What a crazy spring and summer!

Since I have been so bad at blogging this year (only one back in February and a few in August), I'm using this post to show off some of the great photos that we have from this past spring and summer and to write some of the memories down before I forget them.

Emma is currently in love with farm animals- cows, horses, pigs, sheep, chickens. We are not exactly sure where this came from as it just came out of the blue one day. For the last month or so all we hear about is cows, horses, and pigs. Her favorite song is Old MacDonald. I'm not sure that you could say it is John and I's favorite song, but it ranks up in the top due to the sheer amount of times we have listened to it in the past month or so. She is still really into vehicles too, so we also hear a lot about trains, planes, trucks and cars.

We took a trip on the light rail this summer to downtown Minneapolis. Emma talked about riding the "blue" train for the next week or so. It was definitely a highlight for her.

She is still attending swimming and gymnastics every week. Her swimming is improving dramatically every class. She can swim around with just her sponge on- no noodle or barbell- for a long time. Dipping in the water, which is the equivelant to going under water and swimming is her favorite thing to do. She has improved so much that she is moving up to the next level without mom and dad in the water!  When we sing the wheels on the bus, the movements are what we do in the pool not what people normally do. We took her to the aquatic center a few times this summer and she loved it! By next summer, she should be swimming like a pro for sure.

We took a trip to Arizona in April, which was Emma's first time on a plane.  She did wonderful!  Even a couple fellow passengers commented on how well she did. Here she is rocking out with her new headphones in the hotel. We were only gone for a long weekend, but with a two hour time difference it was long enough.  It is amazing how many things are not open at 6:00 in the morning, but for us it was 8:00 so we were up and going regardless.  We managed to find a great park for these early mornings!

May was also graduation for Mom ... masters degree check! This might be part of the reason that I had no life this spring. With attempting to finish up my last two grad classes, entertain a toddler, work full time, and deal with the first trimester of being pregnant,  I had very little time or energy for anything other than those things. But I graduated and I'm very excited to be done. Emma is very excited too as you can tell by this photo!


At the beginning of June, John and I celebrated our 10 year college reunion.  Holy, I can't not believe that we have been out of school for that long. Once I stopped to think about it, I really started to feel old!  Here Emma and I are enjoying the lawn at St. Olaf. 

At Special Olympics, one of my main responsibilities was running the Summer Camp. A few years ago, we added a Young Athletes day camp to our regular Summer Camp. Young Athletes is a program for children ages 2-7 with and without disabilities to teach them the basics of sports-- kicking, throwing, hitting, etc. Since Emma turned two this summer and I'm no longer working the Summer Camp, I took her to the day camp part of it.  It was a beautiful day and always fun to see Emma trying new things.


Here are few other photos worth sharing from the spring/summer:

Emma and Dad hanging out in the hammock (with Stella the baby doll) at the lake this summer. 

Emma and the Easter Bunny. 

We got to spend the weekend at Montevideo in June celebrating my cousin Melea's wedding. It was a great weekend and we are super excited for them (and their newest addition as of October).  Here is Emma dancing away at the reception. We had to drag her away from the party she was having so much fun!!

Things have been so crazy around our house these past nine months. As I look back on these photos, I can't believe how fast the year has gone. We have had even more adventures this fall, but I will leave that for another post.