On the morning of Elna’s birthday party her Papa picked Elna up to go fishing with him. It was her first time fishing and I’m pretty sure she loved it! Thanks to Char for taking the pictures!
This was taken when he came to pick her up—Elna LOVES her Papa!
Catching her first fish!
She did it!
Her reactions in the following picture series is very entertaining:
Elna had a great time—a big thanks to Papa and Grandma Fae!
Some of Brian’s family came from UT to Portland at the end of May and stayed for about a week. While they were here DeWin and Barbara took us on a dinner boat cruise down the Columbia River Gorge. It was a beautiful evening and we had such a great time! Thank you to Brian’s parents! And thank you to both Heather and Char for taking these pictures!
The whole group—our family, DeWin, Barbara, Daren, Heather, Char, Callie, & Jace.
All Elna ate for dinner was the bread with lots of butter on it—Callie was very helpful with buttering her bread for her. Elna loves Callie and still talks about her every day. Callie is very kind and nurturing—such a great cousin!
You can see Elna in the background trying to copy her cousins silly faces. She thinks older kids are so cool—I love when older kids are so nice to her too!
We live in the most beautiful place on earth I think!
Elna has been acting like a little 2 year old for months…but she didn’t actually turn 2 until May 30th. We love this cute 2 year old! Her actual birth was pretty low key and quiet—I made one cupcake for her so she could blow out her candles and feel the love, but other than that we didn’t do much. We had her birthday party a few days later when family was in town.
Here she is with her cupcake:
Oh, the joy!
At 2 years old, Elna is 32 lbs and is 35.5 inches long!
--She’s a talker! She says hundreds of words I am sure, and is learning new ones every minute it seems. She can say 4-word phrases now—it’s amazing to see her connect words. She loves it and so do we!
--She says funny things she has heard us say like “ooh la la”—except she puts the emphasis on the wrong words, which makes it even funnier when she says it, because she emphasizes the “ooh” takes a slight pause, and then says “lala.” It’s great! She also says “aye aye aye” and “wooshy wooshy” when something stinks.
--she says “morsh” instead of “more”
--we say “deal” to her all of the time when we are trying to get her to agree to something. The other day she said something that she wanted and then followed it with “yeah? okay, deal” She’s making her own deals now. Funny girl.
--she says “I like it” and “I did it!” when she does something pretty great.
--she will stuff a whole bag of fruit snacks in her mouth in minutes, but then keep the last one for hours in her hand.
--when we were potty training her, she would get a jelly belly every time she peeped in the potty. One day I noticed that she had collected a days worth in one of her tea cups by saving each one.
--she loves shoes—hers and ours. Bags and collecting things to put in her bags.
--she knows her numbers 1-10.
--she can recognize and say the following shapes: circle, square, triangle, rectangle, trapezoid, oval, diamond, pentagon, and octagon. Amazing, right?!
--she loves looking at pictures and videos of herself on our phones. After I take a picture of her she immediately says “see” because she wants to see herself. She is really good at swiping through all of the pictures on my phone. Sadly, she could probably spend hours looking at pictures/videos and playing with our phones.
--she loves running around, chasing us and being chased, and hide and seek.
--she is still doing great with her potty training—very few accidents!
--we couldn’t ask for anything more!
A week before Elna turned 2, we decided to potty train her. My mom was in town the week before Harriet’s blessing and I knew she would be a big help. I used a program my friend suggested and it worked great! (Let me know if you want more details on it—it was awesome!) It was a 3-day intense system. The first day Elna had a bunch of accidents, but stayed dry a few times. That night she also wet her bed twice. The next day was only marginally better, with another wet night. By the third day we weren’t too hopeful, but things started clicking for Elna that day, she was dry almost the entire day, and by the end of that day she was pretty much potty trained. She was dry that night, and has been dry almost every night since then and her days are always dry! She is awesome! And we are happy to not be paying for her diapers anymore!
These videos are short—worth watching in my opinion…but I’m certainly very biased! She is the cutest little potty trained girl I’ve ever seen!
Elna in her first pair of panties!
When Elna woke up Monday morning we made a HUGE deal about how she was a big girl now and that she doesn’t wear diapers anymore because only babies wear diapers. She went through the house and collected all of her diapers and “threw” them away—we even went outside to the outside trashcan so they felt even more gone. (Later we retrieved those diapers and put them up in the attic for Harriet to use later—diapers are too expensive to just throw away!) She had so much fun throwing her diapers away! Then we gave her her panties and the training began!
Such a cute big girl!
Her first dry night! A big deal!
Her first poop in the toilet! We took a picture to send to Daddy at work—you know, to make a big deal of it and all!
These pictures make me laugh. She’s helping me gather all of Harriet’s dirty diapers and take them out to the trash. She’s obviously taking her job very seriously.
I love how she’s reading on her tummy. She loves Where’s Waldo and after about the first time reading it, found Waldo within seconds of looking at the page. She’s so smart!
This was on her birthday—2 years old and potty trained! Our girl is growing up! Milestones are so exciting! And a little sad for me too, when I think of her losing her baby-ness—love my girl!!
