Developing Her Personality

A few things you might not know about Sarah...

-She loves Flo from the Progressive commercials. Sarah stops dead in her tracks whenever she's on.

- When she wants a bite of what I'm eating, she'll ask "bite?" then open her mouth really wide and close her eyes.

-She's deathly afraid of bubbles in the bath but begs to blow bubbles outside all day long.

- While watching Looney Tunes, she'll say "silly" whenever someone gets hit/electrocuted/exploded/etc.

- If her hair is in her eyes, she'll come find me, grab my hand and put it on her head and say "hair" because she wants me to brush it back for her.

Our Yard Sale Find of the Week:

Child's Rocking Chair $3

Sarah has barely let go of it since Saturday.

We also got Sarah a snowsuit for $1. Here's Sarah sporting the hat.

And then it was the doll's turn. I found it like this on the kitchen floor.

Speaking of this doll....(it doesn't have a name yet. Just "da" which is also her word for dad). I threw it in the washing machine last night so Sarah couldn't sleep with it like she usually does. She asked for it once while we were getting ready for bed but I told her no doll and she was fine with it.

Well this morning when I went in her room to get her, the first thing she asked for was "da". "Doll or Dad?" I asked. "Da" she replied. So we go downstairs for breakfast and she sees her doll on the counter where it had been drying all night and she yells "Da!" I give it to her, put her in her highchair and make her oatmeal. I look over at Sarah and she's hugging the doll tightly and taking short, fake cry-like breaths. It was quite the emotional reunion. She pats her, kisses her and continues the fake whimper until I put her oatmeal and Flinstone vitamin in front of her. Then she hands the precious doll to me so she can eat.

After breakfast she raided her diaper bag, pulled out the changing pad and got into diaper-changing position just for fun, I guess. This is the best shot I got of it since she runs for the camera once she sees it out.

And I'll just let these pictures speak for themselves.

Father's Day Weekend

There are 2 things I love about this picture. First, I love how serious Justin takes his Lego building. It's always about making it the tallest possible. Second, I love the socks Sarah is wearing. Finding these lovely peach socks and insisting I put them on her was the first thing she did after her nap that day.

This picture freaks me out. When did my baby become a little girl?

Friday and Saturday was the Baadsgaard Family Reunion. I love typing Baadsgaard. You can type it all with your left hand. Which makes me so jealous of my mom--she can type her maiden name all with her left hand except for the M at the beginning. Margaret Baadsgaard. So cool.

Anyway, here's my nephew Tyler. Notice his cool necklace. My aunt Melanie helped all the kids make these. The wood is from my grandpa's cherry trees (I miss him and his cherries). The kids sanded the disks and then either put spider stickers or glued silk flowers on them and then strung them like a necklace. It was a lot of work for Melanie and I'm so happy Sarah has a piece of her great-grandpa's cherry tree.

Zack showing his off. Sarah will only wear hers for 2 seconds at a time so no picture of hers, sorry.

My little happy camper. Sarah loved camping. So much so that it took her hours to finally fall asleep. I think it was a combination of too much candy and the excitement of being in a tent. It took a good 2 hours for her to calm down. Maybe more. She would not stop jabbering away in the dark.

My mom and cousin Chelsie. And the beautiful nose and lips of my aunt Mel.

My cousin Hailey and niece Jessica. I loved seeing cousins who rarely or never met hanging out together like old friends. Family bonds are so cool.

The Happy Camper Dye Family

My cousin Trevor and his dad. Don't let the sweet face fool you. Okay, he really is sweet but......

He climbed into my aunt Sue's motorhome and put it in gear. No one knew he had even awoken from his nap. Suddenly the RV rolled back toward the campsite. We all ran for our lives (well not me, I was somewhere else and missed all this excitement). It was stopped by this tree on the right before it could roll over anyone. The ladder has a nice bend in it now. Good times.

The circle of love. The chairs had to be pushed out and the circle made bigger as more people came.

"Just wipe it on my pants." Sarah wasn't quite sure what to do with the dirt on her hands. But then it was pretty fun for her to wipe her hands on me.

The circle of love even bigger.

Sarah thought the tent was so amazing. She didn't want to get out when we were breaking up camp.

Father's Day! Here's Sarah helping Justin open his super-cool new pepper and salt grinders.

A little bit of Sarah for those of you missing her

Last night Sarah surprised us by raising her arm in the air and cheering "YES!" at a random play of the NBA game on TV. Justin, naturally, was overcome with pride.

She had never said "yes" before; it's always been just "yeah", usually preceded by "food". "Food? yeah? food? yeah?" as she nods her way to the kitchen as I follow for the 100th time that day.

In case you haven't seen Sarah's knees, she is now a real kid.

She tripped on the sidewalk on our way to the mailboxes. She cried and I picked her up. I asked her if she wanted to go back home or keep going to get the mail. She wanted to keep going, the little trooper. For a professional whiner, she sure can be tough.

Here we are, where Sarah would always rather be, the park.

And here's little dancey pants in action. This is just a highlight of what was a 3+ minute dance.

Mildly Extreme Backyard Makeover

This past weekend we finally finished a major project. It all started with Justin deciding he did, after all, want a garden.

I didn't do a very good job at taking a "before" shot of our neglected backyard but this picture should give you an idea. I hate sunflowers.

Yucky weeds....infertile clay soil.

Our rusty, one handled wheelbarrow for ornamentation.

So....
The south end of the terrace we planted grass seed (which I've been watering by hand 2-4 times a day for a month). Here's Sarah taking a turn.

With materials and tools from my dad, Justin built these fancy garden boxes with Nate's help. Nate actually helped a lot on this project. I was always so relieved when Nate came over. He's much more handy with a drill and shovel than I ever could be.

Add a cubic yard of compost and a cubic yard of bark and ta da! Shout-out to my sis Rachel for the use of her truck. And apologies to our next door neighbor for the tire tracks in his dirt.

We planted tomatoes in one box and 3 varieties of peppers and 2 kinds of squash in the other.

And a peach tree. Come by in 4 years and we might have a peach. And we may have landscaped the "hill" but don't count on it.

And in other home-project news, our washing machine came to a screeching halt (literally) and is most likely irrepairable. We tore it apart trying to fix it and although we found no evidence it was due to malfeasant mice, I'm still blaming it on them.