Zoo and Counting News

Zoo news:

Today Summer and I went to the zoo.  As much as I am impatient for our little son to get here (two weeks from today is our due date!), I am trying to really enjoy the freedom we have to go and do before he comes!  We started at the dolphins and penguins, Summer's two favorites, and then moved onto the outdoor park (first time we've gotten to play there this spring).  Here are a few pictures....

Just us girls....(well I suppose I am carrying a little boy too!)

Climbing in the big bird's nest with Brandon

Look who is hatching out of the egg!

Counting News:

We came home for lunch and Summer was a good eater and got to have an M&M cookie.  I mentioned in another post that Summer likes to count everything....already today we have counted her cereal, her pieces of turkey, the buses we saw driving to the zoo, etc.  Well today for lunch was the first time she counted by herself.  Here is her dialogue counting the M&M's in her cookie....

Summer: "M&M's!  Count 'em.  1....2....3....4...6....5....orange one!"

I was pretty impressed as usually I do the counting :)

Silliness and Sweetness

 

 Here, Daddy is wearing Summer's hair bow and Summer thinks its pretty funny!

Summer has been cracking us up lately with her little one-liners.  Here are a few I can think of....

1. Tonight when she wanted to go play outside, she brought her shoes over to me and said, "Shoes on, Babe."  (Which is what I tell her!)
2. Tonight we asked her, "Summer, what is your name?"  She replied, "John". (??????? No idea!)
3. A few days ago, after nap, I heard her shouting at the top of her lungs.  I went into her room and she was looking out the window shouting, "FAITH, come on in!"  (Our neighbor girls are Faith and Noelle).   I don't think Faith could here her, but Summer was trying!

Here are a few sweet memories over the last few days....

1. Summer said, "Tucker hug" and proceeded to "try" to hug our wriggly pup.
2. Summer cuddled with me after her nap, stroked my arm, and said, "hi sweetie".
3. Tonight she started swinging the infant swing (we have it set up for baby now) and gently singing "Rock-a-bye, tree top".

Here is a picture of Daddy and Summer watching our first big rainstorm since Summer understands the concept of rain.

Rainy Day turned Sunny

I woke up today to a very cloudy and rainy day....and unfortunately, Summer's mood matched the day perfectly.  She woke up unhappy and spent the day fussing over almost everything....every time she tripped and fell on the floor while walking around, the fact that Elmo wouldn't sit up straight, the fact that the basket handles tipped over instead of stood up straight, etc, etc, etc.

Not only that, but she tested and disobeyed throughout the whole morning too.....nothing like trying to decide how to follow through on disobedience when she is already having an "off" day!  Needless to say, I was feeling down, and just like a really bad mom (I always feel that way when we have so many discipline issues in a row!). 

I put down Summer for a nap an hour earlier than normal.....checked my computer....and...

Psalm 139 was in my devotions for today, 3 friends told me they were praying for me, and two friends offered to watch Summer.....I was absolutely blown away! I honestly could not believe it!

Not only that, but Summer fell asleep right away, which allowed me to take an hour and a half nap!  Everything looks better when I am well rested.  And, Summer is STILL sleeping (this is going on a 3 hour nap for her!). 

Thank you, God, for putting your Word and encouraging friends in my life right when I needed it (like really needed it!)  If you are one of those friends, THANK YOU!  Your encouragement meant more than you know, and I hope that I can return the favor sometime soon.

Random Post :)

This is just a random post of a few pictures and things I want to remember about Summer being 19 months old.

*Summer is very interested in sequence of events and counting.  I will often tell her what we will do that day (i.e. we will eat breakfast, then take Tucker for a run, Mommy will take a shower, then we will go to the library, then go to Walmart, then meet a certain friend for a park date, etc).  Throughout the day, we will talk about what we already did, what we are currently doing, and what we are going to do next.  She likes to bring up these words as we are talking and try to remember what we are doing next and what we already did (so we can tell daddy at dinner what we did that day).  She is also very interested in counting.  Everything we see, if there is more than one of it, she will say, "Count 'em".  We count everything from her cereal, to her fingers, to the lights we see driving, to the "owies" on her knees, to the number of "E's" on the cereal box, etc.  The funniest time was on Sunday before the shower when she saw Grandma Tommerdahl and Grandma Kirkwood together....she exclaimed...."Two Grandma's!  Count 'em!"

*Summer is starting to put two and three words together to form  mini sentences.  She is also working with making words plural.  Most of the time she forms the plural correctly, but Paul and I have to laugh when at bedtime (to turn on her two fans) she says, "fan on's" in instead of "fans on"!  Summer and daddy have so many fun routines at bedtime.  It is really a special time for them including bath time, cuddle time, and lots of laughs!

Summer and Daddy watching college basketball :)

*Summer is starting to learn words to songs.  Right now her favorite's are "The Itsy Bitsy Spider", "Old McDonald Had a Farm", and the "ABC song".  She will start to say something like..."Donald Farm E-I-E-I-O, Moo moo there" as a way of asking us to sing "Old McDonald" for instance.  She will often ask me to sing to her while we are jogging....so her songs come out more "swing style" as I stop to take a breath!  Summer's loves when we go running with her friends!

Tucker and Summer are ready for a run with friends Addison and Adry

*Summer loves chocolate!  Her favorite is M&M's and chocolate cake.  In the grocery store she wanted hold the chocolate chips, and then decided she wanted "hug it"!

Hugging Chocolate!

*Summer loves the park and loves climbing the steps.  She loves finding rocks and sticks and making piles.  She absolutely loves being outside and just running around the yard.  She still loves animals--her favorites are puppies and dolphins (we see them at the zoo). 

*She loves playing with her babies and doing the things I do with her, with her babies.  After we got up and read her Bible story one day, she said "read baby, read baby" and went to read her little Bible with baby on her lap.

Reading her little Bible to Baby

In other news, today we are officially full term (37 weeks) even though I don't expect Baby to come for at least 3 more weeks (Summer was past her due date)!  Here is a picture of Baby with his first clip-on tie I bought him at the consignment sale last week!  We're getting very excited to meet him!

Park Date

This weather is AMAZING!!!!!!!!!  I cannot believe we are out at the park without coats on in March in Minnesota!  Today we met up with a wife of one of Paul's coworkers (Erica) and their son Eli (just 4 days younger than Summer!) for a park date and picnic lunch.  Summer and Eli had a lot of fun at the zoo a few weeks back, and both were talking about seeing each other again!  Here are a few pictures from our park date--they are so cute together!

Swings

Weeeeeee!

Watching the turtle (see it off in the distance?)....the kids loved following the 5 inch long turtle!

Sharing the rocks they found in the sand.

Baby Shower

I have the most thoughtful mommy friends :).  Yesterday my friend Jade planned a "just for fun" baby shower/party for me and my friend Kaity (due with a baby boy just 3 weeks after me).  It was a "just for fun" shower because we asked that people not bring gifts, as this will be both of our second babies, so it was planned to be purely a fun celebration of the new little lives that will be joining us in the next two months.  People were so thoughtful in finding little ways to make us feel special with homemade blessings and just being there to celebrate with us!  Jade put sooo much time and thought into all the decorations, food, game, favors, etc and made it a really fun celebration for the birth of Kaity's and my spring babies!  We had a lot of fun hanging out, and baby's two Grandma's and my sister got to be there too.  I am TRULY blessed by the friendships of everyone as we all raise our first kids together, and several of us move onto raising kid #2.  My mom is always so good to take pictures, so I will share some of the ones she took.  Thank you everyone for making Baby and I feel so special and loved!

FOOD! :)  Yum!

Little blue touches everywhere :)

Baby BOY!

Kaity and I and our boys :)

Jade, the hostess, with Kaity and I

Sisters :)

Baby's two Grandmas and Me

Kaity, Me, Bridget, Rachael...

LaDonna, Kristine, Joy

Thanks everyone!!!!

Weekend with Grandma and Grandpa Tommedahl

Grandma and Grandpa Tommerdahl came for a visit this weekend!  We also got to see Uncle Javonte, Uncle Ty, and Auntie Sarah too.  Grandma brought their little dog Roco, a definite favorite for Summer!  Summer (literally) ran around with Grandma and Grandpa the entire weekend playing at the park, making piles of sticks, running around the yard, throwing the frisbee for Tucker, playing dollies, finding Waldo, having tea parties, and more!  The first word out of her mouth Sunday morning when she woke up was, "Grandma?" to which I said, "Yes, Grandma is still here!"  Here are a few pictures.

Grandma and Summer before Church on Sunday

Tea Party with Grandma and Grandpa

Finding Waldo in "Where's Waldo"

Playing Frisbee with Tucker

Drawing Letters in the dirt (our vegetable garden from last year)

The letter "A"

More letters

An oval, an "O" and a "0"!

After all the playing in the dirt, Summer definitely needed a bath!  Grandma and Grandpa found Summer a bathtime coloring set (combining two of Summer's loves--bathtime and coloring).  Summer LOVES it!  The crayons color on a washable placemat that clings to the bath tub wall.

Park Date

We met up with some friends at the park today!  It was gorgeous and sunny and 65 degrees (amazing!).  Here are a few pictures from our day....

Picnic Lunch (Thanks for the picture, LaDonna!)

Addison, Adry, Summer

Addison, Adry, Summer

On the swing

Riding the Walrus

Playing in the sand with stick

Favorite Slide

Tunnel

36 Week Ultrasound

With Summer, we only got one ultrasound (20 weeks), however at my 36 week check-up for this little guy, my doctor requested another ultrasound because I was measuring small and they just wanted to make sure everything was ok.  (Normally the mom's belly is supposed to measure 36 cm at 36 weeks, and I was measuring 31 cm).  Long story short, everything is GREAT, baby is healthy, and the currently estimate him to be 5lbs 10oz at 36 weeks.  If he comes full term (40 weeks) like Summer did, I would guess him to be around an 8lb baby just like Summer! 

I love trying to explain everything to Summer.  When we go for our check-up's, I always tell her we are going to go "listen to baby", so now every time we drive or jog past our doctor's office, she says "listen baby".  It's pretty cute!  On the way to the ultrasound I told Summer that we were going to see pictures/video of baby moving in mommy's tummy.  Here are a few clips of Summer's view of the ultrasound. :)

Driving to the ultrasound

Walking into the ultrasound

 ***We couldn't tell exactly what her last words were in this video, but after listening to it again, I think she was talking about seeing "fishies" at the doctor's office....sooooo.....

....here is a clip of our 36 week appointment a few days ago when she DID get to see fishies....this might be what she was thinking she would see today!

Waiting for the ultrasound and eating breakfast (she calls Apple Jacks "donuts")

It is fun to try to catch a glimpse of what Summer thinks of all this!  We know she loves babies, and we think she understands that there is a baby in mommy's tummy....this link is my favorite picture to show Summer as we compare the picture to mommy's tummy, she says "baby in there"!

Babymoon and Summer's Weekend with Grandma and Grandpa

Paul and I took a "Babymoon" / "late Valentine's Day" / "early 5 year anniversary" weekend getaway trip to my parents cabin in Wisconsin this past weekend.  It was our first overnight time away together since Summer was born!  With the upcoming birth of our son next month and Paul's big CFA test looming in June, we knew we wouldn't get this kind of time for "connecting" for a while, so we grabbed the opportunity!  I picked Paul up from work on Friday and we stopped for dinner at a place near Paul's work called The Black Sheep.  It had really good pizza and a fun atmosphere!  It was my first time there, but it is already a favorite!  Then we drove to Wisconsin and stayed at my parents' cabin for the weekend.  We talked, and talked, and played Skip-bo, and talked, and played Sequence, and went for walks (55 degrees!), and talked, and read together, and talked about what we read, and ate good food and talked some more!---it was so wonderful to connect without any interruptions from our favorite "little one"! 

Meanwhile, our "little one" got spoiled at home with Grandma and Grandpa! :)  They came to stay at our house and did a bunch of Summer's favorite things and loved her up quite a bit!  Grandma and Grandpa were great about taking pictures and videos of Summer to send to Paul and me on our phones while we were away, as we missed her ;).  Here is the string of pictures and video we got to see while we were gone!  Enjoy :)

Right after I left on Friday, I missed her, so Grandma sent me this picture!

Summer eating Spaghetti for dinner on Friday night

Summer waking up on Saturday morning (6am!  Good Morning Grandma and Grandpa!)

Every morning, Summer and I read a story from her picture Bible (We are on either our 3rd or 4th time through it, I can't remember!), so on Saturday morning Grandpa picked up right where we left off and read the next story!

On the way to see the puppies and kitties at the pet store.

Kitties!

Pizza at the mall food court

Watching a kite at the park

Grilled Cheese :)  Apparently the lady next to Summer sneezed and Summer turned, looked at her, and said "Bless You!"  The lady was pretty surprised, according to Grandma and Grandpa :)

All tucked in, ready for bed, on Saturday night.  She now says "G' Night, Lub you" as we walk out of her room and did the same thing for Grandma and Grandpa :)

Eating "Macaroni's" as she calls it (Macaroni and Cheese).  She ate the while bowl!

Seeing Auntie Kristin

Silly face!

Going for a walk with Grandma and Grandpa