Emeri's Second Birthday

Happy birthday, Emeri! We are so glad we got to spend time with Emeri on her birthday! Grandma made her such a pretty Olaf cake from the movie, Frozen, and the entire table was covered in presents with various shades of pink. :) Liz made a pin-the-nose-on-Olaf game that the kids loved. Everyone wanted to cheat to make sure they got the nose in the right place. Amy, Bella and the Burtons (from the ward) came over to help us celebrate. Lots of people = lots of fun! The best part of all was meeting Baby Oakley! Mitchell and I had gone to Liz and Austin's house to see Oakley a few hours after she was born, but Derek and Bryce hadn't met her yet. Bryce was enamoured and wanted so desperately to wake her up from her nap, but, thankfully, we dissuaded him with cake and games. 

Emeri had fun opening her presents with help and approving oohs and aahs from the on-looking cousins. :) This kid is going to have a great second year!

Emeri was so excited about Olaf on the cake!

Emeri, cake and presents!

Mommy and daughter

Isn't that a cool cake?

Aunt Bella laid claim to Clara for some Clara snuggles and Bryce begged Aunt Amy for a better vantage point. :)

He's not too sure about that hat...

Sweet Baby Oakley! Almost a month old.

Katelyn, Isaac, Andrew and Trouble... I mean, Derek :)

Mallory and Kevin Burton - we love them!

All the kids are inspecting Uncle Austin's hand-drawn Olaf. Very nice!

Blindfolded Isaac is waaaay off target

Closer, but still not quite

Birthday girl's turn!

 Derek's turn

Liz and Mallory!

Aunt Bella loves her Derek!

Aunt Bella loves her Bryce!

First present... a little apprehensive

Yarn mermaid doll from Aunt Kadi, Uncle Mitch, Derek, Bryce and Clara

Putting the yarn mermaid to sleep in the cool bunkbed from Grandma

Andrew was sad and Bauer was the only one willing to comfort him

Amy got some Oakley cuddles

Everyone loves Oakley!

Fort Fun

Derek built a fort around himself... and Clara. I found her as I excavated for Derek, but she seemed to enjoy being buried in pillows and blankets. I, on the other hand, was not pleased to find her buried. Still, one for the memory books. :)

Lunch Date with Nana and Co

Nana, Aunt Amy, Aunt Val and Ally came over for lunch today. Nana always likes to feed Clara baby food and Clara always likes to eat it. Aunt Val snuggled with Derek and Bryce on the rocking chair and Aunt Amy used her phone to facetime with Danny so Bryce could say hi. Ally did a great job holding and playing with Clara!

 Nana and Clara

 Bryce and Aunt Amy

 Ally!

 smirk

 Family!

 Mmm... carrots! Last time I gave her carrots, she made hilarious, disgusted faces. This time, she seemed to like carrots just fine.

 Happy girl!

 Clara, Aunt Val and Derek

 Aunt Amy, Danny (on facetime), Clara and Nana

Bryce is trying to figure out who that is on the shadowy screen... :)

James

 Derek came blazing into the house yelling that he'd found a GIANT turtle and for me to come see it. Of course, I obliged and Derek proudly pointed to a rather large turtle that had become stuck trying to get under the back fence. I pried it free and Derek asked to take it inside to show Grandma - but he didn't want to hold it. We went to show Grandma and then decided to help the turtle get to his home in the pond behind the house. Derek asked to hold it really quick and, just as he was about to back out, I placed his hands around the shell. He was excited to hold a real turtle, but he's becoming cautious about physical interactions. That's my smart boy! When I asked him what the turtle's name is, he said, "Turtles don't have names, Mom." When I asked what he wanted to call him, he responded with, "Maybe I'll call him James." Ladies and gentleman, James the turtle.

 Derek using James to demonstrate the proper way to hold a turtle "so he can't bite my fingers off." Yep.

James was still rather shy (or maybe a little shell-shocked from the three foot drop).

Pile of Giggles

I put Clara in her carseat for a few minutes and Derek and Bryce decided to build a fort to share with Clara. Bryce didn't really want to be in the fort, but he had a great time piling the pillows on Derek. Sweet Clara just sat in the carseat the whole time watching the building, haha.

 



 See the carseat under all those stuffed animals?

 

 There's a pair of Derek eyes, too

 

Bryce had a blast tickling Derek under that red blanket. Giggles galore!

Isaac and Andrew dropped by for some fun later that day. We built a fort to watch Leapfrog and Bryce decided he'd rather sit on the couch. See him?

This Just Happened

Derek, Bryce and Clara hanging out with Uncle Colton

And Clara just crawled her first inch! :D

Computer Cuties

 Busted!

 

The boys love to pretend to type on the keyboard. Unfortunately, they don't always wait for supervision

Pink Ball of Fluff

We've finally got rubber bands for Clara's hair! She's adorable! I can't believe, at nearly seven months, I can put her hair in such fluffy pigtails. She's getting so big, but she's still so petite. We won't know her percentiles til next month, but she's definitely going to be a leggy lightweight. She loves her brothers and I usually have to break up giggle fests at night between her and Derek. He loves to make her laugh. Clara loves her baby doll and pink singing seahorse. She usually likes stuffed animals, but she isn't obsessed with them like Bryce is. She's a very easy baby to put to sleep - she prefers to be swaddled, but she usually turns as far onto her right side as she can and shoves her face as far into the mattress as possible. If she doesn't feel ready for me to leave the room, I usually give her crystal mobile and spin and she is happy to watch that while I sneak out. :) Clara loves tummy time and usually rolls right onto her tummy if placed on her back. She's trying to figure out how to cover distance by rolling, but most often rolls left to tummy and right back to her back without moving very far. She's started to stand assisted for longer periods and she's gotten pretty good at picking up her binkie and putting it back into her mouth. She usually skips her hands and just lowers her head to the floor while on her tummy to maneuver it back into her mouth, haha! We love our sweet Clara and can't wait to see what she does next!

 She's pushing up and getting ready to crawl!

 Clara loves tummy time

I love her dress. Thanks, Nana and aunties!

Here We Go Again

This time, he tried to drink a bottle of vanilla extract. It went down his chest, soaked his diaper and puddled all over the floor of the pantry. At least he and the pantry smell good now. :)

Happy Birthday, Jenna and Gracie!

Well, their birthdays aren't today but it's a great day for a celebration! Happy birthday, Jenna and Gracie! We had a lot of fun hanging out with cousins and eating cake and playing games after the kids went down. Birthdays are the best!

 

 Happy birthday, Jenna!

 

 Tammy made this awesome cake!

 

 Liz's sister was visiting with her kids so we made quite the grand party!

 

 Gracie really wanted that candle

 

Yay! Make a wish!