We Love the Ice Cream Truck!

I get all excited when I hear the music of the ice cream truck in our neighborhood, like I'm 5 years old all over again.  This past Saturday, we got to enjoy our first treat of the season.  Kinda crazy that it started making the rounds in March.  Love it!

Yep, I'll take a Reese's Peanut Butter ice cream cup.  

Oh, and the hot guy in plaid too, please.

St. Patrick's Day Parade

We went to the downtown St. Patrick's Day parade last weekend.  It was our first time and I have a couple of assessments:

1) Basically if you're wearing green, holding a beer or like to ride party buses, you're a shoo-in to be part of the parade. 
2)  It lasted forever.  We showed up minutes before it started and left well before it ended. 
3)  It pays to have a cute 2 year old daughter.  Even though we didn't show up early, a very intoxicated man insisted that we take his wife's spot and park Lily's stroller right up to the front of the curb.  Good thing is, I don't think his wife minded.  And oddly enough, their first granddaughter was born last month and was named Lily.  Extra coincidental bonus points for us in scoring a rockstar spot!

All in all, it was something fun & different to do on a free Saturday and we ran into some great friends while we were at it!

This was Lily's expression basically the whole time.  Not happy, not sad, just expressionless. I think she was tired because she constantly had her 2 beloved fingers in her mouth.

Lots of green!

Evening Walks

I LOVE LOVE LOVE going on evening walks as a family.  I'm so thrilled that the weather is shaping up to be suitable for this all the time!  Last week we were able to walk and play outside right up until Lily's bedtime most nights.  That gives me a happy heart. :)  We even got to stop by Justin's new workout spot right up the street and see where all of the CrossFit madness goes down!

Spring is Here!

Yesterday was officially the first day of spring and since I did nothing to acknowledge it, how about I give you the opportunity to enjoy these pictures of Lily from one of last week's beautiful days!

Family Shadow

Park Highlight & Lowlight

Last week we went to the park every morning I think.  We just couldn't waste any time missing out on the beautiful 80-degree summer-like weather!  One of the mornings was fairly eventful.  Lily had so much fun watching the ducks for the longest time.  At one point, we were sitting on a bench talking about the ducks and she said, "Quacky, can you hear me?"  Her facial expression was so money, but I guess you had to be there. :)

A few minutes later, came the lowlight of the day.  Lily was up on a high part of the playground where I couldn't really get to her easily.  One of the little boys came over to her and first of all, poked her in the eye.  I heard her say, "Owie, eye!"  So I looked up and he then proceeded to push her up against the wall and start hitting her.  I was shouting, "No, No, No, That's not okay!"  The mom must have heard me and came over to yank her kid away from Lily.  By this time she was crying crocodile tears with a petrified look on her face.  Do you blame her?!  Oh my word, all I wanted to do was scoop her up and shield her from horribly mean little boys for the rest of her life.  But, oh wait....that's not realistic, right?  Anyway, the other little kiddos, bless their hearts, weren't intending to but were in her way for her to climb down to get to me so it seemed like an eternity before we could get to each other and I could try to console her.  Finally the episode was over and we took a couple of minutes to talk about how the boy was wrong, dried up the tears and then made everything better by some fun time on the swings. Justin thinks we should enroll her in a karate class as soon as she's able!

Don't ask me what this pose is about.  Lately she's been saying, "Lily lay down" and laying down at random times/places.  Silly goose.

See what I mean?  The swing redeemed the rest of our time following the bully incident.

Smooth & Sassy

2 Year Old Room

Last weekend at church, we moved Lily up to the Younger 2's room.  She's used to being in that room on Tuesday mornings when I go to Bible study so she was not hesitant to jump right into playing when we dropped her off.  She even had a worksheet when we picked her up....that had one tiny purple line on it that she colored. :)  I think she will like that it's a bit more structured with preschool type activities.

Here she is with Daddy right before entering into class for the first time:

And you'll be pleased to know that I handled this milestone better than the move from infant to toddler.  Just for fun - doesn't she look so much more grown up than she did in this picture less than a year ago?!?!

Baby Drew Is Born

Our good friends, the Kennedys, welcomed their second son into the world last Friday.  All day leading up to our visit, Lily was talking about "Baby Drew".  We told her that he was Ty's baby brother so she was also saying, "See baby brother?"  She was pretty excited to get to hold him!

2 Year Stats

Weight: 24.15 lb. (26%)
Height: 33 in. (35%)
Head: 19 in. (80%)

Lily's gaining percentages in all areas!  It's funny because most people are surprised to hear that her head circumference is what it is since it doesn't really appear out of proportion.  It was higher this time than any of her previous appointments.  We're still convinced that's why she's so smart but Dr. A says there's no correlation. :)

Enjoy some more pictures from our time at the Dr.'s office last week:

New Elmo Jammies

Waterbabies Graduate

Lily's last day of Waterbabies was on Wednesday.  The class was only 5 weeks long but she came a long way in that time!  Her HUGE accomplishment was going underwater 3 TIMES this week!  The instructor even used her as a demonstrator for the class!  This momma was so proud.  We really praised and whooped it up once she resurfaced and her almost-ready-to-cry facial expression turned into a smile. :)  I'm thinking we might do one more class before summer is here so she's super acquainted with the pool since we'll likely be there every week.

Bookworm

Proof She's My Daughter

Lily loves chips & salsa.  According to her, they're "ummy".

Free Birthday Ice Cream

Marble Slab Creamery sent us an email coupon for Lily to get a free small ice cream cone for her birthday.  Well, it was far from small, so we all 3 shared it.  It was a great ending to Lily's birthday!

She's softspoken but you can faintly hear her say "mmm!" twice

And I love the shoulder shrug at the end!