14 months old

Yesterday, Haley turned 14 months old. She continues to amaze me and she gets smarter every day. Her "vocabulary" is improving daily. She can say (or attempt to say) more words than I can list. I love that I can understand what she is trying to say these days. I would have to translate her words to a normal person, but I know what she's saying. She makes me laugh constantly and I cherish every moment I have with her. We always have a blast together!

It started raining/pouring yesterday while we were outside playing. I started to take her inside, but I wanted her to see the rain first. I let her down to see what she would do. She walked out in it and I thought for sure that she would run back to me. Instead, she stayed out there. She loved it and stayed out in it forever. She was drenched by the time I forced her to go inside. I wish I could feel that free.

Playing with the water from the downspout.

Today, we tried to play in the sprinkler. I thought that after playing in the rain yesterday and loving it so much that she would love it. No such luck! She didn't care for it at all. I was really hoping this would be another fun way to beat the heat. We'll just have to keep trying until she understands that it is fun.

I did get her to enjoy her swing, though. For the last few months, she has refused to swing at the playground or in the swing that she got for her birthday. Today she really liked it! I'm so glad because everyone knows how fun it is to swing. I even got on the swing beside her and she seemed to love it that we could swing together. At one point, I thought she was going to fall asleep in her swing. I just had to keep hosing her off to keep her cool. It was very HOT today! Now she points to her swing and says "swee". I think it's a combo word for swing and wee because I kept saying "wee, wee" as we were swinging. She also loved the slide on the swing set. I hosed it down too because the plastic was getting hot in the sun. I helped her slide over and over until I was just too tired to do it anymore. She SCREAMED when I made her go inside.

This afternoon, I broke out the sidewalk chalk. Scott has been dying to do this with her, but I was in need of something new to do outside after she had a major breakdown, so I pulled it out. She got excited at first, but didn't really understand what it was all about. She tried a few times to draw, but kept getting distracted by cars which she calls "beep beeps". After trying to play with the chalk for a few minutes, she decided that it was more fun to throw it on the driveway and watch it roll. I then had to put it away.

Here she is trying to bring me a dead flower that she found. She is very excited to have found such a treasure. I probably should have let her keep the chalk. (Please excuse her bloomers. The elastic is broken in them so they were falling off.)

Today was a lot like the others

So, I won't bore you with tons of the same old stuff. We did pretty much the same stuff today that we have been doing. However, we did go on a nature walk today instead of going to the playground. It was short but very pretty. We hit the beach again today and Haley made lots of friends, as usual. She also found a new hobby - bird watching. She was fascinated by a few birds the were flying around trying to find food. She kept pointing at them saying "duh duh" which normally means duck. We kept trying to correct her and get her to say "birdie" or "tweet tweet", but that was too much. So, we will call them ducks for now. After a second nap and Haley's dinner, she and I went down to the grill area to watch da da grill some Mahi mahi for us. We had a low key but very nice day.

Another nice person stopped to take a family photo of us, so we couldn't say "no".

Our footprints in the sand.

The best day!!

Yesterday was the best day! We started it out by going to the playground and then the pool. After Haley's nap and lunchtime, we went back over to the beach. Haley had a fantastic time at the beach again today. We found the perfect spot close to the water that had a little pool for Haley to play in without being right in the ocean. She quickly realized that our beach chairs make a perfect playground. One of us had to be standing up from then on so she could play on our chair. She would scream and pull on us if we were sitting and didn't let her get in the chair. After the beach, Haley was ready for another good nap and some dinner. Scott and I had seafood pizzas from a local pizza place and they were SOOO good. Then we went back over to the beach for a little photo shoot (momma's favorite thing to do). When we came back to the village, an outside concert was going on so we let Haley socialize and dance a bit before bedtime. I couldn't have asked for a better time with my two favorite people in the whole world.

She makes friends everywhere we go.

Beach bums!

Haley and I started out the morning by going to this playground that is just steps from our room. Haley had the best time climbing and sliding and walking all over. I have a feeling we will be doing this every morning.

After her morning nap and some lunch, we made the trip across the highway to the beach. This is the main down side of where we are staying (that the beach is so far away). It's worth it, though, to have all of the other stuff so close to us. Well, based on past beach trips, I thought that Haley wouldn't care a thing about the beach or the sand. In the past, she has hated to have her feet in the ocean and the heat and sun just made her cranky. This time was totally different. She LOVED the ocean. We couldn't get her to go back under the umbrella for anything. Thank goodness we coated her down with sunscreen. She also wouldn't wear her hat no matter how much I begged her. We really had the best time with her.

We put a sheet down for her to sit on, but she just thought it would be better with sand all over it.

The last time she experienced the ocean, she was just a little more than 6 months old. She hated it. It's amazing how much has changed since then. This was her reaction when we put her in this time.

Jumping the waves with da da.

While we were playing, a little boy about her age walked by with his grandparents. She instantly made friends with him. They just looked at each other and pointed for several minutes.

He even tried to kiss her. Boy are we in trouble!

Family shot. A sweet man that was sitting on the beach near us saw that we were taking pictures and offered to get the three of us together. So nice!!

Please notice the look of determination on her face. She was obsessed with getting a handful of sand from the bucket and walking to the water's edge to throw it back in.

Handing sand to da da.

Not only is this a picture of her new hilarious face that she makes, but it shows the creative way that we are having to feed her since we couldn't fit the booster seat in the car. She loves eating this way because she can take a bite and then run all over and come back for a bite when she is ready. I doubt that we will be able to get her to sit in a highchair ever again. It is very messy, though, but it's not our house, right?

The next three pictures are in the little town right outside of our door. We love it here and have taken a nice walk each evening.

Haley finally figured out how to use the remote and point it at the TV. Thank goodness because da da was watching basketball and momma wanted to watch anything but basketball.