DC

  A couple of Saturdays ago, we met up with my cousin and his wife and daughter in DC.  It was our first time taking both kids in on the metro and we picked kind of a measly day to do it.  Not only were there repair delays (not very uncommon), but there was also a huge girl scout jamboree on the mall.  They were trying to set a world record for having the most girl scouts in one place, so the metro was insane.  We (well, I) was VERY close to turning around and going home, but Dave encouraged me to stick it out and I'm glad he did.  We really had a great day with the kids and my cousin's family.

The mall is nice because there's so much area open to exploration for Leah.  And she took full advantage of it!  It was very hard to get her to pause for anything.

Here I am trying to take the first photo.  She would not stay put.  

Ever since she pulled that suitcase on wheels on our Memorial Day Weekend trip, she has been dragging her bags around on the ground as if they have wheels.

Leah LOVED the carousel (though this picture doesn't show it).

But this picture shows how much she loved it! 

She was obviously very disappointed when it ended (is it bad that I'm smiling while my daughter is so distraught?).

...and so does this one! 

Eliza was so sweet with Dallin (I just realized this is the only picture I have of Dallin from that day!).

There's something I like about this picture...maybe because our very independent, confident girl looks so small and vulnerable.

  

Aaaand she's back to the confident independence.

Our next stop was the fountain next to the sculpture gardens.  It was a pretty hot day, so it felt so nice to spend time eating our sandwiches and soaking our feet in the cool water.

  

Thank you so much to Jen, Tyler and Eliza for such a fun day!

Afternoon at the DC Temple Visitor's Center

Sunday afternoon, both little ones woke up early from naps, so we found ourselves with a very wide open afternoon.  Normally when that happens, we take a family walk, HOWEVER, taking a walk outside in humid 95 degree weather is not my cup of tea, so we drove to the Washington DC Temple Visitor's Center a spent some time together there.  We love having this temple close by and wish we could spend more time there.  Leah and I spent a little time together on this bench looking at the temple and eating our snack...a sweet moment with my daughter (ignoring the drops of perspiration running down both of our faces!! did I mention it was hot?!).

More 11 month pictures

Nothing spectacular about these pictures (except that they're of a spectacular little boy!), especially since they're taken with my phone so quality isn't great, but for personal purposes, I wanted to include them on the blog.

 How big is Dallin???

"SO big!"

"So, so, SO big!"

Playing peek-a-boo

Cute video

Just another night at the Briggs home.  I think this was taken Memorial Day Weekend.

Visit from Grandma Briggs!

We were SO lucky to have Grandma Briggs come visit for the weekend.  It was kind of a busy one because we were also having a garage sale that weekend, but it was especially helpful to have her to help take care of the little ones during the yard sale.  It was so much work and would have been that much harder if she hadn't been there with us.

Speaking of the yard sale, for weeks ahead of time I prepared for the sale by taking pictures of things I was selling and posting them to a blog that I linked up on Craig's List.  Leah kept trying to jump in the pictures, so instead of continuing to try to stop her from getting in the picture, I finally took a few of her and Dallin:

I think she felt a lot better after she got some attention!

Anyway, back to the weekend.  We didn't really do anything out of the ordinary, except for spend time with Grandma, which was totally out of the ordinary and special for us since we hardly get to see family.  We all had such a wonderful time just being together and hope that it can happen again sometime soon.

Hanging out before bed time

Yard sale! 

I LOVE how this picture shows the effort being made to get Leah and Dallin to smile!

They enjoyed the seats until we decided we wanted pictures...then they would NOT be happy or sit still.
P.S. those zebra striped chairs served as extra seating in my apartment at BYU!  Now I can actually use them on more appropriately-sized people. 

Grandma showered Leah and Dallin with lots of little gifts, including this fancy tiara and earrings.  Leah was fascinated with the glitz!

Thank you, again, for visiting, Grandma!  We love you! 

11 and 23 months

This month, the last month-marker came around before Dallin and Leah turn 1 and 2.  Crazy!

A snapshot of Dallin at 11 months:

He is all over the place.  His favorite is climbing stairs, and we're still working on learning how to go down safely.  He can do the two steps down into our living room fine, but nothing bigger than that.  

He loves food and wants whatever Leah has.  If I give him his bottle and Leah is eating something else, he throws the bottle to the side and demands what she has.

He loves baths but hates cold water, so he hasn't loved swimming yet.  Hopefully he'll get over that.

He is amazingly difficult during diaper changes and getting dressed.  I thought Leah was tough in this regard at this age, but she didn't have the strength that he has.  He just doesn't want to stop and gets very impatient.

He says lots of "ma ma ma", "ba ba ba", "nigh nigh nigh" (usually when he's tired), and "da!" (just one of those at a time).  

His few "tricks" on command: "How big is Dallin? SO BIG!", peek-a-boo (he puts his hands on either side of his eyes), waves bye-bye and hi, claps his hands, and tries to talk on the phone (whenever he hold it up to his ear, he holds up his other hand over his other ear).

Has the most kissable cheeks.  I can never stop kissing them.

Has the most endearing, pure, innocent, sweet countenance.  He is a joy (I have more pictures of him to share, but I have to find them).

I can't believe this is the last month before Leah turns 2 (we'll have a 2 year old?!).  She is animated, vibrant,  busy, creative, determined, alert, aware, loving, and helpful.  She continues to love her purses and bags and always has one over the shoulder when we're getting ready to head out the door.  She currently has a fascination with large vehicles and calls all of them "choo choos" (sounds more like ju-ju), but she also knows their different names if you ask her to point them out (truck, bus, train, tractor).  She also LOVES babies and looks for them everywhere we go.  The moment she spots a stroller or carseat, she calls out "a bubby!".  If she herself is not strapped in at the time, she will run over to investigate this "bubby" (and it can be a total stranger in the middle of the city...luckily most people with babies are pretty patient with other people with babies and they often stop to let her take a look at their baby).  She has four baby dolls and insists on all of them being tucked in with her at night.

She loves books and her current favorites are The Biggest Bed in the World, Knuffle Bunny: A Case of Mistaken Identity, Dooby Dooby Moo, and We're Going on a Bear Hunt.

A newer development in the last couple months is her interest in singing.  She's more than happy to do a song and dance for us whenever we ask her to.  She also likes to sing along to her piano playing.

She loves to run and she is always falling down (I talked about this in the last post, though...I won't repeat myself).

She's our girl.  We love her!

We turned on the faucet in the kitchen sink the other day and let her have at it with the dishes.  

She was thrilled with the opportunity to "wash the dishes".

 

 

I think she took a sip from every cup and bowl in the sink.

 

 

She approached me with this laundry basket on her head the other day saying "hat!"

Life with these two is crazy and beautiful.  They can be challenging to keep up with, but we also have peaceful moments too (some days more than others!), especially as they have gotten older.  They are becoming better and better playmates as they grow and it is so much fun to see them enjoying each other.  It is also gratifying to see Leah looking out for and taking care of her little brother.  Of course we have moments of discord, too, but overall they have a sweet sibling relationship.  . 

Yes, Dallin is drinking the water from the dishwasher door.  I also had just thoroughly cleaned the dishwasher earlier that day!

Memorial Weekend, Day 2

Note: before reading this post, you may want to get the background from the previous post, Memorial Weekend, Day 1.

Sunday morning came WAY too soon.  We were EXHAUSTED!!  Here's what our morning looked like, in all our loveliness:

Why is it that NOW he will lay his head down and relax???

We knew there were two wards meeting at the local church, and the first was at 9, but since the kids slept until 8:30 (and since we hardly slept at all), we knew making it to that ward wasn't likely for us.  But we were confused about the meeting time of the other ward.  Anyone familiar with our meetings knows that we meet in 3-hour blocks, with a little over an hour of sacrament meeting and about an hour each of Sunday School and Auxiliary meetings.  But the second ward's website was incredibly confusing...it said their first meeting was at 1:00, their worship service was at 4:00, Sunday school was at 10:15, and Relief Society/Priesthood (auxiliary meetings) were at 11:00.  With none of those times making any sense whatsoever, Dave started calling that ward's bishop a few days before our trip.  And he kept calling him.  And he tried calling the other ward's bishop, but neither of them ever responded (until a week later!)...so the end of this long, drawn out story is that we never made it to church that Sunday, but not for lack of effort on our part!

So after a simple in-room breakfast of cereal and bananas, we set out to explore the grounds around our hotel.  

Have you ever seen a happier jaunt?

The hotel was surrounded by docks, and it was a little unnerving having Leah running around on them.  The girl falls ALL the time (because she won't stop running) and constantly has skinned knees to show for it (and will NEVER let me put band-aids on them - she only likes band-aids on her hands when there is no reason to put them there.  I tried to force it once and she couldn't get over it - she was miserable until I finally took them back off.  I thought baind-aids make kids feel better!?!) 

 After our walk, we explored the island a little more, grabbed some lunch, then went back to the hotel to hang out for a bit and try to get the kids down for a much needed nap.

Sadly, just because the kids needed a nap didn't mean they would take one.  We tried for about an hour and a half and couldn't get them to settle down, despite the blackout curtains and our sincerest efforts.  This was when we decided maybe we needed to get the whole family home for some good sleep so we could still enjoy our last full vacation day together.

So we packed up while Leah and Dallin played.

The curtains were an entertainment favorite, especially since you could see through them, even after being wrapped up!

Of course D-man had to join in on the fun!

 I'm happy to report that both kids fell asleep on the way home, so it was a peaceful drive, and everyone slept VERY well that night.  Even though we couldn't get our money back for that second night at the hotel, we were glad we came home...but we were also glad we made the effort to take the trip in the first place!

I don't know how other families do it, but we're ready to wait awhile before we try another hotel trip together!!!!