Taking orders

Every day I'm amazed by what Esme absorbs in the world.  She lives up to the "kid's minds are like sponges" saying.  Should she ever want to pursue a job in the service industry, she's set!  She even remembers Papa Rex's drink and won't let me order it. :)

What can I get you?

I'm also quite impressed with the way that she's holding the pen.  Great technique!

Hanover Bridge

We've had an exceptionally warm winter this year.  Today we went for a walk and then went to the Hanover Bridge.  Esme liked walking across the bridge and looking at the water but mostly she wanted to run in circles and hop.  No surprise there!

We love the Hanover Bridge!

Pink

Time to start blogging again.  After a couple of months hiatus, I'm back.  My goal for 2012 is to be more consistent with the blog.  I know that I've been missing documenting all the fun details of life that are fun to look back at later.  And that's really what this is all about.  I didn't do a baby book for Esme and I don't keep a journal - this is it!  So without further adieu...

Pink!  We left off with pink hair and we'll start again with pink pancakes.  Every one of you know that I can't make pancakes to save my life.  But Esme wanted pink Mickey Mouse pancakes and so I did my best.  The good news is that she's not a very discriminate customer! :)

I added pink food coloring to Bisquick mix and it wasn't exactly pink, but it made Esme happy and therefore I am happy. :)

And that's the excitement at our house today!

P.S.  I have a lot of cute pictures/videos/stories to tell from the last couple of months.  At some point I will probably go back and Back Blog.  So look for some BB posts to come.

Fun things to do with chalk

I saw on my new favorite website a fun idea that I wanted to try with Esme.  I mixed pink sidewalk chalk with water and painted it on Esme's hair.

Wet

 

Dry

Super cute and it washed out easily!  We will be doing this quite a bit!

Ready to go!

If it were up to Esme, she'd have her driver's license already.  If it were up to me, she'd wait until she's 30.  At least she's having fun practicing! 

Playing with the camera

I've been trying to play with our camera more and more since taking our photographer Ali's class on how to take better pictures of your kids.  It's harder than I thought it would be because I'm shooting in manual and Esme moves pretty fast.  So as soon as I get the light and focus done (not to mention the white balance and a gazillion other things) she's gone.

I feel like I'm slowly getting better.  Here are a few of my practice pictures.

Halloween

Esme had a great time for Halloween.  She was much more aware of what was going on this year.  For weeks, every time we drove by a house with pumpkins on the front step, she would say "There's a Happy Halloween house!".

Early on we thought maybe she would be Handy Manny for Halloween because she loves him so much.  We had a giraffe costume (Annika and Laurel's hand-me-down) that I thought would be cute.  But when you asked Esme what she wanted to be for Halloween, she said "a witch".  And so she was.

With the neighbor boys

She was very cute as she went from house to house.  The only downside to the whole night is that she was scared of anyone dressed up like anything scary.  She once screamed (a blood curdling, horror movie scream) when we walked though a fog machine and her hat fell off.  She thought for sure that someone GOT her.

Her innocence is what made this year so much fun.  She was the cutest witch in St. Michael!