“Mommy, where’s my goggles?” – Lucy preparing to cook

The youngest member and I were invited to a party at Filoli, an after hours stroll for members.

Madame handled her first garden party with aplomb. She enjoyed the hors d’oeuvres, particularly the crackers.

She waited patiently to go in the house,  listening to the barbershop quartet.

She was excited to go upstairs (usually not allowed, but open on this special occasion) and see the rooms up there.

In the ballroom she entertained the guests with some impromptu ballet to accompany the piano player.

She enjoyed herself so much, she didn’t want to leave…even when her tuckered mom was ready to go.

“Sorry Wubie, you’re not fancy.”

– Lucy explaining why he was not invited to her party

Lucy loves to create plays of her favorite books. Lately she has been Alice in Wonderland. She got a pinafore recently and it is now her favorite dress up item. She asks every morning ‘is my pinafore ready?’

She knows the book well and quotes bits from it. Often when we are in the garden we pretend the flowers are saying “no weeds!” to us.

She runs around chasing the white rabbit. She even has her own white rabbit!

“This is the worst (day/night/car ride/etc.) ever!”
— A Lucy “go to” quote when she’s not having fun.

The kid was feeling a little under the weather so we made a visit to the doctor. (She’s feeling better now.) While meeting with the doctor, she brought up Lucy’s records and was surprised to discover that we’d brought the kid in exactly one year earlier, to the day.

When I got home I checked the blog and sure enough, I’d made a post about our previous visit.

Lucy’s favorite part about visiting the doctor is the neat “waiting area”, a little playground with a pirate’s motif. Here are a few pics of of Lucy playing. Pics on the left are from last year, pics on the right from this past weekend.

Once we were called in to see the doctor, the experience went about as well as one could expect, much better than our visit one year before. Lucy got her measurements taken:

…and got a ‘Princess’ sticker and lollypop for her trouble.

Mommy, I wanna see the volcano interrupting!

-while watching Kilauea’s latest eruption

We just got back from a snowy weekend. Lucy enjoyed playing in Gma & Gpa’s yard, where there was still a bit of snow left over from last week’s storm.

Before:                                         After:

Here are some snow cats we made in the big pile of snow in the driveway:

We went up to Soda Springs for some snow play at Planet Kids. Lucy had a blast.

She rode on the tube ride, climbed the snowy volcano, and coasted down the hill. We checked out Boreal, which will be great next year for some ski lessons!

We celebrated Grandma K’s birthday with a cake made by Lucy, and played trains with Grandpa.

Grandpa gave Lucy a treasure chest, and let her pick out some shells to put in it!

“I’m a new dolly!”
— Lucy, after washing her feet

Every so often it gets a little quiet and I start to wonder what madame is up to. One day my mommy-radar was tingling and this is what I found…

which reminded me of this…

(That’s Edith climbing to get Mr. Bear’s new clock from Edith and Mr. Bear. )

When I popped onto the scene Lucy assured me of her great climbing ability, and I did let her finish getting the toys and climb down by herself.

She has used the chair to get things like cookies from high places…last week I found her quietly reaching for cookies on top of the micro by using the chair…but adding the stool to it is a new trick.

I think I will keep those cats at a more accessible level from now on…and keep listening for when it is too quiet.

“Sing a song of sixpence, a pocket full of rice“
— Lucy’s version of Sing a Song of Sixpence

Lucy wrote a shopping list and brought it to my store. This is what it said:

Bouncy Mushroom (see fig. 1)

ABC for Wubie (2)

‘Pinano’ music for Wubie to practice  (3)

Xylophone (4)

Stickers for me

Cat Toy for Wubie

Circus Cat

Merry-Go-Round

“Phalaenopsis, phalaenopsis…pretty flower, pretty flower… “(to the tune of Frère Jacques)
— Lucy’s song after visiting the orchid farm

We’ve had a pretty mild summer, a few hot days here and there. On the hot ones we head out of town…to the foggy city or to the cool beach. Here are some snaps from our summer so far, mostly beach pics. Stay tuned for part 2…

The kid loves it when her parents tell her pirate stories (usually starring the kid as the captain and Wubert as her fuzzy first mate.) Imagine her glee when she saw this “real” pirate ship!

Yes, she ultimately did have to see the doctor and yes, there was a bit of crying involved. However, before and after the appointment she got to roam the seven seas in her pirate ship, a much better prospect than sitting in a cold sterile office for an appointment she didn’t really want to keep anyway.

She also got to ride three seals, (whom she dubbed “Larry”, “Daisy”, and “Mickey Mouse”) point out starfish and crabs, follow footprints in the sand, and do a lot of climbing, jumping, and running around. Not bad for an afternoon at the doctor’s office.

Another thing we like to do is illustrate Lucy’s ideas. We’ll gather in front of Lucy’s easel and she’ll start shouting out ideas like “We’re at the beach!” or “Wubert is in trouble with bumblebees!” As she does this, we’ll scribble frantically with crayons, hopelessly trying to keep up with our little girl’s imagination. Almost all of Lucy’s stories star Wubert, who usually plays multiple roles in each story. He’s also usually in some type of trouble.

Here’s one of Lucy’s stories…

“Doo is having a picnic at the beach with Wubert. They have a bucket and a shovel. They have cake. Wubert goes in the water (there are fish!) and Doo has to save him. Wubert’s sleeping. I’m tickling Wubert. I am walking with Wubert on a hill. I’m first. It’s really sunny, and there’s cake.”