Popsicle Girls

Aunt Hayley watched the girls one day for us and they had fun with delicious popsicles. Rhen has a hard time figuring out how to get more out of the plastic when the top part is gone, but she using figures something out and manages to eat the whole thing (minus what she has down the front of her.) We do popsicles shirtless - makes for easier laundry for mom!

This is what you get when you spill and then walk all over in it. Red feet.

We had cute little red footprints all over our deck. It washed right off but I thought it was so cute!

AC skirt - Rease

Why is it so fun to stand on top of the AC vent? This is why! Instant princess skirt!

Plus doesn't it feel so good on a hot summer day to just cool off for a minute?

Sisters

I love my sister!

Kisses - Rhen

Rhen is a kisser. She even wants to give kisses through the shower door - how can I pass that up?

Toes are yummy!

Rhen has started sucking on her toes while she is in her carseat. I try and tell her it's yucky (since she's been walking on her feet all day and they are nasty and dirty) but she just laughs.

So funny!

Coloring

Rease has always loved to color. Lately though she has taken it more seriously and will color for an hour or so at a time. We've started teaching her how to color in the lines and use different colors on one page. You can see how she has progressed.

This is how most of her pictures used to look - scribbles and usually just one color.

Then she started using more than one color on a page.

And now she's getting good at staying in the lines as well.

What a girl!

Draper Days

We spent a little bit of time at Draper Days this year. We went to the parade in the morning and then to the park for a little bit to check out the festivities. Rease and Rhen wanted to ride the horses so that's where we spent our time.

Rhen and I just hanging out waiting for our turn on the horse.

I walked along the side of Rhen just in case she got off balance. But she really didn't need my help at all.

And Rease loves riding the horses - any fair/carnival/parade that we go to that has horses to ride she wants to have a turn.

Both the girls enjoying their ride.

We didn't stay much longer because it was naptime (and super hot outside so we really couldn't stand the heat anymore.) We had good intentions of going back that night for the concert and fireworks but ended up back and mom and dad's house and never made it back. Maybe next year?

Cindy Lou Who

Josh met us at the office one day after work with the boat and the girls all ready to go out on the lake. He does such a great job getting everything ready and even does Rhen's hair when it is out of control. This is how she showed up at the office.

Cindy Lou Who?

That's a good look on you Rhen!

Watermelon Days

Summertime and watermelon seem to go hand in hand. Making a mess usually goes right along with that as well. And Rhen is a master as messes!

The thing I love is that she sticks her finger in the watermelon and then eats it - like a popsicle on a stick.

Delicious!

Mommy's helper

Rease is getting to be old enough that we can send her on errands. She loves helping and we love having another pair of hands to get things done around the house. The other day I was making dinner and needed one more can of corn. I asked Rease to run down to the storage room and get one can of corn and bring it up to me. She immediately ran downstairs happy to help. After she had been gone a couple of minutes I heard her struggling to come up the stairs. "Mommy I got it but it's too heavy!" I couldn't imagine why one can of corn would be too heavy for her so I went to the stairs to see.

No wonder she was struggling. That's a big can! Bless her heart she was trying so hard to help and thought the pineapple was corn. What a sweet helper!

Flexible

The best part of this picture is not my darling, sweet Rease but the princesses in the background who seem to be doing some sort of exercise.

I'm not sure what it is they are actually supposed to be doing, but boy are they flexible!

Rhen's naptime activity

We have the pack and play set up in the storage room for Rhen's naps. We found it's easier to split the girls up for naps because they ended up playing more than sleeping. It seems that Rhen can found someone or something to play with no matter where she is napping.

I went in to get her up the other day and this is what I found.

Looks innocent enough right?

Look close and you can see that she has bean, vegetable and soup cans in her bed with her.

"Look mom I found some toys to play with."

Then I found out what she had done with the rest of them.

Oh there they are.
Thanks Rhen for making a mess of my storage room!

Cup Stacking

Rhen doesn't have much of an attention span. She is usually going from one thing to the next in seconds. So when I saw her sitting still for more than 5 minutes I decided I needed to document the moment.

She found some plastic cups and was entertained for at least 15 minutes stacking, unstacking and restacking them.

Who knew that something so simple could entertain a 16 month old for a period of time?

Backpack?

Rhen found this bag and thought it looked like the perfect backpack. She must have had help putting it on, but then walked around the house for a while with it like she is a big girl!

Weekend in St. George

We spent the weekend in St. George with our friends the Wagners. Kilee's parents have a house there and they were nice enough to let us stay and play for the weekend. Yes, it was hot, but we found plenty of things to do to keep cool.

We headed to the pool for a few hours to escape the heat. Rease loved playing with Beckem.

They also have a little water stand in the backyard that the kids played in for hours. Rhen kept climbing on top and sitting in the water. I guess that's a good way to stay cool!
We spent time inside the nicely air-conditioned house and watched movies and cartoons. I love this picture of all the kids lined up.
Me and the kids relaxing.

We also found a great splash park downtown that the kids loved playing in. Rease of course had to take her dress off so it wouldn't get wet and went in her undies. They had a great time splashing and playing in the water.

One crazy thing that happened at the splash park. Josh was approached by a police officer who said he wanted to talk to him for a minute. I saw Josh talking to the cop and pointing and me and the girls. After a couple of minutes the cop left and I asked Josh what that was all about. He said that the cop had gotten a call that Josh was taking pictures of a girl in just her underwear and wanted to make sure that he was her dad. So Josh said, yes that's Rease and my wife and other daughter Rhen over there as well. The cop said he just had to follow up on the phone call and make sure everything was okay. When I let Rease take her dress off to keep it dry, I didn't think anything of it - just that kids are kids. Little did I know that some people were watching us suspiciously. I thought it was so odd that someone would call us in and even more strange to think that there really are people out there that do that kind of thing. The police officer was very nice and said, "I have kids of my own and I know how it is." Anyway, crazy.On the way home saw these awesome rainbows that we had to get a picture of. Beautiful!

Thanks to the Wagners for a great weekend!