Took Sissy to the fair last night

Should've known better, but it's been a looooooong time since I went to the fair. Forgot about trying to find a place to park, and the crowds, and the lines.

We went and checked out Kiddieland, but decided Brittany's not quite ready for any rides yet. Maybe next year.

Gampaw bought her some cotton candy, but she cringed and batted it away like we'd tried to hand her a live rattlesnake. She never would even taste it. The kid has good instincts! Well, truth be told, if we had handed her a live rattlesnake, she probably would've thought it was some cool new toy, but you know what I mean.

So we went and looked at the animals. Saw lots of horses and cows and goats. Lots and lots of goats -- three barns full. Pretty little Boer goats, but I never knew there were that many goats in the state. Brittany oohed and aahed over all the animals, especially the horsies, but she really went nuts when we found a donkey. She grabbed hold of the side of the pen and jabbered like crazy at it. Had to peel her little hands off so we could finally move on.

Might take her to the zoo next weekend. Or maybe not, since that's the family reunion and Bob's supposed to come down to visit, if he can afford to. Maybe the weekend after.

My little one-toothed wonder

finally sprouted her second tooth! Right next to the first one, on the bottom. No sign of any others yet.

Okay, so my nekkid ladies

aren't actually Naked Ladies, as it turns out. They're Spider Lilies and they look like this, except mine are more of a salmon color. I tried to take a good picture of them today, but you know my crappy camera...

Anyway, they're in full bloom right now and pretty spectacular, so hurry on by in the next day or two if you want to see them at their peak.

Happy birthday, Bridgie!

Mommy loves you!

Brittany at twelve months

Took Little Sis to the doctor Friday for a checkup. She weighs 21 pounds, 10 ounces and is 27 1/4 inches tall. Still in the 10th percentile heightwise, meaning 90% of one-year-olds are taller than she is. Finally got caught up on her immunizations, her hemocrit was fine, and Doc says it's time to wean her off formula and baby food.

We've been letting her feed herself bits and pieces of our dinner this week, and now she won't hardly eat baby food anymore. She loves cheese. And birthday cake and ice cream:



(Hey, Bridgie -- e-mail me the birthday pictures, would ya? And remember to shrink them first.)

It's almost time for her first haircut. I'm not really ready for that yet, but her little forelock is starting to get in her eyes, so I'll have to do something about it soon. Tried a couple of different kinds of barrettes, but they don't stay in very long. Tried to do a little ponytail, too, but she squirms so much I can't get it fastened without hurting her.

She can stand alone, but doesn't think she can. She's steady on her feet holding on to nothing but my hair, so we're working on that.

She chatters incessantly in her own little language that none of us can understand; Mikey says she must be Pentecostal, because she's already speaking in tongues.

She's gone horse-crazy already -- she's in love with her big furry rocking horse. She's not interested in riding it, though. She just pets it and lays her head on it and loves on it all day long, which is almost unbearably cute.

Happy Birthday, Sherri!

One year closer to the Big 4-0!

Nekkid ladies

Hey, Sher! Remember that clump of stuff you brought me from Nina's a couple of years ago that never did anything?

Well, it's doing it now. I counted ten blooms sprouting this morning.

Celebrating Sissy

Y'all missed a heckuva party.

Bob came in from Wichita, and Bridget, Sherri and Mikey's whole family were here.

The pictures I took on my crappy digital camera didn't come out so good but, happily, everybody else brought cameras, plus I had my videocam going, so the whole thing was recorded for posterity.

Brittany was the cutest little one-year-old princess in town, and actually wore her tiara for about 30 seconds at a time before yanking it off. She fed herself some cake and ice cream, and wore the rest. We discussed taking her out in the yard to hose her off, but Sherri wound up giving her a bath. Then she put on her new jammies and now she's sleeping like a baby.

Which is what I should be doing, while I have the chance.

Ordered Brittany's b-day cake

It's a princess castle. And it comes with a little tiara for her to wear.

Still have housecleaning and shopping to do, but right now I need to take a nap. Haven't had an uninterrupted night of sleep in ages.

(**yawn**)

Bob's gone

Moved himself to Wichita yesterday to get away from Sarah and to get a fresh start. He says the career opportunities are much better and it's cheaper to live there than here.

I have legal guardianship of Brittany, so she's staying here with me. If he eventually manages to get the guardianship lifted, it'll tear my heart out if he takes her up there. A hundred and fifty some-odd miles away from me.

I'm trying not to think about that.