23 months!

We're so close to two and I can't believe how the time has flown by.  Every monthaversary I set out to get a nice group picture and for the past few months I end up saying the same thing.  Trying to get a picture with all three and all three of them looking is getting more and more difficult.  They used to just sit where we put them - and it was hard to get them to look and smile, but now as soon as they know you want them to all sit together, they purposely won't.  It's like herding cats or bagging cats.  Ok I'll have to explain that one and please don't call PETA on me, but when I was younger and living with my parents we could have as many as 10-12 cats.  I'm sure my dad started it, but on occasion he would grab a paper grocery bag and put one of the cats in it and then we'd see how many of the cats we could get in the bag.  Ok, I know how this sounds, but we weren't hurting any of them and there were never more than two cats in the bag because by the time you got the second one in, the first one was getting back out or the bag would rip.  So, basically, believe me when I say that it's pretty darn tough to get them to all for a decent picture.

July 4th was earlier in the week.  We enjoyed a picnic in the backyard with Tony's side of the family.  It was fine, but the party basically broke up because our one nephews had yet another bout of constipation.  They seem to be always leaving early because of the same problem (insert eye roll here).  We decided that we'd take the kids down to see the fireworks - looking back, we didn't go last year because it was past their bedtime.  It was past their bedtime this time too, but we got them all bathed and dressed and then loaded them up in the stroller and walked to the elementary school down the road.  It's a pretty good spot to see the fireworks. We arrived just before it was getting dark and within about 10 minutes the sky was lit up nice and bright!  Olivia and Tony did really well with the noise and seemed to like the lights although Olivia kept getting distracted by airplanes going by - which is something they all seem to do every time we're outside.  I swear that they think it's their job to let the entire neighborhood know that there's an airplane going by.
Here's a few pictures of them watching the fireworks.

I know it looks like she's covering her ears, but it'll make more sense if you watch the video...

Little Tony loving the lights!

Amelia watching the dark sky.  I love her hair... such pretty curls!

 

 

We also had a little pool time this weekend.  We have the same purple elephant pool and we've coupled that with the kangaroo climber which makes a water slide!  It's pretty cool, but I've noticed that their attention spans seem shorter as they continuously get in and out of the pool, but it probably just seems that way because last year they couldn't get in and out on their own so they really had no choice but to continue
playing while they were in there.  Here's a few pictures of our recent pool party!

If it's not obvious, I took a ton of pictures of them - trying to get them all together which didn't really happen, but I there were so many cute ones I had to include alot!