Time Flies!

Oh my goodness! Time certainly flies quickly!


Jana at 17 months...
Jana now, at 3 1/2 ...


Then...

Now...

Then...

Now...

Jana at 2 1/2...

Jana now...

Ugh! She's so big!

Jana: 3 years, 5th month... a little late.

We were fortunate enough to get pictures taken this month and Megan did a wonderful job of capturing our kiddos' personalities. Despite Jana's obstinate moments, she's is such a caring and sensitive girl...
even if it isn't always welcome.
She loves her cousin Ari. She is very particular though: she is "Big Ari" now and has issue with Kara calling her "Baby Ari."
When asked to pose for a picture, depending on her mood, she's either a total ham or a stinker.



We are totally in the middle of "Monkey see, monkey do" phase. So, when Kara put the Mr. Potato head bunny teeth in her mouth and got some laughs, Jana had to follow.

Hae I mentioned that Jana insists on matching Kara some days?

Oh yes... the safari hat. One day, Jeremy had to drop the girls off at my work as he was heading to a meeting. While sitting in my cubicle (formerly my boss' cubicle), they found this hat. Oh how they had fun wearing them!??!?! Shhh. Don't tell her that we didn't give one of them back. :-)

Jana loves to take pictures. A picture similar to this one seems to crop up every few weeks. This is one her favorite friends: Chicky!

We're not sure what has started this (maybe the thunderstorms we had a few weeks ago), but Jana has become very sensitive to loud noises. She gets upset when she hears airplanes. She freezes right where she's at and covers her ears. Sometimes she even tries to run inside. This sensitivity does seem to come and go depending on how much sleep she's had.

Yellowstone Day 6: Friday, Back in the Park

We started the last day of the trip off with a trip to the Jackson Lake Lodge for some needed caffeine.

Here's little Miss Independent. She also spent way too much time watching Go Diego Go in the car, so every time she climbs up or down stairs she sings, "suban" (or something like that which is climb in Spanish).
It was such a beautiful building that we thought it would be fun to try to get some family pictures... try is the key word. This was the best we could come up with. Maybe not!


We told Jana that she could get one new "friend" (stuffed animal) on our trip. She immediately decided that she needed a river otter (???). First she decided that her name was going to be Lady (after watching Lady and the Tramp in the car), then she named her Katie. Then after watching a Diego, changed her name to Ollie. We never know what to call it now, but she loves it all the same. Here Jana is carrying Ollie/Katie around in her hoodie. She hasn't done this in a long time.
Uncle Patrick and Ari being too cute!

Dadda decided to try on some hats and Kara needed to as well.
Seriously, isn't she the cutest thing ever? (I'm not biased or anything!)
Tell me that these two aren't going to be great friends when they get older!
Here's the whole gang!

Then we headed out to go to the Lake Lodge, but had quite an adventure along the way. We were in a long line of cars driving through the park. The car directly in front of our lead car in the caravan suddenly veered left into the trees. Thankfully no one was in the oncoming lane of traffic, but the driver never hit the breaks. Probably about a dozen smaller trees slowed him down before a bigger tree caused the car to stop completely, never hitting the breaks. Amazingly enough no one was hurt, but it was pretty surreal to watch.

We safely made it to the Lake Lodge, but still had a bit of the adrenaline rush going.
Off we walked to the old Lodge.

Kara caught a ride with (Great) Uncle Brian.
Jana stopped to pick the flowers along the way.


Gorgeous old building.
It had this huge old porch with all kinds of rocking chairs on it. Grandpa Ray and David enjoyed them...
As did the girls.

and everyone else.

It was very neat on the inside too. Too cute of a picture of Patrick and Sarah!

Jana was so proud of this "bouquet" that she picked.

Then off to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone we went. Absolutely goregous!
The adorable couple!
The girls had a blast running around and playing.
Jana showed them how to dance.
Kara joining in.