second swim of the season

Our little Taylie might as well be a fish. She loves the water!! This is a picture of her swimming for the second time this year. The water is about 80 degrees and she had such a fun time!! The first time she swam was actually on memorial day. We were not expecting her to swim because the water was only 70 degrees!!!!! She went from splashing her hands to kicking her feet to just wanting to jump in. She had so much fun and thought that it was great. Grandpa was such a good sport and got into the pool with her so she could jump to him. When she started shivering and we got her out all she would say was "more" in a shaky little voice. She can't get enough of the water.

getting ready for baby

I was actually able to talk Jacob into painting the room for the upcoming baby, and of course what is a household project with out our little girl to help.

She is very excited to help get things ready for her brother!!

trying to be rid of binkys

Taylie has been pretty good about only using a binky to sleep, but she decided that she was wanting to have it all of the time. We thought that maybe we could try to wean her from it all together. The only idea that I had besides quitting it cold turkey, was to put it somewhere undesirable so if she wanted it that bad, she could have it but it wouldn't be any fun. So I took a shoelace and tied it to her dresser away from all of her toys so all she could do was sit and suck on it. I figured that she would get bored and that would be discouraging. It wasn't. She was perfectly happy to sit on her floor and suck her binky. It didn't take long for her to figure out to grab a book and take it with her so she could "read" while enjoying her binky.
then I thought that if I put it in an even more undesirable position, that may deter her from the habit, and as you can see it didn't.

more help in the kitchen

This time Taylie decided to offer up her services as a taste tester. When I had my back turned Jacob caught her pulling cookie dough right off the beater and eating it before I caught her. I asker her if it was yummy and she said: "good". I guess that means that I have the approval of a 18 month old. Who am I kidding, that is the most important kind of approval!!

On this cookie making adventure, she decided to forgo the fingers and just dive in face first and eat off of the beater. It was so cute I just had to let her go for it!

always in trouble

You know that sound in your house when it is just a little too quiet, you know something (or someone) is up to no good? I have many of those moments during my week and here are a few of them.

On this occasion Taylie was, of course, too quiet for her own good so when I went to check on her she had climbed into the bath tub (which, I did not know she could do!) because she wanted to play with her bath toys. This picture does not show it, but she is actually soaking wet through all of her clothes and slippers and diaper. I think I ended up just giving her a bath.

again, she was being much to quiet, but to my surprise she was not into trouble this time. She was hiding in my bed under my big body pillow waiting for me to come and find her. We played quite an exciting game of peek-a-boo.

I'll be honest, this one was partly my fault. who knew that berry flavored fruit snacks turned blue when you eat them? needless to say her face was not the only thing messy.

mom's little helper....and then some

Taylie has taken an interest in helping me around the house. Most of the time it is very helpful, like when she decides to dust my T.V. Saves me a chore and she seems to like it. She just grabs my cleaning tools and knows what they are used for, it makes me feel like I am setting a good example!

every time that I try to clean the kitchen, especially when it comes to the floors, she just has to help. Most of the time she end up spreading the dirt to where it came from, but she tries.









and again with the mopping. When she helps me mop, she just ends up with wet feet and a bum cause she likes to sit on the floor and slide around.

everybody knows that she is a natural cook! She loves to wear Jacob's apron around the house and even more when she gets to help you cook something. It it so cute!

in the kitchen

Taylie loves to help in the kitchen. She was helping me make peanut butter cookies, we were squishing them flat with a fork. She is such a good helper, she is very good at dumping the ingredients into the mixer and turning it on. I think that her favorite thing to help me make would have to be chocolate chip cookies. It is her job to dump in the chocolate chips. yummy!

Fun with colors

I thought that it would be fun to let Taylie experiment with coloring. Since I was lacking crayons, I decided that markers couldn't be too bad. It actually went quite well until ran (literally ran!!!) to get the camera (not even one room away) and came back to her coloring on her leg. She did a very good job on the washable pad there, but I guess the temptation was too strong. It is a good idea to make sure that you have everything you need before starting an art project because it can take a turn in no time.

Hmm...I just noticed that she got the bottom of her feet too....

I figured that since she had already started, what was the harm in letting her finish?.....

Don't worry....Grandma Brooks bought us some crayons. Thanks Grandma!

What was the harm in letting her finish right? That was what I thought until I tried to wash it off. Apparently my Crayola markers are not the "washable" kind. It took a couple of days to completely get her clean.

Easter at Grandpa and Grandma's house

Grandpa wanted to do an Easter egg hunt for Taylie. So he got more plastic eggs and put them around the yard. As soon as she was shown what to do she went and gatherd the eggs, two at a time (one for each hand), and then put them into her basket.

She actually only got distracted 2 times. Once to look at the fire pit and the other time she wanted to sit on the swing and rock back and forth. It didn't take her long to get back on track.

Once she finished her hunt and realized that she had more of these eggs, she decided to open them up and see if they had candy in them. And of course they did. We have so many treats that we probably have enough to last a couple of months. She is able to eat a few jellybeans a weeks as a special treat.

I must say, that she looked so cute in her little dress!!!

Easter 2008

We had so much fun for Easter this year, having a little kid around makes it alot more fun. It didn't take Taylie long to find her Easter basket. It seems like she has a radar for things that may cause potental trouble.

I now know for next year to put togethor her basket without her around. She saw me putting little treats into the eggs and so when she got into her basket, she knew that there was some way to get to those treats. It took her all of 30 seconds to figure out how to open it. In her basket she got a few treats, a bunny that hangs from its ears, and a book about ABC's.

...and once she opened them, we had to take the basket away. As hard as we tried, there was no taking away the treats that she already found....and shoved into her mouth.