Simply Sitting

Haven's new favorite thing is to simply sit on things.  She loves it.  Anything that you can sit in or on, she will.  Some are meant to be sat on and some are not, but she sits anyway.  Here are a few things she enjoyed sitting in.

First time she sat in the car she started turning the wheel, without anyone showing her how!  This was a friends car, so we may have to invest in one for ourselves.

Haven likes to crawl in her car seat.  She has problems getting out though and usually yells for us.  There is a car seat at church that she loves to sit in also.

We were visiting the Wolf's and they have an Elmo seat.  Haven loved it and Jackson got a bit jealous.

Haven loves her rocking chair.  At first she would stand in it, so we put it up, but now that she likes to sit we pulled it back out again.  This pic was taken before she liked to sit, but you get the picture.

Not the riding lawn mower!!

Grandpa thought that Haven might like a ride on the lawn mower.  Nope, not so much.  She was crying and clinging on to whoever had her.  I think it was just to loud for her.  Maybe when she gets older.

Wedding Reunion

Wedded bliss.  This past weekend we had the great opportunity to attend the wedding of my two friends Curt and Beth.  I was so excited to go, not just to see them get married, but also because I knew I would see friends I haven't seen in YEARS.  The wedding was an outdoor wedding that was held on Beth's parent's land.  They wanted a kid friendly atmosphere, so it was a casual affair.  They told us to dress in our play clothes.  Now that is my kind of wedding!  They had fishing, horse rides and the kids got to decorate their own cupcakes.  I thought that was the coolest idea.  Beth and Curt have known each other forever and I know they will make a great life together. 

Haven and Daddy blowing bubbles.

These are my "teens" who are all grown up now!  Three are married and two have children.  My goodness am I old now or what.  They were in the youth group when I was a sponsor way back when.

I hadn't seen Sean and Lisa in about three years.  I didn't even recognize their two not so little boys.  They are doing well and living in Lawrence, KS.  Sean ministers on the KU campus and Lisa ministers to home school moms.

I was able to see quite a few cousins at the wedding. My cousin Joel performed the wedding.  Below are Maggie, Hannah and Menda.  Looks like they coordinated outfits.  There were other cousins there also.

Haven got to be up close and personal with the horse.

Haven was feeding the horse.

I got to see so many friends and family that are not shown.  What a great time!  It was a wonderful wedding and I am very happy for my friends.

Campmeeting

WOW!  What an awesome week we are having at campmeeting.  The speakers are amazing and God is really working through them.  Jonathan and I have had a great week of spiritual rejuvenation and marriage bonding time.  Haven has been going into the nursery during the services and so J and I have been able to give our full attention to God.  She is doing great being away from us for a couple hours at a time, two times a day.  She has been such a good girl even with the lack of sleep.  She is such a cutie she draws attention where ever she goes.  

Haven got to experience her first taste of watermelon and she LOVED it!  The first time it fell on the ground and we took it away to brush it off, she threw a fit.

Yummy!  That is some good watermelon.  This is her "clean" picture.  By the time she was finished her shirt was soaked with juice.

Miss Independent.  Carrying her treat around where ever she went.  We had a hard time keeping track of her.  She was all over the place.

She just gnawed away at it.

Jonathan was "volunteered" for a watermelon eating contest.  We think it was because he is so tall, so the DS saw his face and called him out.

Which one do you think won?  It was the guy to the left that was bent over devouring his watermelon.  Jonathan was pretty pitiful and didn't even get halfway through his piece.

These pictures are in the wrong order!  So let's play this scene backward.  Here is J and Haven making a basket.

Here they are shooting the basket.

Here is Haven throwing the ball or handing the ball to daddy.

Jonathan inviting Haven to play with him.

Haven loved being outside this week.  She is drawing in the dirt.

Eating wood off the ground.

She has been exploring her world and learning new things.  Such as how to get from the ground to the blacktop.

She has loved walking every where.  She is getting really quick at it to.  It has been great to just let her walk and explore.  The grounds are a safe place for her to learn.

Daddy and Haven playing on "Noah's Ark" playground.

Here they go down the slide!

Haven wasn't all that impressed.  I don't think she knew what it was all about.

Haven was popular with two of the little girls we know.  Here is Jaley, our friend's daughter,  leading Haven to play.

Here is Taryn, a little girl from our church.  She loves Haven and asks to play with her all the time.  Haven loves Taryn too.

Friends

Friends are the best and spending time with them is even better.  Jonathan, Haven and I went to the KC area this past weekend and we had a wonderful time of fellowship with many friends.  My friend Brenda, who lives in Canada, was visiting.  Since she only comes down every once in a blue moon, I wanted to make sure I got to see her.  So we packed our bags and headed northwest.  What a wonderful time I had catching up on life and meeting her new little one Kaley.  

That same weekend I also got to attend my friend Beth's personal shower.  It worked out that it was the same weekend we were going to be in town, so we stayed an extra day and I got to participate in the fun.  I saw people there that I haven't seen in years!  We are going back up again next weekend for her wedding and it will be a reunion of friends and their new little ones.  I am excited!!  

We got to eat supper with Andrew who was home for the summer.  We miss him in Rolla, so it was great to see his sweet shaggy head.  I found out that he is now related to my friend Carla by a recent marriage in her family and so that was a bit freaky in a small world kind of way.

We also got to spend the evening and night with Carla and the boys.  Haven loves spending time with the boys and I love spending time with Carla.  She feeds me warm brownies and ice cream (and lick the brownie batter off the bowl)!  Of course that is not the only reason I like her.  Carla's husband Matt gets off late, so we were up later than this old fart is used to!

So many wonderful friends and such a wonderful time!

Brenda and I met at Breakthrough, I think it was around 10 years ago!  Since she moved to Canada around 6 years ago, I have only been able to see her a couple of times.  I was thrilled it worked out that we were able to meet up this past weekend.  We have both become mommies since the last time we saw each other, so we had so many new things to talk about.  She is true heart friend.

Here is Brenda with 8 week old Kaley.  She was a doll!

I forgot how to hold infants!  It was strange trying to figure out the best position.  When they are your own, you know how they like to be held.  She was so much fun to be with.  I loved looking at her tiny hands and toes.

Haven of course kissed the baby and here she was going to give Brenda a kiss.  She has started kissing stuffed animals and dolls.  So cute!

This is Jackson, Carla's oldest.  He loved giving kisses to Haven.  Long after she was distracted, he still wanted kisses.  Jonathan said that was fine, but when he gets older, no more kisses!

Here is Carla's now middle child since she is pregnant with another little boy.  Keagan is only two weeks younger than Haven, but has quite a few pounds on her! He is one of those babies that has the best thunder thighs in the world.  The kind you just have to pinch and tickle.  Haven is so tiny that two of his thighs equals one of hers.

This is Logan.  He and Haven are also just a couple of weeks apart.  He is just one of the many, many young cousins that Haven has on my side of the family.

It was great that Beth's personal shower was at Logan's house.  That meant it was baby proof and had all kinds of toys to play with!  

Playmate

Haven's bestest playmate is her daddy.  Usually when they are playing and being silly together, this is the laughing, smiling face she wears.

Jonathan will make the simplest noise or face and she will just laugh and laugh.  In this picture he was making a noise and she was covering his mouth and she just laughed and giggled.  Fun huh...

Pretty much anytime is goof-ball time with those two.  It is easy to entertain a one year old!  Daddy put a onesie on his head.

Then we put it on Haven's.

And it goes back and forth.  Fun huh...

We find such joy in making her laugh and giggle.  We get an even bigger kick out of it when it is something simple or silly that brings out the best in her...her smile.

Ducky Pool

I bought a pool for Haven last year on clearance, so we pulled it out and put some cold water in it.  Poor thing had goose-bumps.

She kept putting her and in the water and licking it to get the water off.  I brought her out a drink, but she still did it.

This was one of the few times she actually was sitting.  For some reason she wanted to stand in the pool.

Firsts

Well, firsts come with the territory of a youngun'.  No pun intended!  She has been doing new things such as: saying new words like "thank you", putting the phone up to her ear and saying "hiiiiiiiii", getting two new teeth on top (think there might be a cute gap), had her first ear(s) infection, taken her first antibiotic, she can mimic a cow saying "mooo", a lion roaring, a monkey "ooo ooo ooo"ing, standing up on a toddler rocking chair to grab a figurine, unrolling the toilet paper.  Here are a couple of pictures of some more firsts:

She has been rubbing her messy hands in her hair when she eats.  It is hard to wipe out with the dish rag and makes her hair look like it has product in it!  We can make her hair do all sorts of fun stuff.  I am now rinsing it in the bathtub every time she does that.

What a mess!

Her first piece of pizza!

She just started drinking from a big cup with a straw.

First time she wore her cool new shirt from Aunt Joanne and Uncle Alan.

She has started putting my clothes around her neck and wearing them around the house.

The first time to wear this amazingly cute dress!  She looked great in it.

Haven was holding Grandpa Fry's hand while Grandma Fry pushed her.  This was the second time she has been to the Route 66 fest, but the first time with Grandma and Grandpa.  The first time she was about six weeks old.

Grandpa and Haven with a goat.

Haven and I were going through the fire truck mist.  She would squint her eyes.