Happy Birthday to Me...

OK so I just had a birthday and I had to post my cute pics on here for all to see. I'm pretty sure I have the most darling baby girl on the planet, which is actually what inspired me to take these pictures, not the fact that I am now 26, which my sister-in-law has so kindly informed me is "middle-aged." Ha ha! I think not, but one thing I determined to do a little while ago was to age gracefully. I don't mean physically, because it's sort of hard to control that sort of thing. I mean attitude-wise. I know so many people who freak out when they turn 30 or 40 or whatever, and I really hope to just be able to take each year in stride. So guess what? I'm 26, and I wouldn't care if that number was 36! I hope to be able to proudly state my age each year, so that when I'm 65, I can grin and tell people that I've lived 65 good years. That's my goal anyway! :)

Sydney and Aaron surprised me with singing and a few presents. I got the movie Eragon (very good, as are the books), a pen picked out specifically by Sydney while at Best Buy, and.... a BB/Pellet Gun also known as a varmint shooter. Hooray! I think Sydney was mostly confused about the whole thing, but excited that I was excited. She also repeatedly tried to eat my presents. I don't know how they tasted since I took more of a looking approach.
She is still not very helpful in the present unwrapping arena. She mostly just wanted me to tear pieces of paper off for her to eat. Yum.
For those of you out there wondering (and I know you are!), I really did want the BB Gun - we've got a serious rabbit problem in Colorado. It's so fancy it even has a little scope! It's probably not a great one (and let's face it, I really don't need one) but it's sort of exciting that it has one anyway, I'm not gonna lie.
Also tonight a whole bunch of girls from our ward went out to Chili's to celebrate mine as well as 2 other girls birthdays. This means I am extra full but had tons of fun having a girls night and enjoyed a little time away. As I got there a family arrived with 3 kids, lugging in the kids, diaper bags, and other paraphernalia that kids attract. I had a weird moment where for a split second I wondered where my diaper bag was. Hadn't I brought it? Then I relaxed and enjoyed the fact that Sydney was spending the evening with her daddy and I was getting a milkshake. The end.

Why We Love Summer

Eating outside (some of us just in our nuddy pants obviously!)

Water balloon fights (these created a fair amount of confusion!)
Going to the zoo (we got to see a baby zebra that was only like 17 hours old! He was cute.)
Swimming in the pool. The floatie is Syd's favorite. She kicks her little legs and swims around the 6ft x 8ft kiddie pool.
Summer foods! She was going nuts for the cantelope!

Happy Independence Day!

Today was Sydney's first Independence Day! We started off with our ward's traditional pancake breakfast. I think Sydney ate an entire pancake! She was so happy about it. (Food makes her that way). We came home, took naps, ate some burgers, and got ready to go to the fireworks.

We have this fantastic mall right next to our house and they had live bands and fireworks. We drove the 1 1/2 miles and parked our truck in a fantastic spot. We walked around for awhile and enjoyed the band and the festive air. I also got a snow cone (what moron decided not to sell them regularly in Colorado?) and the lady gave us Sydney's snazzy glow stick necklace. Confession: I have always wanted one of these and have actually never had one. I was way more interested in it than Sydney was!

When it was time for the fireworks we went back to the truck. We opened the back window and let Sydney sit in her seat for a bit while we waited for them to start. (This picture was taken in the back of the truck looking in).
After a bit she came out to join us
Here's our sweet set up
Sydney's initial reaction to the fireworks

She soon cheered up though (after a bunch of Cheerios) and was pretty calm the rest of the time. Although apparently last year the show was pretty poor, it was really great this year! We're used to the fireworks in Idaho (which is actually one of the best shows West of the Mississippi), and we've seen some pretty poor ones in other places we've lived. We were very impressed with this show and really pleased with it! We had some serious issues getting out when the super smart people over there decided to control traffic in the most ridiculous way possible. We finally got home though, so all in all it was a great day!

Simple Toys are Best

Everyone knows simple toys are best. The other day we gave Sydney a box. We used it as a train/car, and it also proved very useful for keeping her in one place for a little while!

Such as when I needed to clean the garage
It worked pretty well! She has lots of fun with it and is perfectly capable of tipping it over so she can wiggle out when she wants to!

Fun in the Sun

Wow, it's been a long time since I've posted. Sorry! Here are some pictures of what we've been doing. We've gone to the pool since it's been pretty warm! On this particular day Sydney waved at the camera every time she saw it.

Then she got tired and we relaxed for a bit.Silly girl.
Afterward we had popsicles. Sydney sort of liked them.
She did not however, like it being taken away! You know she loves her food, but this particularly ticked her off!

Funny Moments

Sleepy Head

Mmmmm. Kiwi tastes soooo good.
Eating the Ravenclaw bracelet I got with the last Harry Potter book. I got Gryffindor, Slytherin, and Ravenclaw. This is the only one she really loves. At least Potter is a part of her daily diet!

Eating hot taco rice. Um, yeah she's excited about food.

Visit from the Parents

My parents came to visit a week and a half ago and we did lots of fun things. First we took a trip to the zoo.

Sydney got pretty tuckered out by the end! We ended up with a zoo pass though, so we're totally excited to go back a lot!
Sydney decided she was in a snuggly mood that night
Believe me - it's unusual! This girl is pretty independant and mostly pushes away and cries if you try to snuggle her. I think she was too exhausted to fight it!
We also went on a few short little hikes at a state park not far from here. It was fun, and Syd's first time hiking, although it was really interesting doing it with the front carrier on! I kept feeling like I was going to trip over something! Thank heavens I didn't!
It was lots of fun to have them here and we're glad they were able to make the trip out!

One of My Weirdest

I don't dream hardly ever. I know most people that say this actually do dream and just can't remember them, but for the most part, I don't think that's me. I've had more dreams in the past year than in the 8-10 years combined, and I think I've still only had about 5 that I can remember. Anyway, I had a weird one last night and I thought I'd share before I forgot it.
It was raining like crazy here at my house and my parents were visiting (they actually did just leave, I'll post pictures soon). They came in my back door and informed me there was a raccoon in my backyard. I went to look and saw a giant prickly porcupine walking away on my patio. I couldn't see the raccoon though, so I opened the door (My dream self is brilliant) and spotted another prickly guy in the back of my yard, 4 lion cubs cuddling under one of our back bushes, and a badger making his way for the house! I quickly shut the door and half-squished a mouse in it. Not until seeing the mouse did I scream. I reopened the door, kicked the mouse out, and noticed that 2 of the lion cubs were sitting inside my back door. We had to grab them by the napes of their necks and toss them out the back door. At that point I realized that my scream had woken Sydney up and was really ticked (not about the ridiculous animals in my yard, just about my baby being awake. Then I woke up to Sydney actually waking up for real this morning. Weird.

Happy Father's Day!

I know it's the end of Father's Day, but I wanted to say Happy First Father's Day to Aaron!
He is such a great daddy and Sydney loves playing with him so much. She loves that he throws her in the air and feeds her his pancakes in the morning. She's got him all wrapped up and he loves it, and so do I! Thanks for being such a great dad Aaron! We love you!

First Swim!

Today Sydney went swimming for the first time ever! We went to our friend's pool which was so great. The shallow end goes down to about 1 inch of water since the edge of the pool is level with the sidewalk right at first. This meant I got to set Sydney down and let her sit in the water and figure it out. She started out confused.

Then she realized it was pretty cool.
There were these great little fountains that only shot up about 1 foot. Eli and Sydney both enjoyed them.
They were her favorite part

We did go out a bit deeper too (see, it goes to my ankles!)Doing some real "swimming." She actually paddled her arms a tiny bit even!
She was really excited to get wrapped in a towel afterward. She loves to be snuggly and was a tad cold at that point.

We got semi-dressed to eat some snacks.

She left these on just long enough to get a picture.

All in all we had tons of fun! We'll go back to the pool soon!

Going Places

This kid is going places, seriously. She uses lots of ways to get to where she wants to go, but still doesn't seem to get too far from home! Sometimes she goes by sea,

Sometimes she rides a zebra (our great neighbors gave us this. She can't use it on her own yet but really likes it anyway)
Sometimes she's biker baby (again, not on her own - her feet aren't on the floor!)
Slinking was a favorite mode of transportation for awhile. She started out sitting up completely in this picture. This is where she ended up. She grew out of that phase pretty quickly though.
Jumping is her current favorite. Our great neighbors also gave us their Jumperoo and Sydney thinks it's the greatest ever. Her poor little leg muscles would just about give out after a couple minutes when she first figured it out though, and she would just lay down because she was all tuckered out! FYI, she still doesn't get the Johnny Jump-up. She sits and stares at us like, "um, this is boring. Can I go back to the one with toys?"
Crawling - yeah not so much. She just looks cute in the pose. Which we put her in.
She's pretty convinced balloons can get her off the farm

But in the end,she's not too unhappy to stay where she is. Especially when daddy shares his toast and jam with her!