4 Months

Claire will officially turn 4 months old on the 19th, and since we'll be in New Hampshire, I'm posting her 4-month photo now. As you can see, the cheeks are a bit plumper and the hair is a bit lighter. So cute!

Sunscreen Girl

I've never met a little kid who likes having sunscreen applied as much as this lady. Every day it goes like this: 

She asks you to put sunscreen on her. You coat her head to toe and she demands more (she usually likes to mix multiple brands/ types). Then you walk away for a minute and she does this:

Though she's wasting expensive sunscreen and making a mess it's a great thing, since she's so fair-skinned and has a dermatologist father :)

The Last Few Days in Photos

Since we're running all over the place and carrying a lot of stuff these days, it's so much easier to snap photos with my iPhone than with our fantastic camera. We still use that, but I often capture the spontaneous, everyday moments with my phone. Here are some from the last few days...

Anna is putting on a Cirque du Soleil show for Claire (or maybe she's doing some kind of Russian dance?)...

 Keith and I have been enjoying some outdoor concerts at Red Butte Garden with friends. It's a great venue where you can bring a picnic and wine and hear some fantastic live music...

 Of course we've been spending time at the cabin, where the Aspens are in full (green) bloom. I can't wait to see these blazing yellow come October!

 Our neighbor friend Sofia (left) turned 2; we helped her celebrate with a toddler's tea party...

 Claire joined us for every outing...

 We rode the carousel at the zoo (When you tell Anna to smile, she does this:)...

 Also at the zoo, our pals Josiah, Wyatt & Kristi Holmberg. And Lukey on the little polar bear:

The kids were mesmerized by the scuba diving seal tank cleaner...

 Best pals, Wyatt & Luke...

 Claire enjoys eating the front of the Baby Bjorn...

 Eating lunch overlooking the elephant area...

 And on the way home, Anna planted a giraffe sticker on sleeping baby sister's forehead...

Claire Bear

Claire will be 4 months old in a few days and--WOW!--has she changed in the last month! Much of her plentiful dark hair has fallen out and she's left with a lighter mane for now. She's smiling and giggling a lot. She rolls over and can sit up in an exersaucer and a high chair. She is a great sleeper. And, as you can see from these photos, she has become a great eater and her reflux, which was common during her first three months, has decreased significantly. She looks a lot like Luke did as a baby, but in a more feminine way (see what I mean below). She's an angel. It was at this time last year that we found out we were expecting another baby, which was quite a surprise. And honestly, I wasn't sure how I felt about that at first. Now I absolutely cannot imagine our family without this little lady. We are so lucky.

For comparison, here's Luke at about 4 months old... can you tell that they're siblings?

Family Hike

This morning we hiked at Brighton Ski Resort...

July 4th

While the weather in SLC has been over 100 degrees for over a week, we've had a nice string of days at the cabin. 
On the morning of the 4th we attended a parade at Brighton Ski Resort with some of our cabin neighbors. It was lots of fun, especially for the kids, who collected a bunch of candy and got excited about riding their bikes (next year) in the kid-bike-decorating and riding portion of the parade. 

Our good friends the Holmbergs came up to celebrate the 4th (and 5th) with us. We did a little biking, hiking, BBQ-ing, beer drinking (adults only), smore's-ing, sparklers-ing and Lincoln Log cabin making. The total Americana package. Luke and Anna were very excited to have a sleep over with their pals Wyatt and Josiah. 
We also experienced three pretty wicked summer storms while at the cabin. Thunder, lighting and rain pounded us for two nights (note: heavy rain on a metal A-frame roof is VERY loud). We got a storm break on the 4th, then on the 5th was a whopper, with a 12-hour power loss, triggered by lightning hitting a neighbor's tree, which knocked out the power line. 

The storm was DIRECTLY overhead at around 6:30 pm, with thunder so loud it made me involuntarily jump and scream (I was standing right at the window), which in turn, freaked Luke and Anna out a little. We promptly lost power and they were very curious about that ("Dad, when will our lights come back on?"..."Mom, I can't see my dinner plate"..."Dad, when will our lights come back on?") They didn't think that our one lantern was adequate light. It was an adventure for them.

Today (Saturday, July 6th--Happy Birthday Billy), Patty came up to watch the kids so Keith and I could go mountain biking on the amazing trails right outside our cabin, to Park City. It was great and I look forward to much more of that this summer.

Anyway, we had some nice family & friends time at the cabin. We'll have many more traditions and memories to create here.

Here are a few random photos (from my phone) from the weekend:

Pretty great mountain biking from the cabin... Here's Keith on the Wasatch Crest trail...

 Claire wants to move! Since she can't actually move yet, her next favorite place is the Baby Bjorn on the front of me...(just like her brother and sister)...

 My view from the front deck...

 Dinner "picnic" on the back of Dad's truck. As Anna (Daddy's Girl) says "I love Dad's truck soooo much"...

 July 4th parade at Brighton Ski Resort. As if the kids didn't love fire trucks enough, this one was throwing candy!!

 Let's take a break from parade candy... for a bite of nature's candy...

 Hiking with pals is always fun (Josiah Holmberg, Luke, Wyatt Holmberg (Luke's best pal), Anna--who thinks she's one of the guys)...

 Daddy & Claire on the front deck...

 Then napping late... or at least one person was napping...

Again, it's a pretty nice view from the mountain bike trail. It'll be equally spectacular when this become a ski trail view...

 Biking the neighborhood...

 Hiking...

 Clairey, getting bigger and more interactive every day...

 Mountain girl, biking in a dress :)

 Night time wind down with Kristi Holmberg reading stories to the boys and me playing with Claire. Superstar-sleeper Anna was already in bed...

 Tim Holmberg telling the boys how to do the sparklers...

What a fun long weekend in the woods!

Cabin Time

We've been spending lots of time at the cabin and in canyon lately. Keith and I have even managed to do some great mountain biking. Here are a few pics from the weekend.
Silver Lake, located between Solitude & Brighton ski resorts, is just a 5-minute drive from our cabin and has a nice interpretive trail all the way around, with a few docks that jut out into the water. The kids love it, despite the melancholy look on Luke's face here!

 Claire isn't making many of our outdoor photos because she's always strapped to me in the Baby Bjorn. But here she is enjoying her first time in the exersaucer. At three-and-a-half months old, she's a strong little lady.

 We had fun playing in the cold mountain stream on a hot day. Luke's shorts got so wet that he stripped down to his undies :)

 Here's our street. Not a bad view...

 I took the kids "mountain biking" on a path behind the cabin. Luke was flying down the trail, while Anna wasn't quite as enthusiastic, though she loves riding on the road. Promise of a marshmallow got her back on the saddle...

 Anna has become quite a little comedian, or I guess she's a comedienne. She has us laughing all the time.