“I helped him out” said Sophia. Sure enough, she had helped Derek out of his crib. Later I checked in his room and she had gotten the SpongeBob step stool out of the bathroom and put it up to his crib to help him.

At that moment, Kevin and I realized our lives had changed forever…again. Strange enough, he got out of his crib on Sunday morning (again with the help of big Sister). However, he has never tried it all on his own! He’s certainly big enough to get out on his own, but I really think he likes it in there.

Sophia had so much fun at the fair. Apparently she made Grandma go on a lot of rides that I’m sure she very much enjoyed. They came back with way too much stuff for Sophia and an awesome toy for Derek. I think Sophia got pretty spoiled too!

We tried to get both kids down for a nap, but before we knew it, it was time to head to the next party. My friend Jodie and her family were throwing a celebration party for the adoption of her 2 boys. The party was at a park with some really fun and dirty playground equipment. The kids had a great time and got SOOO dirty!! Meanwhile, Kevin headed to do some wedding photography. So I got the kids home, played with the neighbors, baths and to bed. Exhausting!!

This morning we got up and headed to the zoo, where we met Amy and Quinton. The kids didn’t do a very good job of listening, so we didn’t stay very long. When we got home we at some lunch and crossed our fingers that the kids would take naps. Well, 2 of us got naps, Derek and I napped while Kevin was mowing and Sophia was watching TV. Does that make me a bad Mom?? Once Kevin got his yard looking great, he showered and took Sophia to the grocery store.

Derek woke up and we played with his new game from Grandma Robin. He loved it! 3 loads of laundry, baths, books, meal prepped for tomorrow night…finally the kids are in bed. Can we relax now??

She really loved the Lady Bugs:

And the boat ride:

Notice how her “Ducky” was buckled in?

But only Derek will know the story behind what I found this morning. We heard Derek playing in his room for awhile this morning when we finally decided to go get him. The first thing I saw was Derek in the corner of his crib covered with his blankey, feet on the side of his crib, drinking his sippy. What a sweet boy. At the same time I smelled the stinky every other morning poopy diaper. As I reached in to give him a big morning hug, he reached to the other side of his crib to give me a present…his poopy diaper.

After a quick glance of the contents in the diaper, I expected the worst. I yelled at Kevin to turn on the bathtub and I quickly snatched Derek out of his crib to wash his buns. To my surprise his bunnos were clean. We disposed of the diaper and got Derek in the tub as I hesitantly looked through the contents of his crib…and….nothing. I found a couple of small spots on the crib sheet, but other than that everything appeared clean.

How in the heck can a 21 month old, take of his pants and poopy diaper and not get any poo anywhere?? I don’t get it. We washed up everything in the crib, just in case, but that is certainly the biggest mystery of the Hillabolt Household as of yet.

On an unrelated note, look who’s become Mr. jump in the pool:

Anyway, the kids had a blast and I was able to snap a couple quick portraits.

We also stopped by the “castle” (aka the Capital) for a short period of time.

Sophia was extra pleased when I put her up on top of this statue for a picture:

I took Sophia to the movie “Up” the other night. It was the first theater she’s ever been in. It was a great movie and Sophia and I both loved it. She only looked away long enough to find her popcorn.

Last weekend we went to a giant furniture store to see the new renovations. We had a fun time in the kids area, then went down for some free cookies and lemonade. Next, we checked out the couches and living room furniture. At one point Derek and Sophia collided which left poor Derek with a nice shiner. Once we decided it was time to go and headed toward the front, Derek spotted something he really liked. He ran over to a coffee table, yelling “ball”, picked up the round vase and proceeded to bounce it on the floor. Too bad it didn’t bounce. I picked up the shattered pieced and took it to someone and said “i guess I just bought this”. He was nice enough to let us leave without our broken purchase.

One more…
Sophia was having a hard time trying to find a story to read. We kept telling her she was running out of time, since it was passed her bedtime. She turned the page looking for her story and said, DAMN. Kevin and I tried to ignore it, but I had to leave the room to laugh. How in the world did she pick that up.

Tonight we hooked the buggy up to Kevin’s bike and went for a nice bike ride. What a busy summer!

Sunday we hurried through breakfast and got ready to go to Quinton’s 2nd birthday party. The kids had a ton of fun. I think Derek amazed everyone at how big he is and Sophia was very helpful with Quinton’s presents. We couldn’t leave without cake and ice cream.

As we had hoped, the kids both fell asleep on the way home. Kevin and I took turns going into the house to get things ready for our picnic, so the kids could continue their naps. After we got everything packed, we headed to Big Creek for our picnic.

Once we finally found our picnic spot, we met up with all our friends. Sophia and Derek were very happy to see Abigail and Amelia and a couple of new friends too, Isabella and Junior. Paul & Caitlyn brought the newest member of their family, a baby boxer named Wylan.

Toward the end of the picnic, the kids found the water spout…who new a water spout could be so fun. Words can’t even describe how much fun the kids had splashing around in the freezing cold water. I’ve never seen Derek laugh so hard. Sophia ended up in her swimsuit and all the rest of the kids were in their unders or diaper. That was sooo much fun to watch the kids be that carefree!!

The kids were both amazing this weekend, and it made these last couple of days fly by so fast. Here’s to wonderful weekends like this!!

He was pretty good for the most part. I think the environment and people were definitely over-stimulating for him, since he spent a lot of time covering his face – particularly when people were talking to us.

The best part was just how much he got in to the mini-bowling they had:

Towards the end, he was throwing the balls down the lane as fast as possible – there were several instances where the even went on to adjoining ones.

All in all, he had a blast!