big girl in the bath!

maren can sit up in the bath tub all on her own now! getting bigger everyday :) tonight was the first time maren has taken a bath with one of her sisters! she loved it! norah is warming up more and more to maren :)

swan lake

the girls dressed up this morning and did a rendition of swan lake for me :)

maren's musical chairs

i've been having a hard time feeding maren baby food b/c i can't find a chair for her to fot safely in.
a friend gave me her old bumbo seat to use with maren, but we didn't take into account maren's size! her little thighs overtake the chair and i can't even get the tray on :) oh well . .

i tried our highchair. it's an antique so it has no buckle which makes me nervous since she can slide out - she sits pretty well on her own but i wouldn't call her perfect yet.

i guess i'll just go back to sticking her in the exersaucer! on another note - she finally ate her first jar of baby food for me tonight - apples & blueberry blend and she loves the "puffs" as i call them :)

weekend pix

ella and i went school supply shopping this weekend :) she came right home and organized it all and put it in her backpack!!

thanks to grandma and grandpa who sent ella this backpack! grandma had it made from a little shop before they left alabama! ella LOVES it :)

while shopping for a first day of school outfit for ella - norah fell in love with this hat :)

out to dinner at our fav, hole in the wall, chinese restaurant :) the girls will eat the spring rolls and rice and they love the tea!

ella impressed our waitress by speaking chinese to her - thank you nick jr. and Ni Hao, Kai-Lan!

let the games begin -- i have begun introducing norah to her potty! so far she's just sitting on it - testing it out :)

my happy girl!!

6 month well check

maren's 6 month check was pretty routine! 19lbs 10oz (97%) and 27 inches (90%) and everything is just perfect! she's on the verge of crawling - getting on all fours and rocking back and forth :)

50inches!! (4ft2in)

43inches!! (3ft7in)

34inches!! (2ft10in)

It's never fun having to take everyone to the appts but they are always very well behaved -- except the tantrum norah had before we left that even our pediatrician was impressed with :)

Free night at the museum!

Friday night was free admission night for our children's museum - one of our fav places in seattle! it was hard to get pix of all they did b/c i was flying solo :)








they spent the majority of our time in the vet office! ella has been saying for a while now she wants to be a vet when she gets older so she was in heaven :)








playing outside on the rooftop playground



very proud of her!!! one of the things we've been working on is climbing up and down and confidence -- this is the first time she's ever attempted anything like this :)

norah's fav place was the enormous train room!

A Taste of Edmonds

Ella and 5 others from her age group were asked to dance at a local festival today! Danny was very proud of his "all-star" :) She had a great time and the festival was a nice family outing as well!

getting to ride the school bus shuttle - could've been her fav part :)

waiting to get on stage




maren's first ride in the pack - she did great all day in it!

JUMP into kindergarten

This past Tuesday Ella had a kindergarten readiness assessment which she seemed to do well on. I wasn't allowed to go in with her, but afterwards the principal and her teacher told me she has very strong skills in verbal and writing and thought she'd make a great transition into K! Starting this past Wednesday through next Friday her school has a program called JUMP which is basically an orientation program into K. She goes to school from 9-11:30 every morning and they are practicing things like moving from one station to another, sitting at their desks, having circle time, walking to music class, etc . . it's a great program that allows it so the teachers don't have to spend the first couple weeks getting the children acclimated - they can just jump right in! i keep telling ella it's just "practice school" because i didn't want her to be nervous about it and she's been doing great!! yesterday she came home with a little certificate that said "Congratulations to Ella for running 2 laps at recess" . . she was very proud of herself (as was i)!! :) School officially starts Wed Sept 7th! She'll be in AM kindergarten w/ Mrs. Fishman. We are very excited!!!!!!!
first day of orientation

before i left her there - sitting in morning circle time



working on her numbers