Cool Shades

Brad does not approve of this picture but I think it's cute. He he. He thinks baby sunglasses are vain but I wanted to start her young protecting her eyes. He said to write that he thinks it's ridiculous at this age. Lara, what do you think? Don't worry, it's not a big deal over here so you won't be "taking sides" :) I just can't believe she leaves them on her face!

Still working on neck strength...it's coming along!

We're off to a youth pastor's retreat for a few days. Happy May everyone!

Mount Garfield Hike

Monday we made an attempt at hiking Mount Garfield. It's a local "must-do" trail - one that everyone asks if you've done yet. It's a fairly grueling short two miles, gaining 2000 feet. It's one of those hikes where you're not sure which way is worse - going up where you pray your lungs don't burst, or going down where you pray your quads don't give out. We actually only made it about half way because there were some nasty looking clouds coming and there are serious warnings about not doing the hike if the trail is at all wet. We thought it better not to chance it with our little girl along. Good thing, too, because it did rain later. Plus, it's not at all a trail I would want to be on if there is anything more than a gentle breeze. As you can maybe see in this picture, much of the trail is the top of this ridge and is about 5 feet wide, then drops off steeply on both sides. (For those of you wondering: Yes, I conquered a little bit of fear on this hike.) Cora lost her pacifier on this hike, too. She spit it out at a point where it bounced off the trail and tumbled down a couple hundred feet...We weren't about to go after it. She has more at home!
If you're a Facebook friend there's an album of more pictures posted there. If you're not, copy and paste this link in the address field.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=17008&l=dd4cf&id=592975435

Toy Exhiliration

This is Cora's little infant-to-toddler rocker. We've been putting her in it since she was a couple weeks old, but I gave up on it for a while because all she did was sit there and stare off to the side, slouched up like a sack of potatoes. So it went away for a while. Well, lately I started putting her in there again and it is soooo fun! Sometimes she gets really excited and her little legs are kicking back and forth so that makes the chair rock forward and backward a little bit, which makes the toys hanging in front of her wave back and forth and rattle. So for a week or two she still just stared but now it was at the toys. She put on her inquisitive, studying face (for those of you who have seen her in person, you know the face I'm talking about - some people call it a "furrow" or "scowl" but I don't think she's mad, she's just thinking hard about something) and stared at those toys for a long time. Lately she started to wave her arms in the air as if she's trying to figure out where those toys are.

Well, today she made a leap in her gross motor skills and depth perception. She figured out how far away those toys are and that she can hit them! Today she was swatting the pig and sheep over and over. Once in a while the poor cow got a smack across the face, too. Way to go, Cora! The amazing thing to me, also, is that she will sit there for 30 minutes, completely enthralled with these little rattling farm animals.

This is very funny - if you can see the details (I took the picture in the dark with no flash so as not to wake Cora up) you'll see that she's sucking on her pacifier with her thumb perfectly positioned to move in in case the pacifier fell out. She generally puts her hand in a fist and sucks on whatever part comes near her mouth, but the last few days I've seen her occasionally get just a finger or two, or her thumb all by itself. Isn't it funny what evidences of development excite us!

Wedding Adventure

We're back! We had a great trip to MN. We are so thankful for good weather, safe travelling, the Stasowick's (where we stayed in Lincoln, NB) and good friends! The wedding was successful - Jer and Val are married! And it was beautiful and everything went well. It was wonderful to be able to be there with them and be part of their special day.

Cora and Cadence did great! They both traveled exceptionally well and sleeping in new places didn't even seem to phase either one of them. What a blessing. We drove in our rented Mini-van for about 11 hours on Thursday to Lincoln, spent the night and went another 6 hours to Hollandale, MN on Friday. Friday was busy with decorating, the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner (at Pizza Hut!). Saturday morning I went to the salon with Val and the bridesmaids to take pictures while they got their hair done. Then it was back to church for pictures, the wedding, and the reception - we danced till midnight! Sunday morning we drove to Sioux Center and had lunch with Grandma Bierma, Uncle Lloyd and Aunt Dianne, Uncle George, Aunt Mary and their kids. It was wonderful to see them, if only for a few hours. That afternoon we drove back to Lincoln for the night and then got up really early Monday morning to drive home to GJ. It was quite the road trip! Since Amanda and I are both nursing our babies we used hand pumps to express milk in the car and feed the girls with bottles. That saved us soooo much time. I can't imagine how long it would have taken to stop every few hours to feed them. I think we had two "emergency" stops - one for a diaper-blowout and one for vomit-like spit-up. Pretty gross. Otherwise we just changed diapers when we stopped for gas or to use the restrooms ourselves.

My parents came out to MN Friday and Saturday and took care of Cora and Cadence when needed. That was such a blessing! I could not have helped Val as she needed me or been as relaxed for the wedding and reception if I was with Cora the whole time, also. I think :) they felt it was worth their long drive to come out for a couple days!

It's good to be home!

First Big Trip

Thursday morning we leave bright and early to drive to Hollandale, MN. Brad is in Jeremy Plantinga and Val Kallemeyn's wedding - the best man, actually. Hello, speech time. We are traveling with Brian and Amanda Cook, local friends of ours. Brian is also standing up for Jer. The great thing is that the Cook's also have a 3 month old little girl. Cadence is one week younger than Cora. It's going to be such a fun trip. I was stressed for a while about how it was all going to go - trying to feed and change two three month olds on a two-day car trip could make for, well, a three-day car trip! But the last few weeks I've been looking forward to it. We'll get there when we get there and I'm pretty sure we'll have fun on the way!

Another exciting part about going to this wedding is that we will get to see a lot of people we don't see often! My parents decided to take a little vaca to MN this weekend and do some grandbaby sitting. It is a bit of a drive for them, but they can do it in about 8 hours, I think. We're so excited to see you, Mom and Dad. We will also get to see lots of Dordt friends and do some catching up with them, which will be wonderful! Then on Sunday we are driving back through Sioux Center to go to church and have lunch with some of the Bierma clan. I'm not sure which number of great-grandchildren Cora is for Grandma Bierma but I'm excited that they get to meet each other! It will be quite the weekend and we're looking forward to it.