Determined to Swim

We already had December dressed for bed on Saturday night when she decided she needed to go swimming. She dug through the beach bag until she found the bottom half of her swimsuit, and then she brought it alternately to Brad and me, seeing if either one of us would put it on her. She was so cute that Brad couldn't resist her. He put half of her swimsuit on. She immediately ran to the porch and peered through the slats to gaze longingly at the pool, as you can see here.

She even tried to squeeze under the gate. She wanted to get to the pool so badly!

In this picture, she has grabbed her floaty baby ring and is trying to throw it over the porch railing...probably in the hopes that if her floaty ring got to the pool, she could too.

Poor December! We didn't take her swimming on Saturday night, but we made it up to her by taking her to the ocean today! I absolutely love going there. We went with another seminary couple and their baby (Christopher, Della, and baby Samuel), as well as two other seminary guys. Della and I went boogie-boarding together! I'd never done it before, but we had a blast! You wouldn't believe how tiring it is, though, fighting the waves to hang on to your balance and swimming deeper to get big waves, not to mention being nervous that one of those sharks that likes to swim in shallow water is going to come and bite one of your legs off. Maybe I was the only one really worried about that. Brad went boogie-boarding too. I took the camera, but I couldn't take any pictures because, as always, the camera's batteries were dead (even though I charged them overnight last night). Roar! Kim will understand my frustration with this. She has the same good camera and wretched batteries that we do.

Right now Brad is in the middle of a Bible knowledge exam. We've been practicing Bible trivia and going over study Bible charts and maps for the past couple of days. If he doesn't pass this, he has to take a much more difficult re-test at the end of the semester. If he doesn't pass that, he has to take a SUPER difficult class next semester! We're both hoping he passes this time, although all the second-year seminarians say that this test is insanely hard and most people don't pass the first time. You have to get 110/150 questions correct. We'll see how Brad does!

Well, I should go clean all the salt water off me, then make dinner and pick up the house before Brad gets home and before December wakes up from her nap! That's a tall order...

Daddy and December Are Studying

Here are Brad and December doing some homework together. Brad's homework is a large theological textbook, while December is studying our screen saver: pictures of our family. That way she won't forget her cousins, aunts & uncles, and grandparents. That's hard work! If you look closely, she's looking at a picture of her and Caden.

December loves to watch the pictures flash across the screen. She could sit there for hours on end! But maybe she's just vain and is waiting for pictures of herself to flash across...hehee

Today, Brad rode his bike to the seminary to study in the library. He attempted to do a bit of work here, but he is unable to. Boy, December and I both sure find it hard not to interrupt Daddy while he is doing homework! It's way more fun to talk to him and play with him than to let him sit there, all still and quiet. We're going to have to learn to be better if we want him to stick around and stay home!

How the Apartment Looks Now

Here is our porch now with the green carpet. Here's where we keep the bike Brad takes to seminary. We were told that black widows like to crawl into the storage closet (that you can see at the end of our porch), so you need to keep an eye out for them when you go in there...eeek

Here's half of our living room

...and here's the other half!

Our updated kitchen! We just got the new oven in, and the day we moved in, so did the new fridge!

The dining room is right next to the kitchen, opposite the living room

Here is my beloved ducky bathroom! December is playing with the ducky spout guard we just got so that she doesn't hurt her head on the faucet.

Our bedroom. I tried to put December in most of the pictures so that you wouldn't be bored just looking at empty roooms but could see her, too!

Here's part of December's room

December was not too happy about being put in her crib for the picture!

Then her closet is to the right, along the length of the wall, to the ceiling. It's huge!

Getting Pretty

December found some makeup in the bathroom this morning and wanted to put it on like a big girl.

Can you see the little red hair elastic in her hair? For the past couple of weeks, I've been trying to convince December that having pretty things in her hair is FUN! But she usually just yanks it out within seconds of it being put in, and then she hands it to me, saying, "Uh-oh!" (as if it were a mistake that she reached up and pulled it out of her head). When these pictures were taken, she was distracted from remembering that she had something in her hair. But she pulled it out after the make-up idea got old.

You can see the blush brush in her hand as she's trying to put it on her cheeks... hehee

Then we tried to get some pictures of ourselves. December was being very smiley!