18 months

 I cannot believe my little baby is already 18 months old!  This has been the fastest year and a half of my life, and I've loved every second of it. 

Kate can say:  mom, dad, nana (grandma), nana (banana), I'm stuck, ball, up, down, woah, all right, what is that?, where did it go?, ouch, tv, mine, night night, I love you, bye bye, hello, hi, hey, uh oh, one, two, three, five, elmo, raar, quack, thank you, go, goal, weee, vroom vroom, bottle, sippy cup, eyes, nose, mouth, shoes.....okay she says a lot of things.

Kate's favorite shows:  Sesame Street, Dora, Backyardigans, Blue's Clues

Kate's favorite movie:  Pippi Longstocking.  Remember this movie?  Yes, the one from the 80's.  It's the only movie she'll actually sit and watch!

Kate's favorite foods: bananas, macaroni and cheese, peas, fruit snacks, and basically anything mommy and daddy are eating.

Kate has been going to nursery for the past 3 sundays!  She LOVES it!  When we dropped her off for the first time, she didn't even look back at us.  She was just so excited to play with people her size.

She can do the hand motions to popcorn popping and itsy bitsy spider.

Kate's favorite toys:  Elmo, her baby doll, her kitchen, slide and magna doodle.

Kate loves to dance, play with cousins, play soccer with daddy, play outside, play with mommy's hair, and get into trouble.

We love this girl, and we're so incredibly blessed to have her in our lives!

Kate's Kitchen

Our wonderful next door neighbor gave us this play kitchen. It's the perfect toy for Kate. She loves this thing! I'm always trying to stop her from playing in MY kitchen, and now she has one of her own!

I love that she loves to clean it!  Good training for the future!

Mmmm...time for dinner!

Bubble Ooodles

These little bubbles are probably the best $6 I've ever spent.  I know what you're thinking, $6 for bubbles?  But these bubbles are no ordinary bubbles.  They are amazing bubbles!  Example One:

They never pop!  They seriously don't pop unless you physically pop them.  Once I left some unpopped bubbles on my stairs, and they stayed intact for days.

Example two:  The bubble liquid is really thick so it lasts forever, and it comes with this cool trumpet thing.  One toot on this and your room is filled with bubbles!  I can make my front room look like Willy Wonka's Factory in seconds. 

I've been trying to teach Kate how to blow her nose lately, so I guess she got confused when I said to "blow" the bubbles!

That's not right either sweetie...

She loves these things, and I do too!

Cookies, as seen by my toddler.

Me:  Kate, we're going to make some cookies for Daddy!

Kate:  doh-day (okay)

Me:  Ooohh, look there cooking in the oven now!

Kate: Woooah.

Mommy I want a cookie!

How long must I wait?!?

Puh-lease give me a cookie mommy?!?

           Woooah.

 Hmmm....do I like cookies?

Yes I do!

This is yummy!

Cookies are...

Awesome!!!!!

Oh man it's all gone!!!  I'd better go beg Mom for some more...

That'll show you Mom!

Nothin' is outta my reach anymore!!!

The Children's Museum Adventure

When I was little and living in Florida, my mother would take us to the local children's museum on a regular basis. I remember how much fun I had, and I can still remember the exhibits to this day. So, even though Kate is only 17 months old, I've been wanting to take her to the Phoenix Children's Museum. I looked on their website and saw that on the first friday of every month the museum is open to the public for FREE. Score! So last night we went.

Now I'm going to say this: It was awesome, but NOT on free friday! It was so incredibly packed that it sucked all the fun out of it.  There were so many people that it just made it stressful! So if you're planning a trip, definitely pay to go during regular hours and don't be a cheapo like me. We could barely navigate around the rooms, it was hard to take pictures, and it smelled of bodies and stinky feet. The next time I go, I will definitely go during a school day during normal hours, so Kate can actually enjoy the museum and have time to play with everything she wants. So, with all that said, I think the kids still had a great time.

The first room we went in was the 3 and under room. This was the most fun room of the night (it was the least crowded). There was stuff to climb on and through, slides, and play houses.

The next room was a play grocery store.  I was sad we couldn't get one of the cute child sized carts to play with, but Kate was okay since she quickly found the most entertaining part of the grocery store.  The beans.

We moved on and explored the museum...

until we came upon the sand table.  Kate loves anything to do with dirt and rocks so this was her favorite!  Until she decided to taste the sand, then she decided she didn't like it so much.

Our last stop was the crazy climbing thing/jungle gym/maze/death trap.  I don't know why we thought it would be a good idea for 4 adults and 3 small children to attempt this but we did.  Well, it was quite an experience!  The adults could barely fit through the little crawl spaces, we kept climbing upwards but there were only dead ends, and Kate and Jaylee did not find it fun at all.  Plus, it was so crowded in there! 

Well, we survived and made it out with all our children.  And after only an hour and a half in the children's museum we were more than ready to leave!  So we packed up and headed home.  It was a fun night (sorta) and we'll have to visit again at a less crazy time.