A lot of Firsts this Summer

We've been doing some super fun things with Claire lately, and so much so that we're never home to blog about it. She's at this super fun (and often times frustrating) age where everything she sees, encounters, touches, etc, is absolutely amazing to her. We love to see her eyes light up and to watch her explore and help her learn all about this world around her.

I'm not quite sure what took us so long but we took Claire to the beach for the first time a couple weekends ago.

Utter amazement, she's probably thinking, "this is the coolest place I've ever seen, why have my parents never brought me here before!" We could not keep that girl out of the frigid water.

Note to self: Take family photo before Claire gets all wet and sandy next time. ;)



This is what we got when we told her to smile, cheese it up Claire.


No ball left behind!

Probably the best part about this whole summer has been having Claire's cousin's in town from Colorado. Oh boy, does she loves those kids. She's still working on saying Rayden, but Kolten she calls "Kole-Kole", and both Zenna and Savannah are "Nenna", way to be efficient Claire. We met up with my parents, Grandma & Granddad and Jay and the kids (plus Rayden's friend); hilariousness/chaos ensued.

Claire made a mad dash any chance she got and grabbed everyone's ball at least once and slam dunked it in the hole; maybe mini-golf wasn't the best idea.

The water was very fascinating, a little later she (very) purposely chucked our ball in the water.

Grandma Debi w/ all her grandkids plus one (Rayden's friend in the hat)

She was very interested in the arcade games, she just squealed and ran from one to another.

Me trying to teach an 1.5 and 3 year old how to stomp on the spiders, I don't think we did very well.

We stuffed ourselves with pizza and ice cream, and laughed way too hard at those silly kids. We removed Claire twice from running on top of the skee ball machines. A better time could not have been had. Claire crashed sooooo hard on the way home.

And then last week we went to a Volcanoes vs. Emeralds baseball game (sadly, we forgot our camera). Levi's cousin works for the Emeralds and invited us out and we had a blast. It was of course Claire's 1st baseball game, but mine also. Claire plastered herself in cotton candy and continually clapped for the wrong team. Thank goodness for the playground behind the bleachers, Claire could only sit still as long as the cotton candy lasted which wasn't nearly long enough.

I love summer! Why does it have to end!?

-Elizabeth