Daddy's bug!

Daddy brought Q in a freshly hatched cicada this morning, complete with the old skin! She had fun looking at it and even let us put it on her shirt. She thought the old skin was a bug, too. A little confused. :)

Our little Trent is engaged!

And we celebrated at he and Mayra's luau tonight!
Lots of babies in Hawaiian get-ups, and even a festive dog in the crowd!

Q had fun jumping with Daddy and riding on Daddy, and even dancing on the table!

Here we are, in our Hawaiian duds! Q wouldn't wear her lei. :(

But she did take some photos with Mommy's camera! She says, "Mommy, picture!" and knows exactly what button to push. Not too bad--I like her composition!!

Something yellow, please!

We've decide to work with Quinn on her colors a little more intentionally since she still thinks everything is black or pink. :) This week we chose Yellow as the color of the week. So we dressed her in yellow clothes every day so we could ask her, "What color is your shirt?"

We made a little "yellow bag" and put different yellow things in the house inside of it. We've been pointing out yellow items wherever we go. She is definitely starting to catch on!

Next I am going to make her a Yellow book.....so, if you'd like to participate, email me a photo of you (or your kids, or your pet....whatever floats your boat!) with something--anything--yellow! Be creative! I am going to put the book together Monday night (31st), so I'd love your photo by then!

Birthday fun with Uncle Mikkke

We went with Mikkkkke to Smashburger for his bday tonight. They gave him a milkshake since it was his bday, and the second the girl set it on our table, Q snatched the metal cup the extra milkshake comes in and started slurping away. It was amazing how fast she had it up to her lips. She gulped and gulped and only stopped occasionally to come up for air.


Then she had fun feeding Mikkkke his milkshake! And some fries. And some ice. And her straw. And I-ya's straw. Mikkke's a better sport than Mommy and Daddy. :)

When Miss Rosalba's Away......

Today after school I was busy putting away some materials I had used today and noticed Q was unusually quiet.....Walked down to the offices to find her perched on Miss Rosalba's desk enjoying the view from the 3rd floor. Of course I had to snap a picture before I made her get down. :) You can always tell when Q is done being at school because she starts scaling every piece of furniture in the building.

my cuties

I took these snapshots for a reading presentation I am facilitating at work tomorrow, and of course couldn't resist sharing them. I honestly think Q's favorite time of the whole day is her before-bed storytime with Daddy. You can always hear her sweet little voice in there saying, "Daddy, more books, please!" And yes, there is a baby in there amongst the daddy, pillows, and "blanks."

(And Daddy's "boo-boo" is a nice little burn from the chainsaw that he acquired while standing on the garage roof cutting down a giant tree limb that had fallen last weekend. Don't know where Q gets her monkey qualities.....)

Who doesn't love a good story on the potty?

These pictures show what a great daddy Matt is! He has really had to step it up these last few weeks since I started back to work and he's in charge of getting Q ready in the morning and to bed in the evenings and does a fabulous job. She's in a difficult stage of no's and pushing the limits and he is amazing at knowing when to distract her, when to insist she does what he asks, and when to remember that she's only 20 months old. I love that boy!

Wanna know what she's looking for?

The beach pictures I took A MONTH AGO and still haven't finished editing and posting. :( Soon, soon! I am a working momma these days, and that is going fabulous, but we are definitely on a different schedule that doesn't have much room for pleasure-editing! Like I said, soon, soon!!!!

PS) Q's hairdo--Kate Gosslin or Meg Ryan?????? It's a toss up for me.

Visit from some Crazy Brasilians....

My aunt and uncle were in the country, and even better--in town--a couple weeks ago, so we got to spend some time with them and they got to meet the babies! 3 babies, in fact. :) My sister is pregnant and I'll have another niece or nephew toward the end of the year!

Quinn took to Rod "od" right away. I think it was his Donald Duck impression and the fact that he let her drink his "bubble abu."

And K enjoyed some lovin,' too!

Told you she was a "monsee"

Found this in my video stash.
This is Q in August, when she was 11 months old.
About a month before she started walking she summitted her highchair.
Hasn't changed a bit since.

Moomees!

After we go for our evening walk, we make smoothies (moomees)! We love spinach, frozen bananas, frozen berries, and any other ripe, frozen fruit we happen to toss into the freezer and a little vanilla yogurt. Yummm! Q has the perfect cup for her "moomees" and as soon as she knows I have the blender out, she runs to get it.

At the park.....

Q loves climbing the slides at the park! Daddy also taught her how to jump off the top into his arms (scary, huh!) He says it is preparation for the pool this summer.

We try to walk to a nearby park as many evenings as we can to let her burn off a little energy, and since I have been back to work I have let her have some time on the playground there every day before we go home. Hopefully that will help get all the climbing out of her system. Her teacher is constantly having to tell her not to climb the shelves, the tables, etc. Little Monkey. Or "monsee," as Q would say.

And the hat on her head? She would only wear it since Daddy had a hat, too. Otherwise, when its just us girls, she fights me the entire time we're outside to take it off. But when Daddy is around, hats are the cool thing to do.

Papa's hat

Papa brought Q this hat from Branson. She always calls it "Papa's hat," and of course anytime she sees any type of cow she always says, "moooo Papa!" since Papa has mooed at her since she was born. :)

Alie was not amused by the shenanigans.

Catch-up from March

This video is from March...
some of the songs we taught Quinn during the month....
Too cute not to post!

She's officially kicked the habit!

Bathtime tonight

Quinn has started saying some of her words correctly....
She has started saying "music" a lot of the time instead of "mumickkk," so I wanted to get some of her recent tricks on camera before she stopped them.
She is still saying "hick" for hand. Know it won't last long, though!
Of course she wasn't too thrilled with doing what I wanted. She just wanted to drink bathwater with her little measuring spoons. Stinker.

Fun with MikkkkkE and I-ya

I needed Matt's help with a large group photo session last night, so Quinn got to go play with Mike and I-ya (Lynda) for a few hours. They had a little pool all ready for her, and a swing, too! Swings, water, and being outside--her favorite things in the world! They got some great pictures of their fun together!
Her new favorite drink? "Bubbles Abu!" (seltzer)

(of course she had to drink some pool water....She also learned how to say BJ (the dog)).

Lots of fun in the swing!

She got so worn out from all the fun that she was falling asleep in the swing!
So that means a nice nap with I-ya!

Her newest words?

Balance beam.

The bad and the good of the backyard...

The bad....

Stepped out this morning to see our glass patio table shattered in a million pieces. And right as I noticed it I stepped down on one of the little glass fragments, which got embedded in my poor foot. I told Quinn to stay away from the table because it had broken, and she patted the edge of the table and said, "Ouch, table!" and signed "ouch." She kept saying, "Uhhh-ohh, table!" the rest of the morning. Not sure what happened, no branches or any other evidence of what might have broken it anywhere around...... I am very sad, we've been dining al-fresco for the past month or so, so we'll miss that little table!

And the good.....

Our second ripe, red strawberry! That of course didn't even make it into the house before Q and I went halfsies on it.

My sorta girly-girl

Yesterday at the pedi office the nurse looked at Q and said, "Is that a shirt or a dress?" kinda like I was dressing my child inappropriately... Well, it's a dress, yes. Q has lots of cute dresses! Except that she's 20 months old, a climber, and has no clue about modesty. So that means I accessorize her little dresses with some nice leggings or jeans, and probably shorts when summer comes. Because, as you can see, my little monkey is pretty much all over the place, all in the course of 2 minutes, demonstrated below.


There, that's much better! Now she's ready to climb the fence!

So maybe we aren't making any fashion statements around here, but we tend to think she rocks the jeans, dress and tenny look...Aunt Lynda says it best when she says this attire fits Q's personality perfectly....a nice balance between girly and practical!

Ouch!

Today Q had her 18month well-baby check only two months late. I know, I got a lecture for it from the nurse.

She is 24lbs and 31.5 inches tall. This puts her in the 40% for weight and 25% for height.

She got 4 shots, poor baby. Two on each leg. I had to hold her down big time after the first one. She was MAD! She got up and yelled at the nurse, pointed, and jibber-jabbered in an angry voice. She also refused to tell the nurse buh-bye.

On the way home she was crying and saying, "talk, Daddy. Boo-boo, Daddy." So Daddy had to call her when he had a break between patients and hear about her boo-boos.

When we got home she was really perterbed by the giant band-aids on her legs, but when I started to pull them off and they pulled her skin a bit that made her even more mad. Daddy tried to take them off tonight at bathtime, but the area still must be sore because she started crying. So we'll give them a bit more time.

PS) Don't you love her baby suntan--the white lines in her wrists and ankles where the sun doesn't shine? So precious!

Notice anything?

Like a paci-free nap? We're endeavoring to get rid of the paci....We're having to tell her all the time to take her paci out because we can't understand what she's saying. I always told myself that would be my bottom line with no more paci....So, it's paci buh-bye. We've just started telling her no when she asks for it. She slept last night, today's nap, and tonight without it. The hard part will be car rides when she is soooo tired and wants her paci. Yikes! I figure that putting it here in writing will make me stick to my no-paci decree!

Fieldtrip Friday

On Friday we went on an adventure with Aunt Lynda. We toured an amazing garden. Q of course found every instance of "abu." Only second to the "abu" were the giant bumble bees hovering around the flowers.
I got some inspiration and ideas for my garden for next year and we all loved being outside in the middle of so many blooms!