Trouble

Aubrey is 10 months now and I like to call her "trouble". As you can see she is always getting into something but at least she is so cute while she is doing it. I didn't have to child proof much with Hailey so I'm learning the tricks.

She is an easy going baby; the two things that get her mad are when someone takes something away from her or eats in front of her without sharing, other than that she is all smiles.

Some of my favorite things:

-When she gets in yelling fights with Hailey (it is so funny)

-When she looks at me and laughs while she crawls away as fast as she can when she knows she is going somewhere she shouldn't

-When I sit her on a bed and she starts bouncing up and down

-When she hears music and stops what she is doing to throw both hands up in the air and bounce up and down

She is so much fun...I could just stare at her all day long.

Well, nothing exciting has been going on. We have been going through an adjustment period with preschool. Hailey went through a week of not wanting to go to school. She is so sweet and sensitive and I think it was hard for her to see the teachers not being the nicest when kids get out of line. Since then I think she has adjusted and she doesn't protest going but she does get excited for the weekend. She was also waking up groggy, thus the mornings were a little hectic trying to get her ready. But today both the girls woke up right at seven which is the time we are suppose to get up so hopefully their clocks have adjusted and we will have smoother sailing. I had to adjust myself because for the last 4 years I have had the leisure of taking mornings slow and not having to go anywhere so I think I have finally adjusted as well. The afternoons are hit or miss because she comes home tired and grumpy some days but overall I think we are finally getting the hang of this school thing.

Stay-cation

Two of my sisters, Laura and Corine, came to visit last week. We went ahead and did a Stay-cation while they were here. We had a lot of fun and are trying to get back into the swing of things. Here are some of the things we did.

Shopping: Grocery and clothes

Swimming and beach

Haircuts, massages and facials

Boating

Disneyworld

Hailey and Aubrey had a lot of fun playing with their Aunts, I had a lot of fun with my sisters and Charlie was a good sport putting up with all of us girls.

7 year Anniversary

Here we are the happy couple in our engagement picture. Much has changed in the last 7 years since that photo including our photographer. Our photographer for this anniversary tagged along the whole evening and when she took the picture she told us to put our heads together and say "cheese". She was very good especially since she was free.

Our Anniversary was on Sunday, August 24th. Charlie made us a yummy breakfast of orange rolls and fruit before church. The girls cooperated and we were all able to take naps at the same time after church which usually doesn't happen. Then for dinner Charlie made another yummy meal of steak, potatoes and green beans. If you couldn't guess, Hailey was our photographer and she also enjoyed the steak while Aubrey crawled around on the floor looking for crumbs. We enjoyed being together and remembering why we love each other so much. On Monday we dropped the kids off at a friends house and went to dinner at Carraba's. That was our first childless date in 10 months. Although we didn't do anything too extravagant we enjoyed our weekend together and will plan extravagance for another anniversary.

Tropical Storm Fay

Other than feeling couped up in the house all week we weathered the storm fine. However our city/county has had a rough time. We have had lots of flooding! We drove around on the second day of the storm and many of the streets were flooded, we had to try three different ways to get back home because roads were blocked off. Thankfully the drainage in our neighborhood is good and other than a leaky window in our bedroom we had no problems. I feel so bad for all the people that have had their homes flooded, it sure does a lot of damage to your possessions. Hailey only had one day of preschool before school was canceled. Hopefully she will start again on Monday, it will be like having a first day again. Hopefully the rest of Hurricane season is good to us, sometimes I think "What am I doing here" :)

First day of Preschool

So the first day of Preschool was on Monday. We all dropped Hailey off as a family. She was excited and looked a little nervous as we left the classroom but had no problems with us leaving. I was missing her and a little anxious to see how her first day went. I know once we get used to going we will get over the first week jitters. She's my first baby going off to school so it's a little hard for me to let go. She was excited to see me when I picked her up and said she had a good time. I didn't get a whole lot out of her on what they did but she said they talked about listening and not listening. She said she met one friend and that the bathrooms didn't have doors on them and one girl looked at her. I will have to check into that and see what that is all about, I think the room used to be used for 2 year olds who are potty training but I think they should have some privacy because they are at the age when we are trying to teach them about modesty.

So here she is as we are about to get in the car for school. It is a uniformed preschool.

After one day of school she has already been on a two day break because of tropical storm Fay. It has been raining for over 24 hours and a little windy but other than that it hasn't done any damage. They probably would have been fine to go to school but at least we are easing our way into the whole going to school thing. She will go tomorrow and then be done for the week.

Here she is doing her first homework assignment, doesn't that look fun? She is suppose to decorate a shoe box and put items in there that tell about herself for show and tell.

Summer Time Update

Wow, I have really been a slacker on here...I hadn't realized how much time went by. It's summer time so we have just been hanging out and swimming a lot. We did so much swimming that Hailey got swimmers ear and we had to take a 5 day break for her ear to heal. But she has become a real swimming fish since I last posted. She jumps in and can swim the length of the pool by herself. She took some swimming classes and really enjoyed that. Here is a picture of her jumping off the diving board on her last day of swim class. (I think the look of terror is just her getting ready to hold her breath.)


She also took dance class this summer. She enjoyed that as well but if she had to pick a favorite I think she would pick swim class.


Aubrey finally rolled last week on her 8 month mark. And a few days after that she learned how to sit up from a lying down position. Both things she learned to do in her crib so it took a few days before I was able to actually see her in action. It has made nap time a little more difficult because she rolls over and sits up instead of taking her nap. This is something we have never had to deal with before because Hailey NEVER sat up in the crib. We kept her in the crib until she was 3 1/2 years old and she would just lay there until we came to get her. Now that I think about it, it was actually really nice and weird at the same time. Here is what she looks like when we come to get her.


We also had my brother Brian and his wife Mich'ele come out and visit for a couple days and we were able to meet our first niece and cousin on my side of the family. She is 2 months old and a cutie, Hailey had a lot of fun holding her. We took them to the beach and the zoo while they were here.

Summer time is winding down, although the heat will be here a few more months for us, and Hailey starts preschool in a week and a half. Hopefully I will have a good report about that soon.

Learning to Swim

Hailey has always been a cautious girl. I have never really pushed her to do anything because when she makes up her mind to do something she does it. She was that way with potty training. She is a goal setter, when she decides she is ready to try something new she will pick a day of the week and then keep asking me when the day comes and then do whatever goal she has set for herself. Well we have been going to the pool a lot this summer and she swims with her floaties. Usually towards the end she will take them off and hang on to the wall or grab on to me. Today was the same, she took them off and then started treading water hanging on to the wall. Then she started to let go of the wall and then grab back onto it. Then she stared treading water going up and down the wall while letting go and grabbing back on. Then she started putting her head under and treading up and down the wall while letting go and then grabbing back on. Then she started to kick her legs and kind of float next to the wall while grabbing onto the wall and letting go. After that she started to kick and use her arms and when she ran out of breath she would grab the wall. This process took about 10 minutes and by the end she was swimming laps by the wall and only grabbing it when she needed some air. All the while I just walked up and down with her not saying anything except for an occasional "good job". It was amazing to watch the process unfold until she was ultimately swimming all by herself without any instruction. So today she learned how to swim! Of course she still has work to go before she is completely comfortable and swimming all around but it was neat to watch her learn how to swim.