Vacation

Today we're leaving for Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina. We'll be there with my family and I've been looking forward to this trip for months. We will get to spend a week at the beach, I'll get to visit with all of my extended family who live there, and Robby will have an entire week off (something he hasn't done in several years). Needless to say, we are all excited and I'm looking forward to seeing Handley have fun playing in the sand and splashing in the waves. I'll post all about our trip when we get back!

Atlanta Botanical Gardens

I've lived in Atlanta almost my entire life (besides a few years spent in NC and FL) and have never been to the Atlanta Botanical Gardens. Handley and met some friends there today and spent the morning strolling through the gardens, looking at the beautiful plants and flowers, and hanging out in the children's garden. There were a lot of little kids there and so many neat things for them to explore. Handley enjoyed the splash garden, the slides, and all of the other fun things to see.

I'm feeling lost...

without my camera. Something is going on with the battery or the battery charger and I can't get it to work. I'm hoping to either have a new charger or a new battery by the end of the week. We leave to go to the beach for a week on Friday (I can't wait!!!), so I MUST have it by then. Robby thinks I'm obsessed with taking pictures and I told him I AM!!! I'm seriously going through withdrawl. There have been several times I've run to get my camera because Handley was doing soemthing cute or funny that needed to be captured, but then I remembered it wasn't working. :-(

As soon as I get it working again, I promise I'll update with a lot of pictures.

And just to add to the previous post, Handley is saying a few more new words now!

up (pu-pu)
book (bok)
popsicle (pop)
cookie (she just says the "c" sound twice, c-c)

She's also finally telling me what a dog says (wfoo-wfoo).

Handley's vocabulary...

is really starting to take off. It feels like everyday she tries to say something new. Her new word today was "hot." I sometimes say her food is hot and when she plays outside on the slide it gets hot from the sun. I guess I say it to her more often than I realize. She said "hot" and jerked her hand up...just how I must do when I say it. For my own records (and for anyone else who cares) these are the words she is currently saying:

Mama
Dada
dog (dou)
uh-oh
ball (boh)
Lambie (Namb-a or na-na)
no (mo or nah)
night-night
baby (ba-ba)
banana (ba-ba)
more (moe)
bye-bye
hot

Mommy's little helper

Tonight I was moving a load of laundry from the washing machine to the dryer and Handley was standing right by me and "helping" to push the clothes in the dryer. I went into my bedroom to answer the phone and was probably out of the laundry room for less than a minute. When I got back I let Handley close the dryer door (she loves to do this) and I turned it on. It immediately started making loud banging sounds and I knew the clothes that were in there shouldn't have been making that much noise. I opened the dryer to inspect what was causing the loud sounds and found not one, but both of my flip-flops. While I was answering the phone she must have thrown them in...what a good little helper. :-)

3 sweet girls

My neighbor's husband has been in the hospital this week. All of their family is out-of-state, so I offered to watch her daughter a few afternoons and allow her some time to visit her husband. Their daughter, Addyson, also happens to be one of Handley's best friends so I knew the girls would have fun playing together. Addyson did great while her mom was gone and I loved having the two sweet little girls. I took them both for a ride in our wagon, which they seemed to enjoy. Handley is used to riding by herself, but got excited to have a friend to look at and ride with.

The putting-everything-in-their-mouth phase has still not passed...Addyson with a play pretzel and Handley with a play bottle...they were just hanging out in this little tent and seeing what they could "taste."

And today when the girls' other friend, Annabelle, came over to play, all 3 of the sweet girls climbed into the tent together!

Story time

On Wednesday mornings, Handley and I make our way to the public library near our house for story time. We've been going all summer and Handley gets very excited when we arrive. The children's librarian, Mrs. M. is very entertaining and Handley really seems to like her. Today, she kept following her around before the story time began.

Before we ever went to story time, I was a little nervous about how she would do. I pictured a quiet librarian reading a book in the front of the room while parents held their children on their laps. Knowing how active and curious Handley is, I knew she wouldn't do well in a set-up like this and I would be struggling to keep her quiet. However, our story time is nothing like I first pictured. First of all, everyone sits on the floor in a big circle. The librarian reads one, maybe two short books and the rest of the time is spent singing songs, reciting nursery rhymes, and dancing to music. It's very quick paced and up-beat. Mrs. M. always reminds parents that every child is different and while some may sit quietly, others may be up walking around and exploring and it is OK.

This morning at story time all the other children were sitting quietly on their parents laps and Handley was standing in the middle of the circle, right in front of Mrs. M, dancing as we sang songs. I love that she has such a happy and free spirit!

I couldn't take pictures during story time because of the other children, but I did manage one of her in the library afterwords. We usually hang around for a little while to read books, do some puzzles, and talk to the other moms and babies. Handley thinks it is fun to run up and down the aisles and pull books from the shelves. What kid wouldn't think that was fun?!?

I really try...

to feed Handley the healthiest foods possible. I made the majority of her baby food and if you look in our freezer, it is stocked with meal options that I've made for her (Robby always gets excited when I start cooking, but a lot of the time it ends up being something yummy and nutritious for her while we have hot-pockets for dinner...j/k, but not really :-). Anyway, I found a great recipe for healthy home-made popsicles, so I slaved in the kitchen one night about a month ago. I made 8 popsicles and she's only eaten 2 of them. Not because she didn't like them, but because after the first few messy experiences, I can't bring myself to let her have another. The popsicles were made with yogurt, bananas and blueberries. The blueberry part is just a stain waiting to happen.

The first time I gave her one I thought I was being smart by putting a bib on her and going outside. Yeah right! Little miss independent wanted to hold it herself, but had no clue about holding the stick part. Instead she just wrapped her little fingers around the entire popsicle and as it started melting, she'd lay it down on the deck, wipe her hands on her shirt, and pick it up to start licking again. Needless to say that sweet yellow shirt she had on is now covered in blue drips and no stain remover will get them out.

Her second popsicle was also eaten outside on our deck. This time I got smart and took her clothes off so they wouldn't' get stained. I was so happy to let her her lick away at the sweet, cool treat that I totally forgot she had mastered a new skill...taking off her own diaper. Just try to picture this...she's walking around the deck, one side of the diaper on and one side hanging off, holding her popsicle with a big grin on her face. I'm sure she's thinking, "this is the life." Next thing I know, she stops walking for a minute and starts peeing!!! I couldn't believe it.

All that being said, I've decided to forgo the healthy popsicles and fall back on the good old classic variety for now.

She loved her orange one so much, she needed a green one too!

Got Milk?

I'm trying to get Handley to drink whole milk now that she's weaned from nursing, but she is resisting a little. I think it is just such a different taste for her and will take some getting used to. I've been giving her two sippy cups with her meals (one with water and one with milk). Hopefully she'll learn to like it, but I'm just not making a big deal about it. When I give her milk, she usually takes a sip and decides to reach for her water cup instead. Sometimes she goes back and forth between the two. I thought these pictures were funny...she keeps one cup in each hand, just in case she changes her mind.

My little secret to get her to drink some milk: a little bit of sugar and vanilla extract...yummy! She thinks she's drinking a milkshake. (Thanks for the tip, Tessa!)

Handley's new favorite place...

Quoting from their website, "KangaZoom is a 12,000 square-foot, safe, indoor play center featuring bouncing inflatables, giant slides, obstacle courses, toddler exploration area..." Some friends told me about this place and it is only about 10 mins. away from our house. I took her to Kangazoom a few weeks ago for her birthday and she LOVED it. She just kept running around and squealing the entire time. The great thing about this place is that parents are allowed to jump and slide with their kids and it only cost $5!!!

Yesterday we went back with our friends Tiara and Avery. Handley and Avery both had a blast and thought they were so big. They enjoyed the toddler room, but preferred to go down the giant slide with the big kids. The slide took my breath away when we went down because it was so high and so steep. I'm sure Handley had the same feeling, but she would just laugh when we got to the bottom and headed straight over to the stairs to climb up again and again. She's such a little dare-devil and definitely takes after her father!

Her smile says it all!!!

Crawling through some of the tunnels...

Handley and I at the top of the giant slide...

And down at the bottom...

Handley and Avery

4th of July fun

We just got back from our lake house where we spent the holiday weekend laughing with friends, riding on the boat, and eating lots of good food. Handley had a few firsts while we were there:

Her first bikini (there is something just so cute about a little girl in a bikini...thanks Aunt Stefanie!)

Her first sparklers (She didn't quite make it to the fireworks, but seemed very interested in the sparklers.)

Her first ride on the tube (I was nervous to let her on but we seriously were going about 2 mph and I had a death grip on her!)
And here are a few more pictures from the fun weekend: