strawberry picking!

we went out on a saturday morning to a nearby strawberry farm and had a blast! it was very hot and very windy, but so nice to spend the day outside as a family, doing something different and fun! a few friends met us up there later with their kiddos too.

 wait for me daddy! look, i have my own box!

 she was great at spotting the strawberries and grabbing them...but couldn't quite master the art of picking, without squishing. oops! she left quite a few squished berries before we could save them!

 and of course she wanted to eat them right away...they looked so juicy and delicious!

 "dittledittle. hand. clean it."

 we quickly assigned her the job of holding the box while daddy and mommy picked...although all the bending and squatting involved in picking didn't allow this pregnant mommy to last very long either. daddy did most of our collecting!

 i tried and tried to get a good shot here because i loved the background and the way the winde was blowing, but my model was too distracted and not wanting to cooperate. can you tell?!

 "hiii goat. hiii. hiiii". she still talks about goats and food because people there were feeding them. she was fascinated.

 the choo choo ride! first daddy tried to get in, but his long legs didn't leave any room for sierra to fit, so mommy and her big belly squeezed in instead! you can't tell by this face, but she LOVED it. she loves trains and this was her very first choo choo ride!

"daddyyyyy! hiiiiii! hiiiiii!"

what a fun morning! we also enjoyed some fresh strawberry lemonade and ice cream and then ate our PBJ sandwiches at the picnic tables in the shade before heading home. sierra crashed in the car and then continued napping for another hour and a half once we got back. we were all spent, but it was well worth it!

new phrases and funnies

i'm sure these will keep coming by the week, or even day and then they won't seem so amazing once she's speaking in full sentences...but it's just so cute!

in the last few days, i've said these phrases one time and sierra repeats me and then keeps saying them...in context! it's so cute! her memory is amazing - she truly is a little sponge!

* "bye bye daddy. have a good day" (ok, so it's not perfect, but pretty darn close!!)
* "night night mommy. sleep tight mommy"
* "oh boy"
* "ah maaan"

* when i ask her a question, she often replies with "ummmmmm. hmmmm..."
   - examples:
         me: "choose one more book. which one do you want?"
           S: walking up to the bookshelf, "ummmmmmm, ummmmmm..." until she chooses one. then she brings it to me saying "read it. read it"
   - me: "ok, now it's time to go home"
       S: "no. no."
      me: "well, where do you want to go?"
       S: "ummmmm, ummmmm..." (there hasn't been a response to that one yet!)

* a conversation with herself today in the car, on the way home:
    - "daddy home. bye bye. daddy wort (work). waawaa (her fake cry). ouwie. daddy ouwie. sad daddy. happy daddy. heeheehee. funny daddy. heeheehee. tittletittletittle (her sound for tickling). heeheehee."

Sierra funnies

* she says "whoa" when the toaster pops

* anytime she sees a bug (alive, dead, a picture in a book, or anything on the floor that looks like a bug), she says "bug, bug, pider, ewww, clean it"

* i love the way she says "hand", in a very British accent...it's more like "haund"

* if she sees a picture of a snake, she says "ssss, sank, mouth" and points to her mouth. it's all because the first time we played with play-doh together i made a snake and she put it in her mouth and bit the head off! now she always associates snakes with her mouth, hehe!

* the way she says expressions is adorable: "aw man", "oh nooo", "o-tay", "alwiiight"

* she still hasn't figured out how to jump in place - she doesn't ever lift her feet off the ground, but instead if you ask her to jump, she gets up on her tiptoes, then back down, up on her toes, back down. precious. she thinks she's jumping off the ground  :)

* she is really into "happy" and "sad". anytime she hears a baby crying she does this little fake cry and then with a very sad face says "sad, baby sad". or if she knows the baby she'll say their name, "sad, anya sad". she also likes to pretend that her animals fall (a.k.a. she throws them on the ground or down the stairs) and she does a fake cry and says "aww, Gu, sad Gu" and wants me to hug and kiss Gu. or she will hit Gu's head under the table (which she did once) and do the whole crying, sad Gu thing. it's pretty funny, but can get a little old when she does it over and over and over! so that's why we're working on making everyone happy now and we laugh instead of cry  :)

this girl is F-U-N, full of energy, nonstop talking and just plain hilarious

in Mommy's footsteps...or shoe steps

we love having a backyard!

from last month...isn't she precious?! (please ignore the unbuttoned jeans, haha! her belly is a little big and it seems like it would have to be uncomfortable sitting down with the botton closed! i guess i forgot to button it back when we went outside :)

fieldtrips

for the last month, we've gone on one "fieldtrip" adventure a week to visit different fun things around the city. it's been super fun to get out of the house, meet up with other friends and their kiddos and spend some time outdoors with the nice weather!

here's what we've done so far:

picnic lunches at a couple different parks

Nature & Science Center

Chick-fil-A on a rainy day

Zoo

strawberry picking

at the nature center...aren't they so cute?! there were 4 of them all about the same size. they had a blast!

fascinated with the "meow, meow"

little friends

digging at the dino pit

 playing with Cannon at Chick-Fil-A (Peyton was there too, but is a little too small for the play area still)

 she sat there for so long and all the big kids has to crawl around her to climb up the steps and she loved being in the center of all that action! she said "hiiii" to each of them and just laughed and laughed. she thinks she's sooo big! while she can often be shy around adults she doesn't know, that is definitely NOT the case with older kids...she LOVES them!!!

more pics to come from our most recent adventures  :)

Daddyyyy

Kyle's birthday was yesterday and we all got to enjoy blueberry muffins together for breakfast! We had a combined bday dinner the night before with Stu and Cat (Stu's bday was 3 days earlier) and celebrated with some really yummy homemade (by Cat, not me!) ice cream cake! Since last night was our community group night, we went out for dinner instead of our normal group time and it was so much fun - sat outside to eat and then play washers...with the beautiful sunset and amazingly cool weather it was a perfect evening!

Sierra enjoyed coloring a bday card for her Daddy and we practiced singing Happy Birthday all day long.

We are SO incredibly blessed to have such an amazing husband and daddy!! He loves us and cares for us so well...and is so much fun! We love you Daddy!!!

Here are a few recent pictures/videos of Sierra and her Daddy...

 "yes, that's right. I'M her daddy" - this was ideal for both: Home Depot (daddy's fave) & a tractor (Sierra's fave)

 she was loving it - a dream come true for her...a real tractor!

 playground time after mommy and daddy got ice cream shakes (ok, sierra did get a few sips too!)

 this has been almost a daily ritual...we watch daddy get in his car and drive off to work

sierra just learned Ring Around the Rosie and to say she loves it is an understatement! she was watching barney (wow, never thought i'd show my kids barney! but we don't have cable and it's on netflix.) and they were playing Ring around the rosie. daddy got her to do it for the first time and she couldn't stop giggling! we have done it over and over ever since!