Not always happy

Like most toddlers, occasionally they have moments where they are not happy. Even Summer, who might seem like the perfect happy smiling child to many, can have an unhappy episode. As rare as these events are, it is a great day when I can capture such an event on camera. Like the following photos I captured one afternoon while Summer was happily playing on the bouncy house in the front yard with daddy. She was happy, having a great time, playing, jumping, laughing. Out walks mom with the camera. Mom asks Summer to stay still so she could take a picture of her, because, after all, this mom is a photo addict. Summer was not in the mood for pictures and yet she was still required to stay still, which created an unhappy, but still a most darling, set of photos. The whole process of asking for photos, whining, crying, taking photos, took about 5 minutes, so for a whole 5 minutes on this day, Summer was not happy. Luckily after the photo taking process was completed, 5 minutes later, Summer was back to being her happy, laughing, jumping self.






I really just wanted to take pictures of her hair again, I love the way the dry Las Vegas air and the plastic on the jumpy house causes the static electricity to lift her hair like that.

I am pretty sure it will not be the last unhappy event but until then, because it may be a while, these photos will have to serve as proof that Summer is not always happy.

Makeup please

Most mothers woill not allow their daughters to wear makeup until the age of 20, or maybe 18, not sure yet because we haven't reached that issue, but at the ripe old age of 2 I have already let Summer wear makeup. Maybe because Summer is such a cutie and I wanted to see how grown up I could make her look or maybe because that show on TLC inspired me to create my own beauty pageant contestant, whatever the reason Summer looks good wearing makeup and some fake hair and took some cute pictures too.




Near the end of most photos shoots, which is about 5 minutes into the session, Summer becomes restless but bribery helps, and a sucker is a great prop too.



In all honestly Summer did not enjoy wearing makeup. At first she did, I had her lay on the bed while I applied the mascara, eye liner, foundation, blush, eye shadow, lipstick, lipliner, but she had just woken from her nap so she wasn't fully awake. She started to whine and cry, which made the mascara run. I was worried it would get into her eye and burn and maybe it did but we got her calmed down enough to take a few good pictures.

Gorgeous little girl

Gorgeous little girl meets decent photographer mom in the backyard for a few pictures one afternoon.


Gorgeous little girl poses for decent photographer mom just like decent photographer mom wanted.


Gorgeous little girl gives decent photographer mom a really wonderful natural smile.


Gorgeous little girl blows decent photographer mom a cute kiss, showing off those cute little lips.


Gorgeous little girl could not have looked any cuter if she had tried, and decent photographer mom could not have been happier with the photos.


Decent photographer mom is in love with gorgeous little girl, how could she not be?

Celebrate by wearing green

Yesterday was one of those holidays mostly associated with beer and wearing green. Most children don't get excited when they hear it is St. Patrick's day but we decided to change things up this year when my friend Rachel threw a St. Patrick's Day party! I can't begin to tell you how excited I was, I had green on from head to toe and Summer had on a green headband with a green bow and a cute shamrock shirt. The party served some of the yummiest green food and green decorations were everywhere. We even did rainbow colored themes, the fruit tray was a colorful rainbow and the games incorporated a rainbow of colors. It was awesome and Summer and I had so much fun. Here are some pictures from the party, enjoy!

Here is Summer and I out back before the party decked in St. Patrick's day outfits.


Looking as beautiful as always.


An attempt to get the kids posed for pictures.


The really cool rainbow fruit tray I made, ok it wasn't that hard to make :o)


My attempt at face painting - it does look a little like a shamrock.


The rainbow game I invented. I went to a thrift store and bought shirts in rainbow colors. I had the kids run around and yelled out "touch the person with the (red/blue/green/etc) shirt on, and when I called a color they all had to run and touch the person who was wearing that color. The first kid ran when I called his color because everyone was chasing him but then they got the idea and had a lot of fun finding the person with the colored shirt we called. It was actually a lot of fun and a cheap game, the shirts were only $1.


All 5 kids sitting waiting for the game to start, somehow magically they almost sat in order of the rainbow colors, all except one and we adjusted them.


Taking a break from the games outside to come inside and play with dolls, I guess it is a girl thing.


Overall it was a wonderful day, we were at Rachel's house for over 3 hours. Summer never napped yesterday but she was in a good mood all day so I was happy.

Randomness

I should do a weekly random thought post, assuming I posted weekly - sorry, I don't know why I have been slacking, I have pictures so that's not it!

This week's randomness (in no particular order)

Last night during dinner Summer told me "Thank You". "Thank you for this" as she was pointing to her plate of food. I don't know why she thanked me but it made me weepy. I am a weepy mom now. I hugged her and thanked her for thanking me. I didn't make anything special either, chicken nuggets, mashed potatoes and corn.

Summer is ready for her birthday. She told me she wanted it to be her birthday every day and asked me if she could have some cake. She was sad, but not for long. We have three birthday parties over the next three weeks so she will get her cake, plus we went to a baby shower last weekend and she had cake. That is a lot of cake.

Summer loves playing in her room. She is getting to a stage or a phase where she enjoys playing by herself. I love to hear her pretend with her babies and little people.


Summer has really nice lips. I just wanted to throw that out there. She is so lucky - her little lips are so cute and plump.

The weather is finally starting to warm up again, YAY! so we will be spending more time at the park. Because Summer is so tall she can easily get around a playground. It is so much more enjoyable when I don't have to worry about her falling down the stairs and she is old enough to know better then to step off a side. She has always been a cautious child and for that I am a lucky mom.


I am still teaching a mommy and me dance class and Summer still enjoys it. Right now we have three babies in the class (around 18 weeks) and Christa, another girl Summer's age. I think the Summer and Christa get a kick out of watching the 3 younger babies. Pretty soon Summer will be ready for the next class, the class without a mommy helping. Actually she is probably ready now :o(

Today the Disney movie Alice in Wonderland comes out. I am hoping Papa buys it. I want to have a movie night with pizza and root beer floats, maybe tomorrow. I loved that movie when I was a kid, hopefully Summer will enjoy it too.

Static

Last year we bought Summer a bouncy. It was on sale. It is colorful. It is bouncy. It is a lot of fun. Summer loves to play on it. It creates a lot of static!


A good mom would have gotten her daughter something to secure the dry static hair down, but me, no - instead I chose to grab the camera.

She is still smiling so I don't think she cared anyway and I got some great photos so everyone was happy. Look at her smiling in that last photo, she loves playing with the bouncy house, even if it does make her hair look like that!

Vegas Weather

Two weeks ago the weather was amazing and we spent a lot of time outside at the park. One night we went out to eat and after, since it was really warm out, we went to the park. Park in the dark. We easily spent 45 minutes playing, running, hiding, all in the dark and Summer loved going to the park in the dark.

We went grocery shopping after dinner tonight and when we were driving home, in the dark, Summer suggested we go to the park, park in the dark. Unfortunately the weather today was crap, windy, cold, overcast, so we were not able to go to the park in the dark, but I know we will soon, this weekend the temperatures are going to reach into the 70s. I love living in Las Vegas because I love the early warm weather.

Here are some pictures from one of the parks near our house. We have 3 parks that I would consider in our area but this one has a fun bridge, and Summer really likes running across the bridge.


I love this town because there are so many parks. I can't wait to go to the park again in the dark, maybe I will try to get some night time dark park pictures.

Stickers

I thought I liked stickers, well I did like stickers before. Before! Before Summer started sticking stickers on everything, like the rug, her window, her fan, her books, her walls. I try to keep the sticking to a minimum as much as possible. I guess I am kinda anal like that. I had to take the stickers off her mirror and her window because those were just too much for me but I am leaving them on the fan, for now. Not sure they will come off anyway and I don't want to hurt Papa's feelings since it was probably his idea, and technically he bought the fan. If they were spread out evenly across the fan maybe it wouldn't be as bad but they are just everywhere. At least the fan looks like a kid fan now, I guess.

One thing is for certain, stickers are not for faces. Summer let me stick stickers all over her face, then she let me take a few pictures as proof. They were very small stickers with not a lot of stickiness to them but enough sticky that made it a little bit painful to remove - oops, I should have thought of that before I stuck them all over her little face. She didn't cry, it wasn't THAT bad but she kept saying "ouch mommy" so I felt bad as I was taking them off. I guess I could have left them on and they would have eventually fallen off, but again - see the anal comment above.



Even though I hate these stickers, they are a cheap form of entertainment and I continue to buy them. I am sure, like everything else, this phase will pass too and something just as annoying will take its place.

Bring on the rain

Normally Vegas is very dry and we don't get much rain. This year has been the exception. I wish I had bought a matching rain jacket and rain boots. I thought about it, really hard, but I just didn't think we would get so much rain. Not that Summer needs a matching jacket and boots to be cute, but they would have been fun. We need the rain, my yard needs the rain, Vegas needs rain. I don't really like rain, well I don't mind the rain I just hate what it does to the sun. I love the sun way more than having rain. It was sunny today but it is suppose to rain again in two days. Maybe that will be the last time for a while.

At least Summer likes the rain. She likes playing in the rain with all the umbrellas we seem to have, since having any in Vegas is strange. I found 3 umbrellas around the house in the last month. They are no longer in our car where they might be used, instead they are all over our house where Summer left them after playing in the rain.


Summer has a good daddy because daddy took these pictures and let Summer play outside. Most likely I was inside on the couch sulking because it was raining.

Isn't it neat how the umbrella, Summer's shirt, and Summer's jacket were all green? That was not planned but it turned out cute, or rather a bit green.

Photography is just so fun

I love taking pictures. I have always been artistic but only good enough to say I am artistic. I guess I might be really good at something but maybe I haven't found it yet. For now I have photography and I really enjoy it. I love taking pictures and judging how well I did, or didn't do. Of course it really helps to have a model, one so pure and fun.


One who will sit in the sun for me so I can play with my sunshine settings, even tho the sun is very bright and one cannot open her eyes.


Luckily this certain one has nice dirty feet, at least I thought they were cute and dirty. Summer didn't think they were so cute and once she realized they were dirty she wanted to clean them off.

I washed them off, I think. They got dirty again but I didn't say anything. Needless to say my mood has been exceptional lately because I know that spring is almost here. Look at those pictures, they just scream spring! Time change is in less than 2 weeks and I am looking forward to springing forward. This will be the first time I have ever wanted to spring forward. I blame it on the birds singing outside my window in the morning. And the sun, don't forget about the sun, who seems to be shining extra brightly lately. I have no doubt that the weather affects my mood.

Better weather, hopefully better pictures. Wish me luck!