Summer is here....

even if the weather in Utah seems to get confused every few days...summer really is here. How do I know this? A street full of kids, dozens of bikes scooters and skateboards, a trash full of empty otter pop wrappers, dirty little feet, sunburns and one extremely exhausted little girl at the end of the day. Yup...Tanglewood summer fun has officially begun.

Reese is so excited, she can hardly stand it!

Her latest accomplishment, learning to ride a scooter. Yesterday she borrowed her friend Delin's scooter and took off. By this afternoon she was almost a pro.

I even caught one of the crashes! But she was tough, not a single tear.

Reese thinks she's just one of the boys...luckily they are so nice to her and always include her...even in their basketball game.

All this hard core playing, scooter riding and basketball games have left Reese with some bumps and bruises. I keep telling Reese that's she's not allowed to hurt my little baby...but she just doesn't listen to me. Luckily I've got plenty of kisses to make them all better.

So you can't tell, but Reese is showing me her first "awee" where blood was present. She scrapped her toe on the sidewalk. Somebody should listen to their mom and wear shoes!

Like a blurr...

I love this picture. Maybe it's because the blurr is symbolic of what my life feels like everyday with Reese running the show around here. Maybe it's because Reese is wearing mixed match pajama's that she picked out and put on all by herself. Or Maybe it's because watching my little wild animal pretend to ride around on her blow up tiger, just makes me smile.

Life with Reese continues to be a wonderful adventure. As most parents, words can not express the love we feel for this little person. I realized that I haven't written many details or updates about Reese for a while, so I thought this would be as good a time as any!

• Reese's vocabulary seems to be on fast forward these days. She surprises us daily with new words. It's funny, but I'm always trying to teach Reese new words, however it's usually things I've never even tried to teach her that she learns the quickest. Tonight as I was putting her to bed, she pointed at Grover on her diaper and said, "Gover". She watches Sesame Street every day, but Grover is not her favorite character and not one that we've been working on. Oh well...we just love that she's learning. And there's nothing quite so sweet as the sound of that little voice, especially when it's saying things like, "hank u (thank you), swawy mama (sorry mama), wuv u (love you), or queen ip (clean up).
• Reese loves to dance. It doesn't matter where we are or what the music is, when she hears the beat...she can't help but move. Honestly, sometimes there doesn't even have to be music. She just loves to move. When we're at home, she loves to dance with me. If music comes on the TV, she will run to me and want me to pick her up. She has to hold my hand while we dance. It's so sweet. Even when I've spun myself into nausea, I can't help but keep going as long as that little voice keeps laughing.
• Reese's favorite cartoon is Curious George. Every morning she watches it first thing, and while she's watching she insists on holding her Curious George stuffed monkey. If we've accidentally left him upstairs, she gets very upset until she is happily holding him. During the opening song for the cartoon, she holds up the monkey and makes him dance around to the music.
• Reese continues to grow tall and skinny. She has such a long torso and skinny little legs. All her new clothes are at least a 3T. Her hair however, is taking it's own sweet time. I'm anxiously awaiting the time that I can experiment with all kinds of cute little girl hair styles.
• Reese loves water. Lately she's discovered the joy's of taking showers. She thinks the shower is her own personal water park, and would love to shower for hours. I'm now trying to teach the concept of water conservation.
• Reese continues to be a very good eater. She eats just about anything we put in front of her. Veggies are still a favorite. Much to her dads dismay, she's a lover of Asparagus, mushrooms and most recently, beets. Popcorn is another recent favorite. When I get the popcorn kernels out she starts squealing with excitement. She jumps up and down and says, "cock orn, cock orn!" I call it her popcorn dance. It's too cute!

Bottom line, Reese is happy, healthy and growing like a weed. We love every bit of her, and can hardly believe she's 20 months old. Time goes too quickly...like a blurr!

Florida...here we come...well...in a few months!

Arnold entered us in a contest to win a free vacation... Yesterday we found out that we won!! We are still in shock! I mean who wins stuff like that?? I guess we do.

After years of giving away fabulous prize's, it feels really good to be on the receiving end of one!

This September we will be headed to beautiful Orlando Florida for 4 days, 3 nights; all expenses paid. That includes air fair, hotel, rental car, and.....

Tickets of our choice to Disney World, Sea World, or Universal Studio's.

As of right now we're leaning towards this place...

To visit these guys....

We figure that might be the most fun for Reese.

We are so grateful to the wonderful people at the CVB in Orlando for picking us as a winner!! Also, Reese and I are incredibly grateful that Arnold took the time to enter this contest. He had to write in 120 characters or less, why Orlando makes you smile. He wrote:

“S is for Sun,

M is for Mickey,

I is for Its the best place to dine and shop,

L is for Laughter and

E is for Everything else!”

Well we're all smiling now! We can't wait until September!

As Ye Sow, So Shall Ye Reap...

This Saturday we swapped our weekly outing for some good old dirt under the fingernails. We planted our annual garden...well... semi-annual anyway. We did skip last year.

This year we've expanded our pots to include square-foot garden boxes. All our neighbors have had huge success with them, so we thought we'd give it a try. This also allows us to try a few new things.

Arnold built our boxes and got everything ready to go.

I did all the planting...big mistake that I'm now paying for, as I'm up in the middle of the night unable to sleep with a swollen face and burning sinus's...but I digress.

We have zucchini, yellow squash, cucumbers and red peppers in the boxes.

In the pots we have tomatoes, basil, chives, and cilantro.

Reese is already excited about helping with the watering process! She's such a big helper these days! Stay tuned in a few months for harvesting.

The Tulip Festival...

was much better this year! Last year a late freeze killed all the tulips. But this year they were in full bloom and they were beautiful. I'm probably a little bias...tulips are one of my favorite flowers.

Our Saturday activity this week was a walk through Thanksgiving Point Gardens to see all the tulips. We had a great time. Reese loved everything from the fish, the flowers, the water, and the cute mommy and baby Owls nested on the cliffs by the water falls.

Jump On It!

A couple months ago our neighborhood play group decided to go to Jump On It for the "mommy & me" jump time. Reese had a blast. We've gone a few more times. Some days Reese is more interested in jumping than others. But we always have a good time.

"Mom! Put down that camera and come jump with me!"

Belly flop!

My little jumper

Mustard!

Our little friend Holden Bunker had a birthday! He loves mustard...the word mustard. So his mom thought it would be fun to have a mustard party.

It started with a yummy mustard cake!

Reese, however, opted for a cupcake...this kid loves cupcakes.

There's a reason why Reese is dressed like a homeless child...why all the kids are dressed in their grubby clothes.

But first the presents...

But then...the mustard...the mustard fight. Because what else do you do at a mustard party?

(At the last minute Reese actually opted to sit on the side lines and watch...well mom decided for her. I was afraid she wouldn't react too well if someone doused her with mustard.)

But most the other kids had a blast spraying mustard all over each other. Like Delin Peterson.

and Gavin Gardner

A few of the other side liners!

Tyler Gardner had a pretty good time as well.

Thanks Holden (and mom) for an awesome party! Happy Birthday!!

I shouldn't have bothered getting dressed this morning.

Today was Stake Conference. About 30 minutes in I decided that chasing a screaming toddler around the church hallways would be a waste of my time, so we headed home. I turned on Curious George for Reese and I studied my Gospel Doctrine lesson for next week. Sorry Stake Presidency...but it was a much better use of my time. Someday I'll get to listen in church again

Wanna go for a drive?

Reese has a new obsession; she loves to play in the car! The good news is she always insists on wearing her seat belt...that's a good start!

"Strap on those foot extenders dad...I'm ready for my first lesson!"

Is it time??

The last couple weeks Reese has been asking to sit on her potty. She's fascinated with the "potty" process and has also started telling me when she needs a diaper change. I've heard these are signs that she's ready to be potty trained.

I'm not sure what to do. In my head I had it all worked out. I would potty train Reese in the fall, right after her 2nd birthday. As the weather started getting cold it would be the perfect time. We'd be staying inside anyway....right?

So now what do I do. I don't want to miss "the window". I've been warned by other mom's about "the window". I'm also worried that Reese's communication skills aren't quite ready for potty training, but what if she really is ready?? I do like the idea of no more diaper expenses...

Any advise from you "potty" experienced mom's??

As promised...

Ok, so here's my new hair! You may be thinking...it doesn't look like any of your options below. Well Andrea (my stylist) and I decided to come up with something that was uniquely my own and worked with the thickness of my hair as well as my face shape. It's actually a little shorter than I had anticipated but I really am loving it.

From wet to done... it takes less than 10 minutes. I can flip it or roll it under. I can flat iron it or just blow dry it. In these pictures I just blew it dry and put a little palm aid on my fingers and ran it through my hair. It took me like 5 minutes today. This will work great with swimming lessons, and outside play all summer.

I decided to leave it dark for now and maybe add some caramel highlights as we go into summer. We'll see, but I'm definitely keeping it on the darker side.

Yes...I now have "mom" hair...but I am a mom and I now know why mom's have "mom" hair.

I love this face!

those brown eyes, cute little teeth and open mouth smile! Everything about it, makes me smile!

The Animal Dance!

Reese's introduction "Hi let's be friends"..."Animal Dance"! Maybe Reese knows something we don't but this was how she greeted all the animals. They seemed to love it! What ever works!

(Don't forget to scroll down and pause the blog music before you watch the video.)

Zoo Day!

The second Saturday in our goal to do something active and fun outside each Saturday of the summer, we decided to take Reese up to the Hoogle Zoo. Reese loves animals, so it was no surprise that she was in heaven the entire time. She squealed, talked, screamed, danced, and waved at every animal we saw. It's a good thing there were fences, walls, and cages to keep her from running right over to each and every one of them and giving them a big hug.

Not sure where she gets this "animal love" thing...neither Arnold or I have that same passion. I guess it's a good thing? Until she wants to bring one home.

On daddy's shoulders, Reese always had the best view.

Reese really wanted to share her fruit snacks....

...with this little guy!

She got a kick out of the giraffes licking their lips!

I couldn't help posting this Diva face!

We spent a lot of time keeping Reese from climbing right over these fences.

This is a good shot of Reese's new hair cut, and I love this little bum!

Reese made a new friend, who desperately wanted to share his cheese with her.

trying to speak bird!

This bunny wanted out, just as much as Reese wanted in.

This duck was eyeing Reese's finger, a nice pre-lunch snack.

Mommy & Baby Elephant...Mommy & Baby Reese