It finally happened....

I remember asking several other moms at church if they had any good suggestions for ways to entertain Maddie while I was trying to cook dinner. Their response was it is always hard. But  it gets easier once you have more than one, they entertain each other. And tonight I had my first moment where it was easier with two than one! It was a miracle! I had tried to squeeze too much in (as usual). We had stayed at the pool a little bit longer than I had planned; I had to rush to the grocery store to get a few more things for dinner; and then rush home to cook dinner b/c Reid and the girl he is dating for coming over to eat and for me to meet her. So I walked in to a messy house (of course! b/c I didn't manage to get them down for a nap at the same time today), set the groceries down, turned on Maddie's music, set Emalyn down in the living room, and hurried into the kitchen to get as much done before one of them had a melt down. And it happened...Emalyn was giggling with joy. I tried to peek in to see what Maddie was doing to make her laugh, and I still have no idea what Maddie she did.  But none the less she entertained her for 20 minutes until Chris walked in the door. It was wonderful! Here's to many more nights of them entertaining each other and maybe even trying new recipes again.

Summer!

I feel like summer is finally here. The pools finally are allowed to open since we are not having to conserve water anymore. We have been outside a lot: walking down to the playground down the street, playing in the sprinkler, and catching lightning bugs at night!

Maddie wasn't sure what she thought about the sprinkler at first, and insisted on Chris and I run through it with her.

We have had all sorts of baby animals in our front yard this year, but the baby bunnies have by far been Maddie's favorite. We found the first one the day we were playing in the sprinkler; it is teeny, tiny, but it is just to the right of Maddie's shoulder. 

This is her latest pose, usually when she is trying to tell you something that she knows she is right about.

And here is another one of the baby bunnies, she is living in the bush right in front of our side porch, and every time we walk out the door Maddie looks for "sister bunny."

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We had a pool party for playgroup at Neel's house. Carrie and Maddie were in matching bathing suits!

Emalyn just chilled in her bumbo!

And you can't have summer without catching lightning bugs. Maddie of course was petrified of them. It has taken me two and a half years of working on the girl just to get her to touch a worm. But she was quite excited to run around the yard and point them out for Chris and me to catch for her. Here she is with her bug box, still unsure if they were going to come out or not, so she wouldn't take her eyes off of them.