Fun with Cousins

We've been on the road a good bit lately...hence the lack of blog posts...but luckily our travels have allowed us to spend a good bit of time with family and it has given Kate the chance to play with most of her cousins. While we are currently in the process of learning about sharing and playing nice, for the most part Kate has been sweet with all of her cousins and really loved getting the chance to play with all of them.

A couple of weekends ago we went to Anne Marie's second birthday party where there was a clown who painted faces and made balloon animals and lots to play with and see outside. Then last weekend we were in Florence for a long Easter weekend with all of Kate's Alabama cousins. They were so sweet to hide Easter eggs and help Kate find them, they took her for walks and just played...so much fun in fact it took Kate all week to catch up on her sleep!

We are extremely blessed to have such a big family with so many sweet cousins for Kate to play with!!

Kate and Claire. Kate has been very into checking out "the baby". I guess it's a good thing seeing as how she'll have a baby around all the time in a few months!

Kate and Karoline hopping on the trampoline at Anne Marie's birthday.

Daniel reading Old McDonald to Kate and Langley

Daniel getting some one on one reading time with Kate

Bath time with Langley and Harper. Kate wasn't quite sure what to think about all the activity at bath time but I think she had fun.

Camden reading to Kate

The bigger cousins put together an egg hunt for Harper and Kate. Harper caught on to the concept faster than Kate and was showing Kate all her goods here.

Mary Emma helping Kate hunt for eggs

Daniel and Owen helping out too

One more of Daniel helping Kate hunt eggs. I thought this one was cute!

17 Months and Daddy's Birthday

This past Saturday we celebrated Kate's 17 month birthday and Nick's 29th birthday with a family crawfish boil in Port Barre. It was great! All of Nick's brothers and most of the sister-in-laws and nieces and nephews were in attendance along with Pop Pop to celebrate the occasion and enjoy some of the best crawfish and veggies that I have ever tasted! All the little ones had a blast running around outside playing with each other and everyone else enjoyed the day spent with family and some great weather!

I can't believe how grown up Kate is becoming! She is a girl who knows what she wants/doesn't want and likes/dislikes. Kate loves to be outside and can now ask, or tell us "ah-sigh" for outside in kind of a whisper to let us know that she would much prefer to be outside. Her vocabulary is really at the point where it is taking off and she is beginning to try to repeat a lot of what we are saying. There are too many new words since the last post to list them all but some of the most frequently used these days are "bub-buh" for bubble (she's obsessed with them and knows everywhere she might see them--the bath, the sink, the washer, momma and daddy's shower...), "dye" or "dye-dye" for bye-bye, she greets with a "heey" or a "whoa" for hey or hello, "bop-bop" for Pop Pop and "bah-bah" for Papa, "nah-nuh" for banana, "day-dee" for baby and tonight I got a "thank you". I don't know exactly how she pronounced it since it was the first time she had really said it but it was very clearly a thank you, Nick even verified that I had heard correctly. I hope to be hearing more and more of it (and a few other manner words) in the future. She LOVES animals and added "dah-dah" for a sheep's baa-baa and "meew-meew" for a cat's meow-meow to her list of animal sounds she knows (cow, dog, tiger, lion and duck). Kate loves to smell the flowers outside and candles inside, color in her coloring books, play with her little farm and ride her babies and stuffed animals around in her little toy wagon. It keeps getting better and better and we continue to have more and more fun with our growing girl!

Kate checking out the crawfish. She wasn't scared of them at all and loved throwing them back into the bucket.

Kate with cousins Braxton and Amelia taking a look at the crawfish

The birthday boy and his little girl

Kate with her Parrain, Marcus

One more with Daddy. Check out those curls! As you can see she's still not getting a whole lot of hair. It's also a little deceiving since everything that is coming in is so curly it just keeps looking short.