Weekend recap. Don't I do this every Monday?

It seems like I update on our weekends every Monday.  That's ok with y'all right??

We had a fun weekend and Lonnie said he had the best Father's Day yet.  I told him that I hope to make him say that every year!  

Saturday morning started out with Blakely sleeping in until 10!  She and I are still getting over this lingering sickness so I am attributing her sleepiness to that, mixed with a growth spurt.  She has been eating constantly as well.  

Lonnie and I woke up on our own at about 9 and couldn't believe it.  We got to slowly wake up and chat and just hang out.  That hasn't happened in 20 months.  It was really nice.  B finally woke up and we went to breakfast at our local place that we go to often.  We hadn't been in a few weeks so they were happy to see us.  Well, happy to see B anyway.  :)

After that we went to a watersports/boating store to get two new batteries for our boat.  Why? Because ours were stolen!  Ugh.  We didn't even realize because it had been a few days since we were out on the boat.  Our neighbor mentioned that a bunch of boat batteries were stolen in the neighborhood and we went to check.  Sure enough they were both gone.  We reported it and ,apparently, whoever did it took about 100 of them.  I guess they just drove up the lake and went dock to dock.  ASSHOLES.  

Anyway, this store turned out to be a huge hit.  They had all of their tubes and party floats out and Blakely was just in heaven.  She jumped on them, laid on them, pushed them around, and tried to roll off of them.  It was a tad difficult to get her to leave!  

Saturday afternoon we went over to a friends house to meet their new twins.  They also have a daughter that just turned 5 so her and Blakely played together.  This was really the first time B has been around babies.  She did really well.  She kept saying baby and pointing to them. She patted them on the head, held their hand and even kissed their toes.  It was really cute.  She did try to step on the boy at one point but I was right there.  Oops :/

Do I even need to say it?  BABYFEVEROMG

We picked up a pizza on the way home and I made a pallet on the floor so we could have a movie night.  This was B's first time watching a movie and she liked it.  We tried Toy St.ory but our internet was acting funky so it wouldn't work.  Monsters, Inc. was on the Dis channel so I had to settle for that.  It was actually adorable!  B watched about a third of the movie before it was time for bed.  I look forward to many more family movie nights!  

We woke up leisurely again on Sunday morning (thank you, B!).  Blakely and I came upstairs and wrapped Lonnie's presents while he was showering.  I got us everything bagels (his favorite) and pink grapefruits (also a fave).  He opened his gifts from us.  Blakely got him two coffee cups with pictures of them on it.  One he can take to work and the other can stay home so he and B can share coffee on the weekend.  While we were wrapping them she kept saying AH-FEE DAD-DEE..over and over.  She loves to sneak coffee from daddy.  Here she is with daddy...drinking his coffee, reading his newspaper and stealing all of his food.  He wouldn't let anyone but her do that!  

We had a lot more pallet on the floor time.  It was rainy the first half of the day so it was a perfect day to snuggle.  

Now today it is back to the grind.  Lonnie's family is coming to stay with us in less than 2 weeks and I have a ton to do to get ready for that.  Time to start checking stuff off of my list!  

Happy Monday!

sicky

For the past couple of days B and I have been sick.  Not cool universe.  

Yesterday and today she slept until 10 am.  You read that right....TEN IN THE MORNING.  I couldn't believe it.  I went and woke her up yesterday at ten because I was so worried about her.  She is usually up by 730 at the latest.  She was burning up so I gave her some medicine and we sat in the recliner.  She passed right out on my chest and slept for 2 more hours.  Since I was feeling pretty awful, I was able to doze with her.  I hate that she is sick but  I looooove the snuggles.  I was telling Lonnie last night "don't you remember when she was weeks old and all we did was sit here and she would sleep on us?"  That seems like forever ago.  He says he doesn't remember that...ha!  I showed him pictures ;)

This morning she stirred around 8 so I went and got her and brought her into bed with me.  She snuggled right in and we slept until 1030 together.  I love that she loves to sleep in her bed and I wouldn't want to change that but sleeping snuggles are just awesome.  

She is napping right now and I should be too but I can't fall asleep.  I am feeling better today so I hope she starts feeling better quickly too.  She just wants to be held and lay on me.  So that is exactly what we have done for the past 48 hours.  Her nose is running like crazy and she has a cough.  I think it is just a virus but if she has fever tomorrow I will take her in.  

Her being sick just shows another way in which she is not a baby anymore.  She points to her nose and says "pipe...no" which means wipe nose.  I get a boogie wipe and tell her to blow and she does.  Most of the time she wants to carry a boogie wipe around with her to wipe her own nose.  If she gets a bunch of drainage in her throat I tell her to cough it up and she does.  When she sneezes and snot goes everywhere she says "uh oh" and gets a "tow" (towel) and "kee" (cleans) it up.  

We've shared lots of germy kisses, watched lots of Mick.ey, drank lots of water (and ice..her fave) and just been totally worthless together this week.  I have loved it but am looking forward to both of us feeling better!  

Oh...and our air conditioner went out this morning.  It is 95 here today.  Come on universe....

She is not a baby anymore.

Yesterday was just one of those days.  You know, one of those days when you look down at your "baby" and she is just absolutely 100% NOT A BABY.  You see her in a completely different light.  You used to carry her into places and now she runs full force and can open the doors herself.  You used to have to help her up the stairs and now she walks them just like an adult.  You recently had to feed her or at least sit right there and help her and now she can sit at a table and feed herself without making a huge mess.  You can now look at her and ask what she wants to do and she can tell you.  She is a big girl and I find myself in amazement of that multiple times a day.  

We started yesterday off with milk, Mick.ey and snuggles in the bed.  Since we got dire.ctv we can watch tv in our bedroom now.  We never do but it is certainly going to be nice on the weekends!  Can we talk about how long she is?

We all three then got up and got ready to go to a third birthday party for my friend Keisha's daughter Kyndal.  The party was at a new play center just for younger kids that opened a few weeks ago.  This place was so great.  It is basically a padded room full of padded toys for littles!  Win!  We have a few jump places and play zones in town but there are always so many big kids that it ends up being more stressful than fun for the mom of a toddler.  They can get trampled so easily.  

Anyway, this new place has a large room with a padded floor.  There is a small bounce house, a small inflatable obstacle course, a ball pit and many other small climbing gyms with slides and toys.  There are other smaller themed rooms....a girls princess room, a boys train room, a sports room and even a puppet room.  Blakely was more than entertained and we will be spending a lot more time there soon.  Here are a few pics of the setup.  Not great pics...I only had my phone.  

  

Playing in the ball pit with Jayda

Die mom-meee DIE!  yeah...that means slide mommy slide!  

She kept shutting poor Eli in the house.  

Quick pic with mommy  

climbing of course

This was probably her favorite.  I had never seen one like it but they sit in the car on the top of the "hill".  Then you give them a push and they fly down the track.  Oh me...she wanted to do it over and over.  I had to explain multiple times about taking turns with the other kids.  

So blurry but this little girl pushed B around in this for the longest.  

When all of the kids sat down to eat ice cream and cake I went to find Blakely.  I thought she was still playing but I found her sitting nicely eating her ice cream (which she had opened by herself) off of her spoon and not getting it everywhere.  I was shocked.  I mean how old is she?!  I may have teared up at that moment.  I just couldn't believe my baby girl was big enough to do that.  

If that was not enough to make me cry myself to sleep about my baby being a big girl then that evening was.  We went to a friends house and they have 2 girls aged 6 and 4.  The second we walked up their driveway B was saying hi and waving to them.  The three girls played while we hung out and dinner was made.  When we told the girls dinner was ready they came into the kitchen and sat down at their little table.  Blakely just picked out a chair and made herself at home.  She said thank you when my friend gave her a plate and she used her spoon and DID NOT MAKE A MESS.  After eating for about 5 minutes I just looked over at Lonnie and said "Can you even believe she is big enough to do this?"  She just looked like such a little girl sitting there having dinner with everyone else.  

After dinner we all went outside to play.  They have a great backyard and B was just happy happy happy.  She got to swing LIKE A BIG GIRL.  

Don't you think we need this trampoline?

Then the real fun started.  The sprinklers came on.  Oh my goodness.  You know it is summertime when you see kids running through the sprinklers.  

I can still hear the squeals of excitement from the girls.  That joy is just something you can't even describe.  How lucky we are to see life through the eyes of our children.  No worries or stress, just fun and love and happiness.  Oh summer how I love you.  The oldest girl came up to me before we left and gave me a big hug and said "Blakely is soooo cute.  Can you bring her back over to play soon?"  Yes, sweet girl.  Yes I will.  

We went home with a wet and worn out toddler.  What a way to spend a Saturday.  

My baby girl is growing up.  Makes a mama's heart hurt so good.  

little monkey

Y'all.  My girl is such a climber.  She will not be denied.  If she wants something or gets the idea in her head that she wants on top of something then she is going to get there.  Determined.  She has always been somewhat of a climber but I think gymnastics has pushed this along a little bit.  

2 weeks ago at gymnastics she learned that she can hang on the bar or rings and hold herself up there.  Until that point she would grab it but I had to hold her on there.  WELL.  Since she figured out how to do that she hangs on everything at the house.  The highchair....It is a matter of time before she either breaks it or it falls over on top of her.  She does it on the kitchen table.  Most recently she has started hanging off of our sofa table.  Yikes.  

She can almost do a forward roll by herself but she is not quite there.  So basically she puts her head down and tries to kick over and it looks like she may break her neck!  She does this all the time but recently started trying to forward roll OFF OF THINGS.  Her chair...the ottoman....  Oy...

There is a foam pit at gymnastics and a rock wall you climb to get out.  Oh the rock wall.  This is what taught her to really climb.  Now she can get onto any chair in our house...even the bar height ones!  She can climb into, or out of, the tub.  And obviously she can climb into the water table.  

Gymnastics also showed her the love of jumping.  She is currently trying to master jumping off things and landing on her feet.  She does this off of her little pink chair so it doesn't scare me that much because it is on carpet and it isn't that high off the ground.  But soon she will move on to higher things to jump off of.  

I am preparing myself for her to climb out of her crib very soon.  I know that she can physically do it right now, especially with her long legs.  She just hasn't tried to yet because she usually goes right to sleep.  If she doesn't then she sits there and talks to Minn.ie or Dotty.  The other day I went shopping and Lonnie sent me a text saying she was swinging from the ledge of her crib.  As soon as she hikes that leg up to the top rail of the crib...she will be out.  Oh me.  What the heck do I do then?!?  I should probably go ahead and put a bunch of pillows on the ground outside of her crib just in case.

I can't take my eyes off of this girl for a second.  She will be climbing the trees in the yard before I even know it!  

Big day for B

On Tuesday we took Blakely to the zoo.  I knew she was going to love it and I was right.  This zoo is not anything special and is actually pretty small compared to others.  But it is perfect for her to see the animals and run around like a crazy girl.  

I would say her favorite thing was the gorilla, who also had a baby.  It was cute.  She saw them before I even showed them to her and she immediately started saying "HOO HOO AHH AHH"...like a monkey.  

We played lots of chase.  That is her most favorite game right now...loooooooots of chase (chashe). 

One of the elephants kept walking in and out of his little house so I wasn't sure if she would even notice him.  He never fully came out but she saw him and pointed him out first thing.  I was actually pretty impressed with how well she could see the animals and that she recognized them.  I mean she loves looking at them in her books and playing with her animals but I just didn't know if she would connect that to the real animals.  She totally did and I definitely think we will make another trip.  

She also liked seeing the fish!  She didn't feed them because the bigger kids were already doing that but I think she wanted to get closer!

I forgot to take a ponytail holder so she had some wacky sweaty/sunscreen-ed hair.  It was pretty hot and humid that day.  

The bear exhibit and the tiger exhibit were closed for some small renovations.  That was a little disappointing just because I know she would have loved to see the bears.  But I guess that is another reason to go back.  

After seeing all of the animals we stopped and ate lunch at the zoo.  We were starving and she waited very patiently for her food.  If patiently waiting includes yelling EAT EAT EAT and pointing to her mouth.  ;)

We gave her some dippin' dots for "dessert".  She couldn't eat them fast enough.  

After the zoo we went to a store that sells the swing set we are looking at buying.  They had a few of them set up so Blakely got to play.  She slept for about 20 minutes on the way there so I was very proud of her for napping on the go and just being in a good mood without her normal 2 hour nap.  

coming soon to my backyard...eeek!

We drove the hour drive home after that and she didn't go back to sleep which surprised me.  She was still in a great mood when we got home.  She decided to kick back, relax and drink a beer...

Mommy and Daddy may have done that as well.  We have been thoroughly enjoying this week with daddy home!

Monday ramblings...

Today, you get a bunch of randomness...

• We are taking Blakely to the zoo tomorrow.  Weather permitting.  I am super excited about this.  The zoo is about an hour away from us and it isn't huge but I think Blakely is going to love seeing the animals.  We have a few other things we are doing in Little Rock so it should be a full day.  
• One of the things we are going to do is look at some swing sets.  I have been researching like crazy and I think we are close to a decision.  I want to see them in person and talk to someone about details before buying.  Thank you for sharing your thoughts on my post about this topic.  I'll be sure to pass along all of my research to you guys.  :)
• I am O-VER the weather lately.  We have been having terrible storms for a week.  We spent a good part of last Thursday in the closet downstairs due to multiple tornadoes.  We also hung out in the closet a lot of Saturday.  I am terrified of tornadoes but thankfully our house is pretty safe so that makes me feel better.  The back side of the bottom level of our house is built into a hill.  I took a new sticker book into the closet and I could barely get the child to come OUT of the closet because of that.  

• Since the weather is nice today we are going on the boat as soon as B wakes up from her nap.  I don't think people really understand how hard it is to entertain a toddler, who is obsessed with being outside, when it rains for a week straight.  It isn't easy to avoid the constant whines of OUTSIDE OUTSIDE OUTSIDE MOM-MEEEE.  

MIL gave B her old iPhone.  I wasn't too sure about this at first.  Then it rained for a week.  Mother in laws for the win.  

We played Blakely in a box.  

We strongly encouraged GranDi to come over and help with the entertaining of the toddler.  She taught B how to color.  

A lot of the time she sat staring out at the rain with her little people.  :(

• On Friday the rain let up in the afternoon so I immediately took this child outside to play.  She wanted her water table (which is BUH BUH TUH BUH in Blakely talk).  She splashed all around for a long time.  I took my eyes off of her for like 7 seconds and then glanced over and saw this.  

I mean.  She is a climber.  My first reaction was to get her down but she was so dang cute I just couldn't.  She climbed in and out of there probably 50 times.  I took a video that is hilarious.  She is standing there and dancing and smiling and all of the sudden she starts peeing.  She looks down and is a bit confused but then just goes right back to splashing.  Oh me.  I figure there is nothing wrong with a little pee :)  I would post the video but she's nakey...so ya know.  

• Have I mentioned that she hates the bath now?  All started about 2 weeks ago.  Bath time means screaming toddler being held down by one parent while other parent frantically washes toddler.  It really isn't fun for all involved.  I am hoping it is just a stage that passes VERY soon.  
• Are any of you watching the NBA games?  Game 7 of the Heat/Pacers is tonight.  GO LEBRON.  

That is all I have for today.  Happy Monday!