Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?

Clara wanted to 'read' to Tom and I before bedtime last night, instead of us reading to her. I caught it the second time around on video.

Here is Clara on the Brown Bear quilt my Mom made for the new baby. Clara really enjoys looking at it and having me wrap her up in it so she can wrestle herself out of it.

Clara is wrapped up in the blanket about to break free :)

Another Friendly Visit

Over Labor Day, we had some more friends from Peoria visit. Jill and Jason were in the same Sunday school class at church as Tom and I, and Jill and I did a lot together outside of church. Kami and Clara are the same age and Kaitlin is a great big sister who plays so well with the little girls. They made a brief visit to see us on their drive down to Texas.

We had a lot of fun hanging out in the backyard and then on Tuesday we took a trip to an inflatable jumpy place. The girls had a lot of fun and I even got in on the action. I think I may have overdone it jumping all over the place and helping Clara climb, slide, and manuever through all these obstacle courses. It was crazy, but we had a lot of fun together.

Here are some pictures Jill took from their visit. They have an really nice digital camera that takes such great pictures...plus they know what their doing with it. Enjoy!

Catch up!

It's been a while...I know!! I'm sorry it's taken me so long to update my blog. I have been more motivated lately to scrapbook - most of Clara's naptime and after she goes to bed is devoted to documenting the past two years. I still have a lot more to do but I'm getting there.

Anyways, here are some recent pictures of Clara and the rest of the family. We have been busy - over Labor Day weekend we had two sets of friends from Peoria come visit us. It was so much fun to see them and hang out together.
Derek and Mary came first. Derek really likes to fish so we took them to Arkansas to visit the White River and to hopefully catch some trout. Tom rented a guide for the two of them and the trip was a success!

Mary, Clara and I visited them on the river and I got some cute pictures. Doesn't Clara look like such a big girl here?




Check out this spider web. Cool, isn't it?



When it was time to go home, Chelsea jumped in the car first. She found a comfortable spot in Clara's car seat. Such a good dog!! Clara has some funky hair. There is a section in the back that has a different texture and after a night of sleeping on it, it really goes haywire. You can mold it into any style or shape. There is no hairspray or gel involved...her hair just does this naturally!

Our other friends, Jill and Jason, along with their two girls, Kami and Katlyn, came too. Jill took most of the pictures during their stay so hopefully I will get a copy of those soon and be able to share them with everyone.

Here's a cute video from a couple weeks ago. Clara is really into learning her ABCs right now. She's really good with uppercase letters and is learning the lowercase ones now. The alphabet song is one of her favorites. Here you go:



Newsflash!! Less than FIVE weeks till our next baby makes his or her arrival. I can't believe how fast this pregnancy has gone by. Everything has gone very smoothly and been pretty easy on me. We have been able to hold out and still not find out the sex. Here is the latest ultrasound. You are seeing the left side of the baby's face along with a hand and the chest. In the top picture, the baby's mouth is open. During the ultrasound, the baby was opening and closing it's mouth and sticking it's toungue out. It was pretty cute. I am getting really excited about meeting this little baby and at the same time trying to enjoy these last few weeks of good sleep and one on one time with Clara.