Kendra 3 Months

Better late than never! This chubby girl is stealing all of our hearts...still! The bigger she gets, the cuter she gets. Everyone loves to hold her and kiss her and smother her in suffocating hugs. Hailey thinks that she is "Hailey's property" and will give me permission to hold or feed her. Hailey wants to be near her all the time and I'm glad that she has a friend in the making.

Kendra is getting to that particular stage where she is crying if she doesn't get what she wants. She's kind of a zero to 60 kind of a girl, so when she's hungry, there's no alarm, it's just an emergency. She loves pat-a-cake, being held, eating, and being talked to. She's a very smiley girl, which Brian seems to think is our only smiling child. I think it's just because she's so entertained by our stupidity that she's always ready to laugh at us. She is so snuggly! Still likes spending a good portion of the late night/early morning sleeping with me in my bed (not that I hate it...but I'd prefer to sleep without kinks in my back).

Since my kids are getting older, there are a lot more questions and concerns with this baby. Why does my body make milk and not water? Hailey asks me all the time why she can't have Kendra's milk. (Weird!) Let's all watch mom change her diaper so we can marvel at the small behinder Kendra has. Why does she not have teeth? Why are her hands always closed? Amazing things like this.

Describe her in one word: Dreamboat.

She is always blowing spit bubbles.

...AND...I am the worst tummy time mommy. Eventually she'll learn how to hold up her enormous head.

July

So, I have this weekly goal of writing in my journal once per week....and....I have never done it yet. I'll just get all caught up here and then I won't feel bad about it anymore. 

July was a good month. Our fourth of July is always a little low key because the kids get to tired to stay up to go to fireworks, but on the 3rd, our neighbors put on a pretty good show for us. We bought some "kid friendly" fireworks for our kids, which in turn scared Hailey to death. She watched the rest of the fireworks inside the house away from any loud booms. 

Grandma Anderson came to visit and the kids piled on top her for story time. It's nice to live only 4 hours away from Brian's family. Any family close by is welcome for me!

Claire wants to become Kendra's official photographer. I'm not sure if it's because she thinks Kendra is cute, or if it's just because she likes holding my camera, but every single time Kendra is in her towel, Claire demands a picture. We now have several that look exactly like this one...

Hailey is a huge fan of her little sister and really likes to hold her. You'd think that Claire took this one based on the horrible centering happening. Props go to Brian on that one.

Another Kendra/mommy shot by Claire.

Now on to how we really have spent our summer. I'm not even joking that we spent nearly every single day at the pool with our friends. We are the first to come and we hoard the shade the entire time we're there. It has been the most relaxing summer. I sit on the side and gab about life with my friends and the kids get exhausted in the water. I don't know if there is a better way to spend the summer or not. I'm thinking that there's not. 

Since we were always at the pool and never home, my house is feeling neglected and I can't seem to ever keep the laundry done or the bathrooms clean. For some reason, you have to be home for those to happen. You'd think that being at the pool would keep your house cleaner....

This whole...getting your face wet...is huge for Claire. I wanted to teach her how to swim this year, but she wouldn't ever listen to me when I got in to help her. As soon as I'd get out, she'd try it out, but never with me. She is now floaty free, but now quite to the point where I would say that she swims exactly, but she's getting very good at diving for toys. Her floating is getting better and she can swim short distances. We are still proud of her. Getting her head wet was a huge hurdle I didn't know we could pass. 

Jared refuses to let me teach him swim. He jumped in without a floaty once and I think he got a little scared.

These girls. I love them.

If it were only not blurry...

My gal pal and I snuggle by the pool for hours and hours. I think she likes being outside as much as the others.

Jared's friends, William and Ethan, sadly moved back to Illinois. Sad day. We will miss them and we have really loved having them over so much to play! 

Miss Claire turned 6! I just can't believe that we have a 6 year old. It's such a happy/sad thing for me. She is probably the most adorable and kind 6 year old the world has ever seen, so I am loving the person that she is becoming. She is very thoughtful. She opened her presents early on her birthday, went swimming (of course) and we finished with our family movie night of watching Prince Caspian. The next day was her first birthday party and she couldn't have been more excited.

Claire loves anything art. I'm glad it was an easy party to make gender neutral and I think she had a blast. She was so excited to have all of her friends at her house at the same time. I thought it was quite possibly the most exhausting day of my life and told her she can have another party when she's 11. :)

Does Jared like cake much?

A little more about Claire:

Her favorite color is Rainbow - "even brown!"

Favorite food: Pizza, Flank steak, ice cream

Favorite toy: stuffed animals and legos

She weighs about 42 pounds and she's a also about 42 inches tall.

She loves movie night on fridays, loves to read, draw, color, play with legos, and especially spend time with her friends.

We love this sweet girl! We can't imagine our lives without her and I think we're all dreading September 6th when she goes back to school. It leaves a hole in our day without her home. 

Kendra 2 Months

Kendra is two months old. How, tell me how, does this happen??? She still hates her carseat and goes from zero to 60 in crying if she doesn't get held when she wants to. She doesn't really like her binki, but will sort of take it. She is getting all sorts of chubs! I love it! She obviously loves to be held and loves to be talked to. She's really starting to talk back to us when we give her some good attention. She likes her bath time much better thank goodness, but it's always better to bathe her in the morning because she's just too tired at night. She's an awesome sleeper. Usually wakes up once per night and I have yet to be awake enough to put her back in her own bed. We just snuggle for a lot of it (which may be why I'm so tired all the time). Her tear ducts are not clogged anymore (hooray! Jared's took 9 months). She'll have her two month checkup in a couple days, so we'll see how much she weighs then. I'm guessing around 13 lbs. She really is a dream baby. So much easier than Hailey was...haha. Being a mom is truly the best thing.

Here is Kendra at two months. I can't believe how much she has changed in one month. I guess that baby acne clearing up does wonders. 

I caught her mid sneeze.

Of course I had to get some of the other main squeezes in my life.