A Lovely Mother's Day

Helena and Daddy gave me the most wonderful Mother's Day this year. Daddy bought me a pair of diamond earings! Yes, the real deal, sparkly diamonds! I was so surprised and delighted! Helena picked out a plant for me - all by herself! Daddy says she walked around the plant nursery saying "I pick for mommy... I pick for mommy." Then all of a sudden, "I pick that one for mommy." Daddy asked her several times if maybe she liked a different one better, but each time, Helena adamantly said "I pick *this* one for mommy!" I must say she does have nice taste! And so does her daddy! Thank you my Loves!

Peek-a-boo Picture

Bet I Can Make You Laugh (2nd attempt)

Diddle Diddle Dumpling, My Friend

JOHN!

Cuddling with my Puppy Pictures

Easter Pictures

Planting Seeds Pictures

Eggy, Fry, Toast with Butter

Each morning Helena awakens and goes from a sound sleep to wide awake in a matter of mere seconds - literally! At that time, she has to go find her daddy (thankfully she says "bye bye mommy and I roll over for a few more minutes of shut eye and to wake up in peace).

She runs in and knocks on the office door where daddy is getting ready for the day and after they have the cutest good morning greeting time, she spurts out "I want eggyfrytoaswithbutter" so fast that it sounds like one long word. That is her favorite breakfast, the "fry" being ketchup. She learned from daddy to put a tiny tsp of ketchup on her eggs.

So each morning, daddy cooks her breakfast and she chows down 2 eggs with a tsp or so of ketchup and a piece of toast with butter on it.

Both daddy and his beloved "Baby Girl" greatly enjoy this darling tradition.

Narrow Feet

Just incase, you all wanted to know, Helena has super skinny piger-toes. Mommy got her these cute sandals in a narow width - and look! They are still too wide. Fortunately the company will make them narrower still for no extra charge. They are a wonderful little family run business in OR www.softstarshoes.com with a family of elves, as they call themselves, that make all sorts of cute kids shoes. The best part (and hardest!) is choosing the colors as there are almost endless possiblities. Helena needed some sandals to match all of her red summer things and after trying on upwards of 40 pairs of sandals - all much too wide, we turned to the good 'ol elves.

Snowy Day in May

Helena "read" me the children's classic The Snowy Day today. She opened the book and began...
"One time, snowflakes covered duh yan[d]." Then she flipped thru the rest of the book. Backtracking to the beginning again she stated "Here we go" and then "Snowflakes cover duh yand, on Peter cheek and face."

Such eloquence from a not yet 2 year old! Those are not the words in the book, she came up with them herself.

Yoga Baby

Downward Facing Dog Pose












Squat Pose













Backbend Pose

Current Favorite Songs

Lately Helena has been a little singing bird. It's so fun to hear her sweet voice trying to find the right melody while she still is struggling to remember the words too. Her current favorites are as follows:

Mary Had a Little Lamb
Old MacDonald
Happy Birthday (4 birthdays in our family in the month of May could have something to do with this!)


Right now as I write, she has just broken out into song "Old MacDonald had a farm, E, I, E, I, O, oink oink here, oink oink there..."

She is also fond of Row Row Your Boat and How Much is that Doggie in the Window?

Stories

Helena's imagination is most definitely thriving! Maybe due to the fact that we read 5-10 books to her on most days. Anyway, she seems to really like to tell stories while taking a bath. Usually the story is centered around some common phrase. For instance...

"Next Easter, I want go to the park. Next Easter duckies go to the park. Next Easter, duckies play with puppies."

Last nights bath theme was "Some"

"Some duckies go to the park. Some duckies go walk in the woods. Some duckies swim in pond. Some duckies play with puppies."

Sometimes the washcloth has transforming powers. "This is ducky [or was it another animal that time??] This duckys' eye. etc Another time the washcloth became a boat for her bath toys to ride on.

It is just wonderful to see her imagination richly at work!! I will try to post on her more of her stories.

The Racoon

"Mommy, Heyna saw a racoon."
You did? Hmmm... I dont know what a racoon says, but I know they like to wash things with their hands b4 they eat them.
"Racoon say 'Eat, eat!'"
Oh, the racoon must have been hungry...
"Racoon hungry! Racoon say eat eat!"
What did the racoon eat?
Without a seconds hesitation - "Rice n beans!"

Later, daddy asked who made the rice and beans...
"Mommy and Starbuck," she replied.

Such Kindness

We were so proud of Helena this last weekend! We had gone up to my mom's house to celebrate several birthdays. I realized later that she generously handed out gifts and never asked where hers was. But best of all was after we finished our lovely picnic and Helena noticed Aunt Kt's empty plate sitting on the arm of her lawn chair. Out of the blue she asked "Aunt Kt, all done?"
"Yes, I'm all done" Aunt Kt replied. Then Helena proceeded to pick up the plate saying "I bring inside to Grammy." Off she trotted, so helpful and kind - with mommy following along to help her in the door and up the stairs!

Oh Man!

One day while vacuuming I noticed Helena seemed awfully quiet in her room so I went to check on her. I found her in the bathroom sitting contentedly on her little potty eating cheerios and pooping! Only problem, she didn't realize that in addition to pulling her panties down she had to also pull her dress up. It was tucked ever so neatly beneath her.

"Oh oh, Helena" I said. "You have to pull your dress up before you sit down. See, it got all messy."
As I proceeded to clean up, she piped in "Heyna... OH MAN!" Needless to say, Mommy got a good laugh!