Spring Fever!

The Easter egg at the end of the day after being "gently" carried around all afternoon and night.
Julia dyed this egg at Miss Melinda's when she was there Tuesday. She chose yellow because it matched blankie.

Martha Stewart's in the house! Julia and I whipped up some bird nests for CrossRidge's bake sale. Chow Mein noodles, almond bark and jelly bean eggs....so easy and cute too!

Treat bags for the Easter party at Miss Melinda's. Julia loved sitting outside on the deck and putting these together. It was really hard for her to understand why we couldn't eat the treats and play with the stickers that went into the bags.


One of our favorite places is the library. They always have a craft to go along with the holiday. Here is Julia showing off her newly constructed Easter egg magnet.

Concentrating on making it perfect...

We have LOVED the blow ups at Eldridge Court this year.

Julia and Sol, I mean Spiderman! Becca says he won't wear anything else...lol!

Becca and Spiderman helped us to start a new tradition of playing hide and go seek at Eldridge Court. Here's Spiderman counting.

Here's Julia counting.

She loves the hide and seek game until I am hiding so good that she can't see me. She likes it for a minute, but then sheer panic sets in and after screaming, "ready or not, here I come!" she starts crying and yelling Mommy, where are you?

Julia's quotable quote one night when we were coming home after dark. "Mommy, the moon is following us!" Wow, that's deep!

California Dreamin....

Pebble Beach

I just got back from a great trip to California. Mary Katherine went with me and it's easy to forget that I did go there because it was a required work trip because we managed to fit so much fun in between the work! We flew out of Northwest Arkansas to Sacramento last Sunday afternoon and visited Napa Valley when we got there. We drove to San Francisco where we stayed until Wednesday for my meetings. Highlights in San Francisco were our hike through Muir Woods, dinner in North Beach, Wicked (yes, it was my THIRD time to see it!), the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (very memorable!), and of course, the shopping. I LOVE me some Anthropologie!


We left San Francisco at noon Wednesday and headed south on Highway 1. It was an amazing drive and the scenery is unforgettable. We didn't have much of an agenda and I really prefer to travel that way. We stopped when we saw something interesting and made lots of side trips. The trip was the best of everything.....wineries, the city, the beach, the theater, museums, the woods, books on tape, lots of good food, a great traveling companion, and I could go on! We made our way to LA Friday to fly home and only had to buy one extra piece of luggage to haul all of our new purchases home ;)

The wineries.....

Hearst Castle.....very interesting tourist stop in San Simeon!

And true to my crazy ways, I left Fayetteville at 10 pm Friday night and drove straight home to my baby girl because I couldn't bear to be without her for another second. I tried to wake her up when I got home at 3 am with lots of kisses, but she wasn't interested. She made up for it with her squeals of happiness when she woke up Saturday morning! John said she didn't ask for me once while I was gone.

Almost 28 months!

Just thought I would write a few notes about Julia at almost 28 months....

* She has an incredible vocabulary and it never ceases to amaze us. She gets her pronouns mixed up sometimes and calls Daddy a "she" and herself "my". She calls Sonic "Snogit" She talks to inanimate objects often like telling her book, "Thank you very much, book." Her memory is also pretty amazing. She remembers people and other details better than I do!

* Julia is a little on the shy side when it comes to interacting with other people. I don't say that she is shy where she can hear it because I don't want her to grow up with that label and believing that she is shy. Usually I just tell people that it takes her little while to "warm up" when she is hiding behind my leg and not talking.

* She loves to perform by singing songs and dancing. She loves her music and unfortunately, has her mom's rhythm when she dances! She also loves to color, create things with playdoh, make crafts, and paint. We think she is already quite the accomplished artist.

* Julia is a big girl. Tall and filled out:)! I can hardly carry her anymore without some serious arm cramps...not that she wants me to anyway.

* Her favorite places are the park, the library, Jee Jee and Papaw's house, and most of all "Home Sweet Home." I think she and John would be perfectly content staying at home and never leaving!

* She is a great sleeper and a great eater. She goes to bed around 9 or 9:30 and wakes up around 8:30. Her naps are getting less and less predictable. She usually lays down around 2:30 and after talking for 30 minutes or so, she will sleep for an hour and a half or so. Sometimes, she will do without a nap but we pay dearly for that later! She eats just about anything we put in front of her, but she does have her favorites (chicken, any and all kinds of fruit, goldfish crackers, juice). Oh yeah, and milk. She drinks entirely too much milk!!

* Julia throws the occasional fit, but they usually happen when she is really tired. She is very good natured, very laid back, and doesn't mind following the rules (for the most part.) The worst part of her days are diaper changes (yes, I am getting ready to get serious about some potty training), putting on clothes, and being made to lay down for a nap.

* She is very content staying at home with John four days a week while I work. She goes to Miss Melinda's on Tuesdays. The last couple of weeks there have been much better for her. She hasn't cried when we left her now for three weeks in a row. It definitely makes all of our days better when she doesn't cry. John is trying out life as a professional musician. It definitely has its ups (getting to stay home with Julia during the week, doing what he loves) and downs (being gone almost all weekend every weekend, driving in the wee hours only to keep me constantly worried about his safety), but overall, its working out okay for now.

Julia and Shawnie and Pat Crase's fun and amazing! art show at the library. Julia spent her time playing with the Thoma the train set that they have at the library. She looks so serious because I interrupted her playing and asked her to pose for the picture!

Hanging out with Sol and Parker

A Sunday afternoon's art and her first time with watercolor!