Silly words and Bob's newest fan

Because it's been so hot this last week we've gone swimming a few times. I told Azure that we had to put on our bathing suits to go. She looked in her drawer for it and when she found it exclaimed, "Okay, baby soup!" I almost died laughing. She is so fun! After she was dressed, we applied her spray on sunscreen. She likes to pretend she's spraying it herself and then rubs it on, even on her bathing suit. Being a stay at home mom is truly the best career move I've ever made :)

Another cute word she says is caterpillar. She adds 2 or 3 extra syllables in there. I'll have to get her saying it on video. At the temple last week we saw a caterpillar on the grass. I put Azure's arm right in it's path so that it would crawl up her arm. She loved watching it crawl up and down and wiggled with delight since it tickled. Almost everyday since then she's been talking about her caterpillar friend, always followed by the word "arm" and then the sign for caterpillar.

Aside from the theme songs of Signing Time and Backyardigans, Get Up, Stand Up is now one of Azure's favorite songs!

Hair cut, animals, videos

Last week I cut my hair. I wanted to try it somewhat short to prepare for the hot, humid summer we have ahead.This is the shortest my hair has ever been. I'm starting to like it more and more. Mostly because it only takes 10 mins to style straight, and only 5 mins to style curly. Gotta love that! My natural curl even curls better, now that it's shorter. On Fridays Charles doesn't have class until 9am so Azure gets to see him before he leaves for school. She wanted to ride on his back, but was still a little sleepy.We bought a membership to the Wilderness Park here and usually go on Toddler Tuesdays. Azure likes the farm and the wolves the best. In the car on the way there she excitedly repeated, "Farm, cow, *moo*, sheep, *baa*, donkey, horse, *neigh*, pig, chicken, *ca-doodle-doo*." And of course, she can do all the signs too, thank you to Signing Time's Leah's Farm. One of our favorites! We check them all out from our library.

Preface to this video: I had Azure on my lap as I read her Hokey Pokey book, which is just the lyrics to the song. I grabbed her arm and shook it all about, and then her legs, and so on to help her learn the movements. Well, she copied me exactly!


Doesn't she just make you smile? Today after coming home from choir rehearsal, I was feeling pretty depressed. I could feel tears welling up in my eyes. As soon as I opened the door, Azure greeted me, "Hi mommy!" She came running and wrapped her arms around my legs. I bent down and she gave me a kiss. I could feel the love that the Lord had for me through that sweet, little girl. What a blessing children are!

Our first political rally

We attended the Tea party on Wed with fellow citizens to let our voice be heard against our government spending our money like it's not our business.

Who enjoyed it the most?

That's right, Azure. She was clapping most of the time and yelling, "Yay!" the other times. Apparently she really likes political rallies.

Our sign reads: Stop The Republicrat Spending Spree. Azure's sign says: My Future Is Not Socially Secure. This is a sobering fact of our future as Americans; a fact I was ignorant to as of recently.

Here's a trailer of the movie about all of this:

Yummy Sauce

About 2 wks or so ago Azure started saying, "Yummy sauce". She had said the word yummy before but, not sauce. And certaintly not sauce paired with the word yummy. I tried to figure out where she came up with it. I remembered a few days earlier she wouldn't eat her apples so I suggested that she dip them in honey, thinking that would entice her to finish them. Sure enough, it did the trick. The next day, she again wouldn't finish her "pastas" (this time mac n cheese w/ broccoli bits). So, I squirted some ketchup on it, and she gobbled it up.

So, I'm concluding that the yummy sauce is both honey and ketchup based on the following conversation:
Me: "Azure, what's the yummy sauce?"
A: "Yummy sauce"
Me: "Is it the Ketchup?"
A: "Ketchup"
Me: "Or the honey?"
A: "Honey"

But, I think we've found yet a 3rd candidate for "yummy sauce". I got the fabulous idea from some crafty kid blog (forgot which one now) to use leftover Cool Whip as edible finger paint. It was a huge hit, though I think I'll use even less next time. She had quite a sugar high after consuming this new yummy sauce.

Happy Easter and other stuff

Seems like awhile since I've done a good post on Azure's new developments...

Yesterday I stood on one of our stools to reach a baking dish on the top shelf of our storage. Azure had been watching me curiously, and as soon as I stood up on the stool she said, "Sit down mommy!" I laughed out loud. Especially when she kept repeating it, her tone getting more and more stern.

She still calls movies, "fujis" and requests to watch one at least 5x a day. I always repeat back to her her request in question form. "You want to watch a fuji?" Her answer, "Okay." I think it's her wishful thinking that of course my answer will be, "okay". Which most of the time it is, unless it's bedtime. Then I ask her, "Which movie do you want to watch?" More than half of the time her answer is, "Baby sally." Which is to say Baby Signing Time or Signing Time. She has a book called "Silly Sally" and gets the words sign and sally mixed up.

We had a good Easter Week. I planned a Passover type dinner for the Young Women at church. Read about Christ's last week on earth, went to a wilderness park, dyed Easter eggs, made candy lollipops for the first time, prepared an Easter lesson for the Young Women, put together Easter baskets for them, planned, invited, and cooked for 10 people for Easter dinner (7 adults, 3 kids) and tried to compile our videos of Azure for The Generations Project. It was busy, but good.

We asked Charles' friend if he could take a few pics of us in our Easter garb. Turns out he has a WAY nice camera and used to photograph weddings. Nice! Here are a few:

"Oh no, wa wa"

This is in the cool/erie city of Celebration, FL (outside of Orlando) on our way back from the keys. Azure enjoyed playing in this water works, though she was a little frightened. "Oh no" and "wet" pretty much sums up this video.

Aunt Tally and Uncle Angel come to visit

The day after my Bday my sister and brother in law came to visit. We had such a great time. It made me sad that we can only see them about 2x a year or so. We are so far.

We had an Easter Egg Hunt at the park.

And played...

Then the excitement began. Savannah is known for it's rivers and marshes. We thought it would be a great idea to do some canoeing on the river. Wrong. It was low tide. Low tide = mud.

Lots of mud

After successfully getting the canoe down the slippery, mud covered ramp, Angel and I got in. 2 minutes later we tipped.

This is my swamp sludge face
"Remember that one time we tried to go canoeing and fell in the swamp and waded ankle deep in mud?" Fun, memorable times :)

We mostly went sight seeing and ate Southern Style. Azure loved the attention. We loved the company.

Y'all come back now, ya hear?

My Birthday

Last Friday I turned 28. This is the first Bday that I have felt somewhat old. 27 didn't seem old to me, 28 does. We had some friends over and ate cake.I am happy to have another year of life. I'm grateful to have married a man that loves to travel just as much as me. We have many more travels planned for the future. I am especially grateful to be the mother of this sweet girl.