Dear Summer, please last forever!

We are trying to hang on to the last warm days of summer. It's fun to look at pictures from last summer because you can see how much the kids have grown in one year.  This year Milo has made huge advances in the pool.  He has always been our little fish, but this year he took it to the next level.   

Let's remember that he is 3. . . He can jump off the side into deep water, surface, and swim to the stairs. 

And yes my 3 year old can do a front flip into the pool.  He taught himself.  One day I was at the pool with my mom and she said, "I didn't know he can do a flip?"  I looked over confused.  And sure enough, scared me to death, full on front flip.

This kid is absolutely fearless in the water!  Chris loves it.  Milo makes him so proud every time that we go swimming.  We really get our moneys worth out of the pool.  We usually wait for dad to come home from work, head over, swim, snack, and then it's bed time.  .  .  It's awesome.

Then there is little miss Taya.  She can also jump off the side of the pool. . . and we learned the hard way (when she fell in) that she can also surface.  She loves to go under over and over again. 

This is her being "Ariel".  She'll go ah ah ah ah ah ah ah ah in the Little Mermaid way.  She loves to play princesses in the pool.  My favorite is when she learned to call Chris, "You mean witch".  We are also very proud of Tay when she swims, but she's a lot more casual with her swimming.  She and I love to watch the people at the pool, and she is pretty low maintenance-true to character, she just does her thing.  I have to say, Taya's biggest accomplishment is that she learned that it is not okay to poop at the pool.  Kind of a funny thing-several horror stories, but she's figured it out:)

And this is what Crew has accomplished this year at the pool:) 

On his 2 month birthday, we dipped his toes in the pool.  He is kind of a fussy baby, so I expected him to dislike it, but he actually seemed very content. It will be so fun next year to watch him experience swimming for the first time.

I just love summer an unreal amount.  There are so many fun things to do outside when it's not miserably cold!

 

We are going to soak up every ray we can until winter, and then start the countdown to spring again:)

 

Crew's Blessing

Well it's official, our baby has been blessed, held up in front of everybody--and now we'll be expected at church again:)  

Bye Bye Blanket

Blanket has been through a lot with us.

Holidays

Even the one's he had to miss out on because he was sick.

And the ones he was scared to death of.

Helped us through moving into a new house.

Blanket was even there for the transition to big brother.

Of course to the circus,

And along to pick pumpkins

Blanket has been there through it all.

The funny thing is, I started this blog thinking, "Oh how sad, Milo is done with his blanket now, and I don't even have a single picture." . . This isn't even half of what I found.  Blanket is always lurking somewhere in the background.   That kid really did LOVE his blanket.  I still remember when he was little and called it kiki.  I always knew that it was kind of a gross attachment.  Lets face it, blanket got drug through the dirt, thrown up on, spilled on, sat on, dipped in the bathtub, and rarely washed.  He started loving this thing around 6 months.  And it seriously went EVERYWHERE.   When he started to play and make-believe, he would talk and talk to blanket.  It really was his very best friend.  He would squeeze it and say, "I love you so much blanket."  There were countless nights that Milo would throw up, and we would stay up and watch "Toy Story", while waiting for the "fast" cycle on the washing machine to beep.  I learned the hard way that skipping the last two minutes on this cycle only results in the door locking and having to start the machine over. 
When Milo was about 2 1/2,  the inevitable happened.  Blanket got left at the mall.  By this time I had patched, sewed, and glued this little rag a million times.  I was barely bigger than a hanker chief, but Milo loved it all the same.  Milo begged and begged to go back to the mall and get it, but I figured that anyone that picked it up would have immediately thrown it away. . . it seriously looked like a dirty dish rag, besides I thought it was time for him to give it up anyway.  That was until missing nap time and crying into the night because he couldn't fall asleep without it.  He always sucks his thumb and snuggles it while falling asleep.  So I layed down by him and told him to just suck his thumb.  He looked at me, then looked at his thumb and said, "why would I do that?"  So the invention of "blankets buddy" came around.  This was a dark brown piece of material that was similar to his original blanket.  I cut up 16 squares of it, so we would never lose it again.  Every time we go to the mall he still asks if we can get his old blanket, but blankets buddy has lasted us a whole year. Then this last weekend we went camping.  I packed like seven bags for the three kids.  I packed toys, food, snow clothes, swim suits, you name it-but I somehow forgot blanket.  When I realized my mistake, I honestly thought that one of us would have to drive home.  But I told Milo what had happened, and he said, "It's okay I'm almost four, I don't need it."  And he didn't, from that moment on he hasn't asked for it. It's weird that my heart kind of broke.  He is almost four, and he's not a baby anymore.  He's my big man.  I look at all of the places that we took blanket, and how Milo has changed over four years.  At the park he used to be terrified of the sand, so he would lay blanket down and sit on it, so that he could at least be closer to the kids.  Now he's a maniac and runs and slides and plays cave monsters like no ones business.  At the Dr's office he used to cling to that baby, and twist it, and cover his eyes with it, but now he just politely tells Jetta that if he is good, that she owes him a sucker.   I'm sad as I sit here writing this.  Blanket helped us grow up, and now I just have a cute, big, almost four year old.  I guess he wasn't the only one with an attachment.