Hap BurDAY Bathtub

So we had told Lea all week it is her birthday and she began saying Happy Birthday to everything, including Tuesday night, the bathtub and cup. Hap BurDay cup, Hap BurDay Grandma, Hap BurDay Mommy with a little wave of her shoulders.

So Wednesday our little monkey turned two. Wow! how time flies. We reminisced a bit about where we were 2 years ago at the time... early in the morning Dan and I had breakfast at Metro Diner before going in to the hospital, middle of the afternoon I was fully ensconced in my epidermal and watching cartoons and "a baby story" while napping. Good friends waiting for word at the bar down the street and then at 7:35 Lea came into our world and changed our life forever in innumerable ways.

But after a little reminiscing and some 2 year old impatience we got on with pizza and presents. Grandma Bubby as she has come to be called (my mom) and Dan's dad, Grandpa, came over and we had a wonderful and low key, but still exhausting night. Thank goodness we had an engineer on hand because many of our new toys needed batteries and you had to have a degree to get the toys out of the package and filled with batteries! Grandpa was our hero, he made everything come to life.

Certainly the hit of the night was the bubble gun from Grandpa. Once Lea figured out how to pull the trigger and get it going by pulling the trigger more than once at first she was after everyone spaying bubble all over the dining room.

She got great presents from both Grandma and Grandpa.

We also opened presents from distant folk like Dave, Marie & Joe (Joooooe... her battle cry!) Lea got a bear back pack with book in it which she has worn most of the day today. From Joe she got this great mat that you can write on with water. She's going to enjoy that! That may usurp carrot washing as our "while mom is cooking" treat! (see carrot washing in the last post) And from Grandma JoAnn Lea got 2 pairs of beautiful shoes, an adorable pooh bear dress, a rain coat and barnyard bath toys. Lea loved them and so did Mom! The sparkly shoes are the best!

Daddy gave Lea a handmade present...
We found, ages ago, in the attic of our shop the pieces of a bassinet. Dan put these together with a padded bottom so Lea has a bed for her dolls. She loves to rock them and Grandma got Lea the cutest doll with big blue eyes, just like Lea. The doll closes her eyes when she lays down so Lea can put her to sleep.



So all covered in bubble solution and surrounded by wrapping paper we helped ourselves to cupcakes and ice cream. Lea blew out her own candle like a pro! I think she was full of pizza because she didn't go crazy on the cupcake like the 4th of july.

The Birthday bubble wars



Eye spy with my little eye


Grandpa reads a story to Lea


After all the presents are opened and cupcakes eaten, night night and thank yous to Grandpa


And we visited the doctor today for her 2 yr check up and our Nurse Practitoner Faith, who we adore, was amazed at Lea. We got to fill out a check list of ability and we were checking off some 3yr old stuff! Lea took to Faith so well and even opened her mouth and said "Ahh!" She got a shot and all she cared about was getting the sticker she was prmoised after the shot. So it all went well.

Lea knows her dinosaurs! Its a Triceretops!



Lea gets her bassinet and rocks, well Cookie Monster to sleep because we can't get the doll out of its packaging fast enough for her.




Bubble wars! I don't know who had more fun, Lea or Grandpa!



Lea blows out her own candle.




One last shot at Daddy with the bubble gun.


There are many videos, I've weeded it down to 5 here, but there were about 15 total. If you'd like to see them all use this link to a YouTube.com playlist I've created.



Happy Birthday Sweetie!

Washing a carrot

When I am busy cooking dinner I give Lea a task of washing vegetables. I give her a small bowl of water which then becomes a large puddle of water, but I can cook dinner without Lea litterally tugging my pajama off. So this is Lea washing a carrot.

Like father, like daughter

So I finally found the old picture of Dan, which I've posted here before, but now we have a photo of Lea to go with it!

A couple fun weekends

Can we go outside, can we, can we, huh? This was while having a play date with Wilder. Judy and her granddaughter Dylan came over too and they all wanted to go outside, but it was raining/mosquitoing so we were styaing inside. There was not as much pining to go outside as this photo illustrates, but it was too adorable not to lead with.

Dylan is 4 and she was enjoying playing with Lea, the living doll. Dylan asked Lea to sit in her lap and Lea liked the idea for a while. It was very cute. They held hands and played ball together. There seemed to be some instictive thing that deterred her from holding hands with that boy, Wilder. hee hee. When Dylan can't remember Wilder's name she calls him "that boy" so we were laughing about that. They were all very cute together and played a lot of catch and drums and other toys.

It looks as though Wilder was upset about not getting his hand held by the girls ;)





The weekend before Grandma and I took Lea to buy shoes at Stride Rite. We had a gift certificate from last birthday that we figured we better use. Also Lea in one swoop grew out of all most all of her shoes.

I remember vividly going with my great grandma to buy shoes at Stride Rite in Southdale mall (Mom, am I right about the mall?). There was this little bridge to walk across so the kid's feet were eye level with the guy trying to measure your feet. The store we went to was not as memorable, but at least we were with Grandma. The poor shoe salesman was patient with us, but Lea was afraid of him, so my mom did most of the measuring.

We got very nice shoes, one pair of leather keds with embroidered butterflies and flower and one pair of black mary janes. Lea loves to put the mary janes on by herself. Well she really loves to put any shoes on by herself, including mommies. I can usually not find the pair of shoes I'm looking for because Lea has wandered into the living room wearing my shoes. She's very good at walking in big girl shoes.


During our afternoon out with Grandma, after shopping, we had lunch at Long John Silver/A&W and Lea got a hat. It was a little big for her.


Lea got a lolly at the bank before coming up to get mom at work.




And our little t-shirt angel. Lea in one of my night t-shirts. The U of Deleware from Aunt Kaitlin, but inside out. When I wear it she tells me there is a "D" on it. If I run out of time, perhaps I'll make Lea a ghost for halloween and just put her in this shirt, hee hee. In the one shot she looks like a statue of an angel to me. Of course I always think she's my little angel!








Before bed Lea wanted to read in the rocking chair all by herself. This would have made a beautiful silhouette, but I couldn't get my new camera to do it.

Movie crazy

This was the day after the 4th. I guess we were preparing for her birthday because she went crazy with a cupcake. This would be the 4th of July exit interview I guess...





We went to dinner with Michael Hopens & Chris Chapman Tuesday night. Had a great time. On the way home my little fashion plate started pretending to play her version of hide and seek — which is counting and sayng "I found you." I don't know what's more impressive the hat and glasses look or the counting. Maybe its the multi-tasking even at only 23 months.
First the fashion show in the truck on the way there

Then the counting on the way home


Counts to 10



Last Friday Lea and I had a girls afternoon out after work. We went to the store and stopped at Sonic for drinks. Lea had an apple juice slushy.




And just in case you are under the impression that she is always an agel... tantrum caught on tape

4th of July

At one point I think we had 9 kids in the house, but 2 families passed each other coming and going. We had a pretty steady 3-5 most of the Day. Mia & Leo Sanchez (Ann & Able's kiddos for those keeping track) stuck with us all day. From parade to fireworks. The three of them seen here waiting for fireworks.



A bucket of mud that the kids played with in the back yard.

A vido of Daddy and Lea waving flags.


This is very dark video you can't see Lea, but you can hear her. She was very tired because it was so late. Fireworksscared her at first but I think she got used to them by the end. She had a little pouty face and burrowed into Dan's side and said "Home now" but we kept telling her the fireworks were pretty so she finally agreed with us and got used to the loud noise. She never cried, just didn't like them. Finally her review was "Scared. Fireworks BOOM. Pretty"

Out of the mouths of babes

Lea and I have been trying to become regular church goers. Good for us. To Lea it means eating snacks of gold fish and going to the playground afterwards if she's a good, quiet girl. Most the time she is. She even helped me say a little prayer for Great Grandpa Jones (Gra) who will be having surgery tomorrow, I believe, as well as for Grandpa who drove to help Gra and grandma Jones get to the hospital and then with recovery... in general to be there to help out. We also said a little prayer for Grandma Lynn who drove to Georgia to see Lea's other Great Grandpa (Grampy) but I digress. The point is that as we were leaving church, a little early, during communion because Lea was getting very antsy... as we're walking up to the doors Lea turns in her Toddler voice and between a lull of music and says "bye bye church, see you next time." It got a couple giggles, but I didn't stay to see how many approved and how many disapproved. I told her Jesus loves her whether she's a quiet girl in church or not.

Then at bed time she was unusually rambunctious. The back story... there's always back story... Lea loves to lunge herself into her clothes closet onto a trunk we have under her hanging clothes. She "hides" her head in the back of the closet doing a superman flying pose on the trunk. She's done this for a while and was doing it repeatedly that night and I was trying to get her to settle down for story time. She tiptoed past me doing a little beat to herself "do da do da do" (she occationally beatboxes a little jazz beat like drums played with brushes when she walks in the pool or tiptoes) so she's tiptoeing right in front of me like she's getting away with something and I asked "Where are you going" and she leans toward me and whispers "closet" and continues on tiptoing until she gets near the closet when she launches herself into her hidey hole. It was so adorable! We finally got storytime done and in bed, but she was wound up!





Perhaps she is wound up because its been so long since she's played outside. We've had rain 19 out of 30 days in June and today, the first day of July it is raning on and off all day. Our lawn is an overgrown jungle swamp! Well I exagerate as you can see in these photos its not THAT bad. Our neighbor got a sign stuck in her yard saying "Mow or else." We're not to that stage yet. So we had a brief respit between rain showers yesterday and here are some new pictures and videos. I am embarking on what promises to be a long drawn out camera hunt. I returned camera one for camera two and I'm still not happy. So much for doing reasearch making you decision easy. I did a lot of research, but until I see how it works in real life I just can't pick the right one! Onward through the fog as my dad used to say!


BTW... in the above photos it had rained earlier in the day and as soon as we came in it began to thunder and rain again!

Also pictured below is Lea with crayons and stickers. She loves to "write." And stickers... oh stickers are a special joy. Not pictures was Mommy with stickers all over her face, that Lea put there. Then Lea looks at me after she's put a sticker on my nose, and two on each cheek and says "Silly." Yes, Mommy is silly.