Camping

We have been taking advantage of the gorgeous weather and camping as much as possible. We love going with our friends the Wades; we have been twice and are planning another trip this weekend :). The first time we went to Firehole and parked the trailer in the dessert. It was a short trip, but we all had fun hanging around the bonfire at night and riding the 4-wheelers the next morning. Milan struggled because she hates to sleep if she thinks she might be missing something so she sat in an exhausted daze around the campfire for hours until she finally passed out then woke up and screamed every 20 minutes during the night; it was not a restful time for anyone since we were all in the same trailer.

I was surprised when the Wades wanted to go camping again. Our second camping trip was awesome though! We camped near the water which Milan couldn't resist. When we first arrived, Milan was happy playing with and tasting all the rocks around us.


We showed Milan how to throw rocks in the water.
When we were close to the water, Milan wanted to try getting the rocks under the water.


One thing led to another and soon Milan was soaked.


We gave Milan a warm bath and cuddled with her by the fire then she went to sleep and SLEPT ALL NIGHT :)! Meanwhile, Dave focused his efforts on collecting sage brush for the fire (I think this is one of his favorite parts of camping especially since he overlooked the bundles of firewood we had and went looking for his own firewood.)


Milan was awake and ready to go at 5:30 am (definitely an improvement over the last camping trip, but next time we are hoping for an 8:00 wake up.) She was pretty tired, but definitely fighting sleep, so she sat on dad's lap and played with a water bottle and lid for a LONG time.

A family picture by me!

This time, I was prepared for Milan's swimming adventures so I dressed her in her suit, doused her with sunblock and bug spray, and sent her off.

Milan had an awesome time and so did we. We had a great time 4-wheeling and jet-skiing. Can't wait for this weekend! :)

We're NERDS!

Milan has some special cabinets and drawers in the kitchen. As you can see, one of her favorite games is taking everything out that she can reach. Milan started blowing on the tupperware lids then it turned into a game for the whole family. Milan was cracking up the whole time and we all had a lot of fun :). Here are some pictures to show you just how nerdy we are......

Cruis'n

The other day Dave was cleaning out his company car and Milan and I went outside to visit with him. Milan had a blast playing with all the buttons inside the car! Dave took Milan for a spin around the block and she loved sitting on da-da's lap and "steering" the car. She lost focus about half way around the block though.....

Happy Father's Day

So, this post is a bit late, but Dave is a great dad every day so I figured I could post this any day. We had a wonderful Father's Day......Grandma Kat and Jack spent the night after Milan's party so we all had breakfast together on Sunday morning. Milan and I gave Dave his gifts and Milan was pretty familiar with gift opening and was quite eager to help.
She loved to tear off pieces and hand them to Grandma Kat.

Since she did this with every piece, it was a pretty long process. Dave got a really nice fishing pole and reel from me and a carrying case from Milan.

Dave is an awesome dad (and husband); Milan and I are both so lucky to have him in our lives. He works really hard and always makes our little family his first priority. Dave is a great provider and I am so appreciative that I am able to stay home with Milan. Lately he has been going to work for twelve hours then coming home and working on the yard. Even though he must be so tired, he finds time and energy to play with Milan and call us during the day to tell us how much he loves us. Milan loves her dad and gets excited every evening when he gets home. Last night, she heard his diesel truck pull up, said da-da, then went to the garage door and waited to see Dave. When he works outside, she stands at the sliding glass door and talks to him. Dave is amazing and we love him so much!

Milan's 1st Birthday Celbrations

I should warn you that this is a long post.....our little girl just turns 1 once so we captured every second on film and I had a hard time limiting the pictures :)

On Milan's birthday we had a small family party and we were joined by Aunt Marie and soon-to-be Uncle Scott from Ontario, OR. We had a lot of fun and are so glad they could join our family celebration.

We opened some presents and Milan really enjoyed unwrapping everything.

She took off with Aunt Marie's present and still loves to "pop" all around the house.

After the gifts were opened, she was thrilled to sit in the middle of everything and sample all her new toys.

We knew Milan would love the birthday cake portion of the celbration, so we stripped her down. She was quite intrigued by the fire so I blew out the candle before we could get in too much trouble.

She devoured the cake and decided she'd had enough when it covered her face up to her eyebrows.

After such an exciting day, she was pooped and passed out in Scott's lap.


The birtday festivities continued on Saturday. We were so lucky to have Grandma Kat and Jack drive over from Salt Lake for the party. We were going to have a party at our house, but it turned out that we needed to add another zone to our sprinkler system so our backyard was in trenches.

Our good friends, the Sorensens are awesome and offered to host the party in their backyard. So instead of falling into the backyard trenches, Milan enjoyed playing on the swings.

Milan decided to join us for dinner and steal a Dorito from dad so she could lick the cheese off.

Then we had some birthday cake (from Costco, my favorite!). Milan was excited about the candle again, but there was too much going for her to spend time eating her cake. She ate a couple of bites with dad, climbed on the table for a bit, then the cake ended up on the ground so she was done.



We moved on to opening presents and we had her attention for the first couple of gifts. Then......the swings were calling her name so she left and I finished opening gifts. She did check back occasionally to check my status and enjoyed playing with her unwrapped toys.



Dave loves that Milan plays with her hair when she's sleepy and taking her bottle so he took this cute picture of Milan winding down.

After all that fun with her friends and a full tummy, she was a tired girl. Here is Milan cuddled up with Jack.

Thanks to all our friends and family who celebrated Milan's birthday with us!!! We had a great time playing with everyone and we will tell Milan about her fun 1st birthday later on :)

Happy Birthday to my Beautiful Little Girl!

Milan turned 1 today! Dave and I have a hard time with the fact that a year has already passed. Milan has brought an incredible amount of joy to our lives. We love her independent personality, her toughness, and the cuddles she gives us when she is tired. Sometimes her stubborness and independence can be challenging (hence the last post), but after a couple of days of manual labor on the yard, I missed my little girl like crazy and realized that being a stay-at-home mom to Milan is the best job in the world :)

Milan had a special birthday. Aunt Marie and Scott came to visit, we opened gifts, ate some cake, and played with our friends the Sorensens. We took a ton of pictures, plus video, which I will post soon!

Lunch Break?

Sorry their has not been posting much. It seems like recently my days have been going like this: wake up, prepare breakfast for Milan, fight her into her high chair, after Milan eats the insides of two grape halves and 3 bites of yogurt I clean up everything else that is on the floor, try to do dishes while Milan is whining on my leg, put away the bags, aluminum foil, tupperware, measuring spoons, bibs, dish towels, shoes from the master closet, books from her bookshelf, Milan's shoes, and Milan's onesies that she has dragged out in minutes, then sit with her on the floor to play while she plays independently (if I leave to accomplish something, she will come whine on my leg again.) I love,love,love my crazy little girl. Lately, I sure could use a "lunch break" every day to shower, eat something besides cereal, start tackling my to-do list and relax. Dave has been busting his bum on our muddy field (soon to be level sprinklered fenced sod) so we will have to plan a relaxing something soon :)