Last week we enjoyed a beautiful day out at the park.  After eating Chipotle for lunch at the park, we took control of the wind and flew our kite.  Later that night, Laura and I had a date at the Norfolk Botanical Gardens for an “Aquafire Night” that had live music, food trucks and of course fire on the water.  We’ve been working with Brooke lately on potty training.  We had tried a few weeks back but Brooke just wasn’t ready.  Now she seems more aware of when she’s gone in her diapers, so we’re hopeful that she’s ready to transition to using the potty.  Today was a beautiful day, we spent much of it outside (even using the potty outside) and finished off the evening with hamburgers (Brooke’s first) and then storytime before bed.

It was another warm spring day so we decided to go on a picnic at Stumpy Lake and kayak a bit.  AJ took pictures of Brooke and I kayaking.

What do you do when even though you skipped dinner and went to bed at 9pm due to pregnancy nausea and cramping and slept for 11 hours but at 8am you are still tired and your toddler wakes up extremely grouchy and it’s raining and 37 degrees outside?  Boil some water for black tea, and get creative.  Since Brooke wanted to fight over breakfast which basically means that she wants breakfast but for Mommy to hold her while making it (thus impeding/stopping the process) and hold her while she eats it, it took much longer than usual today so I decided to skip our plans of Stroller Strides.  It seemed that neither of us were up for it.  After getting both of us dressed I decided to photograph our rainy day exploits for your enjoyment.  Brooke gave me her squinty eyes ‘I’m-watching-you’ look and I talked her into a smile.  Then we went to target where I let her walk around because she said ‘no’ when she saw the cart and she promised she would be good if I let her walk.  She generally kept her word except some crawling and scooting on the floor in the grocery section when I wouldn’t pick her up (arms full of Brooke’s baby, purse, strawberries, raspberries x 2, and an orange juice bottle) where one old man called her lazy, and I laughed and agreed with him, and two old ladies called her precious, which I also agreed with them.  Eventually we made it home and Brooke decided she wanted to play with her picnic toy basket in the entry.  I asked if she was hungry and she said ‘no!’  So I made her a lunch anyway and left it in the kitchen on the counter and came to sit with Brooke in the hall.  She got up and amazingly somehow got the plate off the counter and carried it without dropping anything to the floor where I was sitting.  I was impressed with her carrying ability and thought ‘what the heck’ and let her eat on the floor while I ‘play ate’ the picnic foods.  After a while she relocated to my lap.  We did a short stint playing upstairs and putting away her laundry then I thought it was time to use the ingredients we had bought at Target and make muffins.  I got Brooke into her apron and had her bring the stool from the bathroom so she could help.  She spent some time taking teaspoons of flour out of the mixing bowl and putting them in the muffin tray, while I used our other mixing bowl to mix oatmeal and orange juice.  I helped put that flour back then added the sugar and other dry ingredients and Brooke helped to mix those with a spatula.  They finished baking just as Brooke was ready for a nap, but she’ll wake up to a delicious snack of Cinnamon Oat Cranberry Muffins.