Early summer

Thank you PNW for some beautiful weather and the chance to be outdoors in May and saying "wasn't that winter weather worth it?!".
We have been at parks, taking long walks, and getting our fair share of vitamin D.
Delaney is doing great at bike riding, but is not ready emotionally for those training wheels to come off. Dash is having fun climbing playgrounds an has learned to roll down hills. And drop his pants in the middle of a soccer field as he hears the call of nature.

Spring is here!

We had a great day today. I helped out at Laney's classroom. One advantage to that is that Dash begins to get the experience that hopefully means he will be able to make it in PK3 next year.

After school we went to the park with some of our best buddies. At one point I looked up and Dash was dropping his pants while standing in the soccer field and relieving himself. Thankfully it was just a little pee.

After we got home, we did some rock painting. Tonight, Zap is going to try a twilight bike ride (the hour not the movie) and maybe the two nuggets will be asleep when he returns an hour later.

It was a good day.

We are still here.

Despite all appearances to the contrary, we do still run the blog. Facebook seems so much more convenient but then we don't end up talking about our day.
It's May here and we finally got some beautiful weather. Zap took Laney for a long bike ride yesterday, I made some curtains for her room, and Dash and I had a great time out at the park with Edgar.
We are fighting some bedtime battles. We have a little girl who would prefer to never sleep. I think she thinks she would miss out on something.
We are getting ready to celebrate Dash's third birthday. He's my baby and I'm not sure how this happened.
Zap took me out to Seattle for an amazing 5th anniversary trip. The highlight was a food tour with white mustache urban adventure company. If you are ever in Seattle and want to eat some amazing food, call Bryce and go!

Snowmageddon 2012

So we didn't have a white Christmas, but we got a white January and then some. When I took the kids out in the snow this morning, it was up to my knees in places. It's beautiful, quiet, and fun. They had a great time running, falling, and generally playing in it.

We stayed in today and made some valentine's day crafts and also played a target game with paper plates and marshmallows.

Well, well, well...

Okay, here I go again: attempting to keep my blog up to-date.

Here's what I want to remember about my day.

We started a green/yellow/red light behavior system at our home. It does take a lot of initial energy, but I found that my "loud voice" moments were substantially decreased. That's my resolution for 2012.

Zap and I had to parent through a 2 hour tantrum with Delaney, who -Lord, love her-turned into the spitting image of a 13 year old when she said "I can leave because you hurt my feelings". Yikes. We got her calmed down and she even managed two bowls of soup at dinner.

Dash got put to bed by Zap but woke up around 10:30. I had been in Laney's room and walked in to see if I could help Zap. Dash was in bed all grumpy, telling us "no pet" but when he heard it was my voice, he turned around, all sleepyheaded, and raised his arms to get some snuggles.

And, I rocked out an hour long workout class today. Gotta get in shape for the 5th anniversary surprise gift :)

an upsweep on the roller coaster

We had a long day in Seattle yesterday and we had some good news come out of it. My mom does not have the genetic breast cancer, so she has more options in terms of her care. Also, I won't be at a higher risk of breast cancer than the general public and neither will Delaney. All good news.
We spent a very long time at the breast surgeon's office and had a very long talk with her. We liked her a lot this visit and she listened to my mom's concerns as well as mine and did not discount anything that we had to say.
We learned that she has some more options in terms of surgery, reconstruction, and medical intervention. Right now, we are considering a single mastectomy with concurrent or delayed reconstruction. Other options are a lumpectomy with radiation, or a double mastectomy with concurrent or delayed reconstruction.
Today we have an appointment with an oncologist to get to know her before we begin the process with her. I'm already thinking of questions I have to ask her :)

some big changes are coming

to our home. I haven't posted about this on facebook, mainly because I'm not sure that my mom wants me to share. But this experience is going to impact my life and the lives of those I care for in so many ways and the best way for me to feel better and find a little less anxiety about things is to share. So here goes.
My mom has breast cancer.
She got an unofficial diagnosis on January 23rd when she went in for an ultrasound and consultation about a fibroid she had in her breast. At this appointment, the tech took one look at the lump and called the doctor in to see. They told her then that there was an over 95% chance that the lump was cancerous and that it had likely spread to her lymph nodes, since they looked so poor on the ultrasound. We spent the next few days in a panic and my mom had a biopsy. The biopsy came back positive on the breast and negative on the lymph, which was the best news we could have hoped for at that point.
We saw a surgeon and we have three or four appointments lined up next week with oncologists and another appointment with the surgeon to talk plan and then we also have an appointment to talk with another surgeon to get a second opinion. My mom had a MRI done a few days ago and she's got to go in for another biopsy on her other breast and have a thyroid ultrasound done as well.
I think emotional roller coaster doesn't even touch this. You go from being terrified to being relieved that it hasn't spread, to scared again because she'll likely be facing radiation and chemotherapy and sandwich all of that into living a life with two little ones who are bursting with life and joy.
Sometimes I wish I had a sibling to help me in dealing with my mom in this. I wish I had someone who knew her like I do. But it's just me and my amazing family and friends here to support us while we all battle this.
I've been wondering how to talk to Delaney about cancer and how Nana will be sick.
I've been wondering how we all do all of this.
I think it's going to be a big change for our family. Already I'm missing days from work to be at necessary appointments with her and help her to take in all the information.

In other fun news, Dash just turned 18 months and he's just growing by leaps and bounds. He's learned a lot of new words in the last week or two and he's really starting to show more personality. I've learned that he's empathetic and that he cares for his sister. He hates it when she is upset. I've learned that he's a lover and just really wants to snuggle most days. He loves being outside, especially on a cool, sunny day. He thinks that everything his sister does is completely cool and the next best thing for him to be doing.

Delaney's cracking us up, as usual. She has a new phrase: "if I want to" or "if you want to", as in: "Mama, if you want to, you can put me bed" or "If I want to, I can have a tic-tac". She also uses the words "otherwise" and "actually" fairly appropriately. She said "I have to put this bandaid on; otherwise I will get hurt" and she likes to say "papa. No. Actually Mama" when you ask who is putting her to bed.

More later I'm sure. It feels good to find a place to ramble.

a badly needed update

I've been neglecting the blog, and what makes me the most grumpy about that is that when I don't write it, I don't get to use it as my memory book for all the little every day events that make parenthood so rewarding.
We had a wonderful holiday season and loved hosting a full house on Thanksgiving. Christmas was too much fun with two little ones excited about opening presents.
Work has been going well for me and the flip side of that is that the kids are doing well with their childcare provider, Savannah. We feel glad that we brought her into our home and we're proud of the job she's doing with the kids.
Delaney is almost three and she just seems to say something funny and insightful every day. I'm always calling Zap to share some new Laney quote. She's quite the singer and she's starting to learn a lot more lyrics. She knows the Little Einsteins song by heart. She's starting to develop more sharing with her brother and a little more love towards him, which we were starting to get anxious about. Dashy has loved her from day one and for Laney the love has been a little longer coming.
Dash will be 18 months at the end of the month, and there are times I feel like I've woken up to these two kids after falling asleep with babies. The time speeds by and its hard to see sometimes how quickly its going. But the flip side of that coin is all the development that comes and how we spend half of our day belly laughing at these two.
Dash is walking, running, talking, and becoming quite the ham. He loves to dance and go round and round and in the last two weeks he's learned something like ten words. I think 18 months is one of my favorite developmental time frames.
Zap and I are doing well and just working on not missing a minute. We're starting to look at pre-schools and elementary schools for these guys and thinking about our family five year plan.

I'm finally able to write about...

our family's first experience with a broken arm.
Yup. Delaney broke her arm a week ago today while on a bouncy slide at a nearby children's facility. We saw her feet stick and then she tumbled twice. Zap and Dash were maybe five feet behind her on the slide, and I was just a second or so away from her once she fell. She never fell off the slide. Zap yelled at me that she broke her arm and I scooped her up. Zap got Dash in the car while I carried Delaney and asked for an ice pack (that never came. I ended up using an ice pack our friends had on hand).
We rushed to the Emergency Room and were worked through triage pretty quickly. Joyce and Jerry met us at the hospital to help us out and they eventually brought Dash home and put him to bed. We got Delaney some pain medicine and then some x-rays.
It's actually upside down, but you can see the bowing and if you look closely you can see the break.
We got an IV put in (on the fourth try, mind you) and then the doctors and nurses went to work doing conscious sedation on Delaney. They had to put the elbow back in place, correct the break, and set the bone. We came home with her in a plaster cast and a sling.
During the entire hospital experience, Delaney was incredibly brave. The hardest thing for her was the IV sticks but just a few minutes later, she was giving us an IV. She kept saying "Laney says all done. Laney want home". I just wanted to take the IV for her.

We had our visit with the orthopedic specialist a few days later and they placed her into a long arm cast.
This cast has been easier to work around and she hasn't needed the sling, which is nice. We've since had it signed by a lot of our friends and family. We got some stickers in the mail from Delaney's godmother, Brenna. When we put one of the Piglet stickers on tonight (it had sparkles, Delaney pointed out to me), Delaney said "its flablos" (fabulous), which I'm sure means that she loves it.
Again, she's pretty amazing and resilient. Since the long arm cast gives her the use of her fingers she's a little more able to do things for herself.

From here, we have another orthopedic visit on Friday to check and see how she's doing. We are expecting about six weeks of cast wear and we will probably have another cast placed since if it grows loose she will likely wiggle out of it.

I'm feeling better; less anxious about the whole deal. It was quite an experience.

Summer has been such a whirlwind

I've loved this summer. I love (almost!) having a toddler and (almost!) a preschooler. It's been a joy to see the summer through their eyes. I think about next summer with two walking children and all that they're going to get into and I can't wait!

I started the interview process for a position that fell into my lap around July and I was offered the position a few weeks later. I'm going to be working part-time at the hospital in Centralia in the rehab department as a speech pathologist. I'm so excited about the opportunity to work with a mix of children and adults and hopefully be more challenged in my work environment. I have started to feel under-stimulated mentally as this year has gone on. I love that I have had the opportunity to stay home and raise my children full time to this point, but I was starting to get concerned that if I remained out of work much longer that my licenses would lapse beyond a point of quick return.
So we had a lot of family discussions and looked at nearly every option out there for childcare. Every single option. It was exhausting and it made me question if my returning to work was the right thing for our family at this time. We found our way to a nanny search website and we started up interviews. We had a total of four interviews and we also scheduled two interviews with me and the children so that we could see how the nanny would interact. Our first choice came back and by the end of the four hour interview I had offered her the contract. Her name is Savannah and we're hoping she becomes part of our family and that she will provide, safe, loving, and attentive care to the little ones. I feel confident in her abilities and how she interacts with the kids and knowing all of this makes me more excited to start back to work.

So Dash is NEARLY walking. He has taken up to four steps between Zap and me (especially if there is a food motivator). We actually have an Occupational Therapy visit scheduled tomorrow to see if he is on track. I'm hoping he's close. I'd love him just as much if he didn't walk until 15 months or later, but boy would my back be tired. He's a hefty little boy!
Dash now can sign: more, eat, please, all done, drink, hot, and hear. He learned to say "papa" today which makes Zap so happy. We think he's saying "more" when asking and at lunch today he joined more and please. He rocks!



Delaney's language is growing and growing every single day. It's amazing to see typical language development in action. She has started to tell stories: "I push the button and the dinosaur said ROAR". When she sees something she loves she says "OH...MY...GOSH!".

Together they are often Pete and Repeat. Dash loves his big sister and she loves him back. She likes to say things to make him copy her and she loves to copy him. We are still working on her getting aggressive with him sometimes, but sometimes I think its almost to see what will happen. The other day she stepped on him. She's never done that before and hasn't since (there was a time-out given) but I thought that maybe she just wanted to see what would happen if she put her foot on her brother.



We took a trip up to Bremerton with our friends Jill and Roan so we could meet up with our other friends Laura, Emmett, and Bridger. We did the Kitsap fair with the kids and it didn't take us long to get worn out. The best part was the rides. Delaney has no fear, which we saw at Lakefair, and she rode every ride with joy.



We went camping with our family, Grandpa Jerry, Grandma Joyce, Cousin Lance, and Sean and Sheryl for Labor Day weekend. Our close friends went with us and they brought their two year old and nearly three year old. So we had four children under three sleeping in tents in the (very) cool evening weather. Needless to say, we didn't get much sleep, but we had a really great time. We went geocaching (or treasure hunting as Delaney calls it) and cooked s'mores.

bad blogger Mommy!

but the summer has just been so busy. Here's what I have to blog about.
County Fairs and just how much Delaney loves them
Visits to friends near Bremerton
Delaney's new funny sayings
Dash nearly walking
Mommy got a job!
Camping with the family/very close friends on Labor Day weekend
our new nanny (doesnt' that sound so posh?)
and plenty of pictures.

All that..as soon as we return from said camping. I PROMISE!

Dashy is ONE YEAR old today!!

Happy Birthday to our little man!

We have graduated to size 4 diapers and they fit him great. He is growing so much. We have his one year well child appointment Monday so we'll get his actual weight then.

Dash has also transitioned to whole milk and we've tossed out all the formula. We are working on weaning him from bottles, but he still likes a bottle before bed at night.

Dash has five teeth now and they're all adorable and pearly white! He eats pretty much what we eat, just chopped into little bites.
Dash is sleeping okay. He goes to bed around 7:00 or 7:30 and gets up between 5:30 and 6:00. He does still wake up once or twice in the night. We are working on sleep training and now we put him in bed awake and he puts himself to sleep.

He is a different baby than we had at nine months. He's happy, mobile, and a ton of fun. We truly believe he was in pain from his hernia or the surgery and that he is fully recovered now. I can't tell you how great it is to have a happy baby.

He can stand supported, cruise, and pull to standing. He's close to walking I think. He's started to stand unsupported for up to ten seconds, so that's a big deal.

Dash still has beautiful eyes, and now they are definitely hazel. His hair isn't as curly, but it is wavy.

Dash signs hi, bye, yay, more, all done, nite-nite, eat, hot, and water independently or with very minimal cueing.

I can't wait to celebrate this special day with our family today. He deserves a great party!

The daring girl on the .. kiddie rides

Delaney has always been brave. She is rarely scared of anything. Right now, I can't think of anything off the top of my head that she's "afraid" of. She points out spiders and bugs to us and she's loves to jump off anything she can climb.
We went to Lakefair on Saturday and it is the big fair and parade that Olympia celebrate in the summer. We have always sat at the spot that Joyce and Jerry have sat at for years and we put our lawn chairs down a few days early to be sure we get a good spot.

Delaney and Dash had a great time watching the parade go by. Delaney was a little bothered by the loud sounds of the motorcycles going by and she kept her ears covered for most of their run. She enjoyed the marching bands though. Dash sat with Grandma Joyce for a while and he even managed to catch a quick nap.














Dash got to try Oreo cookies for the first time at the parade. He was covered!

So after the parade, we said goodbye to everyone and went into the fair to give Delaney a chance to do the rides.
The first one she tried was a motorcycle ride that went around and around. I think that at first she was a little unsure. But once it started moving, she was ALL about it. We ended up riding that once twice.







Then she rode the little boats and she really loved that. She loved that she could put her hands in the water while the boat cruised around the track.

The last ride she rode was the fire engine that went around and stopped at the top for the view. I don't have any pictures of that because she asked Papa "by myself?" and I was too nervous for her to get pictures.
Of course all my worrying was for nothing. She loved it. I do have a picture of her getting off of the ride.
We played a duck picking game and the ball rolling game where you race the horses and we bought some cotton candy before we left. Delaney won a stuffed banana and a pink elephant, so she was quite the happy camper on the way home.

I didn't forget about Dash, but he was too little for any rides and he spent the evening in his backpack on either me or Zap. He was one tired boy when we got home.
Next year Lakefair, we will have two little ones riding the rides. Papa will be cheering them on and Mama will be biting her nails watching them.

summer is B..U..S..Y!!

and I am loving it.
One new thing that we started was letterboxing (www.atlasquest.com if you want more information). The idea is that you get the clues together and you go on a hunt. If you follow the clues correctly, you're led to a stamp cache. What's so neat is that most of the stamps are handmade and you get a great hike or walk while you are out looking for them.
On our first day we went with our friends Ryan and his son Noah. We went out to a Catholic church out near Evergreen University and followed the clues. We found a hand carved ram stamp.
Then we went out to Mud Bay Road and after a nice walk we found a hand carved egret stamp. It was so much fun.
The next day I took the kids out with Grandpa Jerry and we went out to Black Hills High School and found a hand carved "ARTS" stamp and from there we went out to a nature trail and hunted and hunted and hunted. We didn't find the stamp but we did find a geocache (trinkets and toys in little boxes) so Delaney left with a bracelet.


We also spent a weekend camping and had a great time. The kids did better than I think Zap or I thought they would do and once they got to sleep they stayed asleep most of the night. It was so relaxing to just sit by the fire. Delaney loved the marshmallows.

What else? We've been going to the Entertainment in the Park series that Lacey is throwing. We meet up with some of our friends and eat a picnic dinner. The first show we went to was a show of performing pigs. Delaney and Dash loved it. Delaney got her face painted like a piglet.
We also went to a olde time music show at the Yelm library yesterday. My favorite part was when the musician played a limberjack; a little man that dances and his feet tap out a rhythm. We saw a juggler show at the park last night and we were pretty impressed.

Today we are taking it easy and spending time in the yard and cleaning around the house. We've got a busy few weeks coming up (Mama's 30th Birthday!, Dash's 1st Birthday, Lakefair) and we're so excited about it all.

Road Trip

The weather here has been really nasty. We've had very cloudy days.. rainy days.. chilly days. I had hit my wall.
So I got online and I searched for a place that we could go. Zap suggested Wenatchee, WA and I booked us a room at a hotel with a pool and we headed out with my mom the next day.
Wenatchee is in Eastern Washington, across the Snoqualmie Pass and on the map it says it is a three and a half hour drive, but with the little ones in tow it took us about five.

The drive actually went better than I thought. We had to stop a couple times and we stopped in Cle Elum and had lunch. We got to our hotel and immediately hit the pool. It was Dash's first time in the water and Delaney hadn't been in a pool in about a year. She took to it again like a fish. My mom loved being in the water with her.

Dash had a blast but the sun and the water exhausted him. After we were done in the pool, we went to a nearby town, Leavenworth. Its a small town that they have completely redesigned into a Bavarian village. It was absolutely adorable. We went shopping and walking around. We ate at the brat house. We went into a hat store and Delaney left with a parasol that we're planning on hanging in her room. We ate ice cream on the grass and just had a really nice time.


The hardest part of the trip was getting both babies to sleep at night. You'd get one asleep and one would wake the other one up.
The next day we went to a petting zoo in a little town called Peshastin. We came home and got right in the pool, this time with some pool toys. Again, Dash was done in by the water and the heat. Delaney had a blast. She learned to crawl along the wall and even stuck her face in the water a time or two.
The pool wore the kids out. They slept good and hard that night.
We headed home around 9 am the next day and made it back safely and soundly. Mama was exhausted!

I just turned around..and evaluation followup

and it is five weeks until Dash's First Birthday.
I'm amazed every day this week by how different he is than even a month ago, but especially two to three months ago.

We had Dash's evaluation on the 14th and the eligibility meeting on the 18th. He received evaluation in the following areas:

cognition (how well he learns, thinks, etc)

adaptive behavior (how he takes care of himself)

gross (crawling, etc) and fine (grasping with hands, etc) motor

educational (learning) skills

speech and language

His scores in EVERY area - except for PT- were within the range of average. Our Family Resource Counselor, who met Dash about six weeks ago, couldn't believe he was the same baby.

His language skills were great, his social skills were good, his cognitive skills were great. All looked good.

But his PT showed about a two to three month delay. He actually qualified for services; even though he'd been crawling about a week. He qualified for services in locomotion, how he gets around, and the OT wanted to work on his cruising, pulling up, etc.

We decided that because he'd made so much progress in the last six weeks that we would do at home stuff for the physical therapy and have her revisit at our home in the fall to see where she thought he was.

We also saw an allergist that day and we got to talking about his hernia surgery and recovery. The allergist said that the surgery is actually fairly involved and that they have to make a new abdominal floor with his fascia and muscles and that that takes a long time to heal, about 8 weeks. The day we had the evaluations and the allergist appointment, was 8 weeks to the day of his surgery.

I do have some very minor concerns but I think he's made such great progress that I expect to see them disappear. My only concern at this point is that he doesn't respond to his name 100% of the time. But he is getting better and better every day.

Here's what I've learned through this all: be an advocate for your child. I was really tired of going to doctors and telling them that something was wrong and having them think I was nuts. But something was wrong. He was likely in pain for a good nine months of his life. I'm proud that I pushed so far, but I'm also really thrilled that his skills are so smack on average.

the best things Delaney has said.. this week

Yesterday, my mom sat Delaney while Zap and I spent the day at appointments with Dash.
We came home and Delaney asked for chocolate milk. My mom agreed and I told her that we only do chocolate milk on the weekends.
I poured regular milk into Delaney's sippy and she asked for chocolate milk. I told her that we were out of chocolate milk and she tried the open the refrigerator. I told her that there was no chocolate milk in the fridge and Delaney RAN to the pantry. She opened it up and said:
"There IT IS!! I FOUND IT!!!" and wildly pointed to the Hershey's syrup bottle. We were all laughing so darn hard that we couldn't breathe. I went to the pantry and grabbed the syrup. I didn't want to be seen as someone who would lie to my child..
I pull the syrup out of the pantry and Delaney says "Mommy, put it in!!" as she hands me her cup.

The other night Zap and I switched off who was putting Delaney to bed. She and I got all snuggled and she said "Sap do?" and it took me a second to figure out it was "Where did Zap go?". I told her that Papa had gone downstairs and we continued to snuggle.

We had just pulled into the garage and we asked her who should put her to bed "Mama or Papa?" and Delaney said "neither"

Just a few of the many times we've laughed this week.

busy busy mama (and family)

I didn't realize it had been so long since I last posted. It really seemed like the baptisms were a week or so ago, but now its been three weeks.
I had such a blast with my best friend, Brenna, here. It was wonderful to see her and to watch her spend time with her godchildren :) Since she left, I feel like my left arm is missing. She's talking about coming back in the fall, so we have that to look so forward to.
My dad also came for a visit, and it was such a great visit. He hasn't been out since Dash was born, so I was thrilled he got to spend some time with them. Having him here is so easy its not like having company. We took it easy, did our schedule, and hung out. Dad helped out by getting in on the living room painting and it was helpful because he knew lots of helpful tricks. He also made this fabulous BBQ dinner. It was like being at home again for me. Coleslaw, beans, corn on the cob, thick BBQ ribs, and pulled pork sandwiches. SO stinking tasty. Now I'm craving it again after having written about it.

Dash is now ten months (and a week now, but we'll pretend like I was on time for this update) and he's made a lot of progress in the last few weeks.

Dash still wears size 3 diapers, but I think we've ordered our last box. I think size 4 starts at 22 pounds, but the 3s seem to be getting a little snug on him. He had a weight check last week and he crossed into 20 pounds! I was a little stupefied. About a week and a half before that he only weighed 18.5 pounds so he put it on :)

Dash is a full formula baby, and that's a big change since 9 months. I went away for a girls weekend and had such a great time, but I didn't pump enough and Dash didn't really care about nursing once I got back. He takes a bottle every three to four hours. He's been on a bottle strike lately, but he's not trying to nurse. My thoughts are that it has to do with other developmental stuff he's doing.
Last month, I posted that Dash had no teeth. Holy moly, he got all four since then! We were shocked! He has his front middle right tooth in and while it was coming up, the top two front teeth started in and now he's just waiting on the bottom middle left tooth to come in (its in just not all the way). It was a rough week for us. He ran a fever and we just couldn't make him happy in any way. He was really miserable.
Dash has started to eat more finger foods: toast, waffles, bananas, peas, crackers, bits of cheese, bits of noodles, bits of apples, pretty much anything he can get in those little hands. It feels good to see him eat and enjoy food.

Dash has been sleeping well now that all the teeth have broken through. That week he wasn't sleeping at all, so neither was Zap, who does the night shift :)
Still for day naps, I rock him and put him to bed sleepy or asleep, depending on how tired he is.

We've finally been on a really consistent day schedule for us, so I'm sure that will change again soon. That seems to be how it goes.

Dash seems to have more "good" days than "bad" days. I wish I had more words to express what I mean by "good" and "bad". Some days he's clingy, fussy, and not interested in anything. But, knock on wood, he's been doing really well.

Dash no longer avoids tummy time, because HE'S CRAWLING!!!! I'm so excited that he's finally become a full crawler. It's adorable and I love that he's more of a handful. I love seeing him interested in his environment, in what he can get into and all of that fun, crawler stuff.

He can stand supported and he can pull up to his knees. He's working on pulling up to his feet, but he's not quite there yet. I have moved his crib down to the next to lowest rail now so that when he wakes up he can stand up in his crib. He can get himself to sitting from a tummy position.

Dash still has beautiful eyes, but some days they are more hazel. He had his first haircut while Brenna was here, but they didn't take much, just a trim. His hair isn't as curly, but it is wavy.

Dash does hi, bye, and yay signs independently but he doesn't do more or all done yet unless we tell/ask him to.

Dash and I go with just each other to babygym twice a week while Delaney goes to Murphy's house for lunch and I think we're both loving the mommy/son time.

Delaney is doing so great. She's a total chatterbox. We're getting really close to being potty trained, but I think that it's going to be a lot of careful monitoring over the next year. I'm thinking we will see some backslides and difficulties depending on her development. Lately sh'es talking all the time and she's pretty funny. She's learning to tell knock knock jokes (knock knock, who's there?, octopus - that's as far as she gets) and she likes to say "Laney funny".
Yesterday she came to me and said "Laney needs sub ba too?". I had no idea. After I couldn't get it, she said it again and then she did a zubber kiss on my knee, so I knew she wanted to zubber kiss my cheek.

Baptisms and spending time out and about

We had the babies baptized at our church, St. Benedict Episcopal Church, this past Sunday and I think it went so well. We had my best friend Brenna in to be their godparent and it is a role that she takes very seriously, which just lets us know that we chose the right person.
Dash went first and George Anne, our vicar, poured Holy Water over his head. He didn't make a peep.
Delaney went second and we were a little worried about how she would handle it but she did great. We explained to her what George Anne (we call her Georgie, and Delaney is familiar with her) would do to her with the water.
After the water, the babies were christened with an oil called chrism. My favorite part was that Dash smelled like the oil for a few days after.



We had a small gathering at our home after the baptisms, and after all of that, we were exhausted!
We got up the next morning and Brenna and I spent the morning taking Delaney and Dash to Kindergym. I was excited to show Brenna kindergym and let her see how much fun Delaney has there.
After that, my wonderful and helpful father in law, Jerry, came over to spend the afternoon with Delaney and Dash while Brenna and I went to Seattle. She hadn't been to Pike's Place Market yet and we wanted to check out the Capitol Hill neighborhood. We had a blast. I don't remember ever laughing so hard. I told someone today that I probably lost three pounds laughing at Brenna the whole weekend.

We got home after the kids had gone to bed and we tried to go to bed early because we'd planned to go to the Portland Zoo and take Delaney and Dash. We met up with my friend Ruth there since she lives in Portland and loves the babies.
The zoo was so much fun. We are working on toilet training Delaney and she was able to stay dry the entire time. We just stopped and used a restroom each time we saw one. She didn't fuss or fight when we let her know that it was time to try.