Another Day, Another Slide

Before I get into today's "slide" adventure, I have to show you this pic of Amelia form this morning. My cousin bought this Florida State dress for her about a year ago, and Amelia is now big enough to wear it. And I think Amelia looks pretty cute in it, even if it isn't an LSU dress:


That is, by the way, her new "cheese" pose. I'm not sure where she got the idea to cock her head sideways, but she's workin' it.

This afternoon we decided to take Amelia back to the cool toy store, but this time, we also let her go next door to the inflatable jumpy playground. (I have no idea what it is called for real.) She wasn't too sure at first, but it wasn't long before she wanted to slide. And because it was such a big slide, Darryl or I had to help her climb the ladder and slide down. Here are Darryl and Amelia sliding; you can kind of get an idea for how big this slide was:
And here I am with her. My eyes are closed and Amelia is wide-eyed and smiling:
At the bottom, I look relieved and Amelia looks drunk from the fun:

Then Girlfriend got brave and did it on her own. We just let her do it solo one time. Figured we shouldn't press our luck:

Okay, I'll be honest...Darryl totally decided to let her go on her own when they got to the top. I would have been too chicken. I was waiting to see the two of them through the view finder on my camera, and then I was so shocked to see Amelia by herself that I almost forgot to shoot.

Anyway, we had fun. She is such a daredevil. Again...another trait she did NOT inherit from me. :)

(And I apologize if I just bored you to tears with pictures from our inflatable slide adventure; it's been a slow news day.)

Bella's Birthday Party

Today Amelia went to her friend Bella's birthday party. At home, we hear Bella's name a lot, I guess because it is easy for Amelia to say. When she gets on her play cell phone, she starts her conversation with, "Bella? Hey!!!" then babble babble babble. It's probably just a hint of what's to come in her teen years.

ANYWAY...

Bella had a super-cool water slide/pool set up in her yard, and Amelia loved it. Unfortunately, my camera battery died after just a few pictures, but I did get this action shot:

(But let me tell you, after this party, I was worn out. Worn. Out. And I wasn't even hosting it.)

Books, TV, Music, and Toy Stores

I think I've started several blog posts in the past week and never finished them. It's as though I don't have the gumption or the focus to finish one post. So here it is, all put in one post, with little snippets of everything.

Books
I've read two books "for fun" over the summer. Only two, because Amelia keeps me so busy that I might manage to hold my eyes open to read for twenty minutes before falling asleep at night.

I read My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult. I thought I wanted to see the movie, but when I heard the movie ending was not the same as the book's, I figured I'd wait to see it on DVD. Anyway, of the few Picoult books I've read, this one was my favorite.


The other book I read, oddly enough, was Getting a Grip, the autobiography of Monica Seles. Darryl picked this one up at an airport when he was traveling, and he thought I'd like it. He was right! Even if you aren't a tennis fan (and I'm not), her story of her rise to fame and her emotional, physical, and mental struggles after her stabbing was very interesting, real, and inspiring. Even more impressive is the fact that she wrote it herself...and it's good! I think I'm definitely going to keep put this on my classroom bookshelf; even my students who aren't "readers" might like it.

TV
My two guilty pleasure TV shows this summer have been The Bachelorette and Tori and Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood. I should be ashamed, but I can't tear myself away!

Music
I recently discovered a satellite radio station I love: XM 51, The Coffeehouse. It's lots of different artists playing mostly acoustic arrangements. I don't know if it's just me, but I'm not liking a lot of the Top 40 right now. Wow, that makes me feel old, like I'm somebody's MawMaw saying, "I don't like that racket the young people call music these days." Oh, well. It is what it is.

Toy Stores
Needing to buy a birthday present for a 2-year-old's party tomorrow, I took Amelia with me to a toy store a friend told me about. It was so cool...the store had lots of toys set up for kids to play with. They even had chairs for the adults to sit in while the kids played. I wish we had found this place at the beginning of the summer because there's nothing like indoor, air-conditioned, free fun! (Of course, I also think that when she is old enough to start begging for toys, this might not be the best place to go!)

Here's Amelia picking something off the shelf to put in her already-full grocery cart:

Amelia's fun with the grandparents

First of all, these last few weeks of summer have been flying by; it does not seem like almost a week has gone by since my last post. I mean, seriously. This isn't fair.

My parents came up this past weekend for their Amelia fix. Darryl and I, as a result, were able to have a couple of child-free outings. Friday night, we went to see The Hangover after several people told us how hilarious it was. Was it funny? Sure. But I think it was one of those situations where everybody went on and on about it so much that our expectations were really high, so we were a bit disappointed. It was still fun to go to the movies, though. Saturday, we looked at some houses for sale in the area (we haven't sold our house, mind you--we just wanted to see what our "price range" could get us), browsed in some stores, and had dinner. It was nice.

Well, back to Amelia and the grandparents. While we were having our fun Saturday afternoon/evening, the grandparents took Amelia to Bass Pro Shop to look at the big fish tank. They also rode a carousel, had chocolate ice cream, and ate at Five Guys Burgers & Fries. They said Amelia was a perfect angel through all that. I hope so! Of course, I'm sure she was having a blast!
It was a good weekend!

Just a breath away from a minivan

Last week felt like a real "mom" week to me. Saturday, Amelia went to a birthday party for a boy in her daycare class, and that, combined with the "playdate," just made feel like it was the official start to many years of playdates and birthday parties. And, lo and behold, when I checked my email last night...Amelia had another birthday party invite!

I hope this doesn't read as a complaint, because it's not. I'm actually enjoying all this. (I'm sure that in the future, when we have three birthday parties to go to in one day, I might be a little tired of it, but so far it's fun.)

At the party Saturday, the cake consisted of a chocolate layer and a yellow layer. Amelia ate the chocolate and left the yellow. As much as Amelia looks like Darryl and acts like Darryl, I think she has my food tastes. (Except I would have eaten both layers, but I would have much preferred the chocolate!)

Ha!

Amelia's playdate

Amelia had her first "official" playdate today. We went to her friend Tanner's house. Tanner is a girl in her class at daycare, and her mom is a teacher in our English department. It was lots of fun to see the girls play together.

They really enjoyed playing on this slide. I think they spent close to two hours on this. Amelia showed Tanner how she prefers to go down the slide:
They also just enjoyed standing on the top, stomping their feet and giggling:


They also read books. After all, they are the daughters of English teachers.
Another activity they enjoyed was chasing each other while squealing. It was cute, even if it was tough on the ears.

We had a great time! And Amelia was asleep after about five minutes in the car. :)

"Hello, my name's Amelia, and I like to do drawings"

This was what happened when I was trying to cook dinner the other night and I let Amelia play in the living room. I thought we had confiscated all the crayons. Oops.

Thank goodness crayon wipes off easily. :)

The Fourth

Is it just me, or is having the Fourth of July fall on a Saturday completely confusing? I thought yesterday was Saturday, and I thought today felt like Friday...I'm just lost, I guess.

Last night (the 3rd), we took Amelia to see some fireworks. I'm not going to lie. I like some fireworks. (I'd like to clarify, though, that I'm not a big fan of backyard fireworks, which is apparently what our neighbors are enjoying as I type. Sheesh.)

Anyway, the weather last night was PERFECT. A couple of times, it felt downright chilly. Why can't the weather be like this every evening in the summer? Here's Amelia hanging out before the big show:


I also want to show you this picture:
I want you to notice that Amelia, completely uncoached by me or anyone else, already knows how to eat an Oreo. Sometimes she gets the filling with her teeth and sometimes with her finger, but she knows that you eat that goodness first before eating the cookie. Smart cookie!! (I know. I know.)

Today, we went to a parade. Darryl will never let me live it down because it was my idea to go, and it was pretty awful. It was long and drawn out, and it was pretty much an opportunity for politicians to shake hands and for businesses to advertise. Let me give you a sampling of today's festive parade:
Yes, folks, we had men dressed as Confederate soldiers waving Confederate flags. Because nothing says "Let's celebrate freedom" like the rebel flag.

And then there was this festive float. I think it speaks for itself.

But here's my girl, being a pretty good sport despite the dismal showing of floats and entertainment in the parade. A small football landed in her stroller, so that provided her some entertainment. (Please forgive me for the patriotic dress. Part of the fun in having a girl is dressing her up from time to time. And she rocked this dress, y'all.)

Well, as I typed this post, I just listened to Neil Diamond sing "America," so I guess my 4th is now complete. (I also think I freaked Darryl out a bit when it got to the "Today!" part and I joined in...because how can anyone stay silent when Neil gets to that part of the song???)