June, where did you go?

It's been busy here. It's always busy and there is always something going on. June is over and I'll have to do my best to get caught up. The first part of the month I was sicker than a dog. Of course it happened just after I had scheduled some time off with the last of my leave time. Good thing I still had leave time to use. It also didn't really spread to my household so I was pretty happy about that, but 102 fever and four days of sleeping in a chair were about enough for anyone around here. I hope that is the last of the illness for awhile.

My dear friend Lisa rounded us together on the 10th of June, me still recovering, and we took a trip to the Portland Zoo. It was Rebekah's first trip and it was a memorable one for two reasons. It was the last time we'd be so close to Lisa, as she graduated from PSU this year and moved to Pullman to be with the love of her life. The other reason was Rebekah's birthday. This was her present and what a present it was. From the time we got to the Zoo and until we left it was a clear obsession with monkeys. "Can we see the monkeys?" "Where are the monkey's?" "Is it time to see the Monkeys?" "I want to see the monkeys." Then after finally seeing the monkeys it was "...that monkey was looking at me mom, wasn't it mom? It was looking at me, can we go back and see the monkey that was looking at me?" Sure there were a lot of other animals we saw that day. The elephant who waved at her, the penguins who swam around her, the polar bears who were sleeping, the giant fish that still scared her, the lions that slept the whole time and the giraffe that ignored us; these were all not enough for my little girl. So second visit to the monkeys we went and a happy girl we left with. When finding the right toy in the store, you would have thought she would buy a monkey, but no we brought home a giraffe named Goldilocks. It's okay, she already has a pretty cute monkey at home.

On the 15th Aaron and I took our furloughs from work and celebrated his birthday. He started out the day with some time to himself as I took Rebekah and joined my mom and some ladies from church for a visit. We went to a peony nursery and walked their garden paths, enjoyed the company and took pictures of their beautiful flowers. Then we found ourselves at Willamette Fruit Co. for lunch. It was the perfect sunny day, which would probably explain why there were so many other people there doing the same thing. It was still nice to chat with the ladies and enjoy each other while enjoying delicious pie and ice cream.
That evening Aaron and I attended the opening game for the Volcanoes, which is based in Keizer and is the minor leagues for the San Francisco Giants. We are not big baseball fans, but we did enjoy the game...well at least into the 9 innings...and then they had to continue because of a tie, and the later it got the colder it got and we didn't want to leave because after the game was fireworks. So 14 innings later, the Volcanoes finally won the season opener and we were cuddled together watching the fireworks show. It was an awesome show and then it was a fight in the parking lot to see who could leave first. On Saturday we celebrated June birthdays with Aaron's family and we also celebrated the dads for Father's day. All in all it was a great weekend.

Last weekend our not so little girl turned 4. I'm amazed every day at the things she is learning to do and how big she is getting. We had scheduled to have her party at a park near our home, but after watching it dump rain all day on Friday I was pretty sure we needed to come up with a new place to go. So we decided to have it at Hazel Green School, which is just outside of Salem/Keizer area. They had a huge covered area and playground if it was nice. Thankfully the sun came out and all the kids enjoyed playing on the slide and other toys. Rebekah's best friend from daycare came and a bunch of family and friends who braved the weather and joined us for a wonderful celebration. She got a ton of new gifts, new toys, new bedroom furniture and new craft supplies. This girl is ready to go.
Before I leave to post pictures here are some things Rebekah is doing:

She is able to play the games on her laptop, especially the counting games. She can spell mom, dad, nana and papa (with a little bit of help). She is able to recognize most of the letters of the alphabet (still the trouble thinking N is a Z). She absolutely loves to dance and listen to music. Right now her favorite is soundtrack for the newest Muppet Movie. Rebekah had some firsts this past year (first trip to the zoo, first trip to the movie theater-The Muppet Movie, first camping experience and first sleep over that wasn't at a grandparents house). Rebekah really enjoys coloring, painting, drawing  and other crafts. She received some foam stickers for her birthday so I know we'll be doing that a lot now. She can write some of her letters A, X, L, C, F, E were some of the firsts. We received a hand-me down iPod from Aaron's parents and she loves to play on that. There are some preschool activities that she enjoys like alphabet tracing. I'm glad that she is into learning, at least a little bit anyway. She enjoys watching Strawberry Shortcake, Pocoyo, Care Bears, Olivia, Doc McStuffins and Octanauts, together we watch Knight Rider and she is very into Michael Knight. In fact she thinks that the Michaels store is also the Knight Rider store.
I love her smile, the weird things she says or does, her help with putting away the groceries and folding the laundry. I'm looking forward to what she has in store for this year and what new things she is going to learn.

Rebekah next to the bear....she was kind of scared so that is why she is so far from it

Auntie Lisa and Rebekah in the Eagles Nest

Oh the monkeys

and monkeys...

This is the elephant that waved to her

The sleepy Lion

So proud of this girl walked the entire time around the zoo while we pushed her stuffed dog Bingo in the stroller

Rebekah with her newest friend Goldilocks at the Peony Garden

There were still some beautiful blooms left

and other pretty flowers.

Three generations of goofballs on this bench

Any time there is a party you should take a picture of all the food

My dad is talking to Dave and Patty. Dave and Patty knew me before there was a me.

Some more of my family and friends enjoying the food and company.

Rebekah enjoying some bubbles while friend Jaya watches

Present time! Rebekah got the Rapunzel doll from us after asking for months if she could get it.

Some foam stickers to go on her new foam sheets.

So many presents

The birthday girl taking out the candles. 

She sang happy birthday until we got to the Rebekah part and looks at me like we are all the silly ones!

It's hard to see but Rebekah is playing ball with Dave. This is a proud and special moment as she has not liked  Dave or wanted anything to do with Dave since she was born. Dave always blamed me for turning her against him. But now I'm proud to say that they are the best of friends!