Horsin' Around

They thought they were real cowgirls riding on this roping steer. Incidentally, this is the only thing Claire would ride at the ranch yesterday.

First time on a horse. She loved it. I see riding lessons in her future.

Luke also loved riding his first horse.

A few non-related informational points:

• The rest of my (hopefully) fantastic photos are in my camera. I've been practicing with film. It's exciting, but somehow disheartening to know that I have to wait to see the results.
  
• It is officially fall here. Really, it feels like winter, as we went from mid-80s directly to low-60s and blustery winds, but I know I shouldn't complain when other areas of the country are expecting snow next week.
  
• The girls are listening to Bocelli at a high volume in Kate's room right now. This has been a common occurrence since Tim pulled out his old CD and introduced it to Kate. They adore it.
  
• Luke had is 18-month well-check last week, at 19 months. He is a solid 28lb 4oz, and is 33.25" tall. And he didn't make a single sound throughout his exam, to include staying silent during 2 shots. Tough guy.

This is the time to live in Las Vegas

I have a love-hate relationship with spring. It started when we moved to Tucson. I LOVE spring. It's beautiful, sunny, and well, spring-y outside. It doesn't get much better than this. Highs in the 70s, lows in the 50s, windows open, flowers blooming. But it transitions into summer all too soon in the southwest. It won't be long before it's 110 and I'm miserable. This year, I'm trying to enjoy spring to its absolute fullest. We have been outside everyday this week, and have walked and ridden bikes to the train park twice since Tim left. We'll go again today if I can get us out the door soon enough after nap. Sure, dinners have consisted of quesadillas more times than the children would care to choose, but it's glorious out there!

On the way to the train park yesterday.

Chalk appetizers chalk drawing before lunch. Notice everyone in short sleeves and/or shorts, except Claire. She demanded to have pants and a sweater. "I'm cold, Mommy." Aaah, she is my daughter.

Oooh, more snacks.

Chalk booty.

Making a break for it.

Oh, also, before I forget. Luke is getting bigger, as some of you have noticed. At 11mo, 2 weeks ago, he measured 30" and 24.6lbs. And he's this close to walking on his own as a preferred choice.

AND, under the category of TMI, Claire did the big deuce on the potty twice yesterday. Here's to hoping she is finally over that fear.

How big is Luke?

So big! At his 9mo appointment yesterday, he weighed in at 22lb 2oz, and he is now 28 3/4" tall. He has learned 3 signs, and usually performs all of them in a row for you, just to show off. [The signs: all done, more, and so big (I know, it's more of a game than a sign, but let's not tell him just yet).]

Really enjoying his sauce.

Look at me, Ma!

Damn.

He isn't walking yet, but is tottering around behind his push-toys by himself. He is also gaining a better sense of balance and is close to riding Rody by himself.

Kate and Claire are back in the swing of things, enjoying school and expanding their amazing imaginations. Kate talks approximately 98% of the minutes she is awake, leaving us all a little bewildered. She and I need to have a little chat about personal information, as I have heard her several times tell strangers the dates of birth of her whole family, and she has even shared our address with people in line at Target. Everyone knows how old I am, and that her father is "older than dirt". As for Claire, she is super excited about turning 3 at the end of the month. She is also insisting on panda cupcakes again. She likes what she likes. But she's branching out, too, as she showed us tonight at dinner by eating a leaf of lettuce and a pickle (both of which she claimed to detest before this).

All about Luke

We've had such a whirlwind of events over the past month, that I have failed to chronicle Luke's recent accomplishments. Just after we got back from Tucson, Luke started crawling. He is taking after big sister Kate in this regard; she crawled at 7 1/2 months, and he crawled at almost 8 months. About a week and a half later, he started holding onto things by himself, and then started pulling himself up on everything just after he turned 8 months old. I walked into his room to check on him during his morning nap, and found him whimpering, "stuck" standing up in his crib. We had an emergency lower-the-crib session that night.

Now he pulls up on everything he can get his hands on (your leg, the steps [his favorite], the cat, the Christmas tree [kidding; he is far too fascinated by the lights to try to pull up on it, yet]), and is even using some of the push-toys on his own. Kate walked at 9 months, so I am anticipating this with Luke. I still have not figured out what to do with our abnormally-railed stairs, and fear we will have to resort to using those super-yard baby gates to fence off the whole area. He uses his head as a third hand, leaning it against something to gain leverage to stand up. He takes his share of spills, but keeps trying until he achieves his goal. Luckily for me, he isn't fully aware of what he is capable of.

He has been saying 'DADADADADA' for weeks, but recently put together the sounds every mom wants to hear: 'MAMAMAMA'. Sadly, he generally only uses this latter sound when he's sad and crying about something.

He is eating semi-solid foods, and particularly loves yogurt melts and cheese puffs. Also on top of the list is regular vanilla yogurt and anything with sugar.

Enjoying dark chocolate gelato in Tucson.

Stats and cereal

Luke is already 4 months old. FOUR MONTHS. Wasn't he just born? I do not know how time is passing so quickly, but I would like for it to slow down a little. Except for the witching hours - those can speed up any time now.

At his well-baby check, we learned that he is heavy. And tall. Specifically, he weighs 18lbs 3oz (95%), and is 26" (75-90%). His noggin is proportionate to his height, at 43cm (75%). The good doctor recommended we start on some rice cereal, which I was all too happy to comply with after Luke started waking up in the middle of the night again last week and consuming an additional meal. Today we had some rice cereal. We didn't care too much for it.

Hey, it's only July 9th

And here are my 4th of July pictures! It's been a full week. Tim had a long weekend to celebrate Independence Day, and we were busy almost the whole time. We invited friends over on Friday night, as they are ready to PCS. The kids swam and swam and ate and swam and lit fireworks and cried and covered their ears. Then they slept.

Saturday was a party at another family's house. The kids were up until 11pm that night...and crabby. Kate tried her first sparkler, and just as I was telling her not to touch the end of it (it had just burned out), she started crying. She had already grabbed it. I did the same thing when I was little, which is why I knew to tell her not to touch it, but I got to her too late. She is fine - just small white burns on three of her fingers.

On Sunday, we went to Max's birthday party at the gymnastics gym (is that redundant?), and they ran and jumped and ate cake. They slept pretty hard that night, too. We took Tim to the airport on Monday morning so he could go to "fanistan", according to Kate. We've been keeping pretty busy since then, so they are holding up fairly well.

Bandages.

Three months old: 25" and 16.5 pounds. WOW. Someone's been eating well.

The kitty is ready for fireworks.