Longing to be mowing

We still like to help Daddy mow the lawn........

Our Castle

A few weeks ago our neighbors offered to let us borrow their castle. Their two girls are older and don't use the castle and thought Dalby would really enjoy playing in the castle....which she does. The castle had been in their backyard untouched for quite a while so we(mainly Ryan) gave it a good scrub down before we assembled it in our yard. What a treat!!!!

A new word

We have a new word at the house, "Taccchhh"(Touch). Think of the tissue commercial where the woman goes through the day saying, "Touch, Touch, Touch, Touch, Touch, Touch, Touch, Feel". We like the word touch and what it means.

A funny story with words that definitely proves toddlers repeat a lot of what they hear. I was changing the crib sheet and I dropped the mattress as I was trying to put the sheet on and I said, "Oh man". A second later I heard, "oh mee". I thought Dalby was talking to the toy she was playing with, until she continued to repeat "oh mee" and I realized that that is her version of "Oh man". Now you can usually get her going, Ryan often does when he is home or on the phone, just by saying, "Oh man". Also, "Oh WOW" often follows "Oh man". Two phrases I have since noticed that I say quite often :)

A new look

We have a Croc fetish here...and not just any type of fetish...a non-matching Croc fetish. Dalby has really gotten into shoes. Over Christmas we bought several pairs of Crocs at a store going out of business. She loves to wear them around the house. The pictures below show her favorite combination(including having them on the wrong feet). However it becomes more of a hazard for her to have them on the wrong feet because the green shoe is HUGE on her, the pink shoe fits her, so we usually help her out a bit. Also a new toy that was found at a garage sale is a big hit. It is a Power Ranger cell phone and it makes all sorts of noises. One of the functions is a fake camera. She loves to take pictures and have her picture taken with the camera.

Congratulations!

Congratulations to Anne who is the most recent Dalby graduate of Michigan State University! What a great weekend we had watching the fifth Dalby receive her diploma and become a proud member of the Spartan alumni family! We had fun seeing everyone and reliving some of our college days. The weekend was packed with activities and bonding time! Ryan, Dalby and I arrived in Detroit on Thursday afternoon where Grandma Dalby picked us up from the airport. From there we headed back to Grandpa and Grandma's house to get lunch and drop Dalby off. Ryan and I then drove to East Lansing where the other siblings were arriving and we all met up at Anne's house. We had a great Thursday night hanging with the siblings and Anne's roommates. Friday we worked on packing Anne up. Dalby arrived with Grandpa and Grandma and we hung out for the afternoon. She enjoyed the college life but was soon whisked off by Bumpa and Mary to Grand Rapids. In Grand Rapids she enjoyed a fun filled few days with the GR clan including YaYa, Aunt Phoebe, Aricin, Susan, Chad, Cole and Morgan. She also got to see Great Grandpa and Great Grandma Luttenton in Concord, MI. The East Lansing crew relaxed for the evening and prepared for the big graduation day. Graduation went beautifully, even though it rained quite a bit on our walk into the Breslin Center. Next onto celebrating - we had a tasty dinner at an Irish pub, new since our days in East Lansing, and then hung out for the evening. Mother's Day we met Bumpa and Mary and had a huge brunch followed by pictures at Sparty. We had tried to do the Sparty pictures on graduation day and the line was way too long!!!! Great job Anne and thanks for letting us share this time with you!

Looking at all of the "p"s and everything else on the runway.

Conferring of the degrees...Anne is in the second row almost in the middle - see if you can find the long red hair.

A college graduate.

A Mother's Day photo

Helping Anne pack up...making sure that Grandpa and Uncle Damon knew where to put things.

Hanging out with cousin Aricin.

Uppie Down....

Or what you would call stairs...are a cool new discovery. We are working on mastering steps. We only have our front and back porch steps, there are lots of steps in Michigan at the various homes but none here in TN.

What else fits?

Our crib is getting crowded these days....for so long I would allow nothing in the crib, not even a blanket. Now as she has gotten older she sleeps with quite a bit. Three staples: George and Baby Rose and a blanket of some sort. Then we can supplement with all sorts of things: a large sheep pillow, a stuffed animal we call "Hammer"(orange monkey with a Hammer Iraq t-shirt), various pieces of tupperware, books, the toy baby bottle, her baby....you name it. Here was the scene during one nap.......