Busch Gardens!

We took Gracie on her first (of many, for sure) amusement park trips this weekend- to Busch Gardens!  We left early on Sunday morning and arrived around 11:00.  The place was packed.  Usually, Sunday mornings are a good time to go, but evidently this is not the case on Memorial Day weekend.  Still, we had a great time, even though all we rode was kiddie rides.  Poor Trish went with us and I'm not sure she realized what she was getting herself into.

Randy, Trish and Gracie rode Oscar's Squirmy Worms (or something like that) in the new Sesame Street area:

Gracie played in the forest playground:

Here's Elmo!

Gracie and I rode this:

Gracie and I also rode the Dinosaur Egg ride:

And here's a gratuitous cute pic:

She also had a great time in this little water playground and watching the Pet Shenanigans show.  We're sure she's destined to be a coaster freak, too- as soon as we drove up she was fascinated with Apollo's Chariot.  She said "Wow" over and over again as we watched it go.

We were so tired when we got home and are still getting caught up on rest.  But it was worth it!

Cute video

Head on over to Sherry's Blog  to see an adorable video of Gracie and Olivia, being BFF (near the bottom of the 5/11 post).  I would post it here, but it will take forever for me to download, then upload it on this computer.

I haven't done a monthly update in a while, and G turns 16 (SIXTEEN!!!) months tomorrow, so here goes:

16 months, about 25 lbs, almost 32 inches

*We're working on using a spoon.  I got a set of bendy spoons by Boon that seem to work pretty well.  She gets that she needs to touch the spoon to the food then put it in her mouth, but there are 3 problems: 1-she barely touches the spoon to the food so not much gets on it (I have to help), 2-she turns the spoon upside down in her mouth, and typically BEFORE it reaches her mouth, so the stuff falls off, 3-hands work as well as a spoon, so why eat Spaghettios with a spoon?   What a mess.  At least today I remembered to change my shirt before our dinner attempt.

*Gracie is SUCH a daredevil!  She loves to climb onto the seat of her little Pooh-mobile and stand up, withOUT holding on!  She'll even pull it over to the pack and play, stand on the seat, then stand on the little steering wheel to try to reach in to get her toys.  Now, we don't encourage this, but we try to stand nearby and let her have some climbing time.

*She can kick a ball quite well.

*She has a balloon obsession.

*Still sleeping and eating like a champ.  She'll try any food at least once- she was eating green olives today.

*She is more interested in books now.  She likes to be read to and will come sit on my lap for a story sometimes.

*She is much more lovey.  She gives hugs (see the aforementioned video), kisses (without touching, just makes a smacking noise) and will almost blow kisses.

*She loves to dance.  We were breaking it down in the car today at a stoplight and the driver of a schoolbus next to us was cracking up at her (and probably me).

*Words she can say:  dog, wow, bye, hey, aw cool, juice, dada, mama (FINALLY!!), car, beach, keys, Trish, papa, fish, Noah, Jojo (Jonah), hi dada (she never says hi to me!), dance, balloon, bubble, bathroom (sometimes), shoe, uh-oh.

*Many of these words can only be understood by us.

*She still loves the kitties, and both Noah AND Jonah are really patient with her.  Poor Jojo got Spaghettios dumped on his head today.

*She has 12 teeth.  And a fierce bite!  Keep fingers out of her mouth!

*She points to things and says "dis" which I think is asking "What's this?".  I could be wrong about that.

I'm sure there's other things I'm forgetting.  Hmmmm.

Not much else going on.  I'll try to get some pics to post soon.

Mama's Day!

I had a very nice Mother's Day today!  I hope all the other Mamas out there did, too.  Gracie got me 2 balloons, flowers, an Old Navy gift card (though I couldn't find anything in there today that I couldn't live without), brunch at Posta at the Marriott downtown, and I did some shopping at NY & Co.  We all spent the day together, enjoyed some outside time and shopping, and are worn out.

Here's a couple pics of my balloons and flowers.  Gracie and I have been drooling over the dragonfly since we saw it a couple weeks ago.  Gracie (and Grandma) picked out the other one on Friday- so sweet!

DONE!

No more pencils, no more books, no more dealing with stupid NCCU!  Wait.  That doesn't rhyme.  Oh, well.

I had my exit interview for my teacher education program on Friday.  It went ok.  I passed it, anyway.  So now all I have left is some paperwork and I SHOULD be eligible to get my license!  I'm waiting for my grades to come in, but with any luck I will have made it through NCCU with a 4.0.  I may not have a teaching job next year, but, hey- at least I'm done.  

In other news, we had a decent weekend.  Randy went to Beer Fest yesterday with Grant, leaving Sherry and I to hang out with the kiddos.  Gracie was actually pretty sweet to Olivia- Grant got a cute video of G pushing O on her little ride-on toy, then hugging her- I'll link it when Sherry posts it on her blog.  It is so nice that they're closer in ability now- they can kind of interact now.

We went to pick strawberries today.  Gracie really enjoyed it!  She followed us down the rows.   We gave her a couple of strawberries to tote around- she refused to put them in the bucket, and ended up kind of squishing them, so she had juice running down her arm and her hands were all stained.  Then she figured out what they were and that she could eat them- her whole face was red!  That girl LOVES some strawberries.  It was the perfect summer photo op (we got a pic on Randy's phone, but I gotta figure out how to send it).

Another thing she really likes is veggie burgers.  We've given her the black bean ones and today we tried a savory mushroom one, and she ate it all!  Without ketchup!  (that's her newest thing- she likes ketchup on everything)  We also give her the veggie corndogs and those are good.  She's a pretty good eater, most days.  Of course, at brunch this morning she didn't eat that well, but she made up for it with breakfast and dinner, so I guess it all balances out.

That's about it for now.  Go Canes!

ETD:  Here's the pics from today:

Vegas Animoto