Aunt Alli Copycat

Angelica loves her Aunt Alli and often says "I want to be like Aunt Alli one day to do this...." She especially loves playing piano with her and singing songs. So one day Alli was practicing and Angelica stood right along side her and pretended to be practicing as well....

Our budding poet

Angelica LOVES to memorize anything, but especially has been enjoying poems. We have a prayer bible of poems we read before bed every night and when we come across a fun one, we memorize a stanza at a time. Enjoy!

Puzzles

It has been so fun watching Angelica get better and better with learning and playing games. She used to take FOREVER to finish or figure out one puzzle. Now, she can put all three of these together in less than 10 minutes!! And she wants MORE...starting on the smaller piece ones now! She loves the puzzle blocks too where you turn each piece to make different pictures!

Our Little Swimmer

After being disappointed in a try at swimming lessons at the Aquatic Center, we decided to try it again at the Olympic Swim Center (at Olympic High School) because Angelica really LOVED the water. So a couple weeks ago she started taking twice a week and is really enjoying it....so much so that it is a daily question (sometimes hourly) of "Do I go to swimming lessons today?" I have already seen improvement with her going under the water and just being more comfortable. The swim instructors she has have been excellent!! Hoping maybe we can do a summer session as well!! Of course Emma is so jealous and just dying to get in the water herself....poor girl, patience!!

Finding Daddy's Hat

Where is Angelica??

This is how I found her late one night when I checked in on her before I went to bed....I couldn't find her at first then realized I should take a picture...this is after removing blankets off of her! Silly girl.

What more could a girl want?

...other than a tiara and heels?

Birthday Party

Angelica was so excited about her party that we celebrated on Sunday of her birthday weekend. She wanted spaghetti and bread and carrots for dinner. She requested a heart and strawberry party with pink and red, so those were the colors I decorated with. She insisted on wearing her Princess dress for the party, so I bought her a crown to go with it. They enjoyed some bubble blowing time outside and she had so much fun with all the attention. She got some wonderful gifts from her Saint Rose doll, to a coloring book Alli made her, new swimming gear, a Writing-tracing game, new puzzle, books, clothes etc. A spoiled princess indeed. Thanks to everyone for making her birthday weekend so special! Lots of good pics at the end....all smiles that night!

Trying out the new big bubble maker

New Princess Dress Up Shoes

Aunty Megs and Uncle Chris gave her swimming lessons, a cap, goggles and new swimsuit...she has loved all of them!

Practicing

This year she wanted a Heart Cake. I thought it would change but after months that was still what she wanted. So I did a double layer Red Velvet Heart Cake.....so yummy....and teh REAL red velvet icing recipe. I did increase sugar to 2 cups, only used one bottle of red food coloring, used 1 cup oil instead of shortening and doubled the cocoa powder. Angelica wanted hearts and strawberries on the heart cake as well, so I found some heart sprinkles and then cut strawberries in half to look like hearts.

Daddy Daughter Date

When I was growing up one of the main reasons I looked forward to my birthdays was because of my daddy daughter date time! So when we started having kids, Jason decided that he would like to continue that tradition that provided so many special memories for me. So on Saturday of Angelica's birthday weekend, Jason took Angel out to wherever she wanted (well we had to cut some things out as her list was very long!). So they first went to Barnes and Noble and enjoyed some hot chocolate and picked out a book and then hit the pretzel place. Then they went to Toys R Us and she picked out a big bubble maker. Next stop was Goodwill.....where she picked out an entire dress up wardrobe all my herself....and when I first saw the items she had them all on!! I should have gotten a picture then. Not too bad....the hat made me laugh and well the shoes should fit for years to come! So cute....she (and Papa) had a blast! She is already talking about where to go next year!

Four Year Photo Shoot

Angelica's Birthday

This year Angel's birthday was on a Friday. I have decided to try and do something special on their birthday with just that particular child, a special mommy time. So my sister Caitlin came over that morning so I could take Angelica out for a nice brunch at our favorite coffee place down the road, Cafe Bella. She ordered French Toast and a hot chocolate. She was in heaven, especially because the hot chocolate came with whip cream and sprinkles. She was so grown up and carried on "adult" conversation the entire time. I asked her what her favorite things were that happened when she was three. She responded: "Going to swimming lessons, doing school, going potty and having Michaela." hehe, laughed at that one...still thinks I think that we just magically got baby out of my tummy and she picked us up. We had a very fun morning, she was so excited about all her weekend birthday plans all day.
She got to open her gifts from Aunt Caitlin and Uncle Casey because they were not going to be at her party. She has been loving the outside garden tools!!

Emma was still sick, so that night Caitlin and Alli and then friends Sarah and her daughter Abby went with us to Red Robin for dinner, a girls night out. While we were waiting to be seated, Sarah gave Angel a quarter for the stuffed animal claw drop...and she not only won but picked up TWO!! I don't know how many times I tried that thing growing up and NEVER won. She was quite excited.

After dinner, we had them sing to Angelica and she was so shocked, happy and embarrassed. She held on to me and stared at me the entire time!! We thought she might start crying but she just couldn't believe they were singing to her at a restaurant! We got a long good laugh out of it....and Caitlin - finally here is the video clip you have been waiting to see!!

Beds are overrated

Lately, Angelica has decided that it is lots of fun to make beds all over the house...using any pillows and blankets she can find. Here she is trying to fool me into thinking she is fast asleep...

...NOT!...

And this is when she is supposed to be taking a nap...in her bed!

Tea Time

The other day Angelica did not want to nap...so she knows she has to have quiet time in the play room. After a bit, I went in to see what she was up to....and this is what I saw:

A Tea Party with her "friends"
(she loves the store that Aunt Ann gave the girls)

The tea is set (and the big tupperware bowl is the salad)

And the friends are the bunny, the pig, and the angel doll.

Swimming Lessons

We had been debating for a long time about which activity to try Angel with first....she wants to do it all...swimming, ballet, gymnastics etc. So we finally decided to try swimming as a class was just starting. Our local YMCA only starts lessons when you turn six. But the actual pool they use started classes as infants and up, however I had been warned they were not as good as the classes at the Y. But we decided to give it a try....Angel LOVED the water. There were only 5 kids in the class and she was so excited to go and just soaked up all the activity. However, the instructor was HORRIBLE. No introductions, no instructions....no explanations and these are 3-5 year olds!! Angel had no idea what she meant when she said "Walk on the wall!" Poor kid. So...even though she loved the water, it was NOT worth the money for such a cold class...I want her to LEARN about what she is doing and water safety etc. I can teach a better class for her for FREE than that. So we canceled the classes....but hope to get to the $1 swim nights on Wednesdays and do our own class. Or I hope that we can get to base with my mom and Alli and I can teach Emma and Angelica....and my mom thinks the base has some good classes. If anyone knows of anything else available locally, let me know.

So excited for her lesson

Holding on to the wall

Anxiously watching all the activity

Going for a lap

Jumping In

Does Not Like all the Splashing by the Boys

Going Under (was shocked she went!)