Naptime

Katie's nap has been slowly dwindling over the past couple of months. And since the big girl bed, they are really almost gone. Yesterday I didn't even try to put her down. At 3:00 she asked for a snack. She was sitting at the table eating her pretzels and I was working in the kitchen. I glanced over to see how she was doing. Her head was bobbing all over the place and her eyes were closed. Obviously asleep, however, she was still eating her pretzels. I even tried to pry the last few out of her hands and she pulled her hand away head still bobbing and eyes closed. She did eat the remaining pretzels. Her last faint words as I put her down were "pacci, pac...ci, pac..." and gone.

August Idaho Trip

A few weeks ago Kimball got a new job as an RN! Yay! We are so proud of him. He is working on the Renal Diabetic floor. After we found out he got the job we jumped in the car and headed for Idaho. The weather was beautiful and Katie really didn't do too bad in the car. One of the first things she asked when we got there was "where's the snow?" One of the first things we did was check out their books. They have so many. She was just in heaven. The first thing she did when we got home was look through ALL of her books. Here are a few of the other fun things that happened while we were there.

They had some fun activities for the kids at the river. Katie wasn't as interested as the older kids so we only did a few things. She got to bang on some metal with her cousin Nick. The Hula Hoops were huge! She just liked standing inside while daddy held it up. The kids made boats and floated them down the gutters. She really liked this one.

She loves grandma's basement. Her favorite part was the kitchen.

A big girl bed! Yes, after the first night she decided she wanted to sleep in the big, blue beds instead of her pack n' play. Luckily they have a trundle bed and a bed rail. The first night in the bed took a while to get her to sleep, but once she's asleep she's good. She LOVED it! She just got a big girl bed at home too this week.

We floated down the river in Island Park. Katie's first boat trip. Unfortunately, the life jacket would choke her if she sat down, so she stood the entire time. That's probably what she would have done anyway, because she couldn't see out when she was sitting. The water was freezing cold, but she still played in it for a while.

Kimball celebrated his birthday while we were there. All the kids waiting with anticipation for the cake and ice cream (from Reed's Dairy, YUM!)

Here are all the cousins. Dillion is the newest memeber of my sister's family. It was great to finally meet him.

We played outside everyday. Tricycles, chalk, water, digging, trampoline, swings, and they even had an outdoor play kitchen. We love their huge patio. There was a dance practice going on outside across the street. A couple of the evenings there was loud music playing. Here the girls are dancing to the music.

Sewing

I was certainly not the one who was chosen "most likely to sew" in my family. But here I am sewing. I have an older sewing machine and we haven't always been the best of friends. However, my mom and sister-in-law inspired me and I decided one day to plug it in again. Then I threaded it and then tested it out. Here are the projects I have finished.

A very easy dress with no zippers, buttons, or 4-H judging.

An extremely easy skirt and flower.

My moms bandana aprons that we use almost every day. Love them!

RN

Congratulations Kimball! It's official, Kimball is now an RN. He took the NCLEX yesterday. We found out this morning that he PASSED!!! We are so proud of him. All of his hard work has paid off.

My Little Swimmer

We have been swimming a couple of times this summer. Katie loves it. She borrowed these arm floaties from her cousin Kaylee (thanks Kaylee). I know Katie has no idea what they are for, but apparently you use them when you swim. At one point she said, "I'm gonna swim" and then jumped off the stair. She must have seen someone else do that. Luckily I was in the water with her.

Stacking and Building

Katie loves to play "blocks" with daddy. Sometimes with me too. We made a pizza once and a cake. Of course we sang "happy to you" to everyone and everything we could think of . Kimball builds really cool things with her. They started out with airplanes, then animals and now he is building her bathtubs and showers for her baby. Of course, Katie likes to pretend to use them too. He is amazing. This is the shower/bathtub combo complete with soap dispenser. Depending on what they come up with next, she might be getting more blocks for Christmas (or Kimball's birthday).

This one is the first bathtub.

This is her new thing lately. She stacks and lines up everthing. She pulls all of her books out and somehow strategically places them just right and then reads all of them. She does this with her Little People and blocks and food. Bedtime stories have become a long process. She has to stack all of her books first and bring them to me. I'm pretty sure she gets this from all of the engineers and accountants on my side of the family.

Fingerpaints

This is Katie's first experience with finger paints. She was very hesitant at first. But as you can see that didn't last very long.