Title TBD

It's been busy. At work the golf course opened at the beginning of April. That officially kicks off summer (a.k.a. The Busy Season) at work. It lasts until October when the golf course closes. That's not an excuse for taking so long between updates. I'm just saying.

So a lot has happened, but a lot hasn't happened.

Every day Sydney seems to have a new word she uses. Or at least she has a new word that we can understand her saying. One of her favorite sayings is "play ball". When the grandparents were here last month we played with her balls on the stairs. We would throw the one of the balls up and it would roll down. Sometimes it would get stuck up on a step and we'd throw another ball to try to knock it down.

So this is what Sydney refers to when she says, "play ball".

It has also evolved into a couple other small games. One day while playing I laid (lay? lie? I can never remember the proper usage) down on my back. Sydney laid down beside me. I started throwing the ball straight up and catching it. She thought it was great fun and no she will sometimes tell me to lie down.

We also sometimes sit on the bottom step (Sydney's not allowed to play on the stairs, but she can sit on the bottom step since her feet are on the ground) and Sydney throws her little ball up. I try to catch it, but if it gets away she'll bound up, grab it, and come back and sit down. I generally have to sit there holding one of the larger balls. If I get up I am ordered back down.

Sydney will also sit on the bottom step and play catch. I toss a ball gently at her and she tries to catch it. (She's amazing good - in my opinion - at catching for a two year old.) She then tosses it back.

Just the other day she threw a ball and it bounced off a step and over the banister. She chased it down but instead of coming back to the foot of the stairs she stayed off to the side and proceeded to try and throw it back over the railing. It's actually rather humorous because I keep having to tell her to step back. Otherwise she is right next to the banister and either has the ball immediately bounce back at her or she throws it straight up and/or backward over her head.

Another of her current favorite sayings originated, I believe, when Mommy takes her into bed. Mommy holds her across both her arms and Sydney likes to drop her head back so she is upside down (or at least her head is). This is "uppa down".

She also did this at breakfast this past week. She leaned sideways in her highchair, twisting her head and neck as far over as she could. "Look, Daddy. Uppa down."

Speaking of eating, Sydney now has a booster seat for the table.



Sydney enjoys eating at the table but we don't use it all the time. Sydney frequently wants to still sit in her high chair. And it's difficult to keep an eye on her if we have other things to do while she's eating. But we try to make an effort to eat at least dinner out there together on the weekends.

Sydney also likes to get up on our bed while I'm getting ready for work. This is usually done at the end of my getting ready process so it's more difficult to get her downstairs for lunch.

She climbs up on the chest/bench we have at the foot of the bed. She then proceeds all the way up to the pillows. I have to put one of the bigger, fluffy pillows behind her so she can lean back on it if she wants to. That's done at her request/direction. She will pull the covers up to her.

She will also frequently direct me to give her any of the various stuffed animals that are in the bedroom. She tucks them in and they take a nap with her. She will frequently lean back and make snoring noises like she is sleeping, but she usually has her eyes open. If she does this she will usually pop up after one or two snores with a proclamation of, "can't sleep".



Sydney is holding Peanut the Elephant in the picture. Fluffy Bear (usually just called Bear, but she has a lot of those) can be seen on the pillow. He is usually the one playing "take a nap" when I'm getting ready for work. Sydney frequently uses the toilet seat for his bed and a bandana as a blanket.

Not seen in the picture are his blue socks. One day while getting dressed Sydney decided she wanted to grab a pair of socks. She grabbed a pair of blue ones. They didn't go with the outfit she had on and I had already pulled out socks for her. When I told her I already had socks she screamed and ran off. She went into our bedroom and grabbed Bear. Since she had previously had me help dress Bear with some of Mommy's socks I knew what she wanted. The socks haven't come off Bear since.

Bunny ("boing boing") can also be seen peeking out from the covers.

Last weekend was a beautiful weekend (as opposed to this weekend which was cold and rainy). Sydney had a play date with Mary Jane. We met Mary Jane and her mother at the Coeur d'Alene city park. There is a large, wooden playground climby-swingy-slidey thingy there.

The girls had lots of fun.



In the middle of this thing is a little wooden boat. Sydney kept going back to it.



She really liked turning the steering wheel. And hoisting the mizzenmast, weighing anchor and scrubbing the poop deck.

Well, all right. It was a little speedboat. She just liked turning the steering wheel.

At the end of every play date Sydney and Mary Jane hug good-bye.



It's cute because they really don't play together on the play dates. They know where each other is and sometimes do the same thing (like throwing balls up the stairs), but they don't actively play together very much. But when it's time to go they get really sad and don't want to leave each other.

Oh. And Sydney's favorite direction - if you decide to ask her which way to go - is "that way!" Always said with the exclamation and a full arm pointing in the direction that is "that way!"

I bring that up because she knows where Mary Jane lives. At least the general direction. It happens to be in the same general area for getting on the highway to go to Coeur d'Alene. So if we're heading to Coeur d'Alene, as we turn onto the on ramp Sydney will frequently be directing us and letting us know that we are not going the proper way. We should be going "that way!"

This weekend we went to Target. We had some things to pick up. While we were there we decided to look at clothes for Sydney. She has plenty right now for the summer, but we don't have any short-sleeve Elmo shirts for her. She keeps pulling out her long-sleeved Elmo shirt and wanting to wear it when it is way too hot.

Unfortunately, Target didn't have any Elmo shirts. But since it's right across the road from the mall we decided to go over to JC Penney. Anne knew they had some there.

We parked and went into the mall. We actually entered through the Macy's store. It was close parking and it is just kitty-corner from Penney's. As we walked out of Macy's into the mall proper a surprising thing caught our attention. They were having a child's wellness fair.

It actually wasn't anything spectacular. We looked around a bit on our way back out and it was really just tables set up by various medical facilities that cater to children. I think there were two dentists, an eye doctor and one pediatrician. Yep, only four tables. It was pretty sad.

But that wasn't what caught our attention. One of the tables had Elmo at it!

Sydney didn't see him at first, but got quite excited when she noticed him as we got closer. (The poor person in the suit was having a hard time seeing anything let alone keeping the head on straight. The lady next to him had to point and direct him three times as we approached where we were. He finally saw us and waved about the time Sydney noticed him.

It was something to see her so excited and shy at the same time.

The lady next to Elmo handed Sydney a little gift bag. This was the main table of the fair and they were handing them out to all the kids. Sydney held it tightly and carried it around the rest of the shopping trip. She let Mommy take her purse so she had a free hand to hold my hand.

We could see that there was a stuffed Elmo in the bag. It's about ten inches tall. It wasn't the main attraction of the bag, though. Sydney could give or take it apparently. (But she does have other stuffed Elmo dolls, so that's not too surprising.)

What Sydney really liked was the little pack of cards in the bag.



It's a little memory game. There are sixteen cards with eight different pictures. Sydney is too young to play the game but she enjoys the cards. She knows what to call each of the eight pictures. And when we were playing them earlier today I would turn them over and ask her what the picture was. I would then ask her if she had one yet. If she did I told her to put them together and she did.

All right. There's an update. Forgive any typos you may see. It's after my bedtime and I'm just going to hit the publish button here and then go to bed. Sometime in the next couple days I come back and clean this up as it needs to be cleaned.