We love the water!

So we've been really gearing up for summer. I realize that most people are just getting excited for spring, but Mommy has taught us well and we're excited for summer. In fact, we spent some time in Grandma and Grandpa's jacuzzi. We didn't even have to heat it up all the way!

My Daddy is the best. He hung out and let me jump and splash to my heart's content. And I actually looked at the camera long enough to get it captured in photo.
When you've got two big blow up toys in a small jacuzzi, there's not much room for big people.
Cara loves the water just as much as I do, if not more. She can sit in that little crab for hours.
Grandma's pool is actually a lot of fun without water in it!
Big splash equals a lot of fun!

The Joy of Me...

Well if you notice my ticker to the right here, I am 2 and a half years old here in a few days. I think that's reason enough to post a blog all about me and my accomplishments again. Right?

Let's see, some wonderful things about me at two and a half years of age....

-I am really getting the hang of this whole language thing. I speak in full sentences combined with a little of Siena-ese. Even Mommy looks for translations some times.
-I still know my ABCs but only just recently got really good at singing the song. I leave out the occasional set of letters but I'm really not bad.
-My favorite song however was until just recently "There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed A Fly". Mommy still hasn't forgiven Daddy for teaching me that song since I would INSIST upon that being the bed time song. That takes a long time. (Good for me not for Mommy!)
-I can follow what's going on in most kid-friendly movies and even laugh at the funny parts. As most kids do, I also have an insane ability to watch the same movie over and over again and then somehow relate it to my daily activities. Such as suddenly shouting out "The Baby is Coming" and "Peaches" in public places. Good thing Mommy is no longer pregnant.
-I show only minor interest in dressing myself. So far Mommy has been spared the forty changes of clothing in a day. I show absolutely zero interest in undressing myself.
-As far as food goes I love fruit snacks, yogurt, apples, bananas, chips, soda, noodles, peanut butter, butter on toast, cereal-sometimes the grown up kinds like Honey Bunches of Oats are the only thing I'll eat, granola bars, quesadillas, and of course french fries and chicken...doesn't have to be a nugget.
-I love to play outside at the park and dig in the dirt.
-I am my Daddy's child. I'm a cautious little bugger. I don't want to fall and ask for Mommy's help if I just don't trust it. (For the record, Cara would jump out of a plane.) I don't try stuff at the park if it looks at all like I can't do it...for the most part. Some things I don't realize I can't do it until too late.
-I love my sister. I like to sit and play with her and make her laugh and give her hugs and try and share my food with her.
-Oh! I am also getting really good at playing pretend. Mommy loves to come down and find me involved in some elaborate story of my own making.

Here I am enjoying spring in St. George on my favorite thing in the backyard that's working. (The pool is currently out of commission...well I guess the hot tub part is working just fine...)


Grandpa was appeasing me this morning when Mommy was talking about needing to do something lame like showering after her workout...

And then later today, Grandpa even let me dig in the dirt and help him plant sunflower seeds. How lucky am I?


And here is a good lookin' hair do for a two and a half year old:

Many Happy Birthdays!

Today is no one's birthday but yesterday was Grandma's and tomorrow is Aunt Becca's and so today has officially been a birthday for several years running. It's just easier to combine the cake and presents and dinner into one night for the two of them. I disagree with this entirely. The more cake the better. But I guess it will be okay since we'll get to play at Pirate Island Pizza tonight. The above photo is Mommy's favorite one from the trip that she didn't go on. Notice Grandma looking good in the background? Awesome.

In other goings on, I have really mastered opening doors. Silly thing to mention right? Well you see I've grown just enough that every door in Grandma's house is easy to open especially because she has the handle vs. the knob kind. We mention it because two days ago after going on a walk with Aunt Becca, Mommy and the two dogs, I convinced Aunt Becca to put the leash on my stuffed dog. Mommy was standing in the front room and I thought she saw me open the door and go out, but apparently not. A few minutes later, she found me in the middle of the road, three houses down, dragging my dog. In a best parenting ever award moment, she only figured out where I was because she noticed the car going really slowly up the road looking at something in the distance. Nice. Oh and did I mention I was barefoot?

And when I'm not doing dangerous things, Cara is. She's really getting into this whole being mobile thing. She can crawl, but doesn't know it. She prefers to get on her hands and knees, then push up onto her toes and try and stand which results in sometimes forward but most times backward movement. She can get herself to sitting from her tummy and can pull herself to standing on anything. She'll get there. If she's within two feet of a sturdy item, you'll find her standing. It's great. Mommy can't leave her alone in the middle of the floor anymore.

Just plain old fun...

in matching outfits too! Well kind of, I get to wear a pretty dress and Cara wears a pants outfit that matches. We're still stinkin' cute.

We went to the park on one of two sunny days during Southern Utah's spring break. Everybody else in the house (except Daddy) were in the Caymans. Yup that's right. They went to a tropical destination without me. Oh well. We had the whole house to ourselves and could run around naked and nobody cared. I could wake up screaming in the night and not have Mommy frantic because I'm waking everybody up. (Ironically...I slept just perfectly all week except for the first night when I was sick.)

Anyway, we went to play at our favorite park and on our way out, I got distracted by wood chips and rocks. We stayed and played for another half hour and Mommy pulled out the camera because honestly, who doesn't want to see a photo of Cara in her cute duds?


And here Mommy kept saying "Siena come sit next to Cara for a picture..." so I kept running farther and farther away.

Until I found this nice wash full of rocks, then I sat down.

Mommy's attempt at a self portrait, holding Cara while perched precariously on a rock:

Sun and fun equals two very tuckered out girlies.

Time flies...

Seriously...it flies! We used to be so good at posting every three days or so. And lately? Not so much. Mostly it's because Mommy has been dealing with this:



Which quickly turns to this:

And turns even faster into this:

Almost everything Cara does turns into the above photo. As a big sister, I generally am pretty good at saying "Oh sweetheart, it's okay" (I really say that) but some days when I'm just as grumpy I say "Stop it." Sometimes emphasized with a tad too hard of a squeeze. Poor Cara, she just wants to be like me. She wants to walk and move and eat and play with me! I'm just too cool. Oh and as a shout out to my cousin Chase. I love dinosaurs. Everything is about dinosaurs lately. We watch Elmo's World about the dinosaurs over and over again. We read books about them. I can't wait to come play with Chase's collection!

Sleepy Chronicles

Awesome sleepy time shots.

Grandma has discovered the way to Cara's heart. Cara loves to have her head and face stroked. If she is even close to tired, bam it's lights out!

This is how Mommy came and found me one night. If you notice, on my bed (where I should be...) is the stuffing from my pillow. Two holes have formed in my Tinkerbell pillow and I love to pull out the goodies. Mommy finally fixed the holes today. Bummer.

Doesn't this just look cozy?

Seriously...7 months old?!

As this is the last day of February, my little sister's ticker will say that she is seven months old tomorrow. Being born on the 31st makes it particularly difficult to count how many months old she is. She's growing up so fast though that soon it won't matter! Mommy quit helping me post about how many months old I am so long ago! Anyway, let's move on to fun facts about Cara at seven months old.

-As previously described in the last post, her new passion is standing...at all times. :) She is working very hard to move herself around whether it's kind of turning in circles on her stomach or doing the smash your face into the carpet and scooch thing...she needs Grandpa Quaife to come teach her how to crawl! She is desperate to be mobile.
-She still remains a smiley baby and loves to greet anyone she sees in the morning with a face cracking grin.
-She did figure out though that Mommy is the best and will cry dramatically if she needs Mom.
-No hair...sigh.
-She's started babbling. Her only real word still is Momma but sometimes I think she means Dadda too. Of course I really remain the only person who regularly understands her. Mom struggles even when I talk.
-And she LOVES food. She loves flavor. In the more adventurous arena, she has been exposed to teriyaki, salsa, sour patch kids, ranch, salt and vinegar.. and she devours them all. She has a strong preference for bananas. It can be the Gerber Baby Food kind but she will flip if she sees a banana in your hand. You better want to share. She eats her veggies too. In the pictures below she's being fed peas and likes them! She's just like Mommy though and pulls a "this is gross, I'm going to puke face" no matter what if it's the first time she's eaten it. However as long as it's not cold she'll eat anything.