Labor Day Monday

Labor Day Monday was a wet, rainy, yucky kind of day in Nashville. The remnants of Hurricane Isaac had been around all weekend and it was just one of those weekends where the sun was really never going to come out. After sleeping in a bit we decided to have a "Science Day" Monday and do something a little different on the rainy extra day of our weekend.

I had pinned several Science-y things on Pinterest so we followed several of those and she was having so much fun with it we did a few other things. Our first experiment was a "Dancing Raisins" experiment where you have raisins in one water bottle with just water and pour Sprite in another. The one with Sprite will make them "dance" as the carbonation moves the raisins up and down.

Our second experiment was with balloons, vinegar and baking soda. You fill a bottle about 1/3 full with vinegar and then fill the balloon half full with baking soda.
The "tongue of concentration". Cracks me up every time!Next, you put the balloon on the bottle and let the baking soda fall into the vinegar to create the chemical reaction and blow up the balloon. Brent got us all worried the whole thing was going to explode and pop in our face so he had us run off to the corner.
Maybe if you put a ton of baking soda it will explode, but ours certainly didn't. Even though Brent about scared her half to death she wanted to try it again, so I made Mr Over-reaction be the Science Helper. These experiments were great because they were easy enough she could do all the measuring herself. Pippin was super interested in everything. (not).The balloon blew up to a nice size and we tied this one off and let her play with it. All of the chemicals/gases in it made it a slightly heavier balloon to play with, so that was fun, too. I didn't have much vinegar on-hand, so we were only able to do it twice, but I picked up some more this week at the store because I know she'll want to do this one a few more times as well as some other chemical reaction experiments I found involving vinegar.We also did some simple "make your own lava lamp" type experiments. All you need is water, oil, salt, and food coloring. She always picked dark colors that made it hard to see the "lava", but had fun anyway mixing the ingredients and trying different colors.
Dropping the salt in creates the "lava" from the oil becoming heavier and mixing with the water.Lilli had fun playing dress up in some of the new dress up clothes from her cousin Madison.During a brief break in the rain Brent was able to take her on a trike ride over to see the firetruck. The firemen have put some new hanging rings in the tree outside the fire station. The little gymnast just had to try it out!
Home Sweet Home!We had a great Labor Day weekend, despite the rain, and are planning to make "science" a more regular part of our down-time activities!

Labor Day Weekend

We had a really nice Labor Day weekend. Nice and low key, and restful for us all. Exactly what we were needing.

That Friday night we went out to Opry Mills mall for dinner and to do a little shopping. We go there quite a bit now since they have a nice Motherhood store I can pick up some new items every few weeks in. My work dress code changed from being dressy (no jeans, ever) to being able to wear jeans every day, so a lot of my maternity clothes with Lilli are just a little dressier than what I prefer wearing now that we're more casual. And styles have changed so I've picked up several new things along the way. Of course Lilli only had one store on her mind - Disney:She ended up with her "one" choice being a new Merida and Angus toy. They get you on the "value" of getting two of something. I was able to get some summer stuff on a great clearance for her for next year, and I snuck a Cinderella backpack (also a big clearance deal) into my bag to "surprise" her with for our trip to Disney coming up soon.
That Saturday morning we did a little yardwork before the rain moved in for the rest of the weekend. Brent got shrubs trimmed all around the house and we finally dug up our potatoes. All I can say about that is that our container (spray painted tires) was the cutest part of the whole thing. They were so tiny. I don't remember what I planted, so maybe that's all we should have expected.
Sunday was really rainy, off an on. As usual we had to pluck Lilli out of someone else's car before going home.That afternoon she wanted to look at baby pictures and movies of herself, so we showed her a lot of her first days which she found hilarious. She absolutely loves watching video of herself, luckily we have about a million hours worth of footage!I wasn't feeling great that day and ended up taking a 4 hour nap!! I'm not sure if it was pregnancy junk or some sort of stomach junk but I felt awful - but the nap REALLY helped!!!

More Labor Day weekend tomorrow!

The rest of the pics...

Brent took several other great pics yesterday for the big "gender announcement". Of course it would have been nice if he had been in one or two, but it was blazing hot, we were pouring sweat, tired, and Lilli just wanted to go see the ducks. But we did get several sweet ones of her and I.This was when she was chanting "No boys, No boys, only girlies! And Daddy." I think she's pretty happy with an all girlie household.
We did our maternity pictures here a few years ago, in the fall. Hard to believe this little secret spot is less than a mile from downtown and the Titans stadium, huh?
The pink balloons turned out so cute! It's pretty much mandatory to come out with some clever way to announce gender these days. If I see one more picture on blogs or Pinterest of people opening a giant box with balloons flying out I'm pretty sure I'll gag. We just keep it simple with a pretty setting and pink balloons. And a cute 3 year old helped!!
She does not have a head injury. She bumped into our table Sunday night and needed a Band-Aid. There's no bump, cut, or bruise there. This is just one that helps her feel better emotionally and even though she's had multiple baths it's still on there.
Throwing pink confetti and shouting Sister....
We had no clue, but there's a helium shortage. Normally we have a small tank and make as many balloons as we want, but everyone is out of the tanks, and Party City isn't even taking pre-orders for balloons because they're not even sure when they'll have helium and when they won't. Our person on Wednesday told us that even at these GOP/DEM national conventions they've been using regular balloons instead of helium in all the displays! Now how has that not made the national news???
I'll try and get some actual baby ultrasound pictures scanned in over the weekend. I can already tell this little girl looks different from her big sister. Lilli already had my more pronounced lips in her ultrasound at this stage, and this baby has a profile all her own. I'm sure this is just the first of many differences between the two!

And the winner is.....

We are thrilled to announce a little more Pink will be joining our house in mid-January!! Lilli is thrilled to know (for sure) she's having a little sister since she's already been telling people for months that's what "she" was having. Whew!! Let the purchasing of matching outfits begin!

Summer Living....

Pics from August 18th - 20th - getting close now!!

Brent is sooo close to being done with the new front fence. The ridiculous weather this summer has been the biggest hindrance. From the building phase where it was literally 110 degrees outside and wood was warping instantly, to the on and off rain since early July making it impossible to have dry wood to work with, this has been the never-ending project. On this particular Saturday morning, he got a nice start with the final coat of paint while Lilli and I went off on a nature walk around the neighborhood. Around lunch-time we stopped for some hot dogs and.....

a storm all of a sudden popped up. It was just a drizzle at first, and luckily the area he painted is protected by the large cypress in our front yard. The downpour started. Fortunately his paint had had long enough to dry, and been protected enough during the drizzle, not to have any damage. Lilli and I had gotten her paints out and were making cute little pictures on the pile of scrap lumber. We really had some fun little designs going - but our art project and her washable paint didn't make it at all. We were too late running out to save it.
That evening we surprised her with a trip to the "big movies". We hadn't been since June and she hadn't seen the new Disney princess movie Brave yet. She loved it, but I have to say if your preschooler doesn't handle some "scary" violence then I would avoid it for a bit. There's a few fight scenes between bears that are fairly intense - a couple of kiddos who looked similar ages to Lilli had to leave during that scene.
Our mandatory picture after the movie with the poster. I don't feel like we go to many movies (this is maybe her 5th or 6th?) but with our free Regal Rewards card we just earned a free movie ticket, and we've already earned a free drink and free popcorn in the past. Definitely worth taking the time to sign up for the card and it does keep us loyal to this particular chain.
Afterwards we went to Michaels to check out what new crafty fall stuff they might have out. She loves, loves, loves these weird little animal and people figurines.She is so obsessed with these car buggies at the grocery store. Since I'm a good mom I try to find one when I can. The turn radius is awful and it's a bear for me to push (and the car itself is smaller), but how you can deny this happiness?
We hit the pool up, maybe for the last time this summer. We hadn't been in forever because of the rain and cooler temps in August. When we got there the kiddie pool had just been closed for thirty minutes because some kid pooped in it (don't even want to know how that happened....) but thankfully they kept it open a little later than the regular hours since it was near closing time. The poop incident really cleared out the crowd so we had so much space when it reopened!!
Our after swim treat - Taco Bell and frozen strawberry lemonade!!We're still trying to get in as many weeknight playdates with Serif and his parents before it starts getting dark so early. These two have so much fun running around. And I think the dads have a lot of fun shooting hoops.....See how dark it was already at 7:30!! Crazy. For some reason Serif had the idea that he wanted to be up inside the little basketball goal and of course Lilli needed to be up there too. They're both so light and small they had plenty of room to hang out up there together and yell for their daddies to look at them. Silly kids!!! She'll miss playing with him this week while they're gone to the beach for their fall vacation. She asked if we could go to "our" beach house and see him. HA! Back to work and school for us all tomorrow, boooo!

A Week in the Life of a Princess....

All these pics are from August 20th - 24th. I am catching up!!!

That Monday afternoon I took Lilli to the doctor. It was the first time she'd had a "sick child" visit in over a year and a half!! Woo hoo!! She is really very rarely sick, and the doc is always really impressed with her track record of hardly ever having to come in. So funny since people tend to rag on "daycare kids" as always being sick. Um, not true. At all. She had been coughing for a bit over a week, but had had no fever, no drainage, and really not felt bad except for the coughing and how that was causing her to not sleep well. We were hoping doc could give us some antibiotics or something just to knock the cough out, but after listening to her, having her run and jump around, and giving her a thorough exam she ruled it as allergies. She did give me a couple of different over the counter things to try, and luckily Zyrtec does come in a kid formula she's old enough for. The evening liquid she had me swap to worked wonders and Lilli was sleeping like a dream that night and so much more rested the next day.

We stopped at Walgreens to pick up the medicines she had recommended and I saw these Ariel swim goggles on clearance. Hilarious. And of course she loved them!!
Every day when we get home in the afternoon her first chore is to take the "baby" gate down to let Pippin out of the living room, then take her shoes and put them up in her room. Once she does that she always changes out of her clothes and into one dress up costume or another. It's like living with royalty. Personally, I'd rather throw on a T and some comfy pants!That week she wanted to take Tinkerbell to school for show and tell.
But it was all Snow White at church that evening. I'm pretty sure she's going to love Disney.
That Friday night we met up with friends for dinner at Mitchells, a little local deli. They have a nice patio area out back for eating and "child running wild area". But oh my word - the flies were 100% out of control. It was basically miserable trying to eat and chase flies off of everything. So we ran over to a little neighborhood park in the area and let the kids run off more steam afterwards. Lilli and Audrey were working on their gymnastics moves on the bars....She has seen my picture taken enough recently to know what to do! Hilarious.One of her recent drawings - on the left is an alien, on the right is Lilli.So glad tomorrow is another day in the weekend. I took a MUCH needed 4 hour nap today and don't regret a second of it.

Pasta, Fencing, and Playing

These pics are all from the weekend of August 17th-19th....

That Friday I was "stuck" in a pretty lengthy meeting between two people who had been to Mirko (my fave Italian restaurant) for lunch and they both smelled like garlic and pasta. So that evening we **had** to go to Mirko. They really are absolutely the best Italian place in Nashville and we all love it. Lilli was in an especially loving mood that evening and was cracking us up the whole time.Such a ham. The portions are pretty large, so even though it's not someplace I would call cheap (it usually runs about $30 for the three of us including tip and dessert to go - their tiramisu is to die for!!) we always have plenty left for the three of us to have lunch the following day.
She loves the spaghetti.....it takes her quite a while to eat piece by piece.Some fence progress on that Saturday....our front yard doesn't seem large at all until you think about it being two sides....The bones to the new gate. That gate had been a thorn in our sides the six years we've lived here. Just a weird latching system people (especially the mail man) couldn't figure out and then other people (again, the mail man) would leave it wide open flapping in the breeze. And there was the time someone (the mail man) broke the whole thing and left it slanted up against the gate. Surely this one will be mail man friendly.The following day - all primed up!The gate - all picketed and primed! Major improvement!! Right now we don't have a latch on it, but we probably will do something. This particular hinge has an auto-close feature so no one can leave it wide open, however in storms and high winds it will beat and flap so we need something to protect against that sort of damage. But this gate is SO much better than what we've had!!! Who-ever put together the last one did a horrible job with the design of it.
Poor Lilli was suffering from allergies so badly this weekend. We really didn't go anywhere because she was pretty pitiful from her cough. She was coughing so badly at night and anytime she tried to sleep. When she woke up that Sunday morning she sounded absolutely horrible and asked us if she could just not go anywhere. She never asks to stay home, so when she does you know she feels pitiful and terrible. (We actually went to the doctor Monday afternoon.) So, she and I stayed home that morning and curled up on the couch watching movies and rested. Brent did take her to feed the ducks and just get some fresh air that afternoon. Since we'd pretty much kept her in all weekend trying to maybe knock the cough out, he got the bike out and took her on a ride down to Shelby Park to feed the ducks.It really is the best place in Nashville to feed ducks. Tons of them and not many people go to feed them, so it's always really easy to get a ton to swim up.Happy to get a little break from being inside!They do love taking a picture or two....So far this weekend we've had a pretty relaxing one. We got a lot of much needed yardwork done this morning with trimming up some shrubs and even did some deep cleaning inside the house and organizing some messy areas of the house. So glad we'll have an extra day on this weekend!