June

June!!! We had been looking forward to June for so long because June =Disneyland!!! More on that later, but here are some other fun happenings from June:

Daphne and I rode the frontrunner to Farmington to meet up with family one night. She thought it was so fun! She squealed, giggled, and said "weeeeeeee" the whole way there. It made me laugh knowing that if she thought the train was that much fun, she had no idea what was coming with all the fun rides at Disneyland.

This girl LOVES wearing her "princess underwears".... she actually wanted to be a big girl and potty train, but Disneyland interrupted it. She hasn't really had the same desire (nor have I had the ambition) since but eventually we will get there.

Left: Daphne having fun looking at all the animals at Petco one night. Right: I have a journal for Daphne and every time I go to write in it, she wants to help me. She has added some fun memories of her own to her book.

Left: Sunday family trip to the duck pond. Daphne tends to eat a piece, give the ducks a piece, and repeat. Right: Daph put on her shoes, my sweater, a sticker on her forehead, and grabbed her Minnie Mouse purse and informed me it was time to go shopping. So we did!

 

We went to the Hogle Zoo one day with Grandma Nana and Monkey (aka Aunt Kamille). We love all the different family and friends that have been able to join us. A zoo membership is awesome. I wish the zoo was closer as it is a lot of work to get there, but well worth the trip!

My favorite animal is the polar bear. I love how he puts on a little show for everyone. He loves to swim right up to the window and show off to all the bystanders.



 

The peacock was quite happy to perform for everyone this day as well.

Riding the carousel with Grandma and Monkey.

 

The best part about this zoo trip is they finally finished the new Safari area and re-opened the train! It was fun to see all the new habitats for the animals and take a ride on the train.

Hee hee. Dan is going to kill me for putting this on here.... I can't even remember how it started but he teased me about something and I told him I would get him back in his sleep....and so I did. I had desperately hoped he wouldn't notice until he got to work, but unfortunately I heard his shrill from the bathroom at 4 am and he begged me to remove it. I tried to convince him the missionaries would have loved to see him with the prank his wife pulled off (and they were blue...which is manly right???) but I finally gave in and removed it before he left to work. 

We love summer school lunch. Nothing better than a free meal for Daphne where she can go and observe all the big kids around her (and feel quite big herself...she talks about wanting to go to the "School bus", aka school, to eat lunch all the time). Perfect outing just down the street from our house. We enjoyed going with friends as well as just by ourselves. We miss summer school lunch already!

Left: We also announced the gender of our baby in June! Dan had fun making all the grandpas guess the gender (grandmas were all out of town!!) and then spraying them with silly string to reveal the answer. We had pictures of Jeff too. Not sure what happened to them??? Either way, it's a BOY! I felt like I was going to have a little boy even before I was pregnant and I was right! Right: Daphne coloring away while we did the gender reveal.

We went out to eat after we found out the gender and revealed it to Grandpa Black. Daphne was so cute as she stared at all the ultrasound pics while waiting for our food.

June also brought another big scare for us with Daphne's health. Long story short, we passed around a lovely stomach virus while in Disneyland and poor Daphne got it the worst. Her tummy just wasn't quite strong enough to handle it. For everyone else, the bug lasted 12 hours. For Daphne, she threw up off and on for over a week and then had diarrhea for several weeks after, which turned into bloody stool. The doctors were quite concerned so Daphne and I spent a few days at Mckay for testing to rule out all the scary stuff. Luckily, Day 1 they were able to confirm she didn't have any ruptures in her intestines or anything that would require surgery, so we were sent home for the night and came back the next day for more testing. In the end, we feel so very blessed. All scary diagnoses were ruled out, which leads us to believe she had colitis, which is basically just swelling and bleeding in her intestines. We figure that her digestive tract is still just so tender that it didn't handle the virus as well as a normal, healthy person would have. It makes perfect sense to me as we have come to learn that her tummy is quite sensitive in general and we have to be careful of what she eats (she is on a very strict diet) as well. Hopefully time will help her heal more and more and in the meantime, I pray she doesn't catch anything else so that her poor tummy can continue to work on becoming strong again. I admire this girl so much. Despite everything she has been through, she has such a happy countenance. She truly glows. She handles her physical trials so well. Most would never know (and sometimes we don't even realize) the severity of pain she has had since birth because of how happy she is and how well she handles it. I admire her so much. She has taught me so much and makes me want to be a better person and to handle things as well as she does.

I love being a mommy and having a cute toddler run up to me with flowers she picked just for me.

Left: Daphne spends a lot of time sitting in her baby doll stroller. It makes me laugh that she can find a way to sit in there (and doesn't break it)! Right: Daphne LOVES church. She looks forward to going to church every Sunday. She often begs during the week to go to church (she will put her shoes and backpack on and tell me it is time for church) with daddy. Her two favorite parts are that daddy takes her a half hour early with him to greet everyone as they come (part of his calling) as well as she loves nursery. I love how much she has grown because of nursery. She comes home singing the songs and telling me all about Jesus. She often tells me she needs to go to church to see the two missionaries (she loves the Elders- only boys she openly tolerates, haha) and to see Jesus Christ Amen (it cracks me up that she calls Jesus that). Anyways, in this picture, she decided she needed a few minutes with mommy in Primary and had fun being a "big girl" and raising her hand during sharing time.

We also went on a picnic in the park with Tori and fed the ducks (or rather stuffed her face with bread while watching the ducks).

Family dinner date to Burger Bar. Dan was super excited to try the mountain man burger, which consisted of elk, venison, antelope, and wild boar. He had a venison and wild boar burger at a ward social in Louisiana and has been dying to eat one similar to that ever since.