healthy little girl! She is weighing 19 lbs 11.5 oz which is 75th percentile. And she's 27 and 3/4 inches long, which is the 54th percentile. I forget which percentile she's in for head circumference, but she continues to have a big head. Which is accentuated by the mop of hair on her head! By comparison, at 9 months J was 22 lbs 13 oz and 29.5 inches long (90th percentile for both). Even though Hope sports some amazingly chunky thighs and chubby cheeks, she's really pretty average sized! :)

She brings so much joy to our lives!

Hope is doing SO much lately! I swear it's like every day she does something new. I'd say her first official word was "bye-bye", which she says all the time with the backwards wave (and started saying at about 8 months). She pretty consistently refers to me as "ma ma ma ma" and Adam as "da da." She also seems to say "ba" in reference to J (apparently I call him "brother" a lot). She also just added "hi" to her repertoire, and it is THEE CUTEST thing! Click HERE to see a video! She is also really close with "grampa" (sorry to all other family members). Click HERE for a video of that. She also claps like a champ, and of course does her "so big." She is making lots of different sounds (including high-pitched squealing, yikes) and often sounds like she is having a one-sided conversation. Click HERE for a video of that! Sorry for all the videos. Actually, I'm not. She's cute!!!

H can often be heard making the "bbbbmmmm bbbbmmmm" truck sound just like big brother used to do, too! And usually she does it while pushing around one of J's cars or trucks or tractors.

Hope is pulling up on everything and wants to go everywhere! 

She has scraped up knees and toesies from crawling around the driveway and the cement at the splash park! And yes, of course I make sure the pavement is not too hot! She wouldn't care anyway, she'd just move quicker. But I still do.

 

My attempt to give her a place to crawl around worked really well.

Hope is a baby food eating champ, and likes pretty much any kind I give her. The only one she's kind of iffy on is peas, and that's perfectly understandable! She also loves puffs and yogurt melts, and has tried Cheerios, too. But that's about where the table food ends for her- she is so gaggy just like her brother! I've tried a bit of cooked carrot (which she chewed and kept on her tongue for like 10 minutes before gagging) and also bits of banana (which she repeatedly gagged on). So that's what we will keep working on! And the sippy cup, too. Oh, and she has also had her first tastes of sand, dirt, grass, rocks, and dog food. Right, but it's bananas and carrots that make her gag?!?!?! Seriously.

Saving that puff for later.

She is also MAJORLY starting to get into J's stuff, which drives him crazy! She is extremely fast when she is going for something she is not supposed to have. She is such a little firecracker, and definitely knows what she wants (and quickly lets us know what she doesn't want.... with that high-pitched squeal). She seriously makes us laugh every day, and we love her so much!!

 

 

 

 

Summer Fun!

We are continuing to stay busy and are trying to enjoy our summer to the fullest! I really love hanging out each day with my 2 buddies, and I know that all too soon J is going to head off to school full time! Waaah! I am going to miss him! And I know Hope will too! Although she will probably be excited to have free reign over all his tractors and trucks while he's gone. :)

But let's not dwell on the sadness of J starting Kindergarten in approximately 50 days (!!!).

2 weekends ago we had a visit from Grandma and Grandpa Wiers and Abby. They all came to town because Matt was in GR for a 2 week class at Calvin. So we were all able to all spend time together over the weekend! On Friday we went to Meijer Gardens, at J's request.

Um, wow. Good "Mad Mom" impression. I guess he's seen that before a time or two?!

In the Japanese Garden

Just hanging around. From a giant horse's hoof.

Both J and H loved the Great Lakes water play area!

While H napped at home with Grandpa and Grandma, Abby, J, and I hung out at the pool in our housing development.
 

For dinner that night we went up to GH and met the Diekema's and Uncle John at Fricano's!

J is a huge fan- he ate 4 pieces!

We're at Fricano's and all I get is squash?!?!

On Saturday we went out to Uncle Carl and Aunt Cora Mae's house to ride the train! Again- J's request. :)

J loves hanging out and learning from Chuck!

Of course Matt and I rode, too! And J was taking our tickets.

Hope loved her first train ride! I tried to sit her up on my lap and she wanted NO part of it. She wanted to sit in the train car all by herself!

On Sunday we went to our church, and then in the afternoon we went blueberry picking! 

Who doesn't wear their candy necklace for blueberry picking?!

On Monday, everyone left us. :( J was quite sad- he said, "I like when people visit us!" He usually ends up staying up later than normal and not having to take a "rest" during the day, so that probably plays a small part in that. :)

J had shown some interest in karate, so we decided to look into that for him. He got to try it out (for free!) and really enjoyed it!

We tried Chan's Martial Arts, but they want a 1 year commitment, and we were not sure we wanted to pay that much $ for J to get sick of it after 2 months! So we'll see- we're looking around a bit and may try another place. Interestingly, not many of these types of places post their prices on their websites. And now I know why!

Tuesday the 14th was our 8th wedding anniversary!

We celebrated by having dinner (with our 3rd and 4th wheels) at Carrabba's in Grandville. And then we stopped by Hager Park in Jenison for J to play! They have a terrain map of the United States there.

There's our Iowa boy in Iowa :)

J has been working hard to complete his summer reading program checklist from the library. Today he checked off "read for 20 minutes in an empty bathtub"!

Yep. That's a book titled "Harvesters."

And one final pic of Hope, because why not?

This is what after pigtail hair looks like! 

Stay tuned- H will be 9 months old in a few days so I will post about that soon!

 
 
 
 

 

 
 

 
 

 

 

 
 
 

 

 

4th of July!

Happy Independence Day!

 We spent the long 4th of July weekend at my parent's house in Wisconsin! We left about 11:30 am on Thursday and arrived in time for dinner at Panera (of course) with Uncle Lew and Aunt JoAnne. 

It was nice to just enjoy a quiet (except for Molly's barking), relaxing weekend! On Friday we hung out in the morning. J is obsessed with doing yard work when he is at Grandpa and Grandma's house. He likes to take Grandpa's clippers and snip grass, weeds, flowers, really anything. And this weekend he discovered Grandpa's spreader (who knew my dad had so many tools?!). So J spent a lot of time spreading dirt for Grandpa (which then Grandpa would sweep up). :) 

Yard work also requires wearing Grandma's gardening gloves.

Hope had her first experience with bubbles!

In the afternoon we hit the Wirth Park pool again- J was VERY excited to go back and show daddy the pool!

Loving the water!

Tired baby when it was time to go home!

Friday night my parents were kind enough to watch the kiddies for us so we could enjoy a date night! I think this was our first real date with just the 2 of us since our anniversary last year- so almost a whole year!  We went to the Cheescake Factory- one of our favorite places, and one we can't enjoy in West Michigan! It was just as yummy as I remembered.

We were only gone like 2 and a half hours to be back to feed H before bed, but it was wonderful! So nice to enjoy a meal and being able to talk without "Hey Mommy" or "Hey Daddy" every 5 seconds. We are so glad that Hope is starting to get used to my parents, too, after seeing them every few weeks- it made it much easier to leave her knowing that she wouldn't be screaming her head off! She is very much a mommy's girl, which has its pros and cons. :)

On Saturday morning we went to the Brookfield 4th of July parade. J was SO excited for this and had been looking forward to it for days!! And it did not disappoint- he got to see army trucks, fire trucks, and he came away with candy and other free crap, I mean stuff. So he was thrilled!

Ready for the parade!

Grandma and Hope were practicing "Yay!"

The highlight for both J and H- free tennis balls! Hope had a death grip on hers.

We relaxed in the afternoon and grilled brats and burgers for dinner.

This is J's idea of relaxing.

Then in the evening we went to the Elm Grove fireworks! This was also something J was SUPER excited about! We met Uncle Lew and Aunt JoAnne at an elementary school near where they shoot off the fireworks.

Fun with glow sticks!

Surprisingly, Hope conked out during the fireworks (she must have been exhausted!). She didn't even flinch for the grand finale! Apparently that is what we have been doing wrong all this time- she needs loud fireworks in order to sleep well!

On Sunday, on our way back to MI, we stopped for a family gathering of my Wiers side of the family. Always so great to seem them! And especially now, it is fun to see our kids play together. Unfortunately I took no pics, but Adam did take one.

See? Lots of fun had by all. :)

And for anyone who is just dying to see what Hope has been up to lately, here are a few videos. HERE is a video of her showing off her crawling skills (taken a few weeks ago, so already she is much faster!).

 And HERE is a video of her doing her "tricks" which include bye-bye, so big, and clapping. Don't mind the messy bed-head and dirty face, okay? And isn't she so smart?? :)