The end of an era

We have declared Sara Beth to be fully potty trained! There are no more diapers in our house. For the past month or two, we have continued to put them on at night time, but we ran out and didn't feel we needed to get any more. Along with that, she has given up her afternoon nap. We still enforce a mandatory quiet time in her room, but she can now handle herself without a hour rest.

Recently, I applied my handyman skills and successfully cut a hole in our roof and installed a skylight. With all the natural sunlight streaming into our bathroom, the old paint revealed its age. So we repainted it a lighter shade, and, of course, Sara Beth wanted to help. She got her painting skills from her mother's side; she was a natural and actually helped with minimal amounts of mess. This is also the last picture of her in a diaper.

This past week, Sara Beth has repeated some of the same antics I did when I was her age. I decided that it would be funny to put on all the pairs of shorts that I own at the same time. On Saturday, when I got Sara Beth from quiet time, I found she had put on 12 different pairs of socks, along with a set of leg warmers for good measure. She proudly smiled for this picture.


Out of the blue, Sara Beth decided that she wanted to write a letter to "Ms. Cindy," Heather's mom. So, she colors some papers and declared that she is going to mail them and begins to walk out through the garage to put them in the mail box. Heather and I were in the middle of finishing dinner, so we stop her and explain that you cannot just put a letter in the mail; you need a stamp on it. We go back to eating and she goes back to her play room. A couple minutes later, she comes out with 8 stamps and about 12 return address labels on her paper, pilfered off my desk, and redeclares her intent to mail the pictures. Heather reclaimed the stamps, but we did praise her ingenuity. I did something very similar when I was 3 with about 200 return address labels and a moving box.

One thing I didn't do as a kid was put on a dress and 4 skirts.

Heather and I were driving in the car while Sara Beth was in the back seat. We were telling Sara Beth our food preparation for the weekend, how we were going to have hamburgers and hot dogs with chips and have some friends over. We then asked her, "Doesn't that sound good?" From the back seat we hear "Wait! You forgot drinks!" Only once we explained that we did have juice, milk, and water, did she agree that it sounded good.

Sara Beth and I are getting better at our block building skills. We can now construct a semi-durable hour for her doll: Emma Rose.