First Steps

We are so excited, Bentley took her first steps today. We knew she was close. When D came home from work he held Bentley in front of him, and she took 2 to 3 steps to get to me. She wouldn't repeat the performance. Instead she would just go down on her knees when we tried to hold her to stand. I'm sure that walking completely on her own will come quickly, or maybe not, since Bentley does everything in her own time. Lately she has been walking while barely holding on to one of our hands, and she has been reaching from one piece of furniture to the next to get around. Since Bentley was walking to me I didn't have the camera, so there aren't any pictures. Maybe next time.

Ten and Eleven

Somehow, I didn't get around to posting Bentley's ten or eleven month pictures. Even though these are late, I thought I would post them.

Ten Months


Eleven Months


It is getting harder and harder to get a picture of Bentley looking at the camera. As soon as I set her down where I want her, she is turning around to touch or climb on whatever is behind her. Even when Bria is standing beside me acting crazy, Bentley hardly takes notice. Bentley was never very cooperative to begin with, but being mobile has made it more difficult. She is, however, learning a lot with all of her exploring. She is also trying to say a few more words, and points at objects (which helps us determine what word she is saying). I think we are going to end up with two very talkative girls!

Nothing Much

There isn't a whole lot going on these days. School starts here tomorrow, but we don't have any kids in school yet. The club that I am in charge of had our monthly activity at the swimming pool this afternoon. It was an extremely warm and windy day, so it worked out well. I wish I had pictures of the girls in the pool, but I didn't plan well enough to bring the camera.

Also, as of today I will also be helping out with our church's monthly after school program. Bria is very excited about that because even though she isn't old enough to go, she was told that she could attend. Our church teaches about Christ and the Bible to kids who may not hear about it anywhere else.

Bria is really the only one who has had excitement these past couple of weeks. Last weekend grandpa and grandma came and got her. She spent the weekend plus a few days with them. They had fun camping a couple of the nights she was there. It also allowed D and I to take a quick trip to RC for one of his work meetings and some errands. We were also able to meet some friends for supper.

Other than that, life has been a bit more relaxed, and we are enjoying it.

Who has time?

I haven't had any time in the last month to update the blog. The sad thing is that I don't even know if that means that we have had a lot going on or not. I have been busy getting things ready for Vacation Bible School (VBS) the last couple of weeks, and VBS is actually being held this week. I was in charge of the set and the skits. The project ended up requiring some work that I wasn't expecting because we didn't get all the resources that we needed. Our church is so small that we just borrow VBS materials from other churches. I had to be creative and search for some things on the internet. Also, I did the set design in the evenings when D was home. Our church, however, doesn't run the air conditioning during the week so it was 90 degrees in there every night. Now that we are into bible school, D and I have been practicing the skit every night with the other members while the kids are at VBS. Because we live right next to the church, we can put Bentley down to bed, practice our skit at our house, go perform, and come right back home. Bria, even though she is too young, is being allowed to participate in VBS. That was the only way that both D and I could help. Bria has really been enjoying it, and has even been memorizing her verses.

Here are some pictures from the past month.

Two sisters who really love each other. Bentley is really good about giving loves to all of us. We all love getting loves from her too.

The girls coming to cuddle with mommy in bed. I was so tired this morning that I laid in bed for a moment and everyone else decided to climb in too.

Bentley was exploring the laundry basket.

Big sister Bria pulling Bentley around on the car. Both girls were laughing, even when Bentley kept falling off.

This is Bria's creation for a bike helmet.

Other than VBS the only other activity we have had (that I can recall) is that my aunt and uncle from California came up and were at my parents' house for a day. The girls and I went to visit them last Thursday. It was just a quick day trip, but it was nice to get away from all the work here. We are hoping that after this week is over, life will get back to normal. Whatever that might be!

Trip Over East

After only a few days at home, we ventured to the eastern part of the state. Bria had a doctors appointment on Thursday to check the progress of the scar from the bump we had removed on her face. After her appointment, we left D with our friend to do some landscaping projects for a couple of days, and Bria and I headed to D's parents where we had left Bentley.

While D was helping our friend with their project, the girls and I hung out at grandpa and grandma's and also took a short trip to Wtown to see our friends. It was nice to be able to let the girls run around in a house that wasn't under construction.

Bria playing with a portion of the Thomas the Train set.

Bria and Bentley swinging in the hammock.

Bria, Bentley, and Grandma making the train go back and forth between them.

The pheasant in my grill that I hit on my way to Wtown. It was still alive. It survived the whole day until we got back to D's parents, where D's dad took it out, and it flew off. I did know it was in there, and that it was alive, but there wasn't any one of our friends available to help me remove it. The pheasant went in a different way than it could come out, but he kept sticking his head through the hole in the grill that we had from a previous incident. It was quite funny, but I felt bad for the little guy.

Saturday night, D came back to his parents. After church on Sunday we headed back home.

4th of July Weekend

On July 1st, J's family came to our house and stayed in their camper. The next morning we spent hang out around our place, and around lunch time the girls and grandpa, grandma, aunt D, and uncle N headed to the hills to start the camping weekend. D and followed after D was off from work. We didn't do much that first day except set up camp and let Bria go swimming before a thunderstorm came through.

The 3rd we spent lounging around at the camp ground in the morning and the afternoon at a lake up in the hills. There is a nice little walking/hiking path around the lake that we had fun exploring. The day was actually a bit chili, but Bria wanted to put her feet in the water so we spent some time wading after our walk.

The water coming over the dam behind the lake.

We squeezed the stroller through the narrow crevice to get around to the back of the lake.

Waiting on Bria, who was in the water.

Hanging out at the campsite.

After getting back to the campsite we had some supper, put the girls to bed, and the younger adults sat in the hot tub to keep warm.

The morning of the 4th we went to a church in town that D and I attended when we lived out there. It was lots of fun to see people that we hadn't seen in about 5 years. For the afternoon, some people played tennis, went swimming, napped, or played miniature golf. The evening fireworks were in town. We found a nice little spot to view them from then headed back to camp to get to bed.

D and I headed home early on the 5th to get back to our projects. My parents brought the girls back as they were traveling through on their way home that afternoon. It was nice to get away for a relaxing weekend, especially since we needed a break from all of our house projects.

How Long Has It Been?

I believe it has been a whole month since I posted anything on our blog. What have we been up to?

After moving into our new house there were endless projects. Hanging pictures, rearranging furniture, trying to treat the carpet for the dog pee in the living room, planting trees at our local dam, deciding that we couldn't live with the pet smell, shopping for new carpet, and list goes on and on...and on. All of that took us a week or so. A few days after we finally felt settled we had to start all of the projects we wanted to get done in the living room before the new carpet was laid. This started with fixing some bowing in the sheet-rock. Before D sanded the sheet-rock, however, we had to take everything out of the living room (including the computer). All of our furniture was in the garage, the decorations were in our master bedroom, and the computer was in one of the spare rooms (we were not able to actually hook it up to have internet access). That brings us to the weekend of July 4th and our camping trip with J's parents, which I will blog about in the next post.

When we came back early in the morning on July 5th, D started mudding the sheet-rock again, and I headed out to the dam to plant more trees (187 in all), fortunately, it was with a tractor. That afternoon we tore out all of the carpet so we would have time to treat the subfloor to get rid of the pet smell. J's parents brought the girls back and we continued to work by painting the ceiling with the first coat of paint that night. The next morning there was more work on the sheet-rock, ceiling painting, wall painting, and floor treatment. It was a long, tiresome day. D's parents had come to help and played with the girls and pitched in with all of the other projects. They actually went really fast. The next day was about the same. Then we took a break and headed to the eastern side of the state for several different things we had going on over that way, which I will also blog about in another post.

We came back home on Sunday, July 11th. The first half of week included detail and touch up painting, removing the water heater and getting a new one, having the new carpet installed, and moving all of the furniture and decorations back into the living room.

Before and after pictures.

Before the new carpet and paint.

After. We still have to hang curtains and finish painting our computer desk. Then our living room will be complete.