Month of June

We've had a busy month. Here's the highlights:

Father's Day cherry pie. Joseph said it was fine.

Swing almost always puts him to sleep.

Ashton desperately wanted to go to a park after we stopped at a friend's house one day. It started to rain but she could care less.

If he's not asleep, then he is one smiley boy in the swing! Love him!

The school, which is across from our local park, is doing construction. Ashton must see the diggers and bulldozers every day.

Ashton finding some new hiding spots.

Showing off her new BYU shirt for football season. She picked it. Pink, of course!

With my new calling as Relief Society President, along with teaching for BYU-Idaho this summer, Ashton likes to copy me and send emails. She's getting really good at hitting "enter" for me except it is often at the wrong time!

We're borrowing someone's bike trailer to see if Ashton and Tanner would like it. Tanner was asleep already but Ashton loved it.

July brings scout camp and high adventure trip (canoeing in Arkansas) for Joseph. The kids and I will head up to Wisconsin again. Then my spring semester ends and I was offered a contract for summer and fall. So I'm teaching the rest of the year. It's nice but I was secretly looking forward to a break.

5 Months Old!

Weight: 20ish pounds

Height: 27ish inches

Clothing Size: 6-9 month clothing with a few 12 month things


Daily Schedule: Wakes up between 7 and 8am. Takes 3-4 naps throughout the day. Ashton preferred to sleep in her own space when she was a baby. Tanner would probably love to co-sleep if I let him. Often, during the afternoon nap he will wake up and fall back asleep in my bed if I'm laying down. He loves sleeping next to me. Just this week he has started to sleep 8-10 hours for his first stretch of sleep at night. Then he'll eat and go back to sleep until his morning wake up. It feels wonderful to have a little more sleep at night. I think it has a lot to do with him finally eating solids. We started him on it over the past few weeks and he didn't really like it until this week. Now, he eats an entire container of baby food every night. Hooray! However, I also know that babies seem to give you a little bit of extra sleep right before they pull an all-nighter. So I'm sure this is simply the calm before the storm.

Special Outings: Wisconsin! He did great the whole trip. It helps that he is still pretty young so can sleep anywhere.

Firsts: First flight, first long car trip, first time meeting aunts and uncles and cousins, first time sitting up, first solid. He is also pretty close to crawling. He gets up on his hands and knees and propels forward.

Sibling love: As long as Tanner isn't touching Ashton, they're okay together. Ashton loves asking Tanner how many sleeps he got and if he is feeling okay. She still hates when he spits up and drools. They like making each other laugh and smile. They definitely are two different babies/kids. I think I am liking the baby phase more this time around but it is still not my favorite stage.

Loves food!

Tip over!

Kid swap date night with Derrick. These two boys are two months apart and best buds already.

Sitting up like a big boy.

Just helping Tanner out.

Ashton got mad that he rolled onto her bag.

How bath time typically goes for Tanner. Ashton puts as much as she can in his tub for him. He is also a little large for this tub but he can't sit up reliably enough to switch him. I recall this in-between stage with Ashton too so I hope it doesn't last too much longer.

Lots of videos this month but he is just so cute!

The Flood

Well, our flood didn't quite last 150 days like it did for Noah. More like four days. But it was still a very exciting time in our lives.

The weekend prior to our area flooding, several neighborhoods in Lake Jackson had evacuated. Those neighborhoods were much closer to the bayou and river than us so I wasn't worried at all. Tuesday morning, I left for storytime and drove back home after lunch. In those three hours, the streets had a considerable amount of water. What confused me was the fact that it hadn't rained. Water was coming UP through the street drains. Around 1:45, I was nervous about getting my car out if the water kept rising the way it was. After calling the city a lot and waiting for their press release at 3:30pm, we were issued a voluntary evacuation. I hemmed and hawed about leaving. I couldn't reach Joseph at work so I needed to make a decision quickly. When the firefighters came around issuing the evacuation notice, the guy told me if the evacuation changed to mandatory and we couldn't get out of our house, we would be charged with child endangerment. That is what convinced me to leave. So we packed up quickly and someone with a very high truck came and got us. My car was stuck in the garage but Joseph was able to park a few blocks away where it hadn't flooded yet.

We were grateful for many ward members who opened their homes to us. We stayed with Ashton's best friend, Collin and their family. Ashton slept on a mattress on the floor, which was the first time out of a crib for her. She did alright. Our home never flooded but the streets were impassable until Friday and Saturday. We came back home Wednesday night to sleep by trekking through the water and then went back to Collin's for Thursday. That way, we weren't stuck at home all day long. Joseph had the rest of the week off so anytime we went somewhere, we walked a few blocks to our car and could get out.

I'm grateful we had 72 hour kits (even though we forgot them amidst the rush and craziness of the afternoon...) and food storage in our home. Also for the fact that we paid our flood insurance. Joseph couldn't remember if we had renewed it earlier in the spring so the first free moment he got was to check that we had insurance. We are also grateful our home didn't flood. We have some ward and stake members who are now facing major home repairs from flooding. It has allowed us to help serve and Ashton loves service opportunities. On Monday, we made lunch for the volunteers at one member's home. Ashton loved making sandwiches and giving lunch to all the missionaries and people there.

Taken around 1:30pm. When I left at 10:30, the streets were completely dry.

I walked around the street to take pictures and send to Joseph at work. I wanted him to see I wasn't just being silly and scared.

As we're leaving.

Playing at Collin's house. Ashton loves their firefighter hats.

Trekking our way back home Wednesday. For me, it was about knee deep at the deepest part. Some friends of ours live a few blocks further down and it was waist deep in some parts for them! Crazy!

The drainage ditches behind our houses. Most water I've ever seen in them.

Derrick and Tanner playing nicely.

Haircut

The night I found out I was taking the kids to Wisconsin, I mentioned to Joseph that I should cut his hair before I left. Ashton was nearby and overhead me. The next night, I found this:

It's hard to tell but she cut off several chunks of hair from her ponytail. It is really noticeable if I do several small ponytails, which I typically do on Sundays. I cried. Between the stress of packing, traveling, and Ashton cutting her baby hair off, I was a bit stressed. I know it will grow back but to see her beautiful hair on the floor was the tipping point that day. On the positive side, she didn't cut her skin or give herself bangs...

Impromptu Trip to Wisconsin

We made a quick, last minute trip to Wisconsin. My paternal grandfather passed away and I decided to go to the funeral. In addition, my brother would be there and I haven't seen him in a long time. We found really cheap tickets to Minneapolis so I brought Ashton with me. Tanner is attached to me so he came too.

We set out bright and early on Wednesday for an 8am flight. Flight went wonderful as Tanner slept for half of it and then was nice the other half. The flight didn't scare me; the three hour drive is what intimidated me. Also, lugging around two carseats, a stroller, and a few bags was tricky. We got the rental car and hit the road. The kids did pretty well on the drive and we made it to my parent's home.

Ashton loves and adores Nana and Papa. She couldn't wait to arrive. We spent lots of time with family, which was great. We drove over for the funeral on Saturday and spent most of the day with my brother. My sister and her husband drove with me so I didn't have to drive 3 hours alone again.

While we were in town, my step-sister and her family stayed at my parent's home too. It was a full house filled with laughter and kids playing nicely. I love seeing Ashton interact with her cousins. My cousin, Amy, came over one night and Ashton ran her ragged playing some sort of monster-tag game. Another night, we went to visit my cousin, Lisa, who has a 10 year old daughter. Ashton walked right into their house and played very well with Megan.

All in all, it was a great trip. I am exhausted as both kids woke up at least twice every night. Tanner ended up in my bed most nights and Ashton joined me a few nights too.

Here's the trip in pictures.

My siblings and I.

Visited Great-Grandma. I got a picture of her holding Tanner but it was really blurry. Good thing we'll be back in 6 weeks.

Visited the new children's museum in Wausau. They had this car track thing that Ashton loved.

Ashton was introduced to a tablet.

Playing monster with Amy

My sister and brother-in-law with my kids and Rindy's.

My parent's ponds have tons of tadpoles so Ashton begged my mom to catch some every day.

Took the boat out for a ride. The kids loved it too.

Playing at the children's place at the Minneapolis airport. Ashton mooched off everyone else to ride the rides. I didn't have any coins... poor kid.

Our return flight didn't leave until 8pm. She was exhausted too. Tanner slept the entire flight and Ashton fell asleep the last hour.

The children's museum had this for tummy time. Tanner was willing to stay on his tummy for a long time.

Megan and Ashton selfie.

We can't wait to go back in six weeks for our planned trip!