Claire is One!

Happy Birthday, Claire! Our sweet little girlie turned one this week. She is so darling and brings so much joy to our family. 

One of Claire's most distinguishing characteristics is her love of food, especially spicy food. There is nothing you can put on her tray that she won't try, and very little that she won't scarf down. She's not a huge fan of Cheerios or other bland food, but she LOVES any meat, any sauce, chili, jambalaya, tomatoes, watermelon, anything. She'll even gnaw on plain lettuce or a raw onion. Seriously. One night she wouldn't eat a quesadilla, but she did enjoy several handfuls of salsa fresca. Sometimes she gets so excited about what she's eating that she laughs gleefully between bites. She doesn't particularly love getting her hands dirty or sticky though, so sometimes she will just lean over and try to eat right off her tray rather than getting her hands dirty, such as the picture below of her trying to eat cake without touching it. Her belly makes it a difficult task, but she actually can do it.

Claire has a sweet, husky voice that she is starting to use more and more often. She babbles constantly and is picking up new words and sounds. Guess what her first word was? "More." As in, more food, please. Now she can also say Baby and Yum-Yum, and sometimes sounds that resemble "Dog" and "Mommy."

She LOVES dolls, stuffed animals, and anything soft that she can snuggle. She will hold onto her stuffed baby doll with her life and just shriek and shout if someone tries to take it away from her. It's cute to watch her develop little preferences about what she loves to "play" with.

She is absolutely adored by her siblings. They hug her, kiss her, and applaud her accomplishments. They just treasure their little sis. Parker, especially, gets so excited when she does something new and loves to come tell me about it. I love that he is so proud of her, and I think that he will always be a protective older brother.

From the moment Claire sent me into labor a few hours before my scheduled c-section, she has done her own thing. She is feisty, silly, adventurous, and adorable. She is my first climber, so that's a fun adventure. She's taken a few little steps, but acts very inconvenienced by it, and far prefers her speed-crawling. She has a mischievous gleam in her eyes that makes me think that she may give me more than her fair share of headaches and heartaches. But we will see what the future holds. We love you, Claire!!!!!!

Guess Who's Here?

Can you guess from this picture of Kenley's who came to visit last week? My mom!!!!!! She obviously wanted to come up to see her grandbabies, but she also has her parents and all five of her siblings here, so there's lots going on up here! She gets to be up here for almost three weeks, so you'll be seeing more of our adventures, but here's what we've been doing so far!

Our first big adventure was going up to a delicious Cajun restaurant in Girdwood called Double Muskey. We had delicious steak, shrimp, jalepeno cheese rolls, and Double Muskey Pie.

Me, Marci (Sister #4), and my mom (Sister #1)

Michelle (Sister #3), Kay (Sister #2), and my grandma

While there, we took a slew of self-portraits, which I'm sure was not at all obnoxious.

Then we had a Girls' Weekend up at the lake with my grandma, my mom and her three sisters, me, Kenley, and Madeline.

We sat out on the dock and read books and trashy magazines.... (psst - I read TWO books on Saturday - that is my idea of a perfect vacation!)

We also took a few rides out on the raft.

The girls were so good. They played together the whole time, leaving lots of time for the rest of us to relax, eat, and enjoy some adult conversation. It was an awesome weekend!

More Summer Fun

The kids have still been spending a lot of time with Marci's kids next door. We watch them twice a week, so the kids have tons of time to play (and fight). Here's what we've been up to!

My aunt Kay has a whole garage full of dress-up stuff, so here's what the girls picked out for themselves.

One day we made homemade pretzels with the letters of the kids' names.

One day we did a talent show that we filmed on the video camera. Kenley wanted to do a cooking show, so she made a fruit salad. Then Madeline did a cooking show also, and made a smoothie. Parker and Carter's "talent" was sitting in this box playing with Star Wars guys.

Claire has been doing lots of eating, discovering more and more spicy foods she loves!

We had a big family dinner up at Kay's house, and the kids couldn't resist running through the big grass field behind her house.

For Carter's birthday, the girls made this "Pin the Parts on Potato Head" game for them all to play. It was so cute!

Okay, this next picture is actually representative of dozens of hours of play. You know the commercials for Bendaroos, and every kid thinks they need some? Well, I picked up a huge, brand-new set of them at a garage sale for $2. I kid you not, Kenley and Madeline have played with them for hours and hours and HOURS. They make animals, their names, wildly inappropriate Barbie clothes, jewelry, and many other creative creations. Tonight Kenley made this alien for her room, and tomorrow she and Madeline want to do a whole space mural on the wall with spaceships, planets, and an alien family. So, my review on this product is that they are well-worth the money. I think the set of 500 or whatever that we have is like $30, which I always thought was a rip-off, but honestly I think I'd pay it now. My kids LOVE these things, and they make some really cool, creative things with them. Here is Kenley with her cute little alien.

So that's what we've been doing for the last few weeks! I started my inservice days on Friday, and I have another week and a half of setting up my classroom and doing school and district training before the kids start on August 18th. But it's been a super fun summer. We've made a lot of memories and had a great time!

At the lake with Dad and Joanie

Over the weekend, we went up to the cabin with my dad and Joanie. Fun times were had by all!

Out on the raft....

The kids sitting on the back of the couch like I used to when I was little...

The lake in the morning....

My dad spending some quality time with Claire. These two were inseparable!

Chillin' at the cabin....

And down at the lake...

Four Generations of Fried Chicken

There's a restaurant here that my family has been going to for years. And by years, I really mean like generations. My grandparents took my dad as a kid, who in turn, with my mom, took me as a kid. And now that we're back, I'm taking my kids to enjoy the tastiest fried chicken and most delicious milkshakes in town. Here's my grandma, the owner, my dad and stepmom, and our little fam. My grandpa passed away before Kenley was born, but he was there in spirit, with his picture on the wall there in the restaurant.

Some other cute shots we took at the restaurant.....

Then we went back to my grandma's, where this darling leaned her chunky arms over into a toy box made by my great-grandpa....

And this darling embraced the culture of her new home...

Sun!!!!! I've missed you!

So today we had our first genuinely sunny day since we've lived here (I know!!!). Of course by this evening it was raining, but we'll just ignore that. But today was gorgeous, so we ditched out on all the hideous phone calls and unpacking we should have been doing and took the kiddos to a lake near our house that has swimming and a playground.

Then we came home and the kids hung out in the front yard, played toys, and ran through the sprinklers. By the way, I  know people are anxious for pictures of the house, but none of the houses you see in these pictures belong to us. This is our front yard though!

Then we did some homemade pizzas with Troxells and let the kids watch a movie while we played games. Here are the cute boys with their swim trunks, and then later sharing the beanbag chair to watch a movie.

It was such a nice day. At least now I'll appreciate the sunshine on the few days we actually have it. *Sigh*