Woodland Park Zoo

We had a great time at the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle. Mark had to work (totally bites) but we still had a blast! Gracie and I went to the zoo with her Grandma Francis and Pop. We saw every animal in the zoo (thanks to my father in law who always gets his money's worth right down to the last cent!:) We were at the zoo for over 5 hours! It was such a long day - in fact about 4 hours into the zoo experience Grace decided to take a quick 30 minute power nap! Gracie loved all of the animals but her favorite was the giraffe. When we got to the giraffe exhibit there were three giraffes standing pretty close to the fence and they were butting heads with one another. Grace got so excited she flung her hands straight up in the air, clenched her fists and her mouth really tight and shuttered (like when you get the shivers) while growling (she loves to growl like a bear) - it was so stinken funny! The weather was surprisingly pleasant - which was a nice shocker considering the forecast called for rain (what's new?!) I really wish Mark could have been there - I guess I should probably start getting used to doing things like this on my own...it's just more fun with my best friend.

Our little bug is growing so fast!

For some of you these are the first photos you've seen of Gracie in quite some time - I do apologize. I never thought in a million years that being a mommy of one would be so time consuming. Mark laughs at me because I'm always making lists. . .the sad thing is that I have to otherwise I'd get swept away by my cute little bug and we would live in a pig sty! Speaking of my little buggy, isn't she getting so big! Everyday she finds something to do that totally blows me away - which makes me go back to the drawing board and come up with a new game plan...it's a repetitive cycle we have going. Let me share a few things about her that some of you may not know: She loves when daddy comes home, she hates when we brush her teeth , she'll eat anything, she loves to swim, she can say "da da" and she signs 'please' and 'thank you', she waves bye bye, nods her head "no" and "yes" and she goes to bed on her own - in fact just tonight her and I were watching the movie "enchanted" and she just got off the couch, walked over to the stairs and looked at me - I said, "Do you want to go nigh-night?" and she nodded her head 'yes'...so, I took her up stairs and tucked her in bed and she went to sleep. She is so amazing. I don't want you to get the wrong impression - she's not all sugar and spice - lately she's been quite the bruiser. She thinks it's funny to hit and within the last 48 hours she's taken a liking to biting...needless to say, we're not too happy with her little spells of aggression. We think perhaps we play a little too rough with her ...oops! All in all, we were extremely blessed with one sweet little girl and we're having the time of our lives with her!

Holy cow, I'm officially a blogger!

Okay, this is so cool - why didn't anyone tell me about blogs? Tia - you should have told me. This is incredibly convienent - we have so many family members and friends living in different states (and even some in our very own) that we don't get to see very often and we would love for them to be apart of our lives as much as possible...especially since Gracie seems to be eating Miracle Grow!:) This is going to help me so much - I spend hours each month developing photos, handwriting cards, and then sending them to people - very time consuming! You may be wondering why I don't email photos - I've tried. We have old school internet - yup, that's right - dial up (cue the scary music) and it takes FOREVER to send a photo. We had high speed internet (loved it) but we are trying to pinch our pennies so that we can afford a family pet - we really want a dog! Here's a brief rundown of what's been happening in our lives lately: As you all know, Mark is a state trooper (who looks so stinken good in his uniform by the way - can you say MUSCLES!) which means his work schedule is never consistent - every 28 days he switches between day and night shift...not an easy thing to do for all of us but we're getting used to it. Being an at home mom is the hardest job I've ever had - but I do enjoy the perks. We moved up to Sedro Woolley ( a small town about 1 1/2 hrs from Seattle) 6 months ago when we purchased our first home (see photo:) - nothing fancy but we really like it. We both love to work out and Gracie has shown a bit of interest in it as well - the other day she picked up one of my lighter dumbells and tried to do a few curls! We're desperately looking forward to the summer months - it's hard to do some of our favorite activities when it's crapping rain every day!