Outtakes

Annabelle totally loves smiling for pictures. Just kidding. She takes after her dad. She would rather make silly faces or smile in an overly cheesy way. Ha! I had to take a picture of her for preschool and I tried doing it two different days and took over 30 pictures. Oh bother. Up above is what I refer to as her coy picture.

This is what I call her "Why are you doing this to me?" picture.

This is the "Did you say tilt my head and shut my eyes? I'm almost positive that's what you said, mom" picture.

Sticking out the tongue and not making eye contact. Totally not what I was looking for.

I think she has a small percentage of troll in her blood. Just maybe. Hopefully it only comes out for the camera.

This was Trev's favorite. He said, "This one is Belle."

School days

Annabelle officially started preschool last week! She is in a class with 11 other students and two awesome teachers that exude joy and have made her feel so comfortable in her new environment. We are so excited about where she is going to preschool and she is loving it!

After the first day of school the teachers sent all the parents a slideshow of pictures from the first day. Can I just say that was awesome?! It was fun to see what she did and be able to show her the pictures and talk to her about it. She loves dressing up and "getting fancy" so of course she found a lovely red leopard skirt and tutu to wear and at one point she was wearing a tiara too.

It looks like she was paying really really close attention during story time.

When she came home she told us she has one friend in class and I'm thinking it must be this little girl. She and Belle were next to each other in almost all of Belle's pictures. :)

Jack turned the Big 0-1!

Jack turned 1 on August 28th! I still can't believe he is already one. Good job, buddy! We celebrated BBQ-style with family and a few friends in our backyard. A big thanks to all who came for celebrating Jack's birthday with us!

Lurk! Lurk! All the grandparents came up for the party! Woohoo!

The birthday boy enjoying a cupcake. He didn't go all crazy eating his cupcake. He ate a lot of the frosting and then crawled over the rest of the cupcake. Ha!

Jack with his friend Lily. Are they experiencing a sugar coma?

The birthday boy playing croquet. Doesn't he look like such an intimidating opponent?

Life these days

This is the perfect picture to describe the current relationship between this duo. Annabelle is all about being in charge of her bro. She tells him no all day, tells him what he can and can't do, tries to hold him in place even though he definitely doesn't like it one bit (as seen above), and picks him up and moves him when she doesn't like what he is doing. I've been breaking up a lot of tifs between them these days. But every now and then I hear them playing and laughing together in another room and all seems well in the world. I love those moments.

Woodland Park

A few weeks ago the kids and I headed down to the Woodland Park Zoo with our friends Alanna, Payton and Addelyn. I don't think Belle and I have been to a zoo since we lived in St. Louis! That is way too long. She absolutely loves animals and hanging out with her friends Payton so it was a win-win situation. Jack hung out in the stroller the whole time and slept A LOT! He seemed to be feeling under the weather and was just kind of zoning out all day. It turned out to be the beginning of the teething process of his first molar. It totally wiped him out for like 4 days straight. He was totally uncomfortable, but on the plus side he took 3 or 4 naps each day! Anyhoo, back to the zoo...

Annabelle and Payton ran around like wild animals all day at the zoo and Alanna and I were positive they would zonk out on the hour and a half car ride home. Alas, they were wide awake the entire time. ;)

Stinkin' cute meerkat.

A big ol' lazy hippo. He needs a pep talk. Okay, he probably wasn't lazy... just hot from the sun and bummed out that he lives in Washington instead of Africa.

Little Miss Ready-for-an-adventure

These pictures just make me chuckle. While we were camping, AB put on her grandpa's hat (obviously too big for her), found a stick and stuck it down the back of her shirt and then tromped around like she was on an adventure.

Look at that look of concentration. I think she is trying to balance a pinecone on the stick. Or maybe she was preparing a pretend smore.

Plotting her next move.

Camping at Sucia

My parents took us on a boat trip to Sucia Island in the San Juan Islands last month and we camped there for two nights. It is a beautiful place to camp. The island is in the shape of a funky H and we camped right in the middle of it on a ridge of land. When we stepped out of our tent and looked to the right there was a cove and when we looked to the left there was a small bay. We went exploring on the beaches, ate smores three times (once was just after breakfast!), went crabbing in the dinghy and relaxed. Belle spent one night on her grandparent's boat for a sleepover and the next night Trev stayed with both kids in the tent and let me enjoy an uninterrupted kid-free night on the boat. What a man!

Jack Attack fell asleep on Grandpa's while we were on a walk and kept napping on him once we get back to camp. He was tuckered out.

There were purple starfish ALL over the ricky parts of the beach!

Here is one of the sunsets we saw from our campground. Just beautiful.

AB played in the sand a ton! She really enjoyed being outside all day while we were camping. She thrives on playing outside and she was making the most of it.

AB playing fetch with someone else's dog.

Grandma and Grandpa tend to fight a lot, especially when there is driftwood around. We had to break them up a few times. ;)

Jack is uber concerned with how his hair looks. He really wanted to showcase his red locks and opted for a hawk one morning. I think it looks stellar.

More sand play. She couldn't get enough of it!

It was beautiful and sunny the whole time we were there... until the morning we boated back to Bellingham. Then it was overcast, chilly, WINDY and when we started our journey across the water it was so so so choppy. Jack slept in my arms the whole time and Trev, Belle and I all felt a bit nauseous by the end of the hour-long trek. I boated quite frequently when I was a kid and I think this was the first time I felt yucky from boating. That can tell you how choppy the water was that day!