The Fair!

Last week was the week of the Northwest Washington Fair. My mom bought tickets awhile ago for the entire family to go together...unfortunately, Ben and Kyle had to work and were unable to join the rest of us for a day at the fair!

We met at Kim and Thane's house for an early lunch (around 11:00) and then headed to the fairgrounds. Rain was predicted for the day (should we be surprised???) and it was a bit overcast but thankfully, the rain held off and the clouds kept it from being too hot!

We started off at the kiddy carnival, thinking it would be fun for Annaliese and Elias to try some of the rides. Turns out, they weren't quite tall enough for the majority of them!

But they could go on the carousel! So that's where we went. Turns out it's a good thing they weren't tall enough...neither of them were too sure about actually being on a ride!

At one point in the middle of the ride, Annaliese gave me a big smile and said, "This is fun!" but she never loosened her grip on me!

That one ride was enough for the day, so we moved on to the tractors and the animals. 

Mallory was tucked in the Ergo all day:) She missed most of the animals.

 Getting ready to give these camels a bottle of milk. The camels were about 1 1/2 yrs old.

 We watched this horse show with Clydesdales. The sound of theirs hooves as they entered the arena was incredible! And then to watch them prancing around with their fancy harnesses on was impressive. Here there were 3 horses, but we saw as many as 6 on one team! 

 Annaliese dancing...the rest of us were watching an Alpaca and Llama Obstacle Course (sorry no pictures of that. It just wasn't that impressive, although it was rather amusing)

 We stumbled upon the Rascal Rodeo, which was events for Special Needs kids. They had these little ponies there, and they were supposed to race around the barrels.  These two little munchkins would run in circles around the same barrel around and around and around again. It was hilarious to watch!

 Annaliese and Elias 'racing' around the barrels.

Haleigh, all snuggled up with Grandma

By the end of the day, everyone had had a good time, there were no major breakdowns by any of the children (although Haleigh was in her third outfit of the day) and we could all say we enjoyed the fair! And although you can't tell by looking at any of the pictures, Auntie Kelsey was also with us:)

5 Months

Another month has come and gone, and truth be told, the 5 month mark has been rather unremarkable. We've been filling our time with cousin play dates, trips to the park, and a lot of relaxing at Grandma's house.

One would think we would have ourselves a great schedule by now, since we aren't doing much else. But that doesn't seem to be the case:)

Sleeping: Haleigh goes to bed anytime after dinner...sometimes its closer to 7 and sometimes its closer to 9. But then she typically sleeps all night, waking around 6:30 for breakfast. On a good day she takes a 2 hr nap in the morning, an hour and a half nap in the afternoon and 1 or 2 short naps somewhere in between. Again, no real schedule.

She seems to prefer sleeping on her side, but I have found her sprawled out on her belly the last few mornings right up against the side of the crib.

Clothes: everything Haleigh wears is now 6 months and it seems to fit just right! She is in sz 2 diapers and they are almost too small.

Favorite activities: watching us eat (she appears to be very interested in food!), sitting up in the bumbo, eating her hands, bath time, having her diaper changed, being tickled, the outdoors and playing with Annaliese.

Dislikes: being hungry

We are close to sitting up, and she can do it on her own, unassisted for about 10 seconds as long as she doesn't see something worth reaching for! We also seem to be teething because her hands are constantly in her mouth; however this does seem to improve some days and then get worse again. But still no teeth to be seen. 

The Antique Tractor Show

Last weekend, we met up with Kim, Thane, and Elias at Berthesen Park in Lynden for the Antique Tractor Show. We arrived just in time for the tractor parade, in which we saw a wide range of tractors from new to very, very old!

 Annaliese, just making sure Haleigh was doing ok!

 Bapa giving his grandkids a little lesson about wheat.

 They had this tractor that the kids could ride in...it was hilarious to watch all the kids furiously turning each steering wheel and looking every direction except for where they were going:)

 Bapa and Uncle Thane checking out an old tractor.

Love!!

Because the parade was going on when we arrived, none of the other exhibits were going on...we were hoping to be able to watch an old saw mill in action and see them do a threshing. However, it was pretty hot outside and we wanted to make it home before the kids fell apart:) 

On a different note, we started potty-training Annaliese earlier in the week. Overall she is doing really well, although we have had a few accidents, which is probably to be expected. And thankfully all of the accidents have been at home or Auntie Kim's house. Success story: On the way home from the tractor show, she announced that she needed to pee and we needed to find a toilet! Thankfully, we were right by a gas station that had the nicest bathroom I have ever seen and she successfully peed in the toilet:)  We also went shopping this week to buy her some princess underwear...she definitely does not want to get Cinderelly wet! (To Annaliese, all princesses are Cinderelly!) Accident story: Auntie Kim had a lot of fresh blackberries at her house...Annaliese really liked the fresh blackberries. Annaliese made a run for the bathroom but didn't quite make it and pooped all over the back steps/kitchen entry way. As a result, Kim's kitchen floor got cleaned, Thane power-washed their patio area, and Annaliese got a bath at Auntie Kim's house!! And the next morning, Annaliese got up and told me that she needed her diaper changed. But she said, "But I not poop in my diaper. I pooped on the steps yesterday. And I took a quick shower. It's okay." She makes me smile:) 

Blueberry Picking!

It's blueberry season!! We met up with Kim, Thane, Elias, Kelsey and Mallory to go blueberry picking in Lynden. Annaliese proved to be a pretty good blueberry picker, although Kyle was by far the fastest of the family! Between the three of us, we picked 18 pounds of blueberries...they are now frozen and ready to be added to oatmeal, pancakes, muffins, cereal, or ice cream! Haleigh was supposed to hang out in the stroller but she didn't really like that idea. Auntie Kim decided that she had enough blueberries and took Haleigh for a walk around the property.

 The berry farm had this wagon available for people to use...the kids loved it!

 Auntie Kelsey and Mallory

Might as well use the stroller for something!!

Back at Kim and Thane's house, we sorted the berries, picking out all the stems and any squished berries before putting them in bags to be frozen. 

En route to Kim and Thane's house from the berry farm, we made a quick stop at the ice cream shop! It was a pretty hot day (mid 80's) so ice cream tasted delicious!!

 (A nice lady offered to take our picture so we could all be in it...but she missed Kim, Thane, and Elias!)

Getting every last drop of ice cream!