February Photodump

Modeling her new sunhat.

Holding hands at the zoo with Hallie.

They love each other.

Checking out the jellyfish at the zoo.

Valentine's Day 2014

Thomas surprised me a couple days before Valentine's day with wildflowers in a mason jar and dark chocolate. (He knew he wouldn't be around the next two days). The day before Valentine's day Brooklyn and I went to a play date at Jump Time with Boise Babies and Tots play group. There were about 20 kids and we all exchanged valentine's. Brooklyn loved opening her valentines. I had fun deciding what to do for Brooklyn's valentines. She loves bubbles so we used that as our theme.
Valentine's morning Brooklyn woke up and opened her presents from her nana and Grandma Sandee and us. She loved the card her Nana gave her and the next couple mornings wanted me to read it to her. I think she liked hearing her name. That afternoon our friends Kelsey and Haley came over to decorate sugar cookies which we stopped by Thomas' work along with dinner that night.
Saturday night Thomas took me to see a ballet performance of Ballet Idaho and out to dinner. I loved having time alone and getting dressed up. The next morning we woke up and Brooklyn's hair was standing straight up like this from playing beauty shop with Grandma. She was happy to get a new monkey binky for Valentine's day along with some books and a couple hot wheels from Thomas and I.

Nana's Visit

My mom came to visit shortly after the New Year. It was so nice to have Brooklyn spend time with her Nana and love on her.  It was also nice to have someone here to keep me company while Thomas was at school and working.
We went to pre-school open gym, a play date to do a story nature walk, a yoga class, and my mom did a bunch of handy jobs around our apartment.  My mom and I were able sneak out one day during nap time to see the movie "Saving Mr. Banks".  All of us went out to dinner at our favorite mexican restaurant one night and then to a basque restaurant for their chocolate pudding that is DIVINE!
Nana made cookies with Brooklyn (she also made sure to always have some "choc-ut" in her purse for her).  The stool Brooklyn is standing on is called a learning tower and is a mama's sanity saver. Before getting it if I was in the kitchen doing anything Brooklyn would cry and cry wanting me to hold her.  Now I can put her right up to the counter or sink and she can be right next to me. She also likes to be in front of the bathroom sink and look at herself in the mirror and play in the water, look out the windows, and stand next to light switches to flick them on and off.

Brooklyn says "shake, shake" whenever we use sprinkles or spices.

My mom came at the perfect time. I had been looking for a toy storage organizer with baskets to put Brooklyn's toys. I had a friend who had gotten one from Costco awhile ago but they hadn't had them in stock for a long time. My mom has a Costco membership and we went to check and they had them in stock! Plus she was able to put it together for us.

Making music with Nana.

Nana's little helper

Takes her job seriously.

Watching movies of herself on Nana's phone.

Tree swing.

Kids in snowsuits, so cute!

Loved having my mom here and can't wait for her to come back!

Photo Dump December

Brooklyn loves these puppets she got for Christmas she puts them on and says "He-whoooooaaaaa!" (Hello)

I curse these ipads and computers at the library. We can no longer leave without a toddler tantrum.

Brooklyn now calls all letter "P" and sometimes she'll grab a fridge magnet and say the "K" sound over and over.

Winter/Christmas Festivities

The first big snow of the season we got Brooklyn all bundled up to play in the snow.  I got so mad at Thomas when he threw some snow at Brooklyn and she started crying.  Did make for a pretty funny picture.  But so sad.

My cuties

Loving the snow at first.

Playing with Dad in the snow.

Poor baby!

While playing at the mall play area Santa and his Mrs. Clause came by to let us know Mrs. Clause would be doing a story time.  We went and listened to a few stories and Brooklyn was happy to get a candy cane.

Mrs. Clause even had an Elmo Christmas book!

We went to the library junior performance of the Nutcracker and afterwards Brooklyn got to twirl around with some of the dancers.

The Nutcraker

Playing in a paper bag with Dad.

Checking out Great-Grandma Clement's snow globe.

Brooklyn 20 months

Love my sweetie!

So grown up.

I have a toddler!!!!! I love Brooklyn's personality and it just shines through more and more every day.  There are seriously some days that overnight she just seems older and more able to express herself.  Some tidbits of information about Brooklyn at 20 months:
- She sleeps with her plush Elmo and Cookie monster at night and her Sesame Street blanket and her elephant binky.
- She sleeps from 8pm-8am but usually will just sit in her crib and talk and play til 8:30pm.
- Wears size 3 diapers
- Wears size 5 shoe
- Wears 18 month clothes but is starting to fit in some 2T clothes as well.
- Loves bubbles and asks for them every day.  She likes us to blow them and then I give her a small empty bottle and blower so she can pretend to blow too.

- Loves play-dough.

Making Play-Dough "pastee".

- Plays with her teeter totter everyday and sings "teeter-totter" as she does it.

She can go in the middle and "totter" on her own but she usually wants one of us to totter with her.

- Likes to do ring-a-round the rosies.
- Loves music and dancing.  We just enrolled her in a class called "Boogey Babies" that is a musical movement class and she has had a blast.

Playing her maracas while wearing her mama's "farf".

- The other day we were walking outside and someone we passed said to me "Your baby is cute!".  Brooklyn then looked at me and said "Mama cute!".
- We have these bingo stampers that I was teaching her how to use by saying "poke a dot" every time we stamped down to make a dot.  So now she really likes "polka dots"  and how she says it is just too adorable.
- Can count to three.
- Loves watching Sesame Street.  The characters she can name and gets excited about are Elmo, "Monster", Abby, and Ernie.  (I personally think Murray is hilarious).
- Has started nursery and has stayed the full two hours without Thomas or I.
-For a while when I would ask her to do something she would say "Oh sure!" and then run and go do it.  Cracked me up.
- When you get a camera or phone out to take a picture of her she immediately says "I see?" and will run over to look at the picture or video (a lot of times before you have even taken one!).
- Will mimic Thomas when he is watching football and yell "Go! Go! Go!" and "Yay!!".
- When I go into her room in the morning she immediately starts labeling things in her crib/room or body parts.
- Eggs are probably the one food we can count on her consistently eating. She is the pickiest eater ever! I really struggle finding foods she will eat. But she'll try random things like wasabi peas, plain salsa by the spoonful, and lemons.

Eating salsa by the spoonful.

Wouldn't eat the baked potato with a fork.

Yum!

Trying wasabi peas.

One thing she will always eat is chocolate.  I blame my mom.

 - Still has some stranger danger but does really well in playgroups and with her friends and at nursery.
- When we go to the bathroom she will sit on her little toilet and pretend to go potty too.
- Her best friend is Hallie and she talks about her every day.
- When she starts to get upset and whinying for something the trick is to say "Oh! It sounds like this.." and she usually calms down and tries asking nicely.
-Can rock a full ponytail and pigtails.

Big girl ponytail.

- When we have our computer out she wants hers out too. While Nana was here visiting she would sit at the table with her computer. So after awhile Brooklyn wanted to sit at a table with her computer as well.

Little secretary.

Working at Nana's computer.