Sunday, February 20, 2011

The Pink & Blue Daily

Today Bret was born, and as a result, "Daily Serena" will enter the archives!! In its place, a new blog has been started that will accommodate both of our babies! Head on over to "The Pink & Blue Daily" for a continuation of Serena's life along with the new addition of Bret!!

Saturday, February 19, 2011

Bathtime Pix Once Again

Serena was pretty serious about 'washing' her own face in the bath today, heehee!


Tonight, Grandma & Aunt Anna arrived via Uncle Craig & Aunt Danielle! Craig & Danielle stayed to visit for a little while and had pie & ice cream with us. Serena loved having company! When everyone arrived, Jordan & I went out to greet them. A little bit later, Serena came out and Uncle Craig knelt down with arms extended to say hi to her. She walked right up to him and gave him a hug! She had lots of fun playing while they were here and showing off all the neat things she could do with her favorite toys (i.e., riding her horsie, doing her shape sorter and her pop-up toy, etc.). She brought a book to Aunt Danielle and sat on her lap and listened attentively while Danielle read the book to her! It was a really fun night! And we're all so happy that Grandma & Aunt Anna are here! Now we're all ready for Bret to come! :)

Friday, February 18, 2011

"Hi"

This morning, Serena was talking on her phone (these days, anything becomes a phone: a washcloth, a plate, her doll's bottle; I think this morning it was the play dollar bill from her singing purse) and kept saying "Hi" and then talking a little and then "Hi" again. Up till now, she has not said "Hi," so I called her over and said "Hi" to her and she responded with an enormous grin and a "Hi"!!!! It was SO cute! For the rest of the day, we said "Hi" back and forth countless times. She even mustered up a "Hi" for Aunt Jessie on the phone! Then, tonight as I was changing her diaper and putting on her jammies before bed, she laid there and kept saying ever-so-cheerfully, "Hi!" :D

Here's some pix from today!

Peek!

Serena's new funnest thing to do: climb up on the toilet!

Another gorgeous warm day spent mostly outside!

Playing in the dirt with Rocky always nearby! Rocky is not allowed to dig, so he just watches closely while Serena digs. If she happens to pull up anything of interest (as she apparently did in this picture), he is right there to investigate!

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Video #1: Playing with the horsie. I just thought she was so cute climbing up on the horsie in her Sunday dress! :) And I love the little story she told me about it!


Video #2: "Ooo's." Serena was teasing Rocky outside and I could hear her laughter, so I grabbed the camera. It's so funny how Rocky just puts up with her silliness!! Then, she kept coming in to get more "Oooo's" so I finally got video of that because she would start saying "Ooo's" way back at the door and say it until she got them. But it's not like she's saying it to be demanding; more like she just really enjoys saying the word "Oooo's"! ;) Oh, and I love how Rocky just follows her in and out!


Video #3: Helping feed the dogs and playing with her purse. This week, as part of our morning routine, I've started letting Serena 'help' with feeding the dogs. She thinks it is really special and takes this 'responsibility' very seriously! In the next segment, Serena is playing with her purse. Every time she made the purse giggle, she looked at me with her mouth as wide as it could possibly be! I just thought it was funny!

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

At Play

Serena had fun playing outside a lot today. Rocky was by her side pretty much the whole time. They are such pals! She made a big mess scooping dirt (with her hands) onto the patio. She also dragged her baby all over the place outside and they picked dandelions. At one point, Serena threw her baby down and hurried inside to her bedroom. A moment later, she emerged with a diaper which she took straight back to her baby and tried to put on her. Next, it was Rocky's turn to be diapered, haha!

Tonight after supper, Daddy was playing on the floor with Serena. He kept tickling her, so I told her she should try to tickle Daddy. She had this shy grin on her face as she reached over and 'tickled' his arm. "Tick-a-tick-a-tick-a!" It was SO cute!

Serena's baby is a big part of her day-to-day activities!

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Lil' Screamer

Serena loves playing with Daddy. He wrestles with her on the floor, tickles her, throws her in the air, and does all kinds of crazy things with her. She's getting a lot braver lately. She used to start whining when things got too crazy, but now she just screams (and wow, can she ever!) and giggles! Half the time, when Jordan says (in a formidable tone), "I'm gonna get you!" she actually runs toward him rather than away, haha!


Monday, February 14, 2011

Busy Day, Busy Baby

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone!

We kept pretty busy today. After running errands all morning, Serena took a late nap and slept so long that I finally had to wake her up so she'd be able to go to bed tonight! I'm sure she's just finally catching up on lost sleep from the weekend. :P Jordan got home a little before 3, so after getting Serena up, we walked to Sonic as fast as we could to make it before 'Happy Hour' ended at 4! We might have been a minute or two late, but they still gave us our drinks half-off! :) It was so pretty and warm out today, so it was perfect to have a sweet tea to sip as we walked back home. We stopped at the park and let Serena out of the stroller while the dogs chased each other.

Serena's interactions with Rocky are so entertaining. One minute she's trying to boss him around (to no avail); the next minute she's giving him hugs!


Serena has finally mastered the art of climbing onto the park benches and is so pleased about it!

It just seems like Serena is coming up with all kinds of new funny things to do these days! I often think throughout the day, "Oh, I need to remember to write about that on the blog tonight!" Too often I forget, though. :( I tried to brainstorm a bit so I could do a little catch-up tonight, so here's a few anecdotes from recent days! :)

The way Serena plays with her baby is changing a lot lately. She brings her baby along to have her diaper changed or to sit in her high chair with her while she eats. Today, she gave her baby a ride on the horsie, too. When I was changing Serena's diaper this evening, she was actually tickling her baby (something Daddy had been doing to Serena right before we went to change her diaper)! She wiggled her fingers at the baby's neck and said, "Tick, tick, tick, tick!" Another funny thing she did with her baby today: Serena is not allowed to touch the computer, though her little hands often 'sneak' up to the keyboard if you are holding her and then she gets in trouble. Well, today she made her baby's hand reach up and touch the computer! Isn't that funny?! I was like, "No, baby, you cannot touch the computer either. Just like Serena can't touch the computer." I wasn't really sure how to handle the situation (I mean, Serena wasn't doing it, but she sort of was?), but I thought it was really interesting that Serena was 'acting that out' with her baby!

Serena has gotten a couple Valentines in the mail over the last few days. I read them to her (she was extremely interested and attentive!) and then I put them on the table with her books so she could look at them when she wanted. She loves to 'read' them to herself over and over with lots of expression! This evening, I noticed that she had them in her baby stroller. They were the only things in there and she'd been walking them around the house, heehee!

Supper is generally the only meal that we all 3 sit down together for. Jordan and I usually hold hands while we thank God for our food before eating. In the last couple weeks or so, we've started to include Serena, and it has become one of her favorite things. After I get supper all ready, I put her in her highchair and then scoot her up to the table. She knows what's next, so she extends a hand to each of us, saying, "Mm, mm, mm" until we each take a hand. For about a week, it pleased her so much that she would laugh and laugh and we'd have to try to quiet her down before we could actually pray. Now, she just has a big smile and she usually stays quiet, though sometimes she has some things to say first (I don't know if she's pretending to pray or what)!

Serena is finally starting to get a little more cooperative with trying to say words. For a while there, she would either laugh when we tried to get her to say a new word, or she would just look away and pretend not to hear us. This was after she had already learned (with apparent pleasure) to say a few words like "book" and "up." I have no idea why she stopped trying to say new words, but I'm glad she's opening up to it again! If she seems like she's not going to try, we say the word and then say, "Your turn!" and then she'll give it a shot. So now she's saying "banana" ("na-na-na-na"), "baby ("bay-bay" or sometimes just "bay")," "ball ("ba")," "cheese" ("dee-dee" or sometimes [and I'm not sure why] "da-da"), "dog" ("day") and making attempts at other random words we come up with.

Music is still a huge part of our everyday lives. We have to have some playing pretty much all day long, whether at home or in the car. When we are at stores, if Serena hears some music, she'll start waving her arm and saying, "Uh, uh, uh" to me in very urgent tones until I acknowledge that I hear the music too. She did the same thing today when we were walking and a car drove by with the windows down and the radio blaring!

Last night, Serena was wearing a sweatshirt with pockets, so I put a toy cell phone in one of them. She thought it was the neatest thing! She tried putting it in and out, but it was kinda hard for her to do since the toy was kinda big. Anyway, she finally got it in and I told her to go show Daddy. You should have seen her strut over to Jordan and just walk on by him with her shoulders back and her belly sticking out! She thought she was something else with that cell phone in her pocket! She kinda juts her chin out and raises her eyebrows, but doesn't make eye contact. It's SO funny, because you can see how impressed she is with herself! "I have a cell phone in my pocket. I am big stuff!" Then, she pulled the cell phone out and proceeded to have a long, loud, and detailed conversation with whoever was on the other end! :D