Cold, Rainy Day Fun

About a month ago, while we were at Gymnastics, Kaiya had a very hard day. She got scared while rolling backwards over a giant foam barrel thing, and just cried and cried. Her teacher (who I love) held her and encouraged her to do other stuff, but she just psyched herself out and had a terrible time coming back from it. Towards the end of class, she did try again, and I was so proud of her, because you could see she was still pretty upset.

Well, after that tough morning, we decided that the perfect thing for us to do would be to go over to our good friend Ben's house and try out Kaiya's new pink rain boots. Ben is one of Kaiya's favorite friends, and the most wonderful thing about them together, is that the are always so nice to each other! It is like they bring out the best in each other (besides an incident with a black marker, but that is another story).

So Ben & Kaiya played outside together in the FREEZING rain and had a ball. They got out the lawn mowers and ran like the wind down the sidewalk and crashed into each other.


Over & over & over again.


Eventually they came into the garage where Tara & I were sitting & watching them. Tara even got out a heating pad for their poor freezing fingers.

As always Kaiya had a wonderful time playing with her friend.


Right after this picture was taken, Kaiya layed down in the water that was streaming down by the sidewalk, and got completely soaked from head to toe, and it was time to go home. She was so cold when we got home that I stripped her wet clothes off & swaddled her in a big quilt, just like when she was a baby. She thought it was hilarious when I told her she was a "baby burrito" and didn't want to take it off.

What a great way to make a sad day happy again!

Halloween Pre-view at the Trunk or Treat

This year for Halloween, Kaiya decided to be Minnie Mouse (okay, so she had a little help deciding from Mom). Kaiya's favorite part about the costume is, of course, the pink sparkly shoes, which she's asked to wear every day since we got them.

Kaiya has been so excited for Halloween, she asks me every day "Is it Halloween time yet?" So when we got the chance to have a little early Trick or Treating at the Trunk or Treat at my parent's ward, we jumped at the chance!

Kaiya loved to see herself all dressed up, she especially liked her little black nose.

Kaiya was one excited girl, she couldn't wait to get out there! Of course it didn't hurt that she got to run around with Buddy.

After all the candy was gathered, we sat in the back of Grandma's car and enjoyed the bounty. Her favorite's were the "Nem & Nem's" (M&M's) and the lollypops. She even got some Dora fruit snacks!

We were a little worried she would be wired from all the sugar when we got home, but she went right to sleep. I hope we are that lucky on Halloween!

The Butterfly Flutterby

In scrapbooking they say that when you get behind, don't start at the earliest thing that needs to be done and try to catch up, they say you should start at what is current and work backwards. So I'm trying the same theory with the blog. So yesterday Jamie took Kaiya to the Butterfly Flutterby on Main Street. They had so much fun, Kaiya couldn't stop talking about it when they got home.

The Butterfly Flutterby is a little festival that occurs at the time the monarch butterflies are migrating through the area on their way to Mexico, and as a part of this, they do a costume parade, interactive butterfly exhibits, crafts and several butterfly releases. Of course Kaiya had to attend this important event in costume.

Although Kaiya still generally won't let me take a normal picture of her (meaning look at the camera and smile) I did get a couple of good action shots. Here she is inspecting some ants in a line on the sidewalk.

This picture makes me laugh, I can almost hear the movie director shouting stage direction from off camera "Now, give me a look of far off wonder".
Jamie picked out those sunglasses for Kaiya when we went to the State Fair, and I think he did a great job.

Finally, it was time for the butterfly release. They found Kaiya's friends Ben & Daniel, and Tara helped the kiddos set it free, while Jamie took the pictures.

After the excitement of the butterfly release Kaiya went to the pony ride. She has been talking about pony rides ever since we went to the State Fair. I made the mistake of assuming they would have them there, and told Kaiya that she could go on a pony ride when we got there. Well, they didn't have any "live animal rides" this year at all, so she was a little bit disappointed. Well then Friday night we went to Wolf Fest at Hannah & Haylee's school, and they had them there. Man was she excited! So she got to ride a pony on Friday night, then they had them again at the Flutterby, so she got to ride a pony twice in two days!
Can you see her little tounge poking out in the picture above?


Since the festival was at the old train depot, before they came home, Jamie and Kaiya went and climbed on some of the old train cars they have there. Kaiya and Buddy like to go look at trains together, and he recently built her the coolest train table ever, so we have been on a train kick!


Daddy & Daughter both had a great time, and I am so grateful that Jamie is such a great dad, and likes to do things with his baby girl. I couldn't ask for anything more.

Trying Something New!

I do a lot of digital scrapbooking, so I thought maybe since I haven't been so good at keeping the blog updated lately, I will post a new lay out! I am not sure how this will work, and Jamie is off at WoodBadge this weekend, so I can't get his input, but lets see if this works.

This layout is supposed to be a "snapshot" of Kaiya on her second birthday. I did one for her on her first birthday, and I loved how it turned out, so I decided to make it a tradition and do another one.

You should be able to click on the picture and have it come up big on your screen. Let me know if it works, and I will post more!

Gymnastics

Okay, so I have been a terribly blog mommy lately, so I will put up something quick tonight. A few weeks ago Kaiya started Gymnastics. Our friend Lauryn has been going to this school for a while and she loves it, and we went to her birthday party there and Kaiya and Jamie and I ALL had a fabulous time! (In fact maybe Jamie & I liked it even better than Kaiya, those giant pits of foam blocks is seriously just as fun as they look!). Well Kaiya is taking the classes with her sweet friend Molly, who is just one day older than she is, and these two make quite a pair. Well Molly's mommy (Megan) did a really cute post on her blog, with pictures, so I will put up the link to that!

http://blakebradyfamily.blogspot.com/2009/10/gymnastics-class.html

Kaiya completely loves going to the classes and has been doing tumble rolls all over the house, Jamie even practices doing them too. It is adorable, maybe I can sneak up behind them sometime with a video camera...

Our Trip to Austin

A month or so ago I got tickets for Jamie and I to see the musical "Wicked" in Austin, and this weekend the date finally came!

We started out on Friday morning with "Meet the Teacher" at Kaiya's new pre-school. She was so excited to go, and had so much fun. Here she is raring to go!



Kaiya and Daddy outside the school

We dropped Kaiya off at my mom & dad's and took off for Austin. That evening we went to see one of the coolest things I have ever seen. About 3 million Mexican Free Tail Bats live under the Congress Avenue Bridge and every day at sunset during the warm months the bats swarm out and fly over the river. It was seriously amazing, pictures cannot do it justice.

Do you see the black smudges in in the sky in these pictures? They are BATS!

The bats seriously kept pouring out from under the bridge for over 15 minutes, it was absolutely amazing.

A beautiful sunset from the Congress Avenue Bridge

I don't know exactly how this started, but whenever Jamie and I go places, one of our favorite things to do is to take pictures of ourselves pointing at/interacting with odd things. Here is Jamie pointing at a sign with a picture of Ann Richards on it that is on the bridge, and making a lovely face.

That night we had dinner at "Chuy's Hula Hut" which was very fun, and scrumptious. We ate on a giant pier over Lake Travis, with a lot of intoxicated people (including one lady who somehow dropped her credit card over the side into the lake, and had half the staff trying to fish it out with a seriously long net).

We definitely enjoyed the atmosphere, it was Tiki-riffic


The next day we slept in (ahh...the novelty!) and had lunch at Stubbs Bar-B-Que where we had a very unique experience...

There are a couple of rooms in the upstairs seating area, and when we were poking around for a place to sit, we stuck our heads into a side room, and there was a meeting of Texas Nationalists, which is apparently a group that thinks that Texas should secede from the United States. It was mostly older, very conservative looking people, and several of the men were wearing 10 gallon hats. Well, if that wasn't enough, then a couple of guys in their early twenties with tattoos and mohawks came in with their dad, and they were wearing shirts that had this on the back:
So, Jamie and I are sitting in the corner, and can see the whole restaurant, and as the Texas Nationalists walk out of their meeting they walk right past these guys, and I have to say, I was getting a little nervous. But as these old white guys in 10 gallon hats walked past the punks wearing gun shirts, the punks got a little nod or hat tip from most of the Texas Nationalist people. All I can say is that Texas is an odd place, and I love it. Then a few minutes later, some other very normal looking people got into a very boisterous discussion with the gun punks about secession. Seriously...only in Texas.

After our meeting of the minds at Stubbs, we went to the LBJ Presidential Library, which was pretty interesting. I have never been to a Presidential Library before, and I really enjoyed the display of gifts he received from diplomats from other countries, and all the things about Lady Bird Johnson. First Ladies are fascinating, don't you think?
Jamie enjoyed meeting the life-sized LBJ, and giving him the boyscout handshake

After the library, it was time to get ready for WICKED!!!! Yay!!! I was so nervous that something would happen and we wouldn't be able to see it (which is what happened when we had tickets in Dallas). But we made it! Yay Yay!
Then on our way back, in the parking garage, I had a reaffirmation of why I don't wear high heels...Yep, this is me, almost having to duck under the clearance sign in the garage...It wasn't just my cute new shoes though, I had Texas hair as well, that gave me another inch at least.

This was also our first trip with the new camera, so I did some experimenting, and came up with a few pictures I am actually kind of proud of:


Overall, this was a wonderful trip, and I really love Austin. It is a fascinating combination of uber-liberal college town, and very straight laced governmental city. I can't wait to go back again, girls weekend anyone???

First Day With My New Camera!

I have been having problems with my old point and click camera, because Kaiya is a pretty fast moving kid, and all my pictures seemed to turn out blurry. So for my birthday, I asked for an SLR camera. My dad, a photography buff from back in the day, and I narrowed it down and picked a great new Nikon, and I was so excited about it, that after the battery charged, I spent the whole next day taking pictures. Here are some of the highlights, and it probably represents a pretty average day for us!

So, I have had trouble getting Kaiya to pose for pictures lately, and someone suggested that I ask her if I can take a picture of her favorite stuffed animal, and boy did that help! I started out by just taking a picture of C.C.

I love this picture, because you can see her sweet little hand fixing C.C.'s flipper. She noticed it was tucked up under her, and wanted to fix it before I took her friend's picture.


Then I asked if I could take a picture of her and C.C. together, and she ran across the room and threw herself on the blue chair.


Of course Kaiya and Daddy had to do a little rough housing, Kaiya says "I wanna go upside-down!" and then she laughs almost manically.


Did I mention that C.C. is our favorite friend? She likes to keep her close by.

Of course, no day would be complete without harassing Pepper until she bears her teeth and growls menacingly.

Then it is time for a bath! Here is my little duck, cheesing it up for the camera!
Don't you think she looks like Jamie in this picture?

Last of all, it is time for stories before bed. Getting ready for bed is Daddy's special time to spend with Kaiya, and I think he enjoys reading stories with her as much as she does.
By the way, thanks to Megan for the tip on the "Baby Jaguar" jammies, they are her favorite, and I wish I would have followed her advice and bought a pair in the next size too. We both love them.

So there you are! A typical Sunday afternoon with our family! I am so excited to learn how to use my new camera really well, thanks Mom & Dad!