June 28

Oh, these children.

Today was a good day. A really, really good day. No tantrums. Lots of accomplishments. Consecutive naps. Sunny dispositions. Sweet treats. A good day.

While we waited for Daddy to get home from work, I accidentally fed the kids dinner. It started as a snack, but they just kept eating...

Daisy thought it was funny to eat her foot. She also thought it was funny every time Caleb walked up, sniffed her foot, and said, "Pee-yew!"

Every. Time.

This boy took a four hour nap today. Perhaps that explains why I'm feeling so positive about the day?

I asked him to show me a smiley face, and this is what he gave me.

Daisy really likes ham.

I was cracking up at these kiddos!

Then Caleb decided to write on our chalkboard wall. This, he informed me, is a picture of Lightning McQueen's face. The pink is his face, and he is in the process of drawing Lightning's eyes.

Daisy saw what her brother was doing and had  to do it, too. Caleb gave her a lesson on the art of chalkboard drawing.

She's a quick study.

I can't even begin to tell you how happy this makes me.

Or this. Sharing the chalk, not fighting over it.

And this.

Do you see her little foot resting on his leg? Melts my heart.

My girl used all of the chalk and dumped the cup, looking for more.

Caleb: "Here, Baby Daisy! It's time to clean up! Let's clean up all of the chalk."

*sings a little clean-up song*

Seriously? Who is this child?

Then we watched a video on the computer. I follow the blog of a woman who has transplanted her family of eight to France for a year. They've created a kid-centric web TV show called "Olive Us", and Caleb loves it. Each episode is between 2 and 5 minutes long, and the most recent one was about visiting a French bakery. Caleb watched it three times. 

You can watch it here.

Happily, we have a  French bakery just down the street! After dinner we paid a visit, and Caleb even called out, "Bonjour!" as we entered.

Of all of the tasty gourmet treats, Caleb chose a white cupcake with white icing.

Why? 

The flag on top. That's my boy.

June 27

Oh, boy.

Today was one of those days. It started out frantic and crazy, had a moment of calm when Grandmother came over to watch the kids while I went to Bible study, then involved multiple temper tantrums and much screaming and unpleasantness. Caleb was over-tired today, and it showed. I was at my wits' end with him, so when he and Daisy woke up from  naps, I did the only thing a mama can do:

I busted out the water table.

It was 98 degrees today, so the kids were thrilled when I suggested that we go on the deck and play. I poured myself a nice tall drink (of water... mama can only go so far!), grabbed my Sudoku, and kicked my feed up on the table while Caleb and Daisy played happily. Suddenly I looked up and saw Caleb walking verrry carefully toward me, carrying a water-filled cup balanced precariously on a water-filled frisbee.

"Mommy, I made this for you! Don't you want to eat it?"

Of course I said yes, then went back to my Sudoku. But that little boy looked up at me with his big brown eyes and said, "Don't you want to drink your coffee and eat your food? Oh! I will get the creamer for you!"

And he ran over to the toy bin, found a block, filled it with water, ran back, and carefully added "cream" to my coffee.

"Oh! I have to whisk the coffee!"

My little boy knows that I take my coffee with cream. It's such a little thing, but such a big deal. He's going to make a good husband some day. That is, if we can ever get past the temper tantrums.

Daisy, meanwhile, scooted around, splashed, and ate leaves. The sweet little girl was happy to share her leaves with me!

Tonight as I put her to bed, I saw the most blessed thing ever: the jagged white ridges of a tooth, poking through her upper gum. Praise the Lord! Tooth #3 has arrived, bringing with it an explanation for all of the fevers of late. Hooray!

June 26

That girl of mine is nothing but trouble.

She was fine Saturday and Sunday, but her temp has been hovering around 100 for the past two days. I'm going to wager that it's unrelated to the previous sickness, and that it is actually teething-related. Low-grade fevers aside, the kids were darling today. We soaked up every minute of the beautiful weather.

 My goofy boy. I haven't posted many pictures of him lately, have I? He has been surprising me lately with how much he knows, remembers, and says. I know I'm biased, but I think the kid is something special. 

(Please disregard the dried-up gravy on his nose, leftover from this morning's biscuit-and-gravy session.)

Any guesses what Daisy is smiling about? Hint: it's Caleb.

He turned a bowl into a hat, and Daisy thought it was the funniest, most clever thing she had ever seen. 

Oh, how she adores him!

And as soon as his back was turned, she was mimicking him. I love their relationship!

Pardon me while I turn into a puddle of goo all over my keyboard.

(Barely-related side note: Caleb is in love with a darling little girl at church. Harper is a towheaded tomboy who barely tolerates Caleb's displays of affection. He spends most of church following her around, trying to give her hugs and kisses. Generally she just pushes him away or says no, which surprised her mom. Harper is known to punch or bite people who pester her. At church on Sunday, Caleb and I passed Harper and her mom on their way out the door. Caleb whispered goodbye to Harper, and she came over and gave him a - totally unsolicited - kiss, then a hug. Caleb has been on cloud nine ever since.)

Me: "Caleb, it's time to eat lunch!"

Caleb: "I'm just going to play a little basketball first!"

He nailed it.

He knew he nailed it.

Daisy loves climbing up on our fireplace hearth. I think she thinks it's a stage.

She also recently discovered that she can push a button on this schoolbus and play music. The girl grinned from ear to ear the first time she did it. Another first that I didn't manage to photograph? Today she made a tower of blocks - four blocks high! Way to go, Daisy! I'd never seen her stack any before, probably because Caleb always knocks them over. But she went ahead and did four at once, just to prove that she could. That's my girl.

June 25

At 9:30 this morning, while I was putting Daisy down for her nap, the doorbell rang. After much debate, I set the girl down and ran to answer it. I was glad I did; it was the FedEx man, delivering my fancy new camera.

I ordered it Friday afternoon.

It came Monday morning.

It was free shipping.

That's how I like my online shopping to go!

I resisted the temptation to tear open the box then and there, and instead returned to the girl's room to actually get her down for a nap. Then I spent the rest of the day playing.

I have to say - I expected to see a giant leap in the quality of my photos. But of the 31 random, haphazard pictures I took today, I don't see much of a difference.

I love my crisp, gigantic new LCD screen; I love the fact that my ISO goes up to 6400 now.

Mostly, I'm trusting that as I learn to use this shiny new camera, I'll gradually discover new ways to improve my photography. But as a very wise friend once told me, "It's the injun, not the arrow." He's right.

But boy do I love my fancy new arrow!

(I have no justification for this photo; it just made me laugh.)

(The girl woke from her morning nap with a temp of 102.8 Some pain reliever brought it back down, and it didn't go back up. Here's hoping it was just a fluke.)

June 23

This is my girl:

This is my girl playing the guitar.

This is my girl playing the guitar with her feet.

This is my (not sick anymore) girl playing the guitar with her hands and her feet.

This is my guitar-playing girl who is not sick anymore

not sick anymore

NOT SICK ANYMORE!

Praise the Lord.

Now, to get her back to sleeping at night. Mama is exhausted.

June 22

Nope - still sick.

But I think she's on the mend. Despite a 102.7 fever at dinnertime, Daisy was still willing to eat some food. And she had normal diapers today. So hopefully she'll sleep all night long and wake up refreshed and healthy in the morning, allowing us to have a fun, fun, fun weekend.

Am I living in a dream world? Possibly, but I'm still holding out hope.

Right after I took this picture of Daisy drawing with chalk on the front porch, I realized how warm she was. I then did the only reasonable thing: I removed her shirt and allowed her to play, shirtless, on the front porch.

We're classy like that.

Also, right before I took this picture I did something really exciting: I ordered my new "big girl" camera! Thanks to the lovely and resourceful Amber, I found a refurbished Canon 60D at a ridiculous price. Since I've been saving up since December, I jumped on the deal. In a week to a week and a half, it will be in my hot little hands. Hooray!

June 21

Big surprise here...

Daisy is sick. 

She is sickedy sick sick sick. Why? Well, we went to church on Sunday. By Tuesday, she was lethargic and feverish. I am seriously ready to quit church; Chris and I are discussing alternating Sundays so that one of us will always be home with Daisy. She sees a pediatric immunologist at the end of August, but that's two months away, and realistically the immunologist probably won't have a magic pill to fix Daisy. So we have to figure out something that works to keep her better. So far, the only options I can come up with are avoiding every potentially illness-causing event or drastically altering our diet to a terrifying extent.

I haven't decided which I prefer.

In the meantime, there's ice cream.

This was this afternoon, when Daisy's temp was 103.7.  Tylenol, a cool cloth, and nudity made her comfortable enough to nurse and eat a little bit of dinner. But I'm pretty sure that ice cream is my favorite fever-reducer. 

(Side note: my mom was feeding Daisy the ice cream and said, "Here, Daisy. This will cool you off!" and Daisy immediately began blowing on her ice cream. You know, to cool it off? I am continually baffled by the things she knows and understands.)

Daisy did pretty well with her spoon!

(Mom came over straight after work to watch the kids so that I could go grocery shopping without a toddler and a sick baby. For that, I am extremely grateful. It means that I can go to bed now, instead of rushing out to the store. That's a good thing, especially if tonight is anything like last night was for poor Daisy.)

June 19

It seems like every day, Daisy has a new word. The other day, it was "duck" and "quack"; today, it's "car".

She really likes cars.

My mom thinks she'll be a tomboy. If you base your predictions on Daisy's current vocabulary, I think Mom is right. So far, Daisy says:

hi

bye

uh-oh

cat

dog

eye

mama

dada

ball

bird

more

ear

Daisy (sounds like "day", sometimes "day-shee")

duck

quack

no

car

book

All animals and "boy" things. She is trying to say "heart", though. She's almost there, and that's kind of girly.

I think my girl is totally girly. A girl can like balls and cars and still be girly.

       

See? Kissing the car. Totally girly.

My boy, meanwhile, is totally into snuggling with loveys at naptime and bedtime. For a while it was his two baby dolls. Today he surprised me, though, and insisted that "Mrs. Puppy" (a gift from GREAT Aunt Mag) and "Mrs. Carrot" (a gift from Auntie Grace) snuggle in bed with him.

When he woke up from his nap, he stumbled down the hall and into the kitchen, still clutching his beloved Mrs. Carrot.

They helped me prep dinner for later on, and then Caleb and Mrs. Carrot shared a snack.

Also, Daisy wants to tell you hi:

            

June 17

Happy Father's Day! We spent the day celebrating Chris, who is a pretty spectacular father. We had breakfast at a real restaurant, went to church, took naps, and spent the evening swimming and grilling at our neighborhood pool.

It was a lot of fun.

Caleb got bold today and decided to pick up his feet while he floated in his Cars inner tube. He was pretty pleased about that step forward.

My little fishies!

Daisy thoroughly enjoyed her grilled hot dog. Caleb didn't complain about his, but he also didn't eat it. He eventually ended up eating one of our extra cheeseburgers.

(Also, isn't Daisy's little skirted swimsuit adorable? Girl clothes are so much fun.)

Caleb, enjoying his commandeered cheeseburger.

We even grilled corn on the cob at the pool. Yum!

Daisy was definitely Daddy's girl today.

She has him wrapped around her finger, and I love it.

After the pool, we had icee pops on the porch swing. 

All in all, a great day for a great daddy.

June 16

Yesterday Chris received a last-minute invitation to today's Cardinals game, and we were lucky (lucky, lucky, LUCKY) enough that my mom was able to do some last-minute babysitting for us. 

A child-free afternoon at the baseball game in an air-conditioned luxury suite? Sweet!

Mom arrived right before Caleb's naptime, and he insisted that she be the one to put him down. While she was snuggling and reading to him, Chris and I found Daisy doing this:

Gazing out the front window, watching the birds.

It's not a big deal, except that we've never seen her pull up to standing at the window before. 

Yay, Daisy!

June 15

Today we spent the morning with Amber and her darling children (seriously, they could not be any more fabulous) at the zoo. Since I can't be bothered to take pictures of animals, I hope you'll be satisfied with pictures of us and our antics instead.

My children had never before ridden on the carousel (I think). 

This is because, at our free zoo, one must pay to ride the carousel. Our family does not pay for such things.

But today, I promised Caleb a ride on the carousel during the zoo's free hour. But the sneaky zoo changed things up on us, and we missed the free hour. Rather than disappoint my sweet little boy, I ponied up the $6 for our little family to ride.

It was a good choice.

Caleb rode a giraffe, and loved it!

Can you see Daisy in the mirror? She rode a horse that went up and down, and grinned the whole time.

It's hard to simultaneously photograph and hold on to children. It's even harder with a 50mm lens.

Caleb's carousel joy, from two feet away.

Caleb and Mary, checking out the chimpanzees.

Caleb and a very photogenic camel. 

Even with Baby #4, Amber makes the whole pregnancy thing look effortless. 

I should probably tell her to stop that - it makes every other pregnant woman in the world look bad.

Michael was pointing at two lion cubs, who were pretty funny to watch.

Caleb's favorite part of the zoo trip, though, was the elephant fountain. He didn't even want to turn away from it for a photo.

Luckily, I convinced him to turn around. Michael was cooperative, at least - this is his stellar "cheese" face. I can't stop laughing about it. Just gaze at that little face for a while and try not to laugh.

This one makes me the happiest, though. Mama Catherine, Daisy who is way past naptime and mealtime and totally done with the whole zoo thing, Michael clapping his little hands, goofy Caleb who is about to sneak his arm around Mary, and Mary, who is doing Lord-knows-what.  Amber and I are pretty lucky mamas!

You can see Amber's (much better) pictures at her blog, including some of animals.