Bathtime

To change things up a little, one night we decided to let the girls swim in our pool after dinner and then just give them a bath in it.

It was pretty fun at first because they got to splash as much as they wanted to, something that doesn't get to happen in the bathtub.

Emily enjoyed it until water started getting in her eyes from Haley's splashing.

After all the fun, it was time to get scrub a dub clean.  We brought out the soap and loofah and just lathered them up.

Then came the rinse from the watering can.  Classy, I know.

After getting all rinsed, the girls got stripped down to get dried off.  Only, they didn't want to get dried off.  Swimming naked was much more fun.  Sorry, no pictures getting posted of that :)

It was fun to do things a little different and we'll probably do it a few more times this summer. 

Summer Fun

Now that summer is officially here, we have been trying to get creative and find things to do to keep busy around the house.  You almost can't even go outside between 9:30am and 6:30pm without being drenched in sweat or eaten by mosquitos.

One day we had fun with pipe cleaners.  I had some around the house and was trying to think of what to do with them.  Then I spotted the broken plastic crown on the counter and thought I would just make a few pipe cleaner crowns to replace it.  They aren't super fancy or anything, but they were a hit.

Haley has also been busy practicing her silly faces.

Since the crowns were a hit, I thought I would see what else we could do with pipe cleaners.  So after searching Pinterest for all of 30 seconds, I found pipe cleaner catepillars.  Perfect!  Haley loved putting the beads on all by herself.

Emily needed a little bit of help, but did a great job.

When we were done, Haley wanted me to write her name on her catepillar and then hang it up to dry (because that's what they did at school, which makes me a little happy that she misses going to school).

Emily enjoyed getting catepillar kisses.

Another day we played balloon ping pong (another great Pinterest find).  Just slap a popsicle stick on a paper plate, blow up a balloon, and you've got hours of entertainment. 

Well, it should have been hours.  Emily didn't quite get the concept of hitting the balloon back and forth, so Haley just popped the balloon to herself while Emily just played with the balloon.

We've also been spending lots of afternoons in our inflatable pool.  Since Zach has been working quite a bit, it is so much easier for me to just fill up the pool rather than take the girls to the pool or beach.  And they have fun just splashing, sliding, and "swimming like Nemo".  It's perfect.

22 Months

I'm a little overdue here, but "Emma" as Haley likes to call her now is 22 months old.  I'm not sure how it's possible that she will be 2 in only 2 months! 

Emily loves her big sister so much.  She usually wants to be in the same room with her doing the same things.  She really wants to be one of the big girls.

Emily is so silly.  She loves laughing and telling her joke.  "Knock knock"  Who's there you ask.  "Peek-a-boo."  Peek-a-boo who?  "Don't cry, just a joke."  And then she laughs hysterically.  It's so precious.  I hope she never loses her sense of humor.

Emily is so smart, and I'm not just saying that :)  She knows her ABC's, can count to 10, has books memorized, and even remembers the words to quite a few songs.  It's amazing.  She really blows my mind sometimes with just how much she already knows.

She cannot get enough of shoes.  It usually takes a while for her to pick which ones she would like to wear because she wants it to be perfect.  She also enjoys walking around in mommy or daddy's shoes. 

Emily loves to play games.  Go Fish with her animals is always fun.  She also enjoys dominoes, but mostly just knocking them over.  She's always up for racing the toy cars or racing on ride on cars. 

Our little Emily Grace is truly one of the most sweetest, lovable little girls.  And she is growing up entirely too fast. 

Things on Thursday

Up until recently, we've managed to stay pretty busy with school, music class, and all our other adventures.  But now, school is out and there just isn't much to do around town.  So here are a few things we've done to try to keep busy :)

Haley is finally riding her bike all on her own.  She is a pro now and loves to go fast!

There has been lots and lots of dress up play.

We read tons of books every day.  I love that these girls are such bookworms.

Haley and Emily have come up with a game called "Haley and Emily too close".  Basically, Zach hooked up the camera to the TV so the girls can watch themselves dance around.  Emily likes to take pictures while they play. 

And speaking of games, Haley has learned to play Go Fish and tries to play with Emily.  It gets pretty silly.

Haley is just like momma and ready for football season to get here!  Haley loves wearing her
"Wreck 'Em Tech" dress and we've been practicing getting our guns up :)

We even went bowling one afternoon with friends.  The girls had such a great time and I was very impressed with their scores! 

Big Girl

Over the weekend we converted Emily's crib into a big girl bed.  I wasn't quite ready for it and it was definitely a spur of the moment decision. 

But it was the right choice.  As soon as Emily saw her new bed, she was over the moon. 

She crawled right on in like it had always been that way.

Even Haley was excited!

I can't believe how quickly my baby girl is growing up!!