Kids say the darndest things...

The more Anna talks, the funnier she gets! I swear, some of the things she comes up with sound better than if I tried to make them up! Just last night, I was drinking a Smirnoff Ice. Of course Anna asked, "What's that?" because she asks millions of questions a day. I told her it was booze. She said, "Maybe when I get bigger I can have booze!" That's been her thing too, is saying that maybe she can try something later. She has said the same thing about gum, hard candy, safety scissors, and coffee. She's so funny! I guess she's realizing that there are restrictions, and she's eager to get past them! I can't blame her there, but I wish she wouldn't try to grow up too fast! It's already happening too fast as it is.

She has also been starting to get very interested in watching birdies, playing the piano, art, and "reading" books on her own. This morning she took a little plastic "table" and had her princesses gather around it, perhaps to eat lunch. Usually she has to line them up in a parade, so it was pretty neat to see her branch out and do something different!

Potty Training

It's finally happening! I have been pushing Anna to use the toilet ever since I started summer vacation. I was met with quite a bit of stubborn resistance (where could she have gotten that??) Finally, somehow something clicked with her this week, and all of a sudden she's been keeping her pull-ups dry! It's so amazing! 3 days in a row she's been able to do it, and tonight she even did #2 for the first time! We're going for the underwear tomorrow, and we'll see how she does with that. I'm so proud of her!! If she keeps this up we are going to buy Jessie underwear over the weekend, because I promised her that in a desperate attempt to get her interested! Whatever works, right?

Visit from Unckie Eye

The last couple weeks of June Unckie Eye came to visit us from Germany. We did all sorts of fun stuff with him! First we stayed close to home and did things like shopping and Home Run Inn. Then we had some adventures like going to the Illinois Railway Museum, which was a lot of fun. They had all sorts of trains from different eras, even some you could ride! I enjoyed the streetcar immensely. There were all these different buildings with different types of train engines in them - steam ones, street cars, etc. Lots of information about each one too, which was fun. Some of them were open for us to go inside as well. The other neat thing about the place is that they have all these volunteers who work to restore the place and the trains, so they're adding and renovating all the time. It was a busy and fun day! The next day we went to the Indiana Dunes, where we started off the day with a bike ride. Unfortunately, the trail was very poorly maintained. There were huge pits of water along a lot of the path, and areas of it were quite overgrown. Plus the whole thing was under power lines and along the railroad tracks, which wasn't exactly scenic. I did think it was fun to see so many cattails, because it reminds me of growing up in Alabama. We also saw a deer in the path on our way back, so that was neat. We ended up riding 12 miles, and it is always fun to bike anyway! After that we went to the beach, where we had a picnic lunch and enjoyed hiking up the dunes. It didn't take long, but it was fun all the same. The water was too cold to actually go in, but the day was still fun overall!

Stephen, Bubby, and Bobby also had some adventures without us, like going to Six Flags and Starved Rock. We visited Chick Fil A too, which was very exciting for me. The last day of Unckie's visit was the 4th of July, where we had a nice cookout and just enjoyed each other's company one last time. It was very sad to say goodbye, but we did have some great times with him these past couple weeks!

"On Our Way Home"

My little girl is so clever. She actually makes up her own songs now. First, back when we went to Starved Rock, she had her "River River over water, woods" tune. But now she does it all the time! Sometimes she seems to just babble nonsense syllables melodically, but she also makes up entire songs! She will often sing "On our way home" when we're out and about, and today she even modified it to be "On our way zoo." I really don't know if it's normal for a 2-year-old to do such things, but it sure does amaze me. She even sings on pitch, which is more than her daddy can do as an adult!

Anna's drawing has also improved immensely. Rather than scribbling aimlessly, now she draws with more purpose. In the picture to the side, she drew legs on the Mickey head that I made. And when she draws, she will make a circle for each eye and a circle for the nose, etc. Things are really starting to resemble true pictures, and she has much better control over her fine motor skills!

Miss Betty Crocker!

I've had another one of those "dream come true" experiences with Anna. This was our first week home together for the summer (yippee!!!), and the weather has been less than cooperative. First it was in the upper 90s and too hot to play long outside. Then the weather turned very stormy, and we had some of the most violent storms I have seen in quite some time. The power was off for 11 hours yesterday, and that's quite unusual for around here! We've made good use of our time though, having gone to indoor bebow, children's museum, and the zoo. This afternoon, after Anna woke up from her nap, we made brownies together. I've seriously had fantasies about baking with her, and up until this point she just hasn't been old enough to really do anything. We made cookies a couple months back, and she did help with the sprinkles, which was a good start. This time though, she seemed to know what was going on the entire time. She helped to stir the batter (and lick the spoon), and she was very excited about the whole process. My heart just melted. I am so happy to see that she enjoys baking with me, because that is going to make this summer even more fun than the last!!

Dells

This past weekend, Anna and I both had our first trip to the Dells! We stayed at Mt. Olympus, which has an indoor water park, outdoor water park, and a big amusement park! It was quite a lot of excitement to squeeze into one weekend (which was supposed to be the start of my summer vacation; as it were, I still had to go back to school on Monday because of the snow days). On Friday, we ate Jimmy Johns on our ride up, then we went to the amusement park for a bit. There were only a few rides open, but it was still fun to start the weekend. On Saturday we had a casual breakfast of snacks in our room, then we spent the whole day at the water park. Anna had a great time in Poseidon's Rage (kinda like a wave pool, but way more intense) and the little slide area. She kept going from the duck slide to the pelican to the whale slides, then repeat. She also tried out the "big kid" slides, which were mini real slides. It was amazing to see her riding on them; she's clearly not a baby anymore. We ended our day at Moosejaw Pizza, where Anna and I split a pan pizza - delicious. The next morning we all slept in (hooray!), then went to breakfast at Paul Bunyan's Cook Shanty - yum yum!! Then we went on a few more rides before heading home. It was great to spend some time with Carrie, Jamie, and Eddie, and to start the summer with lots and lots of excitement!

Memorial Day

Even though it has been a dismally chilly and wet May, somehow we ended up getting sunny and hot weather for Memorial Day. Anna was very excited to see so many family members all in the same place. The silly kid was running from one place to another, jumping up onto the patio chair to get potato chips, running over to blow bubbles, etc. However, Anna had the sense to tell me when she was tired so that she could go take a nap... although she did ask if Marky and Eric could nap with her! When she woke up, she ate half a hot dog, a brownie, then went across the street to get some bebow time with the boys. She sure does love playing in the sand! Plus she loves when I do underdogs on the swing for her. Today for whatever reason, she kept wanting to go down the slide while holding her "White water." She was getting a kick out of that. I think she must have been tired by early evening, because she kept wanting to sit down and watch Mickey. So I told her that she couldn't until everyone left. Of course that meant that she wanted to kick everyone out! But she read books nicely with Auntie Carrie, played outside for a bit longer, and then it was time for people to leave.

Something that I think is pretty funny about what she does now is enjoying to "help" us around the house. She absolutely loves doing dishes (which essentially means that she gets herself wet at the sink and dirties dishes that were once clean). She also likes to sweep, and she even did help move her chairs and table back to where they belong. Such a good little helper! I can't wait to spend the summer with her, starting next week!