Today is Jonathan and my eighth anniversary. Eight years! And what an exciting journey it's been. I love adventuring, laughing, walking, learning, changing and parenting with him. He serves me, and the kids, so very well. Here's to many more shared smiles, my love (photo credit: Quinn Lily Gowins).

We just got back from our second annual Cape Lookout camping trip with friends. Two nights in a tent with our newly potty trained toddler and our infant with a rainy weather forecast. Who does that? There is no one else I could or would ever sign up for that with. But nothing is impossible with Jonathan by my side. 

In all fairness, Quinn has been doing amazing with the potty business and Archer seemed to love being outdoors nonstop. I loved smelling campfire on his soft, fuzzy head. It did rain, but we made a little shanty town out of tarps so there was a large sheltered area to hang out under. The camping trip was a blast and we are already pumped to plan next year's trip. But, still, there were a lot of unknowns so that makes a little bit edgy, right?

My baby is 3 months old! Oh, Archer, please slow down. 

This guy loves standing, splashing in the bath, eating, and being rolled around like a log. He started sleeping from 8pm to 6:30ish am last week. He went on his first stroller ride last week and loves it. He loves the Ergo too, but a pre-bed walk to the park in a stroller seems to be quite fun to him. He thinks his daddy is so funny and singing I've Got the Joy in My Heart song or My God Is So Big song to him while using his arms to do the motions almost always gets a laugh.

We love you Archer!

[Big sigh of relief] We've actually finally really made it through our Spring to-do list now. We are so tired. We have spent a lot of time working outside (especially Jonathan) the last couple weeks, but we also squeezed in some fun. My mom came for a visit and Jonathan's parents came for a visit. We got to meet the Wrights' sweet baby girl. We hosted cake club with the fabulous Changs. And had some fun park trips with friends. We turned a corner with potty training progress at the end of last week and it was really encouraging. The Lord has sustained us. I'll spare the details, but Quinn has such a good attitude, bless her heart.

Mr. Archer is sleeping an eight hour stretch, is drooling a ton, started laughing, and was trying to do planks during tummy time. Look out world.

This girlie continues to be a bookworm, love it!

The past week and a half has been crazy. We started potty training Quinn on Memorial Day weekend...and that's all I'm going to say about that at this time.

Jonathan finished our fence that weekend and we've done a ton of yard work lately. Archer turned two months old (my baby is growing up too fast!) and we went to a neighborhood BBQ on Memorial Day.

We spent a ton of time outdoors last week and went to some parks for play dates. This weekend Quinn had her first smore. Some friends of ours just put in a new fire pit so we went to test it out Saturday night, so fun! Their property is amazing for kids to run wild on.

We had our first Sundae Sunday party of the summer. It was a good turnout and the homemade flavor of the month was a simple chocolate.

A highlight of last week is that Quinn and Archer are starting to really interact. He loves watching her and smiling at her and she likes helping him play and talking to him. It completely melts my heart seeing these two begin their friendship.

A quick update on the kiddos. Archer is eight weeks old today! He is now wearing size 6 months because he is getting so long. And that was even before we started cloth diapers with him today. I'm curious to find out his new measurements at his check-up on Friday. His head is quite round, especially with his cheeks getting chubbier. He's cheery, chatty, and strong. Look at these muscles.

Quinn's Montessori activities have been going well. This is our current learning activity set-up.

Clockwise from top left we have knobbed cylinders, colored pasta sorting, pipe cleaner threading, and stringing beads. Her mat is in the bottom left corner. Aside from doing these independently, she's been working over and over on a United States puzzle, a spelling puzzle (pictured below), some jigsaw puzzles, and writing notes and lists. When she writes, she'll spell a word out loud (just an assortment of letters in a row, not actually spelling) and draw squiggly lines next to eachother as she says each letter. She frequently asks me to spell different words with the letters from her puzzle. And she's starting to know the names of the state puzzle pieces, which is boggling my mind. Toddlers are such sponges! 

Her imagination continues to be quite active. Most days I'm expected to respond to Michael (from Mary Poppins), Joseph (as in Mary's husband), or whatever other role she's cast me as in her current game. She is also in love with her salt water sandals. The majority of the time she wants them on first thing in the morning, even while her pajamas are still on, and doesn't take them off until bedtime when she requests to have them on the floor near her bed.