Fun in the Summertime

It's been almost a month since my last post!

We went on a wonderfully relaxing trip in July. Lance had to go to meetings in Austin and Arlington, so we tagged along! We stayed in hotels, ate out, and relaxed. The highlights were going to the Austin Children's Museum, 6 Flags, and an awesome pet store where we got to touch lots of the animals.

One of Elijah's favorite parts of the Children's Museum - the Milk Exhibit. This is the ramp where you roll the "bottled milk" to the "grocery store." It's awesome!

Looking at herself in a mirror at the children's museum

Although she'd been to the museum before, this was her first time to be old enough to enjoy the exhibits herself! It was fun to watch her figure out how to put the ball in the hole after it rolled down.

At 6 flags - my sister Amy, Elijah, and my nephew Ethan on a 3-D ride. Elijah LOVED 6 Flags and already can't wait to go back!

Kate's favorite part of 6 Flags was the mist sprayers. She is a water girl for sure!

The kids got their portraits made. This was my favorite one of them together.

Last weekend, 2 of my greatest friends, Tahj and Fran, and their guys, joined us for a fun day last weekened. They came over for a big homemade breakfast that morning. Then, in the evening, we all had a triple date! We enjoyed some delicious chicken fried steak at Abilene's Beehive, and then we came back to our house for some Rock Band, courtesy of Guy. I had never tried it before - we all had a great time!

My aunt's tuxedo store, Esquire Tuxedo here in Abilene, is closing after 34 years. They gave away tuxes to everyone in the family, including "Tolar. Elijah Tolar." He LOVES his tux, and he actually wore it to Wal-Mart one morning! He'll wear it to my mom's wedding in October. Isn't he dashing?




I can hardly believe my littlest angel will be a year old on Friday! She is growing up so fast. We are having a wonderful time, and I count myself more blessed every day!


She is doing really well. Here are some of her latest feats:

• She can walk a bit, and has walked as many as 10 steps in a row without falling. Every time she does it, Elijah says, "I saw that!"
• She can say about 35 words (and I thought Elijah was a talker!). The ones we hear most often are "Mama," "Down," "Thank you," "See," "Bite," and "Uh-oh." It is so much fun to get to know her in this way!
• She has 6 teeth now - 4 on top and 2 on bottom. She had some hard times a couple weeks back. It's tough getting 3 top teeth at once! They are still coming down a bit, but pretty soon, she's gonna have a mouthful.
  
  
  She is learning to feed herself with a spoon. This is one of her favorite tricks!
  
  
  We have been having a bit of a hard time with bedtime again - Elijah has started to be afraid of the dark. I'm at a bit of a loss for what to do to help him through this stage - Lance and I have racked our brains for a couple weeks now, trying to think of a new approach. It seems we've already tried it all, from being sympathetic to being serious. We've even bought special toys to protect him and talked about faith. It's a strange mix of emotions to hear him go through it - I feel so sorry for him, and I want to scoop him up and let him stay right beside me all the time. But I know that's not best for him. And it makes things difficult on everyone when he gets so upset that he wakes Kate up. If anyone has suggestions, they would be most welcomed.
  
  In the meantime, I'm weaning Kate, which is another process of doing what seems counter-intuitive. It's hard to "push them out of the nest" sometimes, even though you know it's right and good and what's meant to be! I feel so blessed to have been able to breastfeed both of my children for a year, and it's hard to see that precious time come to a close, especially not knowing for sure whether or not we're going to have another one (my vote is yes!).
  
  I hope all is well as your summer draws to a close!