Grandpa Visits

So my dad and his wife visited last week. They left for home last Monday, but I've had a busy weekend of work, so this is my first chance to post. Thankfully, the weather was beautiful while they were here, unlike the turn it has taken today.

We went to John Ball Park Zoo in Grand Rapids last Friday. We stopped and ate a nice lunch at Olive Garden first so we got to the zoo a little late. We only had about 2 hours to walk around before they closed, but as anyone who has been there before knows 2 hours is PLENTY of time to see that zoo. I'm happy to report Emma did not have a single accident the whole time we were gone. She wore a pull-up just in case, but it was still dry when we got home.

Saturday we went apple picking. Nothing too involved. Just a quick trip to the back of the orchard for some Empire apples. They are my absolute favorite apples in the whole world! Sunday everyone went to the beach in the morning while Isabella and I hung out at the house. I made a nice chicken dinner with mashed potatoes and corn on the cob and Isabella took a nice nap. Then Monday Matt and Emma went to drop them off at the train station for their long trip back to Washington. Of course after waiting for the train for an hour they finally called Amtrak and found out the train was still an hour and a half away. So we packed up the car real quick and drove to Chicago to get them to Union Station to catch the train to Washington. We made it to Chicago in record time, dropped off our company and headed to Ikea.

Had a good time shopping at Ikea, but had to get going to avoid traffic....yeah right. Of course we were stuck in some crappy traffic on the way home, but still made it home for dinner. Now today I am still trying to recover from the last week and a half. I worked Wednesday and Friday nights and all day Saturday and Sunday. And now I am being paged by Ella. Still working on all the pictures. Here are a couple from the zoo and apple picking.

Quick Update

So we started some serious potty training last Saturday and I am happy to report that Emma is pretty much potty trained. She had a couple of accidents Sunday morning, mostly because she wasn't telling us when she had to go. She has been wearing diapers overnight, but has woken up dry every morning but 1. The best thing is that she now hates to put a diaper on and would rather wear big girl undies! I have a few new pictures and I'm going to try and get them on the Picasa site tonight. My dad will be here tomorrow night so I probably won't have much time to blog or put pictures up for a few days. Oh, and not to forget the baby, but Isabella is now taking a few steps at a time by herself. It will probably be a few more weeks before she's running, but she is pretty mobile. She also likes to climb on the couch and crawl around now. There is a picture of her on the couch with the remotes and she did all of that herself.

September already?

Wow how the summer has flown by....I realized at work last night that school starts today. Thankfully I don't have any kids in school yet, but wow, summer is over. Since I started working it seems like time is going by faster. I have less time at home with Matt and the girls because I'm working almost all day every weekend. I'm trying to not let it bother me since we really need the money, but I feel like I'm missing my girls growing up. Emma will be 2 and a half next month and Isabella turns 1 in 2 short months.

A quick update on the girls...Emma is still working on potty training but is really more interested in playing and talking than the potty chair. She is very petite still...only weighing 26 pounds and only tall enough for 18 month size pants. Isabella on the other hand weighs 22 pounds and is only about 3-4 inches shorter than Emma. She is 9 and a half months right now and is almost walking! She can stand up by herself and will turn and kind of take a few steps, but isn't quite there yet. Emma is also mastering the alphabet and is starting to spell small words. She knows most of her colors and can count to 10. I guess she will just be my genius midget.

My dad will be here to visit in a few weeks so I hope to have all the pictures organized by then, but keep in mind my hours have doubled at work lately since people have gone back to school. So I will do what I can on my days off.