Cookies and coconuts

Sara Beth has begun to sing to herself.  Unprompted at 7am, we will hear chorus to "Jesus loves me" repeated over the baby monitor.  It is really cute how she can't carry a tune.

We got a coconut from the store the other day and Sara Beth wanted to help open it up.  We carried it into the garage to smash it open with a hammer and screw driver.

Sara Beth, of course, wanted to use the hammer to crack it open, in her words, "all by herself."

Today, she got her flu shot.  In order to reward her for receiving it without much of a fuss, Heather decided to back cookies with her.  Heather handed the ingredients to Sara Beth, and she dumped them into the mixing bowl.  She then sampled to dough regularly while Heather placed them on the cookie sheet.

Once they got out of the oven and cooled off, Sara Beth and Heather sat down and had one to celebrate a job well done.

Dinner with friends

This past Saturday, Sara Beth and her friend Adrinna, had the opportunity to play together for most of the day.  When Sara Beth got her pink stuffed dog to carry around, Adrianna got the brown stuffed dog.  Sara Beth put on her fairy wings and Adrianna put on a yellow princess dress and both had a great time.  The only trouble came when they both wanted the same purse to accessorize their outfit.  It was resolved once I got another purse from Sara Beth's stash.  For lunch, they got fruit and crackers and a peanut butter and honey sandwich.

Sara Beth has been asking more and more about getting earrings.  Initially, Heather and I had said that we were not going to get Sara Beth's ears pierced until she was old enough to ask.  Well, now she is old enough to ask, but not old enough to realize what she is asking for.  Heather has some screw on earrings from my grandmother, which are rather uncomfortable to wear.  So Heather asked Sara Beth if she wanted to wear them, in hope that Sara Beth would realize that they didn't feel good and would stop requesting her ears to get pierced.  It didn't work.  Sara Beth loved them.  So, Heather took Sara Beth to the jeweler and had the lady their explain the process of getting her ears pierced.  Sara Beth's eyes got wider and wider and she decided that she didn't want to get her ears pierced after all; but she wore my grandmother's earrings for the entire day.

After the rain

It rained quite a bit around here the past week.  Not quite as bad as the national news stations declared.  No one got washed away, though I did have to find an alternate route home the day it rained two inches in one hour as a road was flooded.  After the sun came back out, Sara Beth, Heather, and I decided to go down to the local creek to see the effect the rain had on it.  Sara Beth asked to bring all her friends.

And this is what we found.  Sara Beth is standing on the sidewalk as it goes towards what used to be the banks of the creek.  Sara Beth enjoyed throwing random debris into the water. As you can see below, she throws like a girl.

A little later in the week, Sara Beth asked Heather if she could sit on the counter and help make dinner.  Heather gave her a bit of cooked chicken to munch on while Heather concocted her recipe.  When Sara Beth asked to help stir, Heather needed to get another ingredient from the other side of the kitchen, so she let Sara Beth use the spatula.  Sara Beth tossed her half eaten piece of chicken into the bowl and mixed it in with the rest of the dinner before Heather could stop her.

One of Sara Beth's favorite recipes for us to make for her: mix 2 parts ice cream with 1 part M&Ms and serve chilled.  She consumed the entire bowl full in about 60 seconds.

Helping in the kitchen

Sara Beth has been helping out a lot in the kitchen this past week.  She helps take the junk mail out to the recycle bin.  In the below picture, she realized that I was trying to toss a James Avery jewelry catalog.  Instead of following me to the recycle bin, she started flipping though the pages, uttering "Oooh, pretty..." on almost every page.  If you look carefully, you will notice that she is holding the magazine up side down.

Quite often, while Heather and I are cooking in the kitchen, Sara Beth will want to sit on the counter and watch as we prepare a meal.  I left the butter knife within reach of her hands, and she decided she wanted to help by stabbing the butter.

Last Wednesday, Heather and Sara Beth made cup cakes together.  Sara Beth worked hard at putting the frosting on them.

Runnning around does take a lot of energy. Sara Beth is eating a tortilla here while the rest of dinner is finished up.