My heart beeps

My niece IlaJane says the cutest things... today she said, "Katie, did you know my heart beeps?" 

Babble

Zoe's been talking more and more, which is really fun.  But I've noticed something interesting... as her language skills develop, mine seem to be worsening.  My friend Kristine who is a Speech Therapist who works with kids told me when you're teaching your baby new words you should keep your language brief, 1 or 2 words.  So instead of saying, "Zoe, look here is the ball!", just say "ball" and point or give it to her.  So I've been trying this and have noticed after a full day with Zoe, I might skip a few words when talking to Tim... like instead of saying, "Honey, could you please go get our baby girl out of her crib and change her diaper while I cook dinner?" ... I might say, "Go get girl"...  yikes. 

It also reminds me of when Tim was in Switzerland and living and talking with so many people who didn't speak very much English, his language skills suffered.  He would leave out the adverbs or adjectives and sounded as if English was maybe his second language too.  Luckily, it seems like it's more like picking up a temporary accent than actually losing your vocabulary.  Anyway, here is Zoe saying a few words, it's fun to get them on video. 

What I'd rather do than crawl...

Happy Baby Pose
Sphinx Pose
Downward Dog
Sucking on my toes

The saddest garden

So I planted our garden 17 days ago... and we have NOTHING growing.  Most of the seed packs said we should see sprouts within 10 days.  I am not sure what I did wrong... seeds too deep?  too much clay in the soil?  not enough compost?  too much compost?  not enough water?  too much water?  I prefer to think it was our pesky squirrel who stole the seeds much like he stole our prayer flags, but he has a large family of baby squirrels to feed, so it makes me feel just a little better.  Except for that I think I kind of hate squirrels.  And now the cute little row markers look like tombstones to me.  RIP Arugula.  RIP Spinach and Cilantro.  RIP dear Kale and Beet Medley.  I'll give it a try again next week.  Does anyone have any suggestions for better results next time?

Vacaaaation!

Brianna and I just got back from a 4 day trip to visit our brother, Bryson and his wife Natalie in Memphis.  This trip involved flying into Little Rock, renting a mini-van(which I ended up loving!) and driving 2.5 hours to Memphis. And we took the kids!  On the drive to the airport Brianna and I talked about what we were thinking about the trip and decided to look at it as a VACATION!  This means, after being woken up repeatedly by tiny feet and hands kicking and pushing, Brianna sure did deserve that 3rd cup of coffee the next morning!  And, when Zoe smeared her teething biscuit ALL OVER the rental car seat belt, I just let that one go because we were on vacation!  And should we stop at the Sonic and get Cherry Limeade and Cheddar Peppers... Um, yes please.  And on and on... the feeling that we were in "vacation mode" allowed us both to relax more, allowed the kiddies to go a bit wild, and we let go of scheduled naps and mealtimes, etc.  It was awesome!  This may not be a huge revelation, but it really did work and we had a wonderful visit. 

Bryson and Natalie are doing so well and I am so proud of them and inspired by them.  They are both amazing with kids, it was really cute to see them having fun with Zoe, IlaJane and Finn.  Bryson is going on a mission trip to the Dominican Republic next week!  Memphis was really interesting... so beautiful and then ugly (but we mostly saw the beautiful parts).  The zoo and Shelby Farm Park were awesome, Finnley said, "This is heaven."  These are some of my favorite pics from the weekend:

Frontier gave us a whole row to ourselves!  YES

Uncle Brysee

Ringing Finnley's neck/ CHEESE!

OMG, what is this heat and humidity all about???

Beautiful field in Shelby Farm Park

The Mississippi seriously is BIG