Oops! I Did It Again

Eek. Random flashback from horrible nineties teeny pop music. Yeah, let's not do that again. But here I find myself again saying "woops, has it really been that long?". And here I thought summer days were lazy...
Not here, not lately. We've been busy and when we're not busy I'm spent! I went to bed before 9:30 three nights this week and fell asleep on the couch before 10:00 another night. What? I blame my endearing ball of energy lil' rugrats I guess!
The past week was pretty consumed by my little fish learning how to swim. Hannah Grace took swim lessons all week and she loved it. She is my cautious child so I was super impressed that by the second day she was swimming underwater and even jumped off the diving board. I think she did scrape her leg jumping off the side on Thursday though, so by Friday she was not about the jumping thing anymore. She did learn how to "monkey crawl" along the side of the wall, and also made it all the way to the bottom of the shallow end to get a ring! I love watching her be able to go underwater and swim all on her own. I was super proud of her for doing it and she did a great job and really loved it. I tried getting a video of her on my phone, but I don't really know how to get it on here, and you probably can't even see well enough to go through the trouble of trying to figure it out. I did get a picture of her though at home after a swim lesson....

Ha! Yeah, she wore her "gobbles" on her head all day- it took three pair to finally found some that would stay on her head (the one's pictured were not those). I corrected her a couple times on how to pronounce "goggles" but I kind of stopped because, well I think it is super adorable to hear her say she "can't forget her gobbles".

Lately Hannah Grace has loved to go in my closet. I have a full length mirror in there and many times we have caught her in there, having snuck a make up brush out of my drawer and sitting in there just playing- I think she also found a little cardboard jewelry box that she would kind of tuck into her little hideaway spot. A couple times I go in there and have no idea she is in there and it just makes me smile when I realize she's quietly retreated in there. So when we cleaned out under our bathroom vanity this weekend, I decided to take some of my old stuff I would otherwise throw out like sparkly barrettes and clips, jewelry and ring boxes, some nail stuff, etc. and put it into little drawers and made her an official little cubby in there. She loves it and pretty much every time I get ready in the bathroom, she likes to sit in there and "get ready" too.

We went out to Brighton (about an hour away) last night for a cook out and some wiffle ball and playing in the sprinkler. I think next on Hannah's list needs to be some softball/ t-ball. She was so happy to have the ball thrown to her and even more shocking to me- she could actually hit it!! My little girl is growing up! I'm sure Bennett would have loved it too had he been in a better mood. For him the sprinkler playing was the highlight.

I'm fully aware of the hodgepodgeyness (it's a word, mmhmm) of this post, but I can't go without mentioning Father's Day today. Dad's totally deserve a post to themselves =) but since I am playing holy-moly-I-haven't-caught-up-in-over-a-week-now-I-am-super-behind-posting, I have a growing line-up of upcoming posts, there is no way I can do them all separately. So Happy Father's Day to all the great dad's. Father's Day is hard because I think doing things out of ordinary for men is difficult, since, let's face it- I think men are pretty simple when it comes to that stuff, but that doesn't mean I undermine it's importance in any way. I'm sure I have mentioned on here before (oh yeah, that was last year's Father's Day post) that I think the role of the father to a child (whether son or daughter) is the most lifelong influential relationship there is. Ryan and I both have amazing dad's and I am so lucky that my kid's have the greatest dad they can ask for. I will try not to just repeat everything I have already said, I just know there isn't a day that goes by that I don't see the love that my husband has for his kids. And it is a sight to behold, a father and his kids, isn't it?

This Father's Day was also special in that baby Banks was baptized. We got this "Father's Day" pic

 at the church this morning- more pics from the baptism to come.

Generations of Braithwait men.

We enjoyed a celebration lunch at Ross and Lori's and then came home and cooked out steaks for dinner. We set the sprinkler out to where it hit the swing set slide and opened a whole new can of fun. Until it was time to come in and we got the play the game of "on how many body parts can you find grass?"

Boy got to be crazy if he thinks he's comin' in my house like that! =)

I had to get grass out of their ears, their armpits, every crevice of their bodies, kid you not.

Gives a whole new meaning to "black bottom cupcake". Haha.

Okay so I think that's enough catching up for one night. In case, you just can't get enough, here are some teasers for what's yet to come:

Some of this-

And a lot of this-

with a smidgen of this-

and if I decide to get really brave and get my act together, maybe eventually some stuff about this-

Do I have you on the edge of your seat yet? (*sense mild sarcasm).

Well, that's a wrap for tonight. Hope all the dads out there today could tell how much you are loved and appreciated by your families. Happy Father's Day!