Hi People,

It's been a busy, but good summer. One of the biggest milestones at our house is that Ilea is mostly potty trained now! She uses panties during the day, but a diaper still at night. She's been dry a couple of times, so it should come soon. Only 3 more years of diapers! Ilea continues to love to play with Kyler, read books, and is pretending more and more. She also still loves Barney, Dragon Tales, and her newest favorite - Veggie Tales.

In July some of the cute things she did were to play with Kyler by putting every toy he had from a box onto him. She would tell him what each one was, then put it on top of him, one by one. Another day she was playing with her plastic food. Ilea brought some over to Kyler to feed him, saying "Say please Kyler, say please!" She wanted him to eat some carrots.

She also tries to help when Kyler is upset. He has a pillow with a music box in it. He was fussing one day while I was changing him, and she ran in, turned on the music box, saying, "Don't cry Kyler, it's OK". In the middle of Aug, Kyler was in his bouncy chair fussing while Jenny finished lunch. Ilea told him, "I'm finished now, Kyler! We can play!" She ran to the Excersaucer (about 10 feet away), turned on a star which plays Twinkle, Twinkle, LIttle Star, and ran back to Kyler. "Do you see it Kyler? It's making music for you!" She turned the star on 4 or 5 times, checking with Kyler each time to make sure he knew it was for him.

Ilea also loves to pay attention to daddy. She patted his arm in early Aug, and said "Good boy, Daddy". We cracked up. It was out of the blue during dinner. We have no idea what she was talking about!

In July, Jenny looked for Ilea upstairs. She was sitting in the middle of her bed with a book in her lap. It was Grandfather Twilight, and she was carefully reading each page and talking about it.

In Aug, we were coming home from Costco. Ilea had a box of enzyme tablets for Kipp. She held it up to her ear and started talkiing into it like a phone. She talked to herself almost all the way home from the store! Speaking of stores, she loves to go to Fred Meyer, the "cookie Store". She knows where the goodies are!

Kyler chews on everything he can get into his mouth. He's very happy, and lights up when he sees Ilea. She hugs him, and kisses him. He is starting to vocalize more. He enjoys making loud noises just to hear himself. Luckily, it's not the high-pitched squeal that Ilea had! The ladies at the church nursery love Kyler. They said the try to get to be the one to check him in because he is so easy and happy. They think he looks like a little old man, very thoughtfull. Other people have mentioned this also.