Morning at the parks

The weather finally got nice enough to go to the park today. I put her in her wagon and we went to 2 parks. Doesn't she look excited about being out of the house? The weather has been so cold around here lately we can't do much except go walk around Walmart, or the mall.

One of the parks we can see if we look out our back window, and the other is down the street. It is actually the playground for the elementary school I know Jill knows where I am talking about. For those of you that don't know Jacob and his family were here at Fort Knox when Jacob was around 7 years old. They actually lived in a house right down the street from where we live now. He tells me some of the most interesting stories about when they were there. Most of the stories make me so happy I have a girl. LOL
Here is Kayla when she first got out of her wagon. She seemed really nervous about walking in the grass. I think its because it was so uneven.

She stayed in one spot and pointed at everything she saw. The funny part was when she started walking and fell. (Sounds mean huh?) This little girl would NOT let her hands touch the ground. She even broke one falls with her forehead because she was trying to keep her hands off the ground. It reminded me of Diyosa talking about how her daughter never wants to get her shoes dirty. LOL When Kayla would fall she would try to stand up using her arms, without putting her hands on the ground. I couldn't stop laughing. Unfortunately I couldn't get a picture of it. When I went to take a picture of that my camera said that my memory card was full. :-( Sorry... maybe next time.

Once she got walking there was no stopping her. We walked over to this gate and visited with the dog. She really enjoyed him. I did too until he threw that big stick at my baby! Of course he only wanted to play, but if I didn't grab her when I did it would have smacked her on the head. When this dog stands on his hind legs his head and shoulders are over the fence. He could jump out of he really wanted to.

Yesterday we went to Value City to look at some lawn furniture that I am going to get. Of course she read most of the way. I turned the music off so she could read to me. It lasted about 10 mins. It was really sweet.

And in case any of you are wondering... this is the new way to wear necklaces. Makayla is setting a new trend! LOL
I love this girl!

Makayla hads her 1st "Incendent Report" written up on her on friday. I know the words "incedent report" sounds so bad. Try hearing this over your voice mail "Hello Melani this is Mrs. Graves from Kaylas class room. Can you call me back when you get a second. Makayla is fine, but she had an incedent this morning that I would like to tell you about." My heart jumped out of my chest! I just pictures some kid biting her, or her biting some kid, or her falling and bumping her head. A million things ran through my head. I called back and she told me that when they were serving breakfast one of the ladies put grits into a bowl and Makayla reached in to grab them, but they were still really hot. Of course Kayla screamed. The lady got the grits off of her hand as quick as she could and put a cold towel on her hand. There was no blistering or anything like that. I was so relieved to hear that. It might sound weird but I was thinking "thank God she only burned her hand." A lot worst could have happened.
I gotta run. I just laid Kayla down for a nap. Now I have the rest of our day to plan out. Hope you all have a great week.

I almost forgot

I have yet ANOTHER site for everyone to check on. This time it is a VIDEO site!!! I know... how exciting! There are only a select few that I will let have this site. I haven't password protected it yet, and there are some videos on there that I don't want any wierdos to look at so e-mail me, or leave a comment, to get the site. There are some really cute videos on there. Some of her dancing, walking, playing with her new hippo toy, laughing, taking a bath, and the very first time she ever reached out and grabbed for some toys in front of her. The bath ones are the reason I'm not putting the site on here. I have no way of knowing who looks at this site. It is really sad that I have to be like that, but this world isn't the safest place. Hope yall don't feel like im over-exagerating, i'm just an over protective momma! :-)
Here are some pictures from the last trip we took to the zoo before Duncan had to leave. The first three are some of my favorites. She couldn't get enough of him this day. I really think she knew he was going to be leaving.

Here she is seeing ducks for the first time. She must have said "du" a million times that day after seeing them. There was no animal in the zoo that she didn't call "du!"

This is another shot that I love.


A picture of me! WOW... that's rare.

I love cats, so here we are checking one out. Of course Kayla re-named him "du!"

Look at the curiousity in that face. This girl really amazes me. I can't remember what I did before she came along.

It's Official...

I am now the mother of a toddler! Makayla started walking for good on the 6th of this month. Before then she would take a few steps here and there, but nothing constant. On the night of the sixth I guess she figured "they know I am walking... so I might as well give in." She got up and circled the house probably a dozen times like she had been walking all along. We were SO excited! Now all she wants to do is walk, and believe me, I don't mind. This girl is heavy!
I think a lot of her walking has to do with the fact that she has moved into the next age bracket daycare room. Up until she was 13 months she was in the "infant room". Anyone who knows Kayla knows that she was bored out of her mind in that room. They had a small "boxed-in" play area that had very immature toys. She could entertain herself but we all know that Kayla is extremely observant and it is hard to be observant of children that are doing less that you. Now she has moved up the the 13 months to 3 year old room and she is doing great! I LOVE this room. It is the best thing for her. They have an art room where the kids get to paint and draw and stuff like that. They have a gross motor room where they get to climb. They have a wonderful outdoor play ground which has a garden in one corner of it. The kids grow fruits every year in their garden and get to pick the fruit when it is ripe and make a fruit salad. They also teach them to self serve their food when it is time to eat. They have designated nap areas, and story time. I could go on and on about how wonderful this room is, but I think what I like the most is the communication between me and the daycare providers. The other room never really updated me on how she was doing and I HATED that. The "lead" in this new room tells me everything Kayla does from the dozen times a day she wants to wash her hands to the pulling of hair on a little boy who wanted to sit in the seat she was sitting in for lunch. (Yea... she thinks shes a bully, or maybe he thought he could pick on the new girl! LOL) The providers all seemed as excited as I was about her walking. I just love this new room. I can't say that enough.
A lot has changed here in good ole' KY. Duncan is officially out of the army and loving that. He unfortunatley took a job with his dad who works for th military, but is currently in Georgia. Duncan HATES being away from Makayla, but makes more than enough money to support his family. I am so happy that is able to look at the big picture of things like this. We both know that finacially this is what is best. We all know i'm broke... i'm in the military! LOL J/K... well, not really!
Another new thing around here is the constant use of the "R" word. That's right. I am in my window to reenlist and they are doing EVERYTHING possible to get me to do it. They sure are making it sound tempting, but I would have to end up in Cali to actually consider it. They are trying to get me within 2 hours of Napa with a huge bonus, so we shall see.
Now for the good stuff. PICTURES!!!
Our princess is still a book worm, and I completely encourage that. Here she is in the middle of her bedroom floor looking at some books. Notice how she has to pull ALL the book off the shelves so she can look at one of them for 20 mins.

Another reading session. I put her in our reading chair and told her "read this while mommy cleans up the mess." Sure enough she opened it up and started pointing at the pictures and "reading." She is too much.

This was one of the rainy days that we had last weekend. We spent a lot of time in the house so we had to switch between the living room with the toys and Noggin channel and her bedroom with the toys and her childrens music CD's.

Another thing her new daycare room is teaching is writting and coloring. I was so surprised that she knew what to do when I handed her a pen for the first time. I went and got this magnadoodle because it isn't so messy.

Here is the toddler walking around "the island" at 0600am waiting for me to get ready to take her to daycare. That little squooshy face she is making is because she was trying to run. She gets really stiff and tries so hard to run, but really never picks up the pace and ends up throwing her balance all off. It is the funniest thing to watch.

This was another 0600am picture. Every time I see this pictures I can't help but laugh. We were sitting at the table waiting to leave for daycare. We were having our usual morning conversation and I was so tired I kept yawning. Every time I would yawn she would mock me. I could not stop laughing. I don't think I ever got a "good yawn" in that morning.

My little helper, still loves the dryer! Now I can get her to throw laundry into the washer and pull things out of the dryer. By the time she is 2 I might be able to take that off the list of things I have to do every weekend and add it to hers. LOL J/K
This is one of her new toys that she got some time in the last couple of weeks. It is an inflatable hippo. She can crawl through the mouth and the back is full of "chucky cheese" balls that she can jump around and play in. She loves this thing.





That's it for the pictures for now. I don't know how many of you check the flickr page that I have set up, but there are a few other new pictures on there. It is so easy to add pictures to that page. I can upload them right from my camera! I really love that page. I can update it quicker and easier than this page, so check it often!