February 2013

 Rachel is climbing even higher on everything now. She's officially a toddler now that she is a big 1 year old.

 We found a nice secluded park pretty close to our house called Dana Park, so we went out one Saturday. Andrea rode her bike around the park while Daddy followed and Mommy played with Rachel on the playground.

 We went to the Rambow's for Tayla's 3rd birthday. Andrea got her a Tinkler Bell beach towel because they will be going to Great America a lot this summer. Rachel just wanted to play with the baby dolls.

 This is what Daddy and the girls do when Mommy is gone to a Relief Society Activity. 

 Pretty awesome fort. We watched many How to Train Your Dragon TV shows in there. We left the fort up for about 4 days. It was way too cool to take down.

 The girls made Valentines for their cousins.  Rachel painted with water colors.

 Well, maybe there was a little painting in the midst of all her playing.

 Adding lots of glitter of course!

 When Andrea is done sitting in time out Rachel thinks it's her turn to sit in time out. She has to do everything Andrea does of course. :-)

 Playing dress up and dancing in the dance studio is a regular occurrence in our home.

 We had Hailey over to make Valentine Cookies. It was a blast, but Mom cleaned the kitchen at least 3 times before they were finished. Flour was everywhere!!!!

 Each girl got a turn to add ingredients, roll out the dough, cut it with a cookie cutter, and frost the cookies. Rachel even started saying, "Cookie" really well.

 We used those cookies for my Valentine Dance party. I had several foam hearts taped on the mirror and the girls each got a turn to pick a heart.  The heart had certain dance activities to do. Each activity had a Valentine Theme. It was a really fun dance class. After class the girls got to exchange Valentines and eat Valentine cookies. 

 All that I wanted for Valentine's Day was a date with my husband. He came home with a dozen roses which he had bought on his way to work. In fact, in the elevator several guys asked him if they could buy them from him because the stores were packed with men trying to buy flowers for their wives. We went to dinner at the cheesecake factory. We had to wait an hour to be seated, so we just walked around the mall and window shopped before we ate. It was sooo wonderful to actually see Steve before 10:00 at night.

 The Curtises watched our kids while we went to the temple one Saturday, so we watched their kids the next Saturday. We had pancakes for breakfast, painted, had a Valentine dance party, and went to the park. It was a lot of fun. I don't know if I'm ready for 6 kids yet, but hopefully I'll get better at it because they come one at a time.

 We took the girls to Happy Hollow. It was Daddy's first time. He thought it was great.

 Stay in Rachel. :-)

 Rachel has discovered where her nose is. She actually does know most of her main body parts. 

 Andrea is in a free preschool class supported by First 5 Catholic Charities and the government. They gave out a ton of free tickets to Disney on ice, so we got to go. It was really awesome, especially the part with Rapunzel's hair. They were wrapping the ribbon around and flying through the air above the ice. Pretty awesome.

 Rachel is just beginning her fascination with shoes. She tries on everyone's socks and shoes. So adorable.

 Rachel has raided the pantry yet again. In her attempt to get some crackers they got dumped all over the floor like usual.

 Rachel is having a blast opening up clementines. 

The girls play together so well now. They were both climbing in and out of the bottom of the high chair and laughing so hard. I love watching them play together. 

Highlights from this month:

* Rachel got her 1 year shots and didn't even cry. I'm not exaggerating. I don't know if she has a high pain tolerance or if she is just used to getting hurt by her older sister. 

* Rachel can thread sewing cards already.Andrea loves gymnastics!!!

* Towards the end of stake conference Andrea said, "Mom, how many more talks are there?"

* Andrea is so positive. One day she was talking about something and said, "Isn't that awesome!"

* Rachel says, "Love you" "Look" "I want to see"

* Rachel fell asleep in my arms while I was getting fitted for glasses. 

* Rachel got her finger slammed rally hard in the door while at the Curtises.

* Rachel will fold her arms for prayers now and tries to say, "Amen" now. 

* Both girls went to the dentist and have no cavities. 

* Mommy got her permanent retainer off after 10 years of wearing it. 

* Rachel tries to take dance class with the girls. She pulls out the snakes and says, "Ah". 

* Rachel is obsessed with chapstick and turning the lights off and on. She says, "Ah Ah" for "On, off."

* We went to the Redwood Forest with a bunch of friends and went on a guided tour. The rode there was really windy and crazy!

* Rachel can put a shoe on all by herself.

* Andrea said a prayers and said, "Please bless Rachel to fold her arms during the prayer so she can be blessed by Jesus." it was hilarious!

* Rachel talks all day long. She loves to open the microwave. 

* Andrea wrote several letters on her chalk board and even a few words like "MOM" and "DAD"

* Rachel loves to dance and knows exactly what to do for the Wheels on the Bus warm up.