Mountains

I am slow at posting these days, but here are some pictures from our latest adventure (2 weeks ago).  My parents rented a wonderful cabin/house in the mountains and we took the girls on their second trip overnight.  If you remember our first trip to the beach was very difficult and Scott said we would not do another overnight trip for 5 years.  However, this opportunity was too tempting and so we tried again, the first night was pretty bad but the next 2 nights were much better.  The girls really did great and enjoyed the outing.  They loved playing with their cousins Jesse even crawled around on the floor with them and they loved it when he chased them down the hall.  We had a lot of fun and even got to hang out in the hot tub after the girls went to bed. 

Behind the house was a little creek that was sooo cold, but the girls did like to dip their hands and toes in it.  It was very pretty and I took some pictures of the girls and Scott even let me be in a few.  I think it was a good trip overall.

Here are the girls cousins that were able to join us at the mountains....aren't they cute.

Our Second Walker

It is official we now have two walkers.  Olivia has decided to join Savannah.  Savannah is obviously still the superior walker of the two, but Olivia is going to make big strides to catch up with Savannah.  Emma enjoys walking behind toys, but still does not show the interest in walking by herself.  Why should Emma bother walking, when her sisters want to play with her they still get down on the floor and crawl around with her.

New Tricks

The girls have lots of new 'tricks' now, they are very good at peek-a-boo, it is their favorite game and they can do it themselves.  When they find a burp cloth lying around they take it and put it over their heads, then either they will pull it off and laugh or a sister will crawl over to pull it off.  It is funny, here is a video from a few months ago of them playing with our friend Larry.



They also have learned to make noises with their mouth.  I think Savannah was the first to learn how to stick her tongue out and vibrate it to make noise and lots of spit.  It did not take long for her sisters to catch on.  Our little Emma was the first to learn that if she fake coughs mom and dad will ask her if she is ok, so now it is a game...I think she had some help from nana and paw-paw Steve on that trick.  Her sisters caught onto that game very fast too, so now we have 3 fake coughers.  We also taught them how to give people high-5 and we are working on blowing kisses.  Olivia also gives real kisses, when we ask for a kiss she opens her mouth and then leans forward to give you a wonderful wet slobbery kiss.  Here is a video Scott took of them doing their 'tricks'.



Their new favorite toy is a riding/push toy they love to push it around, and our little climber Olivia has learned to use it as a step ladder to try to get over the gate.  Savannah loves to walk with the toy, Olivia loves to ride on it...so...the other day we caught Savannah pushing Olivia it was so funny, unfortunately we weren't fast enough to get out the camera in time, but here is a video of them playing with the toy.

Projects

It has been very busy here the past few weeks.  I had two projects that I wanted to get done around the time of the girls birthday.  The first project was a fence.  We wanted to close in the back yard to prevent the girls from being able to get to the front.  I was able to get the fence all built before their birthday, but the paint came after.  The fence is 2 small sections.  On the left side of the house our fence connects to the neighbors fence and on the right side of the house it butts up to the neighborhood fence.  The fence took a lot longer than I had planned.  The ground was hard when I dug the post holes.  There were a couple days I could not work on it since it rained.  The gates took a while since I had never built a fence gate before, so I had to make sure I took my time to do it right.  There is only about 35 feet of fence, but it took more than a gallon of paint.  Here are pictures of the completed and painted fence.

The other project I wanted to accomplish was a swingset for the girls.  It took me a while to decide on what to get for them.  We looked at all those large kits at Home Depot, Lowes, Target, Walmart, Toys r us, and other places.  The kits were all very expensive, a most basic kits costing over $500.  These sets were built with cheap 2x4s and were not all that sturdy.  I then found a small kit at Target for around $100 dollars and then paid about $125 for the lumber for it.  Mom and dad stayed for a couple days after the party so dad was able to help me build the swingset.  It was easy to do, but it did take a little bit of time and some more money in drill bits to drill through the 4x6.  After it was all built I was able to use the same paint as the fence to give it a more natural feel in our back yard.  Sarah and I and more importantly the girls all love the swingset.  Here is a picture of the completed swingset.  I would also like to thank our neighbor for the slide, the girls can't use it quite yet, but I am sure they will love it soon enough.  

The set came with 2 adult type swings and a pair of rings.  Those are all sitting in the garage.  We put on a fourth swing for when the girls have a friend come over and play.  I mentioned that the girls love the swingset so I will also show you a video of them on the swingset.  

Smash Cake Session

A friend at work had told me about this new photography trend where you do a 'smash cake' session with a proffessional photographer.  I thought this was a terrific idea and decided that with Scott's help, his mom's help and his dad's, I would be able to do a session myself.  I dressed the girls in some adorable tutus that the girls got from Ryan and his mommy (she made them...too cute huh?) and let them go at a cake together.  I think the pictures turned out pretty good for a non-proffessional.

Emma

Olivia

Savannah

Our First Walker

Just a quick update on our little stander Savannah...she has turned into a walker.  She took her first step (really more like 2) this afternoon.  She has taken several more little steps this evening showing off to my mom and her company.  It's so cute, I'm so glad she did it on the weekend so that I was there to see her try out her new skill.