Mara's 2nd Birthday Party

We celebrated Mara's 2nd birthday with a fun-filled, sun-filled BBQ party!
These photos are mediocre and I didn't snap many... it is hard to be the photographer and the host. :)

Mara during the birthday song... a little unsure...

 Very unsure and reaching for the nearest person...

...her great Aunt Jeanie (and godmother!)...

Jellybean Bribery

I said:  "I'll give you guys jellybeans if you let me take your picture."
This is what I got.
I highly recommend jellybeans as bribery.

Old Ladies

These two sit around in these chairs and just shoot the breeze.
You'd think they were 80.

I hope this is what they are doing when they are 80.
I love it.

Cousins Who Read Together.... Stay Together

Phone Pics... May and June 2013

I have been using the camera on my phone a lot more lately and as I was scrolling through the other day, I realized I had quite a few cute ones that I wanted to save. Here are a handful from May and June, in no particular order.

Woodland Park Zoo, May 2013

Kennedy getting her face painted at the zoo.

Roderick holding a real fish at preschool... it's in his genes!

 Kennedy at her "graduation" at MDO preschool...

Kennedy's preschool friend, Leighton, came for a play date. The girls had so much fun playing dress-up!

Road Trippin' to Lake Chelan for a girls weekend with Margaret and Heidi!

Bike Riding on the Auburn - Green River trail...

Library time! Their favorite part is playing on the computers. Ahh... kids these days.

Kennedy holding sweet baby Laila (my friend Sarah's new baby girl).
Kennedy was enamored by her!

Riding the horse outside of Fred Meyer before our big family outing to grocery shop :)

Kennedy and I on her last day of Co-Op preschool. 

Cousin Love! Mckenna, Kennedy and Mara - June 2013

Rocky and the Toothless Wonder

Anyone who knows me knows I am very accident prone.
Apparently my daughters are taking after me.

Last week, Mara fell off one of our bar stools while strapped into her portable high chair. Kennedy was playing peek-a-boo and accidentally knocked the entire bar stool over WITH Mara in it. Mara whacked her head on the hardwood floor leaving a nasty goose egg right in between her eyebrows. It was purple and huge and I was so upset that I immediately took her into our pediatrician. Fortunately, she did not have a concussion or anything, just a bad goose egg which turned into two black eyes. Here is a photo of her in the doctor's office. It breaks my heart to even look at it!

But as you can see, it is healing nicely and you can just see some faint bruising now.

Exactly 24 HOURS LATER... Kennedy got bonked in the mouth by her cousin Roderick. It was an accident... they were rolling on the ground laughing and he went to sit up and caught her in the chin with his head. Totally fluke deal but it knocked one of her bottom teeth loose and fractured the one next to it. SOOO... off we went again to the pediatric dentist. I have been to the pediatric dentist wayy too much... remember this?!?

Unfortunately, this wasn't such an easy fix and the dentist told me that her tooth had been broken down to the gum so we had to have it extracted. Ugh. It was terrible having to watch my little girl go through that. They gave her some nitrous to calm her down and of course they numbed her but she was so scared that it just broke my heart. At one point the hygienist was rubbing MY back because I was crying as they poked the needle into her gum to numb her.

Needless to say, it was a stressful few days.  But, Kennedy was remarkably brave through the whole thing and she now proudly walks around with her missing bottom tooth.

We also got a visit from the tooth fairy who generously left Kennedy three whole dollars since this was such a traumatic tooth loss :) Kennedy was a bit unsure of the tooth fairy concept so she insisted we write her a letter asking her to just leave her surprise downstairs like Santa. She did not like the idea of the tooth fairy actually coming into her room in the middle of the night. Can't blame her - it is kind of a creepy concept!

Crossing my fingers that we will be accident-free for a long while!

Dear Mara ... On Your 2nd Birthday

Dear Mara-Bug,
I always say it but man, time flies! Two years, already?!?! I would be pretty sad at how fast time is going if I didn't enjoy you so much at this age! You are just a joy... as you have been since the moment you were born. You continue to be our little happy-go-lucky, laid-back girl. I always say "that's our Mara... just along for the ride.... so happy to be here." And it's true.
You are so good-natured... and loving... truly my little snuggle-bug.

A few things I really want to remember about you at this age.

 - How you snuggle with me in bed in the mornings. You wake up between 6-6:30 everyday and I bring you in bed with me for a little while. You don't like to just snuggle next to me... you literally like to lay on top of me. :) You lay right on my chest just like you did as a newborn. Sometimes you fall back to sleep but most of the time you just lay and sing little songs to yourself. Long after you are grown and on your own, these morning snuggles will stay near and dear to my heart.

- You are such a ham! We call you our little goofball. And no one thinks you are funnier than your sister. Lately, I will be in the kitchen or folding laundry or something and I will hear little giggles coming from the play room. I will find you and Kennedy in there just laughing hysterically to yourselves. Of course you have your moments of getting frustrated with each other but mostly, you just love each other. Little buddies, that is for certain.

- You are becoming quite a little talker - I would estimate that you know upwards of 250+ words? And you have started to put them together into little two or three word phrases such as "daddy come home," "daddy at work," "where's sissy?", etc.

- At your two month check-up, you weighed 22.8 lbs and were 32 inches in height. You are in the 10th percentile for weight and in the 15th percentile for height. Right around where your sister was at this age, I believe.

- Your hair is an unruly mess and I put in ponytails most days as we wait for it to grow out of this awkward phase. When it is down and in it's full glory, I always call you the mad scientist (see below for proof!).

- You love, love, love MUSIC. You love to sing songs...every night before bed, we rock in the chair for 15 minutes or so and we sing song after song after song. You never get tired of it and you know the words to a lot of these songs which is so cute. You also love books and puzzles.

- Favorite Foods: ummmm..... EVERYTHING. No joke. You LOVE food. The other day you ate salmon and guacamole for lunch. Totally typical of a toddler, right? Your major favorites though are macaroni and cheese (you eat an average of 3 bowls if I make it... you are your mother's daughter), yogurt, fruit (watermelon!), avocado, cucumbers, tomatoes. You and your sister are not difficult to feed that is for sure... I am actually super grateful for this fact!

Pretending to talk on the phone with a paper plate... as I said... a ham

- You still nap once a day (usually for about an hour and a half to two hours). You are a routine girl... sound asleep in bed by 8 pm and up about 6:30ish. A few photos I snapped of you after your nap the other day... they really capture how stinkin' happy you are!!

I won't babble on and on but to put it simply............. you are a pleasure and a joy and you add so very much to our little family. I love watching you grow and change and I can't wait to see what you will do in this life. I think it is going to be so wonderful and special. You are an amazing little lady... thanks for being my favorite second-born daughter. :) You make me oh so happy (OK... maybe I did babble on just a little.)

Happy 2nd  Birthday bug... Your mama loves you to pieces.
x0x0