ABC's

Makaela has started singing the ABC's minus the actual letters of the song :) But she's got most of the tune down! She sings it all the time! It's so much fun to listen to her sing and talk all day long. It's fun now...I am sure it will be a bit challenging when she is actually trying to communicate with me and I have no idea what she is saying. But for now, her babble is cute and fun and she loves it!!

This video has a few funny spots to it. One in particular, Bella comes over to check out the camera and sniffs her little snout right in front of it :)

Bonding with Bella

Makaela has taken a particular liking to Bella lately which has been really fun!! She loves to "play" with her, and sweet Bella is so gentle and patient with Makaela. She is constantly sitting on her trying to ride her, or checking out her feet or her mouth or something. I see a budding friendship here :)

Our Little Break Dancer

I really think we might have a break dancer among us--and No, I'm not talking about Nathan :) Makaela LOVES to dance, and she busts out some pretty funny moves!! Every time I play this video, she starts dancing right away. It is soooo funny! Enjoy!

Giveaway Fun

I have Erin Kuester to thank for this. She introduced me to giveaway blogs. Thanks for the addiction friend :) I was quickly sucked in, but took a break as life got really busy with moving and such, but I'm going to hop back into the swing of things right now. I've been following giveaways from a blog called Mommy and Me Giveaways, and I've lucked out twice now. I won a set of Avent bottles for when hopefully baby #2 comes along, and I also won a piece of shapewear! Some of the things aren't necessarily things I would use but would love to use as gifts for baby showers or donate the to the nursery to be used there!!

The big giveaway we are currently crossing our fingers for is a giveaway of Microsoft Office 2010 for MAC. That's right. The full Microsoft Office Suite. We relatively recently acquired a MAC, but don't have any of those programs and I'd love to get my excel back to use for budgeting and keeping track of all our bills etc!! So, with fingers crossed, we'll hope for something good out of this!! If not, thats ok--I figure there's no hurt in trying for something for free :) Anyway, check out the website if you're interested in picking up any free products of various kinds!! Who doesn't love free and usable stuff?!?! :)

California Vacation

We just recently enjoyed a vacation to California to spend time with our families, to spend time in the sunshine, and to eat at In-N-Out :) We flew out Sunday after church and landed in San Francisco. We promptly made a stop at In-N-Out to make sure we got the trip started off right :) Having been on our diet, however, we were diligent and we did order our burgers protein style!! Still tasty although messy :)

We spent the first few days with Nathan's family down in the Antelope Valley. We went to the beach our second day there and had a great time! School was still in session so the beach was VERY quiet which was so nice! It was pretty chilly which was also nice as we weren't exhausted from the sun when we left. It was too cold to go into the water though, so we did just a quick dip of the feet. Makaela did NOT like this at all. I can't blame her. It was pretty cold. She also wasn't a fan of the sand sticking to her. The sunscreen was a little sticky on her legs which made the sand stick to her which consequently made her stand with one leg up in the air trying to get the sand off :)

We stayed with our good friends the Ash's while in the AV. They have a son who just turned 1 at the end of May and he and Makaela had a mostly good time playing together. Most of the time they were together it was nearing time for them to go to bed, but the times they were awake they had fun. We also enjoyed our time with them being able to hang out a little almost every night.

We enjoyed time with everyone in Nathan's family and were thankful for the time we had with each of them. We even got to see Nathan's grandma on his dads side, and grandpa on his moms side--an added treat!!

Friday we got to have dinner with some dear friends from school and we treasured that time very much. We finished off the night heading down to my family in Granada Hills. We spent one full day with my entire family before we all had to go our separate ways for various commitments. Then we spent the last half of our trip with my parents and sister in Visalia. That was a great time of relaxing and chillin--doing very little which we absolutely loved! We got in a few (and by few, I really mean only a few) good hands of pinochle with my parents.

Our trip was such a refreshing time for us and we are so thankful for the time we had to go away. We came back prepared to hit the ground running and we did!! God has been so gracious to us in providing for us and allowing us this time with our families. As our family hopefully grows in the future, we know those trips will become a lot more effort so we are thankful for the ease of time we have with them now.

Now we are springing into the fall (and yes, I did mean fall. Our fall church things really start in the summer) and preparing for Christmas and for the choir year ahead. We're excited about the upcoming season of ministry and looking forward to how the Lord will teach and grow us through these next several months!!

waaazzzzzz uuuupppppppp!!!!!!!

While we were on vacation in CA (which I will put up pictures of and blog about next) grandma and grandpa taught Makaela how to say Wuz Up! Enough said.

Dancing Machine

These two videos have a few slow spots, but like most videos with kids, sometimes they've gotta get their second wind to continue entertaining :) Makaela has developed quite the repertoire of dance moves!! I think you will see just about all of them in these two videos. She seems to favor the break dancing moves, but seems to throw in some kind of ballroom move every now and then too. She loves music and starts dancing anytime she hears any kind of music. I'm sure you'll see that here :)

Don't mind the basketball game in the background :) Or the cheering or yelling