We’re back to our Tuesday summer routine: get up, breakfast, lake, hope someone invites us over for dinner (lucky we have great parents who live close by), drive home late and crash. Not a bad way to spend a day.

Haley got ahold of her spoon when we were all loading the truck…

Sunbreak!

This is why we love Long Lake.

Headed home… scuffed knee and all. 🙂

We spent Father’s Day pretty lowkey. Jim got home super late (make that early) from work and so we skipped church and had a big breakfast.

Haley can drink from her sippy cup on her own now!

For dinner I made these rolled flank steak pinwheels that turned out soooo good. They are going on the food blog!

The kids loved being home with their favorite guy. JT “helped” Jim work on his puzzle and Haley got some good old snuggle time.

This week Haley turned ten months old. Double digits! She had to go to her doctor for a weight check. Haley now weighs 14 pounds 8 ounces. This is still in the zero percentile for her age, but she did gain 10 ounces in the last month.

Haley started crawling in the past two weeks and is now able to make it down the hall or across the house. She is slow but persistent. 🙂 Today she crawled all the way from her room to JT’s room, which is down the hall and around a corner (and past the stairs – time for more supervision!). JT cracked up laughing when he saw Haley’s little face poking around the corner and her little hand pushing open his door. Too cute!

Just today she finally said “Mama” directed at me… a good moment. She has been saying “Dada” for quite a while and has started with all sorts of other word sounds, like dog and brother. She is signing “all done” now and, along with shaking her head no, it is quite clear when mealtime has come to an end.

Love these pictures that we took on her 10-month-day.

Okay, so we won’t officially call it “crawling” but we are pretty close here. Haley has perfected her forward-frog and can get to anything now. This has made her much more interested in things she has ignored until recently: opening cupboards and drawers, grabbing JT’s toys, finding objects on the floor, and more! I love it. The only downside I see here is that I am vacuuming every day again.

When JT took his turn, I overheard the funniest thing… so I had to post it, too.

I LOVE these ladies. We just finished our fifth year of Book Club with our annual barbecue. Since everyone was there, we took a group picture. We look pretty fabulous. We have been together through career changes, moves, surgeries, and 14 children (with two more on the way). Besides just talking about books, we watch movies, share everything from advice to recipes, and laugh a lot. I am so lucky to have each of these lovely ladies as a friend. Here’s to many more years!

At the BBQ… we had a great time hanging out while our families played and enjoyed good food and desserts (banana split cupcakes or peanut butter snickers cookies, anyone?). I took lots of pictures, but here are two favorites of my kids.

When we got home, I couldn’t help but take a picture of my husband, who said he would try to come in the house “like a mom,” also known as “carrying it all in one trip while herding children inside.”

Haley, JT, and I went outside to move the furniture back onto our freshly stained deck. My children were so adorable that I had to take some pictures. I am not sure there is anything in the whole world cuter than Haley, and JT is pretty handsome too.

Sweeping

See any teeth in there?

We went back out after nap and had a great time playing. Haley is wearing a sweater that was mine as a baby. My Aunt Merrie gave it to my mom when she found out my mom was pregnant with me, so it was my very first baby gift. And now it fits Haley!

Sibling love

While I was making dinner, JT got out some bubbles and blew them at Haley.

Watching for them…

There’s one…

Got it!

We had three birthdays this weekend! The first was Jim’s. He took the day off, which was great for him. We had yummy strawberry waffles and sausage for breakfast and then he opened his present from me with a little help from JT.

Jim’s birthday wish is always to spend the day on the lake, and this year the weather cooperated. We had lunch with Jim’s parents and the kids in the boat.

Haley’s first time driving the boat!

Check out the last birthday picture from 2009 here…

Enjoying swimming, dry suit style

Then Jim’s parents took the kids back to their house for naps and Jim and I had the boat to ourselves for several hours. We read, napped, skiied, and relaxed without thinking about diapers, snacks, or toys. We had a fabulous birthday dinner at Jim’s parents’ house and spent the night at my parents’ house. In the morning, my parents watched the kids and Jim and I had boat date number two. The weather was gorgeous!

The course at Long Lake

Enjoying a relaxing morning

If you’ve never seen someone ski a course…

Enjoying our boat dates!

Then Sunday afternoon we went to another birthday party for our friends’ daughter Madison, who turned one.

Haley enjoying the blanket

The “big kids” of the group

Shoulder ride!

Haley is a little ticklish.

We went home tired and got up Monday morning for birthday party number three… Gracelyn turning three! It was at the bouncy house near our house, so we got to sleep in and relax before heading over for jumping, pizza, and an ice cream princess cake. It was Haley’s first time in a bouncy house, and she wasn’t too impressed. Maybe next time.

My friend Emrie gave Haley a Gloworm for Christmas. We both think they’re a little strange, but her daughter, Sadie, loves hers. Haley has been a little ambivalent to the whole thing until this week, when she noticed the music and the glowing face and decided to squeal with delight and give it a big smooch. So cute!

Mealtime with Haley has become quite an undertaking. She is cranky about eating most of the time. She has started to shake her head “no” at me, which is super fun (highly sarcastic there, if you didn’t catch it). It doesn’t matter what is on the end of the spoon, she doesn’t want it for the first, oh, few minutes. Then she settles in and resigns to eating.

We’ve stopped getting out crackers or puffs until after she’s had her bowl, because otherwise she screams and shakes her head until she gets one. Nice. Also, the other day she dropped her cracker from her high chair, leaned over the edge to point to it, and said, “Ca ca.” Good heavens! Grandma Cole has started calling her “Carb Queen.”

The good news is that she loves to feed herself and is not afraid to tear into apple slices, crusts of bread, etc. Look what she did to the apple slice below… keep in mind she has no teeth!

A video to testify… she is distracted by the camera here or something because normally it is much longer before she settles down.

I love having kitchen helpers. JT helps at probably half of the meals. This week he learned how to snap asparagus. He snapped and rinsed an entire pound!

Haley stirred pretend sauce for our spring stir fry in her bowl.