Huge Milestone!

I just wanted everyone to know that Averi said her first word today! She learned how to wave bye-bye over the weekend, and she LOVES doing it. She'll even pick up my hand and shake it when she wants me to wave to her. Well, this evening, Aaron was holding her and I was waving, and when I asked her if she could wave bye, she said, "Buh." Aaron and I looked and each other, and asked her again to wave bye-bye. This time she said "Buh buh." And she looked pleased as punch. Now she says it every time we ask her if she can say bye-bye. So totally adorable. Summary of our kids' first words: Katie: dog Paul: granola bar (I promise, this was actually his first word. It's always about the food with him.) Averi: bye Notice there's not a mama or a dada in there. I refuse to ask myself what this indicates about my parenting. FYI: Averi's also cutting her first tooth. Such a big week for such a little girl!

Camping in Moab

We were planning on going down to Lake Mead this weekend to go boating and camping with Aaron's family, but on Wednesday morning (the day we were planning on leaving), we realized that the forecasted weather was extremely windy. If any of you have been boating, you'll know that boating in windy weather is next to impossible and no fun at all. I was SOOOOO disappointed. I love to be on the water, and wakeboarding is so much fun. I've also been feeling boating-deprived, since I've been VERY pregnant 3 out of the last 5 summers. So I was thrilled to be going, but then my hopes were dashed. I felt like the conversation between Anne and Marilla: MARILLA: You set your heart too much on frivolous things and then crash down into despair when you don't get them. ANNE: I know. I can't help flying up on the wings of anticipation. It's as glorious as soaring through a sunset. It almost pays for the thud. MARILLA: Well, maybe it does. But I'd rather walk calmly along and do without both flying and thud. Sorry, I couldn't help but referencing one of my favorite movies. Anywho... So we searched around ALL of the lakes that were within driving distance of both Salt Lake and Albuquerque (which is a very small number of lakes), and ALL of them had the same windy forecast. So we decided to abandon the boating plan in favor of camping in Moab. And I'm glad to say that we had an amazing time. We drove down on Thursday morning. Let me tell you, road trips with two barely potty-trained toddlers are a riot. We stopped for potty breaks about every hour, and each one took at least 15 minutes. And of course they were completely wired and didn't sleep at all (Paul may have slept for about half an hour, but my memory of that is hazy). Averi, as usual, was a gem. Since we had to stop so frequently, we were able to get her out of her carseat and hold her, which helped her to maintain her sanity. Friday was quite windy, so we scrapped our hiking/sand dune plans in favor of Dead Horse Point State Park and bowling. We also ate lunch/dinner (linner?) in town. Saturday was a bit calmer, so we drove into Arches and "hiked" to a few of the arches and then took the kids to the huge sand hill off the highway to play. Aaron had never been to Arches before (I don't know how he missed out on that one, since he's been to Moab with the Scouts several times) so that was a new experience for him, and the kids loved scrambling up the rocks and just being outside in general. Averi's favorite part was eating the dirt clods at the sand dune. She was furious whenever we took them out of her mouth. If you don't want to see tons of photos of my adorable family, I advise you to stop here. Otherwise, here are some of our many, many pictures: Averi after I took the Fresca away from her... The fam at the Monitor and Merrimack. See how windy it was? Dead Horse Point State Park Aaron in mortal peril... and Jake in even worse danger. Katie had better form than most of the adults. Katie thought she was the bee's knees with her super cool water bottle holder. At Balanced Rock. In front of Delicate Arch. Double Arch This was the first time we'd used the large child carrier, and it worked great! Paul informed us that hiking was really fun; it may have something to do with the fact that he did none of the work! The aftermath. Our car was completely filled with red sand! It's going to be so much fun to clean!