Daddy Day

For Daddy's Day this year, I thought it would be fun to do something creative and artsy with HG that Hunt could have for the home office... I had seen ideas for canvas painting, and while the potential mess was a little daunting, I thought the end result could be a sweet gift that I knew Hunt would get really excited about.  It turned out to be really cute- although the process was just as much of a cluster as I anticipated, especially once she realized that it was way more fun to paint her own body than the canvases... This would be fine, except that I had to figure out a way to get her inside to a shower without touching anything- which basically ended with me holding her in our shower while I was fully dressed.  It was quite a scene.  But Daddy was very happy for his art, and has it proudly displayed on the wall, which made the whole thing worth while!

Berry Pickin on the Farm

Daddy introducing us to the art of strawberry picking...

 

"Oh, I can do this too guys..."



  

Sweet boy Miles

Miles and Grace on the hunt for the largest strawberry

Hmm, this looks tastey...

Don't mind if I do...

 

A few pints of sampling later...

Yep, still trying out the product...

 

This facial expression makes me laugh!

 

"Little" Grace, "Big" Grace, Harrison, and Miles

Adore this picture.

Reading Al Fresco

We've had some lovely evenings over the past week, which has been accompanied by grilling out and eating on the deck- probably one of my favorite things about the summer.  Harper likes to read books in the evening and she keeps a stash in the living room for this purpose, and so I realized that one way to keep her entertained while we try and spend a few minutes relaxing out there is to read al fresco.  The process of her retrieving each and every of said book stash and bringing them out one by one is hilarious... She has this fast-ish toddler walk that is sort of a waddle up on her toes and she scoots back and forth until all of the books are at the reader's access.  Each one that comes out is usually followed by "Teetee" as she sets it down, and it can be hard to tell if the thank you is directed at the actual book itself or the reader, but it's pretty funny either way.  Check out that hair also... the Seussical Mullet (as it is lovingly referred to) needs a bath big time after a day of playing outside in the Giraffe pool!

Selfies with Squeaky

Harper and Mommy took some self portraits this weekend!

Giraffe Swimming

A little Sunday morning swim in the Giraffe pool...

Living the Toddler Dream

At least once a week now Harper and I have been convening in Mindy's backyard with Harrison and Miles for toddler pool time/patio dinners.  With Hunt having class some evenings, the grind of leaving work and transitioning into single mommy-mode can be a little trying some days and admittedly my patience and excitement for such evenings can vary.  Enter, however, summer weather and toddler play time outside and it's a whole new game.  Harper adores being outside, loves water, and is always up for socializing with Miles and Harrison who are precious little boys.  The fact that I genuinely like and have connection their mommy is an absolute bonus.  These evenings with their family really help to break up the week, and I am so incredibly thankful that we lucked out with having them next door to us. 

I actually managed to catch some perfect Squeaky smiles too!!  More often than not, she is smiling, but catching the actual look in a picture often seems to allude me, which is crazy considering how much I photograph her.  But here they are, to my delight!  Harper kept going up to sit down on the step and then would pat the seat next to her for Harrison and Miles to come sit next to her.  It's really neat to see her skills in interacting with other children that she picks up at school, and it brings me complete joy to see how her face lights up when she is excited by others.

Haawperr

This weekend, I was lucky/blessed enough to experience a simple perfect moment of sheer joy, as I heard our little girl say her very own name for the very first time.  Apparently, Hunt has been working on this with her in the mornings where they review who makes up her family: Mommy, Daddy, Baba, Harper, repeat.  I am quite sure that they are working on this at school too and probably don't refer to her as Squeaky or it's other derivations.  Nevertheless, on Friday evening as we were hustling and bustling around to get packed up to head over to El Rodeo for our weekly dinner-- a process which is hectic and generally annoying to me after a long week, until we make it to said destination and I get to eat melted cheese-- and I hear this "Haawperr" with total pride coming from a little toddler voice.  It stopped me completely in my tracks, and there was almost a little mommy tear.  If you could see the scene at the time, it was the perfect iteration of our real life right now-- lots of rushing, and packing, and organizing, and maybe some nagging and prodding to keep on schedule, get to dinner before it gets too late, etc etc etc and then all of the craziness punctuated by this wonderful, amazing new discovery that our little munchkin can say her name, and is so happy to do so over and over on command.  Beautiful.

The charm of hearing her list her family and name did not wear out for the entire weekend.  We probably made her do it 20 times and videotaped half of them.  The excitement in her voice each time she says her name is my favorite part!

A few still shots from the playground... the weather was nice enough to play for awhile Saturday evening, and we had a really nice time out there with just our little family enjoying our small slice of suburbia.

Little lady and her favorite "lellow".  To my delight, she totally tolerates wearing a bow and actually keeps it in for some time before taking it off and trying to eat it.  If you ask her which one she wants to wear, though, the response is always the same these days-- "lellow".