One and a Half Years!

Our Little Mae continues to be the sweetest little baby we know!  Brinley is technically 19 months old now, but I have some cute photos of her at 18 months that I wanted to share.  One of Brinley's new best friends is Lady (our foster dog).  Brinley likes to give Lady pats, make sure she has enough water in her dish, feed Lady her food, and put Lady "n'night" in her crate with a treat.  It is really nice (and important for Karl and I) that Brinley have such a positive experience and love with dogs.

Brinley is talking, talking, talking now, and it's fun to listen to her tell stories.  Those "stories" still need a lot of translation from mom when someone is listening, but I'm amazed each day at the vocabulary that Brinley is building.  Some of her favorite toys right now are her dolls--and everything included in taking care of her dolls.  Brinley also continues to just be plain "busy" all the time putting things in containers and testing to see how things work.

We are very proud of Brinley and just love her so much!  Here are some fun pictures of our sweet girl!

This is one of Brinley's favorites:  stickers!

Brinley still loves her slide!

Hanging out with Lady

This is Brinley's typical "cheese" face

One of the things we love about Brinley is her silliness.
Not many people get to see that side of Brinley because
she's pretty shy when we're out and about.  Karl
and I say we know Brinley is our kid for 3 reasons (other
than she looks identical to us obviously):  1.  Brinley
loves spaghetti, 2.  Brinley loves ketchup, 3:  Brinley is VERY silly,
just like her parents.

Meet Brinley's tongue

Brinley built this tower all by herself!  

Smiling for the camera

Brinley is getting lots of hair now, which of course I just love to play with.
This hairstyle is actually something Karl did...he might
secretly want to be a hair dresser as much as I do.

Watching Daddy leave for work.

Best Friends (and yes, I have thought about how sad
it will be for Brinley when Lady finds a permanent home--
and no, we're not keeping her).

Brinley reading to her baby

Loving the splash pad at the zoo

Summer Fun!

When we went to the zoo, Brinley insisted that she bring her backpack
(we were bringing a backpack too...).   When I was locking up the house,
she turned around and called my name--made me think of how big she is--
with that backpack on, it made me think she was getting ready to
go to school!

Edward Jones Open House

Last Tuesday, we had an open house/ice cream social at Karl's Office to celebrate his new office!  Thank you, thank you, thank you to those of you who were able to come show Karl your support!  Also, thank you to so many who were there in spirit, and thinking about us :).
Somehow I didn't get pictures of all the people that came, but here are some fun photos!

Little Mae

She was super excited to get dressed up for Daddy's party!

Can't go anywhere without her babies!

 We had a great time giving the office a good cleaning and decorating it too!  It is still a bit of a work in progress, but with Cameron's design help, and the awesome stuff that the office came with, it's coming together.  Here are some pictures of what it looks like so far.

Karl's desk

Karl's office

Photos from our trip out west (one is Tim's and one is Karl's)

The main room--Leanna's desk.

Thanks mom and dad for the plant!

Entryway!

Dow came to hang out too!--Brinley's 4 favorites from the day:
1.  Dow was there!
2.  They had blueberries!
3.  There were balloons!
4.  Several of her friends showed up!

Karl in his new office

Family Photo in front of the office (and yes, Karl's name is on the door!)

We had the opportunity to travel again to see family in July!  We drove to Springfield, MO to see all of Karl's family.  Karl spent some of the time in St. Louis at some Edward Jones training.  Here are some highlights from the trip!

The weekend that we were in Springfield was the opening of a new John Deere Reman plant
(Karl's dad is the general manager of Reman).  It was fun to see the ribbon cutting and hear Opa speak!
In addition to the opening of the new plant, it was also the 175th anniversary of John Deere, AND, family
fun day!  Brinley and her cousins had tons of fun on the inflatables and dancing to all the music!

We're so proud of Opa!

Testing out the John Deere

Jonas and Grandma Marian with a 3010 tractor.  The The John Deere 3010 holds a  special place of pride in the Flatau Family. It was a BIG DEAL the day it was delivered to the Flatau Farm.

Is it a big truck or a little girl? Yes!

The Fire Department was there too!  Brinley enjoyed sitting
in the fire truck.

Testing out more equipment

Back at Oma and Opa's house, Brinley enjoyed listening to
Joel read.

Such a good reader!

Brinley and Cousin Janna

Brinley with cousin Jonas

Brinley and Kara are similar in age, and they
were together for several days--they had a great time
playing together.

When the sprinklers came on one morning, we couldn't resist
playing in them!

It was also Karl's mom's birthday while we were there.  Happy Birthday!!