July 24-July 31 Phone Pictures

August 1 - Aug 8 phone pictures

Time Flies

The other day I was at the dentist. He took a good look at the two adorable teeth Laurie has and asked, "How old is she, seven months?" I promptly corrected him, "Nope, she's six months. She is just big for her age." I thought through my answer and realized that I had been telling people that she was six months old for about a month... Oops. He was exactly on the nose - she was officially seven months old the following day. He said he could tell from her teeth so I guess that means they came in at the exact right time. (They broke through on the airplane when we traveled to Utah so I know the exact date - June 30.)

Anyway, I can't believe how quickly time seems to be going right now. Part of that probably stems from a three weeks vacation. That time just kind of vanished and now it is suddenly a month later. Then Andrew went south to drive from Utah to Texas with his dad so we "lost" another week.

I felt like the transition between six and seven months has been a huge one for Laurie. She is well past the infant phase and even seems like she isn't so much of a baby anymore even though she is still a ways out from becoming a toddler. She isn't quite scooting but seems like she will be any day. She is becoming more and more interactive. She LOVES to smile and her daddy and her brothers. Yesterday when Andrew had left the room she called out to him with a little cry and started waving her hand - opening and closing her fist in the way that we would typically do in saying hello or goodbye. She has learned that doing that means something, she just didn't have quite the right meaning.

Peter is finishing up his soccer season. It is too bad that we missed several games and practices while we were in Utah. His coach has been great and he seems to be on a really good team. He has been enjoying playing as the goalie although in today's game he played defense and forward in the two halves and was good in both of those positions as well. Peter also loves board games and plays daily. His favorite is Monopoly. Ammon and I each have times when we play against him.

Ammon does a lot of reading, playing on the wii, and is involved in scouts. We are looking forward to him doing a five-day kayaking day camp in a few weeks.

Andrew is enjoying work as a banker but is beginning to throw in for promotions. We'll see where that takes us.

I'm loving my family and am amazed to see how quickly and constantly life seems to change.

Collages: February - May

Another Ordinary Day

Today I woke up to the sound of Laurie cooing in her crib. She doesn't usually cry - just kind of calls out until I come and get her. But today she was just happy to talk to herself and play for a while. It was adorable.

We heard Barbara outside so we went upstairs for a visit. Sonner was thrilled to see Laurie and they both spent a few minutes talking to her. But it was raining pretty hard and a bit cold so Barbara invited us into her house even though she is still pretty sick. We visited for a few minutes but didn't stay too long.

Laurie had been really squirmy in my arms. Barbara said that she probably wanted to roll over again. I set her down on a blanket on the floor and within moments she had rolled over. I even got video of it! I'm so proud of my little girl.

I had visiting teaching this afternoon. I was super late because Andrew wasn't able to get home with the car on time. It was hectic and frustrating. I think our number one biggest regret with our move to Alaska has been that we left our second vehicle behind. We were so happy to give it to my brother and so relieved to not have an extra car to drive up here, but we have missed our Explorer SO MUCH! Anyway, with visiting teaching as late as it was, I wasn't as current on feeding the baby as I had meant to be. I left her home with Andrew and forgot to put in nursing pads. That made for an awkward leak. Fortunately the ladies I was with were really nice about it so now it is just a funny story.

The whole afternoon went differently than intended. Since Andrew came home late and stayed with Laurie while I visit taught instead of me keeping the car after his lunch break, he took the car back to work and I didn't have the car all afternoon. This messed up my plans to grab food for dinner at the store. So we had spaghetti with no meat in the sauce. It turned out great. I'm always pleased when I feel like I was able to make a meal appear out of thin air. But we really need to get to the grocery store soon.

I spent the evening playing Phase 10 with Peter and discussing books with Ammon. I am trying to get Ammon to record what books he reads and also at least verbalize a review about what he thought of them. He just goes through books so quickly - I want him to slow it down a little bit and pay attention to what he is reading.

Andrew and I have been quite tired this evening. Shockingly Laurie is already in bed (just after 10:00). Unfortunately we just heard Ammon still up so we can't go to bed quite yet. Hopefully soon, though. We are ready to sleep. (Plus we are using up our monthly internet allotment too quickly and we already watched two episodes on Netflix so, you know, what else is there to do but go to sleep...)

Actually, I'm hoping for a bath and then bed. Night night.

Back to the Basics

I really want to get back to keeping a journal so for a little while I'm going to start posting boring travel-logs of my day which may include what we did, what I spent time thinking about or whatever else I come up with.  Life with a new baby is both hectic and slow. I need to write to help myself evaluate how I am using my time and determine if it is what I want to be doing. So rather than trying to catch up on what's been going on for the past several months, let's talk about today.

I didn't wake up until I heard Laurie playing in her crib around 11:00 in the morning.  I was SOOO tired.  Laurie has been pretty regular about waking up in the morning for about an hour and then going back to sleep for most of the morning, so if I choose to sacrifice my morning time for sleep I generally have been able to since day one.  It's been a while since I stayed in bed until 11:00, though.  I wasn't expecting her to sleep that long.  Lately her wake up time has been around 9:30 and I've just stayed up after that.

Andrew came home for lunch just after noon.  That is pretty typical although last week was really busy at the bank and his lunches were getting later and later with each day. Because it's Wednesday I drove him back to work and kept the car.  That way I could drive Ammon to scouts. As long as I was out dropping him off, I also drove over to the library to drop off an overdue book. I wanted to go to the fabric store as well - I had taken the time to dig out a gift card I had to use for purchasing.  But I thought of it last minute and in my haste I forgot to grab the stroller.  I could have just grabbed the stroller at home and gone back out but Laurie seemed a little fussy so I opted to just stay home.  As it turned out, she was just wanting to top off the food situation and then fell asleep.

When the boys got home from school they hunted for the Phase 10 cards.  We are in the middle of the game.  The cards are MIA, though, so we started a game of zilch instead.  Games, popcorn and the rest of the Oreos that Andrew bought the other day.  It was a fun afternoon.  Peter was having incredible luck, however, and Ammon was not, so Ammon dropped out of the game fairly quickly.

Ammon told me that his friend was going to lend him the second Percy Jackson book (he had just read a comic book version of the first one and we had borrowed the movie from the library and watched it over the weekend) but I told him we should just go get the book from the library. Since we had the car at our disposal, we loaded up and did that this afternoon. Ammon came home with 10 books. Another movie we have watched recently was Redwall and Peter decided to search out that book so that he could read it.  It's a pretty big book for a 7 year old so I was pretty pleased with him for that.

Once home we pulled together some food - Ammon ate a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and Peter had the remaining waffles that Andrew had made and frozen. Then it was time for Ammon to head out to scouts.  Peter opted to stay home even though I had to go pick up Andrew after dropping off Ammon.

Ammon wanted to take a book to scouts with him but I wouldn't let him. He was a bit frustrated with me for not allowing it, but we talked it over and I explained my point of view and he was accepting of my decision by the time I dropped him off.  That is one thing I really appreciate about Ammon - he is very logical and I can usually explain my reasoning to him.

From the church I went to get Andrew.  I was about five minutes early and I sent him a text asking if he would be out on time.  He said yes, but Laurie was getting fussy so I decided to take her into the mall and wait for her there anyway. In the end it turned out to be a good move because he was about ten minutes late finishing up. He came out to where I was waiting and some random guy came up and admired Laurie.  It was someone who knew Andrew from the bank.  He says that happens a lot - people recognize him even though he doesn't know who they are. Just then Jessie and Chad Edwards came in with her three younger siblings.  Their dad, Steve Thomas, was just in a very serious accident on Friday and he and his wife are in Seattle at the hospital. We visited with them for a few minutes and then headed home.

Andrew ate a peanut butter sandwich for dinner. (I have been HATING the hectic nature of Wednesdays so I decided to try going simple for dinner and it totally worked.  Today was not nearly the miserable stress that we generally have.) Then it was time to take Andrew to the church for Young Men's and pick up Ammon from cub scouts. Andrew went into the church and planned to send Ammon out. He called me a few minutes later asking if I had Ammon because he was not to be found.  I didn't. He looked some more and called me again. That time while he was on the phone I had another call come in.  I suspected that it might have something to do with Ammon, so I took the call.  Sure enough Ammon was on the other line saying that he had walked home and was calling me from the computer.

I went home and we worked on laundry.  I laid Laurie down on her back on the living room floor and then worked on sorting socks with the boys just a few feet away from her. When we finished up I looked over and saw her laying on her tummy watching us.  It was her first official rolling over!!! I was so excited and proud of her.  The boys were offended in her behalf when I rolled her back over onto her back.  They said I ruined her progress. But she honestly doesn't like being on her tummy for too long and I was hoping she'd roll over again - so I could watch her this time.

Pretty soon after that it was time to go pick Andrew back up from the church.  First I said prayers with the boys and sent them to bed.  Then I loaded Laurie back in the car (I swear she is NEVER in the car as much as she was today) and we went off to get Andrew. When we got home I made myself a chicken quesadilla and started working on this blog. Peter came out and begged for food (his regular nightly routine) and Andrew started wondering what we could eat for a treat (our regular nightly routine). I mentioned that he could always make cookies for my visiting teaching ladies since I am going to visit them tomorrow. Next thing I knew he was in the kitchen with Laurie and I've been typing away.  Cookies are almost done and we are watching our current favorite show - Royal Pains. And that is a day in the life of me...  :)