Baby Singewald: Summer Days Drifting Away! (July

July and August days were filled with unpacking, organizing and trying to reassemble some kind of "normal" for our daily life, since I knew that once workshop started again and we were back at work, house tasks would take twice as long to complete! During the summer, I also worked one or two days a week at SACC (school-aged child care) at St. Hubert's to help make up some of my unpaid time from my maternity leave with Emma. Most of my days at SACC were spent chaperoning field trips, so the time passed quickly, but it was difficult to be away from the kids in the summer and then have my at-home time so busy with trying to get life back to normal in our new house! However, we did squeeze in fun daily and try to live up every moment together!

John found the pure joy of the sprinkler this summer! Before this year, he wasn't sure he wanted to run in it, but now that he realized it's not scary, I think there will be a lot more fun to come next summer when Emma will be running through it with him!

Emma LOVED her little pony to ride that Uncle Steve and Aunt Katie gave her!

Cute little moments!

Emma gave her stamp of approval on the frozen chocolate pudding in graham crackers!

Emma loved walking with her new stroller/scooter/cart from Uncle Tim and Auntie Crystal!

The last week of July, my whole family was blessed to spend time in Chicago with Mike and Jeanna to live the city life for awhile! We loved our time there with them and the kids did a great job on the long drive down. There were times when Phil and I discussed driving through the night next time so most of the trip would be quiet, since both John and Emma struggled to nap in the car, so we'll have to see what future trips hold! However, they did a great job and fun was had by all!

They both had silly moments in the car!

Emma is obsessed with Darcy, Mike and Jeanna's dog! She follows Darcy around and would lay on her any chance she could get!

We took an adventure as a family to the Museum of Science and Industry one day, where John loved the huge display of model trains, the combine he could climb up in and the airplane he could explore!

A trip to Chicago also wouldn't be complete without a trip to the Shedd Aquarium, where we could all get our fill of every fish possible, including the Jellies exhibit and the dolphin/whale/sea lion show! Thanks to my having brought our stroller, we were able to skip the incredibly long entrance line and go in a side accessible entrance (since the main entrance is up a few flights of stairs) and walk right through!
(Sorry some of the pictures are blurry! My camera didn't like the no flash restriction!)

John loved the exploratory portion of the museum!

While we were in Chicago, Emma's top right tooth popped through on July 29 and her top left tooth on July 31! Our little lady was finally getting more teeth!

Emma had always been a good eater, but at this point, her favorite foods are bananas, peaches, dried apples, veggie chips, deli turkey and ham, cheese, peas, pasta, Nutri-Grain bars and toast with jelly. She eats with her hands and doesn't normally want to be fed anymore. She will still eat baby cereal and fruit at breakfast, but wants to do lunch and dinner on her own!

John, on the other hand, still struggles to try new things, but Emma is opening his eyes to new foods! Sometimes when she eats them, he'll be willing to try them too! John still continues to love his cinnamon bread with jelly in the morning or Nutri-Grain bar, but also enjoys most kinds of meat and fish, and peas, carrots and corn for veggies. It's definitely the hardest to get him to try new veggies! We'll just keep at it!

Emma loves her new purse from Uncle Matt and Aunt Beth! She instantly tried to put her bracelet on, talk on her phone and look at herself in the little mirror! She is all girl!

Emma loves to play with John. She loves to tackle him, wrestle and will even stand up, put her arms up tall and "pounce" on someone on the floor, stating "kaboom!" She loves to feed her baby, play with her singing picnic basket, crawl up on the couch or fireplace, and sing Elmo's song "la la la la." She also loves to swing at the park, go down slides and pick grass!

At almost 13 months old, Emma clearly says mum mum, dada, Elmo, Daisy, shakes her head no and says uh-uh, and Mmmm for more or milk. She babbles all the time and sometimes quite loudly! Emma also has a definite temper starting to show and has had some tantrums already! She walks with help from one or two hands, depending on how wobbly she is at the time! She has walked with just a few fingers of help a couple of times, but instantly sits down! She is very fast at crawling though and when she walks along things using them for support!

Emma still only wants a bottle at bedtime but will take a sippy at other times. She goes to sleep on her own most of the time after being put in her crib awake. She has been sleeping through the night almost every night for the last month (July - Aug)... Most times 12-13 hrs at a time! She is normally only taking one nap 2-3 hrs long because of sleeping in. We hope this pattern will continue even when teeth appear! At this point though, she's figured out going to bed on her own and sleeping through the night earlier in life than John did!

John continues to love to be active and creative! A perfect day for him consists of time at the park, coloring or painting pictures, playing ball outside and running around with Daisy! He is happiest outside doing "jobs" with dad, snuggling to read stories with mom or having dance parties with all of us! He is such a happy kid and has such a kind heart!

Summer fun at the park!

You can't beat the sandbox on a sunny summer day!

A boy and his dog...

I see t-ball in someone's future!!

Uh-oh... you mean I wasn't supposed to sit in here?! I'm stuck!!

The first weekend of August the Carver County Fair was in town, so we decided to go and enjoy an evening with the rides and animals. John loved doing some of the rides with both Phil and I and Emma couldn't get enough of all the people! We also tried cotton candy and mini-donuts, which were loved by all!

Other cute snuggle moments...

Reading...

and Grilling...

Mmmm....Meat!

Emma is such a goofball sometimes!

One of my all-time favorite pictures!!

"Hey, Mom! Do you see me? I'm getting up on the fireplace!"

"Oh, no! She caught me!"

John's washing the dishes... He wanted to help and play in the sink at the same time!

John decided to check out Daisy's door for her before she did to make sure it worked ok. Yes, he did go through it as well!

Fun with Papa!

Emma was excited to get up north (as we all were) and have one more weekend together for Papa's birthday before school started again for all of us! Workshop had already started, so we all welcomed a little rest and relaxation before the chaos continued! My parents were also able to join us, so we had a great time relaxing, fishing and enjoying the beautiful and quiet time up in the north country!

Disclaimer: Emma went into Daisy's kennel on her own!! She thought it was a fun place to play!

John enjoyed building a fort with sticks on the beach!

What great drivers!

Cool shades!

It was a little windy that night....

Happy Birthday to Papa! His two favorite helpers came to his rescue to blow out his candles (although we thought Emma was going to dig into the cake with her fork before we were even done singing!)

It's time to walk! Emma started walking on Aug. 27, and nothing has been safe since!

As I left for workshop meetings on August 30, Emma waved good-bye to me on her own. She was getting so big!

On Labor Day weekend, the weather was fantastic and we decided to take the kids to the MN Zoo for one last trip before school started. They loved being outside and seeing all the animals, but I think our favorite part of the trip was the butterfly garden. John loved seeing all the butterflies flying around us and wanted to take pictures of them with my phone! I happily handed it over to him and he took all the zoo pictures, other than 2 of the butterfly ones. I think we may have a photographer on our hands! He did a fantastic job of getting nice, clear and zoomed pictures of the butterflies and animals!