Chillaxing

Well, summer is definitely here! I don't remember the last time I was able to take the babies outside for their morning walk - it's already so hot and humid by the time morning naps are over that I just can't bear the thought of wearing my Moby wrap and lugging Anna while pushing Riah in the stroller! To compensate for walking, though, we've been swimming a lot recently; Mark's parents put a pool in in the fall, and it's definitely added to the reasons I'm glad we still live within 4 miles of their house! Anna LOVES the water, and I'm probably going to get her a little inflatable pool to put on our back patio so she can swim here too. Mark's schedule this month has been surprisingly nice, considering the fact that he's technically working nights. He works an overnight on Sunday, sleeps all day Monday, then works a 24 hour shift from Monday night till Tuesday night. Then he's home all day Wed/Thurs, and has clinic Friday mornings. We're loving having him around! We've gone swimming, taken Anna to the Aquarium using our family pass that Mark got her for Christmas (which she loves at least as much as swimming), grilled, watched lots of good World Cup football - this is made more awesome by the fact that Anna has a little England shirt! - had picnics together ... as Calvin and Hobbes would say, "The days are just packed!" :)

We're starting to look for tickets to England for the fall - very exciting (though somewhat pricier than when Mark and I routinely flew back and forth before getting married!), mainly because the reason for our trip is that Steph is getting married! We're super excited, both for Steph and Adam, and just to be back in England again :)

Anna seems to have had a 'developmental growth spurt' recently; all of a sudden she is very good at walking only holding ONE of our hands instead of clutching both for dear life, she talks pretty much all day and sounds just like us (with intonation, phrases of differing lengths, different 'words' that mean different things etc), she will happily play by herself in her play-yard for a good 25-30 minutes, and I think the amount that she understands is rapidly increasing. We often play "where's Anna.... there she is!", and have done that for months now, but all of a sudden when we substitute in other words for Anna she can find Mama, Dada, Sushi (her fish), her blankie, her tiger, her books.... and is good at following commands. It is crazy to me the rate at which her little mind is developing and expanding. I LOVE getting to watch that all day!

Well, I need to go shower my poolwater off so we can go out for sushi (uh ... actual sushi. This could become a problem!) when Mark gets back from doing manly man things at Lowes. As I said - the days are just packed :)