July Already?!?!?

Phew...what a week! We have been busy, busy, busy!!!

Tuesday started with Elle's first trip to the salon for a haircut. Nothing drastic, just a little "shaping". Here is the before shot.

Capes on and ready....

Yeah, I'm not so sure about this lady mom....

Snacks cure ALL...

We ALL survived, thanks Marie for being so patient! I love her new bangs - we no longer have to look like Pebbles everyday!

After Elle's haircut we headed to Gramma and Grampa's, we haven't been there since Christmas. With Gramma here every other week during the school year, it had been while since we made the trip.

Elle quickly made herself comfortable! Wood chips are so fun to play with and eat!?!?

Elle had her one year pictures taken by the lovely Erika Krause (Van Roy) Wednesday morning. Here are a few from our "sneak peak", check the rest out at erikakrause.com.

Thank you so much for your patients Erika, can't wait to see the rest! Thanks again, and see you in August!

After pictures, we went to Thornberry (were our wedding reception was) for lunch and then Daddy and Grampa went golfing. Elle took a quick spin on the golf cart!

Gramma did a great job of "baby proofing" their house and while doing that found a few of my old toys for Elle to play with. It was too cute watching her play with the cabbage patch dolls. She would give the baby her pacifier (only if she had one in her mouth too). Feed the baby her bottle (only when she was done).

Elle loves to play in water, we had put this bucket out for Paisley and Elle thought it would be fun to pick it up and dump it out....

So we decided to put on her swimsuit. Gramma and Grampa don't have a pool, but who needs one when you have a Rubbermaid tote? She splashed and played for about 30 minutes - it was a hoot!

After her dip in the pool, Grampa thought we would get Elle "geared" up for camping. They watched John Denver and the Muppets go Camping. Adam and I loved the Muppet's as a kid - Elle enjoyed them too!

Gramma and Grampa surprised us with this new buggy for Elle. We have been looking and debating on what type of bike trailer to buy. Grampa found this one on Craig's List, it is like BRAND NEW! We are so excited to use it in Door County this year! Thank you Gramma and Grampa, we love it already!

Of course we had to take it for a trail run.

Sink baths at Gramma and Grampa's!

All babies need stroller rides, even cabbage patch dolls and your toy doggy. First you put the baby in the stroller...

Then you push the baby...

Be sure to stop and check on the baby....

Then you can keep going! So stinkin' cute!

Gramma and Grampa have this fake cat (which Paisley loves too) and Elle had to check it out.

She had to get up close and personal to make sure it wasn't a real cat! ;)

We got home Thursday afternoon and moved all of the furniture and stuff out of the basement so the carpeting could be installed Friday.

Friday morning (well ALL day) the carpet was installed. So glad to have that behind us! Thank you Grandma Maureen for all of your help last week. You were a life saver!

We managed to sneak out for an evening and went to the Twins/Brewers game. There was a little rain delay - 2 hours later, the game started. We didn't get home until 2:30am - YIKES!!!


Adam and Amy joined us for a night of fun! It turned out to be a nice night and the Twins won!


There was a fireworks display following the game!


Sunday afternoon we headed over to Finley's Gramma and Grampa's house. We went for a boat ride and Finley was sure to take care of Elle. He is going to be such a good big brother to Hadley! Thanks for the invite Finley (Heather, Debbie & Dan), we truly enjoyed ourselves!


Sunday morning Elle and I got up early and headed to Menomonie for our first 5K. It was a hot one, but all went well and Elle slept for 3/4's of the run/walk! The twins were troopers too! Thanks Auntie Amy for the invite, glad I could do my first 5K with someone!


With only a little nap during the race, she needed a little more sleep. Elle grabbed a quick nap on our way to Freedom Fest.


When she woke up, we visited the animals. There were baby pigs...
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Cows, (not pictured)a Zebra, baby skunk, otter, fainting goats, Alpaca and chickens.

What a fun filled week! Another busy week ahead...

AND - Elle turns O.N.E. next Monday!!! Seriously where has the time gone??????

When it Rains...it Pours!

Well...where do I start. This week has been a little crazy. Let's back up to Father's Day Eve - Eau Claire set a record (and not the kind you want to set) 4.5 inches of rain in 2 hours! That is a lot of R.A.I.N. Some of that rain "seeped' into our basement soaking our carpet.

I noticed the wet carpet Sunday morning, so we got out all of our fans and our dehumidifier to dry things up. By Sunday evening/Monday morning things felt back to normal. Until Tuesday when I woke up...moldy, musty, old basement smell filled the downstairs! YUCK. We did a little more investigating and found water was under our steps (it is a storage area), there was extra carpet just laying on the floor. You guessed it, that was SOAKING wet and smelled lovely - NOT! So we cleaned that out, moved the fans and dehumidifier under the steps. We called a plumber to make sure it wasn't a pipe leaking or backing up - NOPE. Thinking that removing and cleaning up under the steps would take care of the smell. Wrong AGAIN! Next I called two different carpet cleaning services. The first told me he didn't even need to come and look at the carpet, mold had already starting growing in the pad. GREAT... Then I called a different company for a second opinion. He said he could come look at it, but if it was his house, he would take it out. (Now remember, they "want" my business because if they clean my carpet, they get $$) With two different companies saying we should remove the carpeting, so we won't have to worry (especially with a small child at home), we did....

Thank you Grandma Maureen for helping us move all of the "stuff" out of the basement!

Elle traded Daddy's lawn mower in for one that blows bubbles! Now Elle can make lines in our yard just like her daddy does. :)


Elle helped Daddy open his "real" present - We got him (us) a video camera! Happy Father's Day to a wonderful Daddy. Elle is so lucky to have you and so am I! Love you!

What have we done in between moving furniture, holiday decorations, winter clothes, pulling carpet, etc..... not too much! But here are the few pictures I did take this week.

Elle is now tall enough to get into the drawer with the Ziploc bags and she L.O.V.E.S. to pull all of the bags out!

Wednesday David played ball in Menomonie - who would have thought it would be in the 50's at the END of June! Brrr, it was a chilly game (that went into extra innings)! But Grandma wasn't complaining, she got extra snuggles with Elle.

Friday was finally a warmer day - it felt more like summer. Elle and I met Melissa and Claire and Owen Park. First we took a nice walk on the trail, then we came back to play on the toys! LOOK OUT, Elle is in the drivers seat! We had a nice morning and Elle was sleeping about 2 minutes into our ride home!

Remember those Ziploc bags...she stepped on one and walked around the whole kitchen with it stuck to her foot. Each step she would take, she would give her foot an extra little kick trying to get it off...finally she sat down and took it off. It was so funny!

She is getting sneaky... even with the safety locks on the doors, she is trying to get into the cupboards!

Another baseball game on Saturday, what a perfect place for a little girl to sit! (And try to eat the sunflower shells...YUCK!!)

There was a really neat playground right next to the ball field, so Grandma Maureen called Brock and Aftin. They came to play and watched a little of the game. What nice cousins, they took Elle down the slide about 100 times!

We have another busy week. Elle gets her first haircut (getting very nervous about it) and we are heading home to get her one year pictures done. Aahhh - where did the last year go? I cannot believe our little baby is going to be a year old! And on top of that, carpet will be installed on Friday! Thanks for checking in, have a great week!

The Rueber's

Mommy Time!!!!

I am officially on summer vacation and loving all of my time home with Elle and David! Lots of projects and things on my "to do" list, but I am devoted to spending quality time enjoying our family this summer - so if my "to do" list doesn't get done, next summer! :)

Gramma now has the summer off too! We want to say THANK YOU for all of the time you have spent here this last school year! Elle is so LUCKY to have her Gramma be such a big part of her life!! We miss you already Gramma, but we will see you just about every two weeks this summer! ;)

Miss Independent wants to feed herself, so this week we gave her a little bowl with food and a spoon. She knows how to dip the spoon in and then put it in her mouth. Now, how much actually gets in her mouth...not a whole lot. But she LOVES it!

She also loves putting her bottle in the bowl of food....

Elle's newest gig, is to climb in and out of anything and everything. This tub (which usually has blankets in it) is her favorite and she HAS to bring her doggy in with her. It is the funniest thing! She will sit in there for 15 minutes!

Climbing into the very small space under her night stand...

And climbing into the drawer on the ottoman! Looks safe doesn't it?!?!? She can then get herself on TOP of the ottoman. She is a daredevil!

I am not sure if Dave likes me being home (I have lots of projects), but we have gotten lots done in my first week home! One of the projects was a little landscaping in the back yard and it looks so much better! As many of you know with small children, you do as much as you can while they sleep, but you can never get ALL of it done. Dave was sifting through some dirt, while Elle and I were in the sand box. She thought it would be a good idea to help Daddy, so she brought her shovel over to help. TOO CUTE!

We ate our first dinner outside on the deck! Elle was a little distracted by the neighbor kids playing in their back yard, she didn't eat too much that night.

After dinner one night, we headed to Owen park to play. Elle could swing ALL day, especially when she can watch all of the big kids play on the other equipment!

Our first true play date was this past Friday. 10 kids, 6 moms and 3 grandmas ventured to Irvine Park. It was Elle's first (of many) trips to see the animals. This picture cracks me up, she is on her tippie-toes to see the pony....

He finally came over to check her out! He even nibbled on her fingers and she gave me this "Mommy is this okay?!?" look!

The bunnies were more her size!

We ended our trip by playing in the fountains. Elle is taking more and more steps every day. She walked from one spout of water to another! GO ELLE! She also tried to use it as a drinking fountain.

Many more summer days to come! Thanks for checking in!