"fancy" kate

anyone know who fancy nancy is? if so, this should remind you of her:)

sweet conversation

today we spent some time in the car driving. as we were driving the girls were happily reading and singing to the music we had in the car. randomly kate started with this:
k: mommy, you're the greatest mommy.
me: what does mommy do to make you say that?
k: because you love me......SO MUCH!
it is times like this that i am thankful that i've hung in there, and not given up. being a mommy, especially one that stays home, is an exhausting, sometimes unappreciated, and (by the worlds standards) an unglamorous job. BUT, when my 3-year-old says something like this, i realize it is ALL worth it!

our little reader

one of amelia's new favorite things to do is read. she will sit in either her chair or go into kate's room, get some books, then plop down and start reading. we love that both of our girls LOVE books.

we've been busy

talk about starting the summer off with a bang. as soon as tim's family left, my family came in to town. amy and abby (my sister and niece) flew in from spokane for a week's stay with us. we had a blast doing fun things as well as just hanging around the house relaxing. after a few days, my parents drove up to join in on the fun. we took a trip to the zoo, picniced at the park, and did s'mores (a summer fav). i am so thankful for times spent with my family and miss them dearly. i so wish that we couild do these types of things more often, but am learning to treasure the times that we do have.

all seven

it's not very often that all seven rollins' grandkids are together so we thought we'd try to capture a picture of them. this was about the best that our camera got.

amelia

who would have thought that a one year old would want to be so much like her sister. i am constantly amazed at how much she strives to do what kate is doing, but also by how vastly different she is. for example, at train town, the little train take you for a ride, then stops at a "town" where you can get off and explore and also feed some farm animals. both times we've gone (this being the second) kate has had no interest in feeding the animals due to fear. amelia, on the other hand, walks right up to the HUGE sheep, sticks out her hand, and lets him eat right out of her hand without a second thought. amelia, also unlike kate, will climb on ANYTHING. she can get herself on almost any chair, bench, table, you name it. kate just doesn't have any interest in being high up. i'm just always so amazed at how different my girls are, but also think that it is so fun to see them starting to interact and wondering what they will be like in 5 years, and ten. what will they like, what will they dislike, who will be their friends? we haven't done anything differently with the two of them, and yet they are completely different. i guess it's God's way of making sure we trust instead of getting comfortable in what we are doing:) the picture of amelia dressing up was all her idea. she "asked" me to help her put the shoes on and would bring them to me if they fell off. i think we have another princess on our hands:) (please don't think we let her hang out like this all the time-it was 104 degrees at our house and she was hot).

train town

this last week was busy, once again, trying to spend as much time with tim's brother and family as possible. we had the whole rollins crew over for dinner one night, then met everyone at train town in sonoma for a day of rides, trains, and a picnic in the park. here are a few pictures of the outings.