Fun at the Zoo!

Today we went to the zoo again. We are members so we can go for free whenever we want. But today was special because Daddy, Grandma, Grandpa, and Aunt Amy went with us! It was the most perfect day for it too. We walked, well, Gracie and I rode, around the zoo.

Gracie had fun petting and brushing the goats at the children's zoo.

Mommy met Crissey the Cow, how fitting huh?

Gracie saw her mama llamas. She is obsessed with this book called "LLama Llama mad at mama."

Gracie loved watching the dolphin swim.

She also saw her favorites-giraffes!

We also met some dinosaurs.


We also were lucky enough to meet "Dolph" (Rudolph, Gracie's favorite movie friend)

Here she is trying on his antlers.

Gracie even rode the carosel not once, but twice......

on the panda

and on the tiger

Then of course we had to stop so Gracie could buy her favorite animals-giraffe, panada, and zebra.

It was a perfect day for family and fun!

Playdate Fun!

It's getting harder to post as I have been busy getting ready for school to start ;(. So that makes me incredibly tired! A few weeks ago now, some of my college girlfriends and I were reunited with another college buddy, or ASA sister, and her son Adam. We had a great time! My friend Jessica has started her own photography company and Amy wanted to have Adam's one year pictures taken. So we went to this park in Manhattan. Teh kids had fun and Jessica even took some pics of Gracie Lynn. I will post those later. After that, we headed back to Jessica's house for some lunch and play! Scott was sharing his little tubo of balls and the kids had a blast. Gracie loved jumping inside it and throwing the balls out and making a mess of course. All these little playdates we keep having have been amazing to watch. I have watched Gracie start to become a bit more social but also it's neat to see how she shares and treats others. While she is still a bit shy, she is making progress and acts like a polite little girl! Too bad mommy has to go back to work and these playdates become few and far between. On the other hand, soon Gracie will have 2 playmates to play with whenever she wants!

Baby Days of Summer!

All summer long on Thursdays, my friends and I have gathered at my BFF Dana's house for some swimming in the sun with the kiddies! Granted this summer has been rather cool and rainy, today was probably the perfect day! The temperature was right, there were no clouds, no humidity, no chilly breeze. It was the perfect day because it was most likely our last as most of us have to head back to work. Yuck! I wish summer could last forever! Anyways, Gracie just loves swimming! (Too bad Grandpa tore down our pool) We played in the different tubes and did "motoroboat", "pop goes the weasel" and "ring around the rosy." Today everybody had a good day swimming and Gracie was even social and said "hi" to all her friends and even called them by name-Allie, Scott, Sean, Emily, Meghan and Jared. Now we jsut have to figure out what we are going to do with these kiddies over the winter!

Double Duty Diaper Bash!

Yesterday was our big "Double Duty Diaper Bash." Despite the hot weather, who knew who would be hotter than blazes out, everyone came with thier diapers and had a good time.

Chuck, Gracie and I had twin shirts to wear. Since I ordered mine, of course it was tight in the belly region so I chose not to wear it since it was so hot outside. I setteled for my moo-moo of a dress instead! Here is Gracie wearing hers though.

Chuck was busy manning the grill for hours! He was busy making his famous kabobs, hot dogs, hamburgers and whatever else. Everyone ate well and we have more than enough food leftover too!

I also made my famous diaper bash cake. Turned out pretty well huh?

Even though it was hot, we set up a tent and plenty of chairs and played beanbags all day and night too!

It was so good to see everyone. Chuck and I don't get out much and I enjoyed visiting with everyone.

Eveyday friends....

College Friends...

Old friends....

Neighbor friends...

Work friends.....

No diaper bash would be complete either without the vodka watermelon. Yes, this baby was busy soaking up the juices all night. Mark couldn't wait to cut into it and many enjoyed eating it. Jello-shots were also a must. It made me slightly sad that I couldn't partake in any of these activities.

And of course, Chuck decicded to do an encore performance of modeling his Depends. We recieved these at the last bash but Chuck couldn't resist being an underwear model. I won't lie, I held on to these because there are some days lately that I think about wearing them at night so I don't have to keep getting out of bed to pee!

And finally, we wrapped up the night by counting all the Pampers diapers we received. The final count of all the sizes were 2,834! That is almost double what we got last time! That is good since we are having double the babies this time.

Thanks to everyone who came! We loved seeing you! Hope you had a good time!

And thank you for the diapers! We will have many days of happy, dry bums ahead of us!

Diaper Bash of Years Ago

Today is our Double Duty Diaper Bash! Here are some pictures from our first diaper bash back in May of 2007. We had quite a few people come and it was fun. Chuck manned the grill and made his famous kabobs and Erin helped. We had bags and ladder ball games going on. Of course there was plenty of food to eat and drink too. I made a fabulous cake and thought I was going to decorate it all pretty and cool but you can see it turned out far from that! We even recieived some Depends which Chuck had no problem modeling. We'll see if there is a repeat today. Last time is was rather cool and now today is supposed to be a scorcher! Last diaper count was well over 1,000. We didn't have to buy diapers for Gracie's first year! And that even included grabbing packs to take to the babysitters! That really helped us out and we can surely use the help this time around too! I'll post pictures tomorrow of the bash and give a final diaper count!

The Zoo!

The other day I decided that I needed to get out of the house and do something fun. I didn't want to do anything that we normally do. I really wanted to go to the zoo. Afterall, we are members so it is free! The only thing was I needed to recruit helpers. I physically can't do much with Gracie by myself anymore and plus I am leaning down that handicap road too so I knew I needed help with not only Gracie by myself. So I called up some friends, went and picked up a wheelchair from my parents, loaded up my minivan and set off for the zoo! It was a gorgeous day and even though it was a little bit crowded, it was still fun. Chuck and I took Gracie to the zoo about a month ago but I found I could barely walk halfway around it without feeling very tired and sore. Mark pushed me this time in a wheelchair and Anne and Erin took turns pushing Gracie. She absolutely loves the zoo! She is obsessed with animals right now and knows many of them and their sounds! She was so excited and going from exhibit to exhibit, she proudly would say thier names and make thier sounds. She would just stare in amazement. Unfortunately one of the animals that Gracie loves is the panda and the zoo does not have any. But the ones she still talks about seeing are the monkeys, dolphins, bears, elephants, zebras, camels, giraffes, goats, cows, pigs, chickens, horses, and "dolph" (Rudoplh, the reindeer in the kids zoo). We have to go back because Gracie just loves it and I love watching her love it! So if anyone is ever interested, I can get you in for free but you will have to willing to push me or Gracie!

I Love Swimming!

This summer I signed Gracie up for not one, but two sessions of swimming lessons. I took her back to where I used to work years ago as a lifeguard and swim teacher. They have a parent-infant class that parents take with their children. I think the class goes up to 3 or 4 years of age so we probably have one more summer in this class before Gracie can move up. (Although next year I will need two other people to attend swim lessons with me!) Regardless of the cool weather and the fact that the heater in the pool broke, we still had fun at lessons. Daddy came when he could too. We always started out in the "baby pool." We would warm up by jumping like popcorn, watering different parts of our bodies, which Gracie knows neck and chin now, and practicing swimming like different sea creatures like fish, crabs, alligators, sharks, and an octopus. Gracie loves doing this still even when we are not swimming! We also sing "wheels on the bus" and make ice cream sundaes by doing different splashes. Then we move over to the "big pool." We get in by singing "humpty dumpty" and letting the kids fall in. Then we practice front and back floats. Gracie is pretty good. She even likes blowing bubbles! Going underwater is something we will practice next year! We play circle games like "london bridge", "pop goes the weasel" , "motorboat", and "ring around the rosies." Gracie loves "weasel" as she calls it. She loves playing that when we are swimming anywhere! Then we always get some freetime where we can use noodles or kickboards. Gracie likes both. We ride the noodle and pretend it's a horse. Usually though she only likes the noodle for about a minute and then we have to switch colors. We had 4 weeks of lessons this summer and it was fun! At the end of each session, each child gets a little certificate and a freezepop! It makes me sad that this is one of the last times I will be able to participate in something like this with just Gracie! It was definately some great mother-daughter bonding time! I will always treasure this too! I love my little fish!