thesellers.net

Both Molly and (especially) Leah like to watch Bubble Guppies on Nick Jr. When we started talking about flying to see G'mom and Grampa in Memphis the "Gup, Gup and Away" episode became an instant hit. We sang, "Yeah, we're gonna fly. Fly, fly, fly, fly, fly. fly" many, many times during our traveling. Molly was super excited when she was given her own set of Delta wings!

Michelle, Jeremy and Emmie drove up from Birmingham to visit too. We took the girls to the Children's Museum of Memphis, which was packed with fun activities. Here's Leah doing some indoor fishing on the Mississippi River.

The fishing pole was a bit hard to handle, so switching to a net which was much easier for Emmie.

Molly is ready to fight some fires.

Molly's absolute favorite part was launching paper airplanes. She got very good at shooting them and even managed to get it in the target a good bit of the time.

Leah gave us a puppet show.

The museum also had a couple green screens for the kids to have fun with. Who knows where they saw themselves on the monitor, but Chad had some editing fun.

More to come tomorrow...

These chocolate peanut butter cupcakes were for our Bible study. There is a debate in our house as to whether the peanut butter cream cheese icing plus the surprise peanut butter inside was ENOUGH peanut butter! And as a side note, chilled peanut butter cream cheese icing tastes extra yummy!

Leah's friend, Rachel, turned 2. So, I made her a Lucy jumper for her birthday. She can wear it now, and layer it with a shirt when the weather becomes cooler.

I just can't resist making these whale jon jons for baby boys. This one is for Camp, our friends Gabe and Helen's little boy.

Molly's been going to swimming lessons this week at the pool by our house. While she loves playing in the shallow kiddie pool, she is not a fan of the deep pool or of getting her head wet. So, we enrolled her in swim lessons to help with this.

The pool offers individual lessons that are 10 minutes long, 4 days a week for 2 weeks. Molly was excited about the lessons, but still scared of getting her head wet. 3 days in, the head of the lessons said our goal was to get Molly to put her head under the water by the end of the 2 weeks. To our surprise, she did it the very next day, still within the first week.

When not dunking her entire head, she spends some time putting part of her face under the water so she can blow bubbles. Here she is doing so while being pulled around the pool on a kickboard. Considering she wouldn't put her face in the water to blow bubbles while sitting on the steps the first day, this is definitely progress.

She's not to the point of doing anything with her arms (other than holding her instructor or a kickboard), but she is learning proper kicking form.

I'm not sure why she likes licking her chin while swimming, but I'm happy she's enjoying herself. She never seemed to have fun in the big pool before as she always seemed so scared. I think her instructor, Miss Keira, helped a lot with this by making Molly feel very comfortable.

We may not be ready for swim team yet, but she's made great strides in a short time. I'm just happy she's having fun swimming now.

When I asked Riley's mom what the birthday girl would like, the answer was, "Anything homemade by the very talented Jen Sellers would be very welcome and appreciated." Looks like Molly's friends are loving the dresses made by her Mommy!

I love the square neck, the ruffle sleeves, and the pleats in the front and back. I bought the pattern after seeing it on Mandy's blog. She's the cousin of my friend, Emily.

I also made a dress for one of Molly's preschool friends, Maisie. All these dresses means that I am getting to try out a lot of different patterns.

With this dress, I put my first zipper in a garment, and if you look hard you can see side pockets!

A couple months ago, my Aunt Jan asked if she could make the girls something because she had an itch to do some sewing for some little girls. When a package arrived in the mail, I opened it and responded, "Oh, I forgot she was making the girls something!" It was a fun surprise!

The dresses definitely passed the playability test.

Leah is now the fifth little girl to wear this dress. G'mom made it for Aunt 'Chelle over 30 years ago. Here is Molly wearing it.

We were sad to learn that Emmie had broken her arm earlier this week. So, we decided to do something to cheer her up. Emmie - this video is for you. Molly, Leah, Jen, and I hope it helps you feel a bit better.

The kids sang a couple of their Vacation Bible School songs for us in church today. We may have to separate Molly and Simon next time they are on stage together to keep Molly from pretending to eat Simon every so often. As you can see, she had a lot of fun.

We made our annual trek to Savannah to visit Chad's family last week. We flew last year, but decided this year that it had to be our long roadtrip down I-95 again. And it was a long one indeed. Add together ~12 hours on the road, plus a sick child (one girl on each leg!), and you get two very.long.days. However, the three days in the middle were quite pleasant!

The hammock was the favorite destination, and thankfully the aunts frequently obliged the girls' requests to swing. It really is very relaxing.

Grandaddy's dock is also a great place to hang out and relax.

We also spent one morning at Uncle Carl's house swimming. Leah had a great time in the water, while Molly insisted on staying on the steps. I put Leah's head under a few times to get her more comfortable with the water. She always came up shocked, but after a lot of cheering from the crowd, she'd start smiling and say "I did it!"

You can see all the pictures from our visit on Flickr starting here. And if you missed it, a reading from Molly here.

On our drive down to Savannah, Molly decided to read to Leah (no, she's not actually reading, she just knows this book well). Sorry about the road noise. It might be hard to hear her.

I'm not sure if this came about because of the pirate pigs on Dora, the pirate episode of the Backyardigans, or the pirate in the What's in the Bible videos, but Leah now loves to pretend to be a pirate. This basically consists of her saying "Arrrrrrhhh!" followed by "I'm a pirate!" It's pretty hilarious.

The girls have really enjoyed their pool playtime every week. We've already been more times this summer than the entire summer last year. Thank goodness for a single afternoon naptime!

Pouring water with cups and buckets is certainly the favorite activity.

It can be serious business.

And anything can be a bucket, even an upside down boat!

Molly has not been interested in actually swimming, but she does enjoy splashing around.

Jumping in is fun too!

Is it good luck to dump water out of a cup behind you like it is to throw salt over your shoulder?

Though, sometimes you have to take a break from the action to survey the landscape and plan your next move.

After our first trip to the pool, I decided that the girls needed some cover-ups. So, I made them these matching terry cloth cover-ups. They have been perfect for keeping them warm and dry while eating our picnic lunches.