Summer Events

Melinda and I went to Las Vegas for a delayed anniversary get away. Nanna and Poppy watched the kids for us while we were gone from Monday the 12th through Wednesday the 14th. On Sunday the 11th we went for a family walk and Melinda and I were both so somber about leaving, I felt a lot like I did before I left for Peru. And we both agreed that we felt something similar to the day we had to give Alex over to the doctor for his surgery. We were just so sad about leaving our kids. This was going to be our longest time away from them – two whole nights, and 3 days. Monday morning as Melinda was getting ready, including buying their favorite cereal, and folding their cloths, she actually cried. I think it’s sweet that she loves them so much. Just the same it was good to get away, and by the time we started to enjoy ourselves, it was time to come home. They did just great while we were away – they were happy to be with Nanna and Poppy and were well behaved. The funniest occurrence of the stay was on the second night. Abby was sleeping with Nanna in her bed. Nanna must have been snoring, because she was awoken all of a sudden by an annoyed little voice saying, “Nanna, be quiet!”. Then, in frustration she threw herself back down on the pillow and sighed.

Nanna said that she enjoyed Alex always saying “Thank You” which he does very consistently. It sounds more like “doo doo”.

Alex, as a typical boy, loves to tease his sister, much to our frustration. Abby has no problem screaming when she is being borrowed, and it’s a powerful scream too, which mostly hides Alex’s laughter as he runs from her carrying her doll, or stands on her blanket, or pins her to the ground. Abby has some good wrestling moves as well and takes her turns pinning Alex down, then it’s his turn to do the screaming. As soon as we break it up, they laugh and go right back at it. We are trying to teach them to let the other one go when they start to scream or cry, but we haven’t made much progress yet.

Alex just loves Toy Story. Buzz Lightyear is his favorite. He says it “Buh Lye La” (he still usually only says the first syllable of words, but he does speak in complete sentences now). He watches toy story with wrapped attention and will later pretend that he is Buzz as we run and jumps around the house. I would really like to buy him a Buzz Lightyear toy.

Both of you kids are really good at going to Nursery. Sometimes Alex has a hard time at first, until he gets distracted. I think he will have a hard time going to Nursery by himself once Abby moves up to Primary next year. Alex’s favorite toy is the Fisher-Price cash register. Abby loves the dolls of course, but they both really enjoy doing puzzles. Abby is up to the cardboard 12 piece puzzles, the one that just show the outline of the pieces. Alex still likes the wooden cut out puzzles.

We went camping this last weekend, from Thursday, to Saturday. We went with most of Melinda’s family up to Current Creek. It was about a 2 hour drive. The spot we found was shaded by Aspen trees – which, due to the time of year, continually dropped sap on everything. The surrounding area was really beautiful. Alex wanted to ride the “bikes”, or the four wheelers. We went on two rides together, both on about the same course, up to the top of the next hill where we could look down over the valley. There was a nice mix of aspens and pines, a lingering amount of snow on top of the mountain and it was just amazing.