A Few Months Later...

It seems as though life is flying by and I am not keeping up with this blog! Hopefully in a few words I can update you on our lives these past few months.

Since our last post...
Taylor turned 2 on August 24th! Although she really didn't have any desire to talk in the past, her vocabulary has taken off! It's so fun to hear her sweet voice, which seems to be lower in pitch than Kaitlyn's. She FINALLY started saying Kaitlyn's name. Well, it was more "Kate" but it was good enough for us! However, yesterday she started using 2 syllables for Kaitlyn. It's amazing how her vocabulary expands by the day. If she's anything like Kaitlyn, she'll never lack in conversation. Our favorite thing about her is that she truly loves life. Life is a party no matter what the case. She gets excited about everything! We love her enthusiasm. Hopefully it will stay that way. I will say, however, that nothing melts my heart more than snuggling with her. At night during our bedtime routine, I love it when she pulls me close to give me a kiss through that pacifier of hers. As we snuggle she loves to join in singing with me and prays by herself. These are moments I'll treasure forever.

Kaitlyn will be 5 in March- less than 3 months away! Where did that time go? She's growing up. I suppose it's bitter sweet for me. I love that she and I can do special activities and have the conversations we have but I just want her to stay young. I'm not ready to send her to Kindergarten in August. I'm not ready for her to start this phase of life. It's hard to imagine her not being in my care all day. At least I still have several months to get ready. When I taught Kindergarten we had a "Boo-Hoo Breakfast" for parents the first day. Yep, need to prep for that!!!

Kaitlyn LOVES to learn! I pray she'll keep that enthusiasm for learning. She's reading simple books, sounding out words phonetically and writing a simple sentence. And I must say, she is a great learner in the kitchen. She loves to help me bake. I figure it's never too early to teach her the meaning of fractions, right? :) Aside from this, my most favorite moments are our conversations at night. It's fun to lay with her and talk about our day, talk about our plans for tomorrow and share stories from when I was a child. She LOVES that! She told me the other night, "Mom, I love you the most and I love Daddy the most. I love you and Daddy and Taylor the same height." This heart of hers is tender and compassionate. I know I'm the mom but I think she exemplifies this sometimes more than other children her age. At night we pray that she'll always have a beautiful heart, a heart that loves God and others. These moments with our sweet Kaitlyn are ones I will treasure forever.

Jason and I are doing well! I'm so proud of the hard worker he is. He is a PTO and now trains new officers as they come out of the academy. Teaching in the field is right up his alley. He's such a leader and a man of many talents! Boy, the girls and I are so blessed! With one of his many talents he plans on going to Zambia this summer on a medical mission trip. Last year, the medical personnel saw over 16,500 people in just 6 days. Wow! He's very excited to take his God-given talents to the people where many have never seen a doctor, ever. He'll be gone for about 2 1/2 weeks. He will have such an amazing time! We'll miss him but what an amazing experience he'll have.

Well, here are some pictures of our past few months! Enjoy!

Pictures of the past few months

Bella

Bella is now almost 6 months old!

A Long Overdue Update!

Oh my! It's been quite a while since I've updated. I'm not even sure I've put a picture of our dog on here. Bella is our little black lab who LOVES the girls and the girls adore her. Let's just say she's a puppy. For those of you who have ever raised a puppy you know what I mean. : ) She is incredibly patient with Taylor who tugs, pulls and bosses her around. So good natured and incredibly sweet.

Kaitlyn is approaching 4 1/2 in September. Taylor will be 2 in 14 days, already! I'd better be figuring out what exactly I'm going to do for her birthday. It will be here before I know it. Kaitlyn is as sweet as ever. The problem is, she just won't stop growing up! She enjoys being such a big helper with the dog. I love that she and Taylor can now play together. It's funny because she reverses the roles when they play. Taylor is the mom and she is the baby (or one of them is the dog which I thought would stop once they got a dog). Recently, it was rather precious when they were playing in Kaitlyn's kitchen and they each brought Jason breakfast in bed. Boy were they proud of their pretend creations! Kaitlyn loves to be a role model for Taylor which is great because Taylor wants to be just like her.

I have started preschool with Kaitlyn. She asks me to do it with her which makes it even more fun. I pulled out a lot of my teaching stuff from when I taught kindergarten and it's coming in quite handy!

Taylor is finally starting to talk. She said her first sentence on June 9th! "Don't touch" came out of her mouth much to our amazement. It was after that I realized I really do tell her that quite often. I guess it's proof she does listen! Since then she's added MANY more words to ber vocabulary as well as a few phrases. Taylor's not quite 2 yet and just about potty trained. She wants to be like Kaitlyn so much that she has done this all herself, amazingly! I love it! Hopefully the diapers that I currently have will be the last diapers I will ever buy.

We had the opportunity to take a family vacation to San Diego this summer. It was a much needed vacation. It was so nice to just get away- just our little family. We went to Sea World, the San Diego Zoo, a Padres baseball game and of course the beach. The girls LOVED the ocean. Thankfully we took our tent with us because it allowed us to stay one day for 5 1/2 hours! We were there for 6 days which was absolutely relaxing but I must say, it's always good to come home. :)

Since I haven't been good about updating the pictures you will be surprised just how much the girls have grown. Enjoy pictures of our last few months!

San Diego Vacation