Dancer

Ordinary?

LSB: I wish I wasn't an ordinary girl.

Me: Sweetheart, if there is one thing you are not, it's ordinary.

LSB: If I was extraordinary, I could turn myself into a mermaid.

The Itsty-Bitsy Spider went up the water spout...

Our church had a "Candyland" party last night for kids Scouten's age and a little older. We've been talking about a "Halloween Party" all week - and needless to say she was excited. I had no idea what to expect, and at the last second talked Sean into dressing up too - I was already planning on it, as one of my co-workers brought in a spiderweb cape and I knew I needed to wear that!

As an adult, I thought "Candyland" was a blast. It was set up like the game, with game stations throughout the gameboard where kids could stop and play for prizes. At the end, a snowcone station, where you could pick your flavor. As the mama of a 2-year-old that doesn't breathe so well after a night in the cold, an indoor Halloween event was great!! Well done CC UMC!

My eyes beheld an eerie sight!!

Singing in The Rain....I'm just a SINGING IN THE RAIN...

Okay, maybe she's just splashing in the puddles while wearing new white shoes...I'd blame her Grandma Coash, if only I could stop laughing...

If you're happy and you know it - clap your hands

Scouten can point out our local library - and we drive by it often. She usually says "Library!!" followed by "It's locked!" Wednesday night when we drove by, we knew it was unlocked, so we asked if she wanted to go in. As you can see by the following pic, she didn't even want to take a picture of her first trip, she just wanted to get to the BOOKS!

The children's section has a rug with abc's, numbers, and animals on it - she had a ball with that, then she found the beads.
After signing up for a library card and checking out three books, we headed home. She dug around in a toybox and found her gardening gloves, where she wanted us to "Water the garden."
When we said we could go water it, she proceeded to clap and jump around...
While gloves were required, pants were optional....

Here's our haul from Wednesday night...minus a few smaller tomatoes that didn't make it inside.

Tuppence a bag...

Two out of the last three mornings, Scouten has gone to the zoo before 9 a.m. This morning when Grandma showed up, she of course told her that she wanted to go see the ducks. How could she deny her request, when this is what happens when she goes?



The huh-huh at 34 seconds makes me smile everytime...what an entertainer!!

and on this farm he had some ducks

My two-year-old is faking a nap, so I thought I'd give you a little update on our day - that's not a typo, she really is faking a nap...
We had a big day planned for the birthday girl today, but her immune system obviously disagreed with our plans. She was diagnosed with bronchitis on Wednesday, she's had a couple days of steroids and good ole breathing treatments, but we decided to stay close to home, just in case. Yesterday was pretty rough.

Sean and I both took the day off, even though grandma Reva rolled her eyes when we told her. So this morning we asked Scouten what SHE wanted to do for her birthday, her reply?
"go look at ducks and.....drink grandma's coffee." So at 8:40 a.m. we left the house for the CC Zoo, if I told you she was excited, I might be understating it...

I think the following picture should be called "TWO monkeys looking at each other".

After the zoo we went to Short Stop for a pop, dropped daddy off to mow and went to "dancing class" as she is now calling it. Her Auntie CJ got her a tutu for her birthday, so she HAD to wear that...as Miss Jolie said, "EVERY girl needs a tutu."

When we pulled in the driveway after dance, her friends were at their grandma's house next door, so out came the bubbles. Daddy finished up mowing, and after a quick stop at the radio station, it was off to PIZZA!

Whew!! Now that she has stopped faking and started taking a nap, I think I'll join her...

move 'em out..rawhide!

On Facebook this week, most people are posting pictures of their daddy's for father's day. There's no possible way I can post only ONE picture, (a) I have too many gems and (b) I have two very special daddies in my life. So I guess I'll have to post multiple pictures here, instead.

The day my husband became a father, he really didn't want to let Scouten go, at all, the entire day. I had a pretty urgent c-section, and we talked beforehand about how I would be just fine, and he needed to stick with the baby. After she was born, I saw that we didn't have to have that talk, he knew I was okay, and he was headed out the door. One of the nurses told me later that she couldn't believe how proud he was when he came walking down the hallway with his baby girl. So, before I start sobbing, I'll tell you this is what my parents' saw when they walked into the hospital room the morning Scouten was born.

I KNOW she's not eight hours old, and she's all snuggled up to her daddy! Speaking of daddy's, when I called my parents to let them know she had been born, and that we had named her my dad's mom's maiden name, his reply was,"You're going to have to repeat that, Rhy." I can't decide if he really didn't hear, or if he was in shock. He picked up the phone, so I'm going to go with"in shock."
From the very beginning, I'm pretty sure he thought she was a keeper...
I have a million pictures of Sean snuggling his girl, but this is one of my favorites, I like to think that they are both holding each other...
Grandpa even has his own lullaby that he sings to Scouten - now that's she's almost two and knows EVERYTHING, she knows the words to "Grandpa's lullaby" and sings it every time she gets in the swing.
I adore this shot, cause my SB's have never looked more alike...someone (sorry can't remember who) pointed out, "they even have the same hair."
For Scouten's first Halloween, grandpa showed up with a jack-o-lantern, and then they held hands, while talking about the jack-o-lantern. The second Halloween they used a jig-saw to cut out pumpkin faces, who knows what they will do next year, probably just run it through the lawnmower.

Sometimes I have to remind myself that SOME daddy's aren't THIS involved in their daughter's lives, some daddy's don't take her to her first dance class, or change her diaper, or push her on the swing six million times, or hold her while she thinks of some kind of trouble for both of them to get into...

This last shot I really can't talk about, I just have to look at it. I know this because it sits on my desk at work, and one of my co-workers asked me about it. I turned into a teary-blubbery-babbling mess. I'll just let it speak for itself.

Hi-ho the dairy-o the farmer in the dell

Our little gardner, hard at work...

with the light of the glittering stars...

Two years ago, my mother won tickets to the "Symphony on the Flint Hills." She took my dad and has been raving about it ever since. I did a little research and found that tickets are not easy to get. They are ususally sold out within a few hours - this year the window opened at 8am, and I'm pretty positive the tickets didn't last until noon. Thanks to the beauty of technology, we bought our tickets via Sean's phone while driving down the road to Oklahoma. I think my mom was kind of shocked we actually did get tickets!

Because it's in the middle of someone's pasture, they can accomadate quite a few people. One report I've read already says there were 7500 people, and I don't think they were too far off! I marveled throughout the whole event how many people were there.

This year the concert was in Volland - which is between Alma and Alta Vista. You can mapquest it if you'd like, it really does exist. The scenery getting there was pretty amazing.

We KNEW we were on the right track when we hit traffic in the middle of a semi-paved road and when we saw this. Those are tents, cars and people in the distance...

Once we made it through all the traffic, and got ourselves parked, we waited for my sister, who was about a mile behind us, but through some luck only parked about 8 cars away from us. It was a big pasture - I'm amazed we we even found each other. While we were waiting we people watched. Where else could you see a Wyoming cowboy and his family park next to a brand new Johnson County corvette?

Finally we made it through all the entrace tents, took a beautiful hayrack ride across to the actual site, and found all kinds of tents to explore and things to do. Some were already finished up, because we didn't make it to the site until 6ish and the concert started at 6:45. This beautiful site was near the donors tent. My sister tried to explain to the event staff guarding the tent, that we had bought tickets and were therefore "donors." That reasoning didn't work, so we went to explore the other tents where they had offered 20 minute lectures, an instrument petting zoo, and storytelling.


Oh! And there were wagon rides...

I am still marveling at how many people were there. I just can't explain it. Some people looked right at home in there overalls or cowboy hats, and others in there fancy dresses with heeled boots, looked completely lost.

There were some photographers set up to just take pictures of the sunset and nothing else, so I thought I might as well get in a shot. It really was beautiful to listen to the orchestra play while the sun was setting.

But the site that really took my breath away was at the end, when the Fort Riley Mounted colorguard rode over the hill and through the crowd. They literally rode between the orchestra and the crowd. There was a horse that didn't appreciate the loudness of the music, but did do what his rider told him to do.

All in all, it was a great night of experiences, music, scenery, and fun! I can't wait to go next year.

Gotta Dance!!

Aint it a glorious day? Right as a morning in May.

A few months ago, Mom, Scouten and I were in this ridiculous baby store. By ridiculous, I mean the display window had a round crib in it, complete with chandelier. Luckily the clothes only went up to 2t and Scouten was wearing 3t's already! Anyway, the store also had a chalkboard in the back that was set up for kids to play with, instead of breaking all the uber-expensive toys. Scouten thought it was AWESOME. Yesterday, Grandma and Grandpa Coash showed up with a 4ft x 4ft square...

Scouten didn't hesitate or look twice...she was asking for the chalk before Grandpa even got the level out...
I think this one is called animal silhouettes in the grass...or maybe that's just what it looks like to me...she says her abc's while she's drawing, so maybe it's a great story and I just don't get it.
Scouten wasn't the only one to have fun with the chalkboard. Grandpa got in the act as well. That's a picture of Scouten he's drawing...I don't know about the curly hair, but I sure didn't ask either...