Happy Birthday

We celebrated Claire's 1st birthday!

Here is a few things that she's doing now:

• 21 lbs (50%), 31 inches long (97%), wearing 18 months clothes and size 4 shoes!
• 12 teeth (6 on the top and 6 on the bottom)
• New words now include ice, hot, moo, quack, ruff, meow, doggie, hi, bye, go (actually go, go, go!), buzz as in what bees say and cracker. She tries to say balloon, ball, bird, boat, spoon and goat but these all sound the same right now. We are still waiting for mommy and daddy. 
• Claire can point out her body parts. Belly button and toes are her favorites but she also knows ears, eyes, nose, fingers, knees, head and hair.
• We are still working on our sign language. If prompted she will do 'all done' and 'milk' but wont do it on her own; we are going to keep at it. 
• Loves fruit! Especially blueberries (thank you grandma), strawberries and watermelon. It will be sad this winter when we can no longer find it.
• MUSIC, MUSIC, MUSIC! The best ones (in Claire's opinion) are Twinkle, Twinkle and Itsy Bitsy Spider.
• Two of her favorite games are 'I see you' (peak-a-boo) and 'I am going to get you' (chase) followed by a good tickle of the ribs. She has the best laugh! 

I'll get a few more pics of her birthday party here soon! 

Dirt, dirt and more dirt

We had 45 dump truck loads of FREE fill dirt delivered last month. All thanks to a neighbor who works for an excavation company and knew that we needed a ton of dirt. All this dirt is to level out our yard and help direct the rain water away from our house into several drainage ditches. These pictures don't do it justice, we had LOTS of dirt everywhere.

Ta Da! 

We are planning on planting grass seed in mid to late September once it has cooled down a bit. I'll keep you posted of the progress of our future lawn. The battle has now began inside the house and keeping the dust to a minimal by dusting every other day and the poor dogs need a bath, as they no longer look 'golden'.

Sandbox

On a recent trip to the beach we picked up some sand for Claire's sandbox. Apparently it is illegal to remove sand from the beach (who knew) so we loaded up our buckets from a trail set a few yards back. Thanks for your help Jack!

 

Claire would play in her sandbox all day everyday if we let her but Momma says 'no' because sand gets everywhere! I mean everywhere! 

Camping at Cougar

Camping this year was an adventure, not quite the relaxing weekends of years pasts but it was fun and Claire had a great time. She was one big ball of dirt but what the heck we're camping! Plus everything is washable and Spray-n-Wash is my new best friend in the laundry isle.

Claire and Dave enjoying the swings.

Happy has can be playin in the dirt!

Awwwww! My favorite!!

Too bad I didn't get the next face on camera. It was too funny!

Grandkids

On August 26th, Mom and Dean's will celebrate their 10 year wedding anniversary so as a surprise present we got all the grandkids together for some pictures. It was about 100 degrees that day but everyone was a good sport and they turned out really great.

Lots of babbles and a few whispers

Nine months already, can you believe it!

Here is a few of the favorites from her photo shoot last month. You'll notice the scratch on her head on a few of them. Claire took a header on our concrete patio the night before which of course was perfect timing.