The Ultimate Bib

Bryn is not a very tidy eater. Even with a regular bib on, she still gets messy. In fact, I usually resort to feeding her myself, so her clothes don't get dirty. But yesterday I made this bib out of a hand towel, using my friends tutorial, and it's been awesome! I made two of them and the supplies for both cost me $5 total.

In addition to protecting Bryn's clothes, the bib has also made her noticeably more reverant and well-behaved. See above photo.

"Looking for garbage trucks"...a.ka. spying on the neighbors.

Caps For Sale

After talking to my friend Kristin about the fun things she used to do with her young kids, I've been trying to do more fun things with Bryn. She is a former teacher and she basically made daily lesson plans with books to read and fun things to do. My friends Jen and Kristy do the same thing everyday and it's awesome! So, in an attempt to step up my game, I made a list of my favorite children's books, and then Bryn and I checked out the first ten books today at the library, and had an awesome afternoon reading through them. So many classics! Here is Bryn's favorite of the day:

I love this book! Love the cute little illustrations and even the colors of the pictures. Cute story, cute dialogue. Bryn was laughing so hard when the peddler was getting mad at the monkeys. We re-read those pages over and over.

And then we stacked Bryn's "caps" upon her head and it was heaven, for a hat-lover like her!

Company Picnic

Josh and B on the ferris wheel.

We spent the afternoon at Josh's summer party for his company. It was even more fun than last year (wow, she was chubby back then!) because Bryn was old enough to do the rides and games. This morning I told Brynlee we were going to a party today, and I told her everything we'd do. All day she kept saying "Party? Party? Party?" And then the whole time as she did the activities she kept saying "PARTY!" Cute.

Bryn and I relaxed while Josh paddled us around the lake. I loved Bryn in that orange vest.

Bryn's favorite part was the bouncy house in the background. She just went nuts in there, jumping all over, doing somersaults, and then lying down and getting bounced by other kids. She kept saying "Party! Party! Bean! Bean!" ("Bean" is short for Jumping Bean, which we call her when she gets silly jumping on our bed.) She was in heaven.

Fun party, fun afternoon.

BIG little

Bryn loves Leslie Patricelli picture books...and so do I. We've read them each about a million times, and Bryn now reads along. (Mind you, they're really simple books.) I always giggle when Bryn reads these two pages. She points to each object and says what she thinks it is. Here are her answers: (clockwise, from the top left) -does a wild cackle (she thinks it's a hyena) -"rock" -"but" -"raff" -"asdnknkjchnsdkfjls" -"tower" -"bee, bzzzzzzzzzz" -"sssssssss" (she thinks it's a snake) -"paci" -"kitty!!!!!!!!" -"candy" -"money" -"bunny" (it's the ears) -"pea" Cute? Maybe only to me and Josh. And my mom. But I have her read it ten times a day and I giggle every time.

Play Kitchen

We finally finished making Bryn's little play kitchen....a project that lingered on for months! I've seen a million of these handmade play kitchen on the internet, so I wanted to jump on the bandwagon.

We started off with this side table, which I found at Goodwill for $10.00. We cut down the legs a few inches, took off the knob, filled in the hole, and sanded the whole thing down. Then we primed and painted the whole thing, added a new handle, and added a little "back-splash" panel on the back. And of course added the other little parts. We covered the whole darn thing with three coats of Polyurethane to make it more durable.

We cut a hole for the sink and gorilla glued a little silver bowl in the hole. The faucet is an upside down letter "J" from Michaels. The knobs were taken from an old dresser found by our dumpster, and then painted silver. And the burners are thin wood circles from Michaels. The pots and pans, metal hooks, and metal bar are all from Ikea.

We took apart the drawer and added some hinges and black chain to the front part of the drawer to make it an oven.

It stays shut with a magnetic closure from Home Depot.

I sewed up a little dish towel, that probably shouldn't be hanging on the ground. And a little oven mitt, that turned out more like a snow mitten or a Christmas tree ornament.

Bryn's fake food and dishes hide behind this lovely little curtain. The curtain is hung on a wooden dowel. And that's that.

Big thanks to our neighbor Tyler for lending us his fancy saw about 35 times.

And big thanks to Josh for accompanying me to Home Depot about 75 times, and then pretty much building the whole thing, with me peering over his shoulder and critiquing any imperfection.

I think Bryn will love it! (She'd better.)

Three Years Ago Today

I'm a lucky girl.

Pudding

It's been pretty hot and humid lately, and the only thing you can do about it is get in your swimsuit and cover yourself in pudding. My talented photographer friend Michelle took all these fun pictures of the girls.

Isn't Maddy the cutest little girl ever? Well....uh....tied with Bryn I guess.

Pudding Painting

Nothing like pudding up the nose

Thanks Michelle! Fun day!

Grandpa Hawkins

Grandpa Hawkins and Bryn, right before our move to California

Josh has been in Utah this weekend for the funeral of this dear man who passed away this week: Josh's Grandpa Hawkins. I really wish I could have been there for the memorial services, to honor such a wonderful man. I'm grateful to have known him, and to have married into his family. I'm so happy that he is finally reunited with his dear wife.

La Habra Children's Museum

I forgot to post about a fun little trip to the Children's Museum in La Habra. It was my first time taking Brynlee there, and it was awesome!

A sweet shot of Bryn's mullet. She's since had a little trim.

Driving the bus

So much fun!! We will definitely be back!

(What I didn't get any pictures of was Brynlee kissing the faces of the dead animals in the Taxidermy room. That was lovely.)

Busy Week

This week has been CRAZY. So many things popping up. When it rains it pours. While I've been running around like mad, Bryn has spent the majority of her days drawing. Thank goodness for something that keeps her so occupied. As she draws she says "yine, yine, yine" and does big, straight lines, "suckle" and does circles, and "sssss" for snake forms that are completely indiscernable.

(Not sure why this picture rotated, but don't have time to figure it out.)

I think we have ourselves an abstract expressionist.

New Hats

Bryn's hat of choice used to be the knitted beanie, but now she's moved on to bigger and brighter things. Thanks to Sophie for the little witch hat, and thank you Logan for the handmade orange cap. Bryn spent the weekend in front of the mirror, admiring herself in these two newest additions to her hat collection.

Fairview Park

Fairview Park is a huge park in Costa Mesa that we checked out this afternoon. Not the most scenic place we've ever been (see above photos), but Bryn had a blast prancing along the trails and playing on the log benches and things. We'll be back there next week for the free train ride around the park - something on my to-do list for months. (Well, until I realized the park is a barren wasteland. We'll see.)

In other news, today we FINALLY FINISHED Bryn's play kitchen. It's been sitting in our garage, half-finished for months, so it is such a relief to have it completely DONE. Pictures to come.

Whole Wheat Chocolate-Blueberry Cake

I saw this recipe in my Better Homes and Gardens magazine. It was the "grand prize" winner for some sort of contest. It contains no white flour, oil, butter, or milk and the nutrition facts are pretty good for a chocolate cake! But healthy or not, this cake was soo yummy. Josh and I loved it! Here's a link to the recipe on the BHG website: YUM. I will definitely be making this again soon!