This was Claire after her baby blessing (2.5 months old.) I hope Maddie will be able to fit into this dress too. It was my grandfather's (baby boys wore dresses and pink wasn't girly back then.) It's pretty cool that this dress is an over 100 year old family heirloom.
Maddie is her own person, but you can tell she's Claire's sister. You can see my eyes don't seem very blue compared to Maddie's. What beautiful eyes I get to look into every day. :)
The next 3 weeks are going to be a little crazy and will involve sorting what goes to Korea with Chris, what we need for the next year that we'll take up north in the van, and what goes in storage for the next year. Yikes! I try not to think about it too much, because it stresses me out.One thing I do know, we sure are going to miss this man when we're apart. :(
We have been enjoying our time left in San Angelo. The weather has been AWESOME. One of the main things I missed in Monterey was summer weather. Days over 70 degrees were a rarity there, so I missed just wearing short sleeve shirts. But spring has sprung here in San Angelo, and we are loving it. Chris has been enjoying his charcoal grill before he has to put it in storage for the year. He has been making all kinds of goodies, our favorites including bacon-wrapped jalapeno poppers, bbq chicken pizza, and catfish for the yummiest, freshest fish tacos. Yes, these goodies will have to be added to our Naugle Family Cookbook.
Yummy pizza ready to take off the grill.
Speaking of cooking, we've been thoroughly enjoying Chris's new cookbook I got him for his birthday. It's called "The Food You Crave" by Ellie Krieger. We've made so many recipes from it already including peach french toast bake, peanut butter banana smoothies, jerk chicken with a pineapple salsa, salmon cakes, poached salmon with lemon-mint tzatziki, pear ginger crumble, and more. This cookbook is going to have to go with us to Korea. :)Another way we have been enjoying the beautiful weather is by going on family walks, especially on Sundays. In San Angelo, they have a river walk with a visitor's center, municipal golf course, and an awesome castle playground. At Christmas time, they have an awesome Christmas light display you can drive through. When it's warmer out, we've enjoyed going on walks together as a family. It was a great place for Chris to make use of his new hobby - photography. Yes, my husband who only takes pictures when asked has now gotten into photography and got a really nice new camera to take with him to Korea. It wasn't crazy expensive, but is a step up from our pocket camera. He's been loving the features it has, and used one family afternoon walk to practice his new hobby.
One benefit of Chris now enjoying photography is that there will be more pictures of me with the kids - actual proof that I do spend time with them. :)
Playing in our back yard
As you can see, Claire is quite the cutie. She continues to entertain and amuse us. For quite a while now, she has loved singing and dancing. While she does sing real songs, lately, she has been making up her own songs based on her own thoughts as well as bits and pieces of real songs. These bits come from a variety of songs - Book of Mormon Stories, The Wise Man and Foolish Man, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, I am a Child of God, and others. But the one "song" that seems to creep into every song is the little tag at the end of every Farmer's Insurance commercial. (We don't even watch that much tv, but I guess it's catchy.) You know, "We are farmers. Bum da dum bum bum bum bum." Yeah, that is in all of her songs now, though sometimes it's "we are kitties" or "we are elephants", etc. Oh, and in most songs, she also includes the line, "every single day." Claire cracks me up.
Sorry it's sideways, but here she is dancing again. She's so entertaining. :)
Besides singing and dancing, Claire has also really gotten into coloring and drawing. She loves to draw pictures of people and has sent a few to family members. My favorites have been when she drew Chris and her and another of her and I holding hands. Also, she once drew a picture of Maddie, but she was about the size of my thumb nail...because Maddie is small. Hee hee. She also loves to chase around the house. Sometimes Chris or I will chase her, but her favorite is Maddie. That's right, her 3 month old little sister. I of course assist Maddie in the running and heckling. :)
One of Claire's favorite games is making a boat train with various toys, laundry baskets, stools, etc. When Maddie is in her bouncy seat, she likes to include her too.
Ok, so Claire is in the make-a-silly-face-for-the-camera phase, but I shared this picture because I love how Maddie is looking at her adoringly. She looks at Claire like that a lot. <3
Yeah, these sisters really love each other and I couldn't be happier. :)
Oh, one of my favorite activities Claire and I did multiple times this month was her first acting experience. She was really enjoying one of the Mo Willems Piggie and Elephant stories we borrowed from the library - "Elephants Cannot Dance." It ended up evolving into a full on skit. Usually she would be the piggie and I would be the elephant. We had to help Maddie be the little squirrels that came in at the very end of the story. I hope to get her doing it on video one of these days. Her facial expressions are priceless.
Ok, just a little more on Claire. What can I say? I love that girl and I don't want those of you not around her to miss out. Claire has been loving Primary. In fact, she gave her first talk in Primary at the beginning of March. I wasn't sure if she'd get shy, but she didn't. She did an excellent job helping write and giving the talk. Her Primary president also has incentives (candy) for the children to memorize a given scripture each month. I wasn't sure if she'd be able to do it, but she's done great! She memorized "If ye do keep his commandments, he doth bless you and prosper you." She also memorized "O remember my sons, to learn wisdom in thy youth. Yea, learn in thy youth to keep the commandments of God." I'm very proud of her for such an accomplishment. Oh, and her last accomplishment I would like to share is her skill with chopsticks. We went out to eat at a Japanese/ Korean restaurant and she wanted some chopsticks. With no guidance from me, she was suddenly picking up broccoli and other items with her chopsticks! Apparently she's getting ready for Korea. While she didn't hold the chopsticks how you usually would, she still figured out how to use them with one hand and pick things up. Go Claire!
Maddie is of course also growing like a weed. She now stands up a lot better, has started grabbing at things and putting them in her mouth, and laughs a lot. Oh, how I love her laughs. I have found quite a few tickle spots to get those laughs frequently. She is such a happy, smiley, sweet baby. She now sleeps through the night every night now. Yea! She'll eat around 9 and soon after fall asleep, and won't get up until 7-8AM. Woo hoo! I feel so much more rested. :)
I love her little laugh, though sometimes you have to be looking at her to know it's laughing and not fussing. :)
11 weeks old with her doll from Uncle John and Aunt Cay
12 weeks old
3 months (13 weeks) old
14 weeks old
Maddie has been discovering her tongue lately. That doesn't stop her from smiling with it sticking out though!
I love that little crooked smile of her's.
Claire and Maddie with their first bath together. (Sorry about the color - weird mode on the camera.) It will be the last for a while too. Babies are way to slippery to hold and clean at the same time. I couldn't have done it without Claire's help holding her.
A sneak peak at the girls' Easter dresses. Claire has a matching dress except with pink accents instead of purple. They'll be all dressed up in them this weekend when we update our family portrait.
Finally, I would like to share some pictures from our first family circus trip. Chris wasn't thrilled about going to the circus as he remembers them being sort of strange, but we both thought Claire would love it and found a good deal on groupon. (Chris also looked at it as another opportunity to use his cool new camera.) It had been a long time since I'd been to the circus, so I was pretty excited. Well, to be honest, it was kind of strange, and I was annoyed that they tried (unsuccessfully with us) guilting the parents to buy expensive, cheap toys as a part of the show. It wasn't the most extravagant circus, but our main purpose was accomplished. Claire LOVED it, and we had a good time as a family. :)
The elephants were my favorite. :)
Claire wanted to go see the clown during intermission, but got scared when we got close up.
That last picture makes my heart happy. :)
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