Dyl's 1st Birthday Bash!

2 of Dylan's 3 Great-Grandmas. We are so glad Mimi & Oldemor could both be here for Dyl's big party. 

Adorable Eden. She LOVED our porch door!

A rousting game of duck-duck-goose. This was the cutest thing ever, and I can't wait till Dyl's old enough to participate! 

I love how Travis is running SUPER fast ;) and the huge smile on Saylor's face.

Lunchtime - the birthday girl loved baked beans.

14 kiddos - I can't remember the last time I had so much fun! Maybe the Duggars are on to something...

Josiah tackling Harper - looks like she loved it! Future Mr. & Mrs. Demmler maybe? 

The birthday girl & her Daddy ♥ My two main squeezes.

Kirk & August (7 weeks) 

"Hmm...what is this tasty thing Mommy gave me to eat?"

"This pink stuff's pretty good!"

Cupcake, devoured.

"This is great! Delicious & messy!"

"Why haven't they fed me one of these before?!?"

"Here Mommy, you should try this. It's really good."

Grandpoppy. Or possibly "Papa"?

Clean-up patrol.

"This party is awesome! Tons of other kids, and delicious cupcakes!" 

Bella was so sweet, and such a good helper when opening Dyl's presents. (Dyl wasn't into opening presents at all - so we needed help.)

"I'd much rather play on steps than open gifts." says the big 1 year old birthday girl.

We had lots of present opening volunteers though! :) 

Dyl just loved having all the other kids swarming around her. And there was plenty of ripped paper to play with. 

"This is so much fun! Why don't we do this every day??"

"I love this baby doll - it laughs and that makes me laugh!" 

Emrie & Charley: proof that girls run in packs from very young ages. They were so cute together.

Dyl with her super awesome sparkling bouncy ball and laughing baby doll -both of which she thinks are awesome.

Playing with her dinosaur walker from Aunt Jackie - she loves it!

♥

We really had a wonderful time at Dyl's party on Saturday, and we hope all of our friends & family who came to celebrate Dyl's big day with us had a great time too! Thank you so much to everyone who came out to enjoy the day with us. And a huge THANK YOU to Mom & Grandma/Mimi for helping us pull it all together at the last minute! :)

3rd Annual Congenital Heart Walk

We had an awesome turn out for the 3rd annual CHWalk today! Thank you so much to Mom, Poppy, Eva, Jenny, Jess, Liam, Abby, Greg, Heather, Emrie, Henry, Greta, Greg, Katy, Jennifer, Caleb, Lauren, Sydney, Spencer, Jess, & Oscar for walking with us. Your support means so much to us, we truly can't thank you enough. Thank you for helping us honor Haley's memory, and of course fund-raise to help fight these devastating heart conditions. We love you all.

Happy 1st Birthday, Dylan!

"What's this super cool thing?!?"

"Ooh, a walker with chomp & clack alligators! Thank you so much, Grandma & Grandpa! I love it!"

"Now, what else can I get into..."

"Tissue paper is awesome!"

"Well, now. If that isn't just the cutest coat ever."

"That card has teddy bears on it!"

"What an adorable bunny!"

"Do NOT put that thing on my head."

Post-present opening mess. :) Telling Grandma & Grandpa about all the cool stuff she got.

A group picture wasn't very successful. "Don't hold me - I want to play with all my cool new stuff!"

I'm not sure what she's looking at, something up in the loft maybe? But I think she's too cute!

We sure love our little girl! (She has a habit of trying to make me flash everyone on a regular basis these days. Trouble maker!) 

"Don't you dare try to take my hand out of Mommy's shirt." (I wouldn't mess with that face!)

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Dylan, happy birthday to you! 1 candle in your birthday brie & apple tart - you thought it was delicious.

And you loved the candle! You needed a little help to blow it out though. I hope you made a good wish. :)

Happy 1st Birthday to our sweet Dylly-Roo! Thank you for bringing joy back into our lives - we love you bunches & bunches! You are our world. 

THREE, how can it be??

Happy 3rd Birthday, Haley-Bug! This day in 2009 was one of the happiest days of my life. Seeing you and holding you for the first time was the most incredible feeling in the world, I dearly love being your mommy. We all miss you and love you, bunches and bunches. We wish more than anything that you could be here and we could celebrate with you. I know your little sister would think it was the coolest thing in the world if she had a big 3-year-old sister here to entertain her. Thank you so much for making our lives better, and for being so amazing, even if it was only for far too short of a while. We love you with all our hearts. 

Excitement

"Do you need help taking my picture, Mommy?"

Our little Mountain Goat. She climbs over and up anything these days.

"I have to enjoy looking out this window at the clinic while I can, because soon we're moving to our new house in town!"

Double trouble.

I love our crawling, climbing, smiling, giggling, and babbling Dylan! She is so much fun! (And SO busy these days - we're going to need at least 15 baby gates in the new house...)

We got the keys to our new house this past Sunday - woo hoo! We love it and have no buyer's remorse, thank goodness. Though I will be sad to leave our house here by the clinic, it's been good to us and we have lots of wonderful memories here. I'm a dairy cow and always a little resistant to change, so I just try to take it as much in stride as I can.

The new house has a pretty big advantage for winning me over to its side though - with 3 bathrooms, big bedrooms, big closets, and space galore. I'm going to have to get used to going up and down stairs a million times a day though, and it's going to be a lot of house to clean! We are having some work done to it at the moment (removing old, non-functioning baseboard heaters, putting in new trim in place of said heaters, and painting) - and it's fun to go and see the progress. Matt Glenn is who's doing the work for us, and he's working on Dyl's room first so hopefully it will be ready to go for us to move all the way in this Saturday. Anyone want to join us for a moving party??? :)

We're excited for Sunday the 2nd of September as well - Chad and I will be celebrating our 6th anniversary in a new house with a lovely Dylly-roo to celebrate with us! Life just keeps getting better.