We went to our good buddy Drew’s house today for a playgroup. His mom had set up the kiddie pool and Charis, Drew and Annie were all enjoying the water just splashing away. Charis was standing just outside of the pool and playing with some pool toys when she fell face first into the pool (she lost her balance). When you are a mother this makes your heart drop to the very bottom of your body (yes, my heart was literally in my feet!). I sprang ever so swiftly from my seat and became super mom scooping Charis from the water. I was really surprised to find that the face plant did not bother her. She did not even cry which was most surprising. She was quickly back at play poolside. The next thing I know she is standing up and falling face first into the pool again only this time on purpose. She pulled herself out of the pool and just started laughing. She laughed so hard that she actually started to snort! She attempted the face plant one last time before the day was over this time she got stuck on the side of the pool but somehow it was still funny to her. We are going to have to keep an eye on this little face planting fishy.

Charis has been taking steps here and there for about a month. She will walk if you will hold her hands but she is kind of keeping the alone walking a big secret. She can do it but she just won’t. Brad and I think that she is afraid that we might figure out that she can walk and then we will no longer carry her anywhere. Charis does have us figured out because this is a very true something. I mean when you weigh between 25-30 pounds no one really wants to carry you all the time no matter how much they love you. As soon as Charis could maneuver the steps we started letting her climb up them all by her big self (supervised of course!). Anyways, we had our good buddy Drew over today and he is 5 weeks older than Charis and he is quite the little walker! He was cruising all around and practically doing circles around Charis. She must of thought about this all afternoon because this evening as our friends were arriving for bible study she starting walking around to each of them. She was so proud of herself and quite the little show off!

Yes, Old MacDonald had a farm and yes, he had many animals on that farm but no matter the animal it says woof woof. Well, that is according to Charis anyway. She is passionately in love with Doggies (better known as duh’s). She knows that duh’s make the woof woof sound but what she doesn’t know is that doggies are the only ones who say woof woof. When she sees a picture of other animals she will name the animal (if she knows what it is) then she says, “woof woof!” If you tell her for instance no, the kitty cat says meow she just woof woofs all the more. It is pretty cute! Hopefully someday Old MacDonald will hear other animal sounds on his farm but for now there is just a woof woof here and there and everywhere.

“Yes!” I said to this total stranger who was out walking her dog. “Do you have a chicken?” she asked. “No!” with quite the chuckle I responded. Thus began the great chicken conversation that I knew would come sooner or later when a neighbor would spy our newfound friend who has taken up residence in the backyard. This neighbor lives a yard behind out backyard so she is a pretty good spy! The chicken had come to visit her a time or two as well. Neither of us could decide where our neighborhood hen came from but we did have a good laugh at the oddity of it. Another oddity our neighbor’s last name is Charis only spelled differently. Crazy huh! Well, if this neighbor who lives two backyards away from us (downhill mind you) thinks that we have a pet chicken I can only imagine what our next-door neighbors think. I do talk to them pretty regularly though and they have not mentioned the hen. They probably just think that I am so crazy for having a pet chicken why bring it up.

Okay so it wasn’t a sea it was a river and it definitely was not blue it was more brownish I suppose. For Memorial Day we borrowed Brad’s parents boat and hit the water with our bible study group. We went out around 11ish and did not make it to far at all. We made it to our favorite spot and then got ready to tube for a bit. Poor Sarah was on the tube and ready to go and the boat just did not feel like starting. We called Brad’s bother Matt since good ole’ (ole’ as in buddy and pal not old) Dad was out of town. Matt came to our rescue with a fresh new battery! Super nice of him huh! He gave up an hour or so of his morning to help us out! Thanks Matt and Ariana! With a new battery we were set to go! While we were awaiting the new battery our friendly TWRA “stopped” (more like motored over to us since we were going no where fast) us. We had a fun conversation with him while showing him that we did indeed have 9 life vest on the boat, a float cushion and fire extinguisher. Curtis decided to make sure that he was well equipped and safe on his jet ski. We went through the checklist for him and we chatted about his gun etc. It was really a fun “stop”. It added humor to the morning. He told us about the DUI’s that he had already had that morning as well. Really quite interesting! Anyways, we really had a fun day out on the lake after the new battery was in. There was tubing and swimming, lunch and floating. Curtis and Alex even did an incredible to watch switching of tubes while the boat was going along. An incredible feet really! It was a blessing to us to spend more sweet time with these incredible people. The Lord has truly blessed us with sweet friendships in this group. We are thankful for them! The only stinky part of the trip was that we did loose two pairs of sunglasses though. That got me to thinking about all the wonderful and not so wonderful stuff at the bottom of the “sea”. There must be loads of glasses and sunglasses not to mention all the jewelry and everything else that cannot float. There is a fair share of yucky stuff as well I am sure from huge catfish to weird unknown things etc. I would not allow my mind to dwell on the unknown stuff for to long. We all came back to the slip pretty fried. Several people put on sunscreen 3-4 times but the sun was just inescapable that day. Brad and I had on 45 and we were still fried. Crazy! Well, I just thought that I would share our fun day and make your mind wonder what all is at the bottom of the deep “blue” “seas”.

Charis and I were playing in the Living Room today. I know I know gasp horror the Living Room. Didn’t anyone teach me that it is a room for looking at not using! We actually do not let Charis in the Family Room. Odd, I know. We save that room for Brad and I and since Charis does not watch TV it actually works out better to have the Living Room as a fun place to hang out for her. It is a little bigger and toys come super sized these days so everything fits well in there for her. Just a little warning here…that is something that you do not realize as much before you have kids (the size of the toys that is) but when all these toys invade your home you realize oh so quickly that there will be a limit or there will be no where left to live in your house…Just a warning for all those out there expecting or thinking about having kids someday! Back to my story after my little rampage; poor Charis was desperate for some O’s. Cheerios that is! We were playing and she headed off to the Dining Room that is pretty normal, as she usually will explore the room and then come back fairly quickly. She was gone for a bit and I heard the Cheerio container kind of clunking around. I think that she was trying to figure out how to carry the container to me but carrying is not conducive to crawling. She finally decided on crawling and pushing the container along. She made it all the way to me pushing the Cheerios with this precious little look of, “I know I do not usually get food when I am not in my highchair but aren’t you proud of me for getting this container all the way in here and might I be able to have some little O’s for all my efforts?” it was to cute to resist! She celebrated the opening of the container with flopping arms and legs and a huge smile.