She Knows How to Pick 'Em

K. got to pick her own pumpkin this year at the orchard! Last year, she just picked (ahem...chose) from the pre-picked pumpkins. This year, we actually took her into the patch and let her select and pick her own pumpkin. She really liked walking through the dirt and finding the right pumpkin, and her near-obsession with pumpkins confirms my suspicions that her favorite color at the moment might be orange. She picked hers (with a little help from Dad).
And then she pulled it in the wagon. She pulled by herself for a long time while Mom and Dad looked for the perfect pumpkins for themselves.
Once Dad put his pumpkin in, though, K. just went along for the ride.

But what a fun ride it was!

Then she helped pick the pumpkin for her little sister. Sister will miss Halloween, unless she comes early, but she is scheduled to make an appearance two days later. We got her a pumpkin anyway so she's "represented" on the front porch with the rest of us.

Then we rode back to pay for our selections. K continued to clutch the little pumpkins until we removed them from her grip, and even then she insisted on holding one for the trip home.

Orchard Play

At the orchard, we attempted to have a cute photo op. It was a pretty windy day, and it shows in the photo. We're a little windblown (and I'm a lot pregnant--hubby's jacket is in its last day or two of zipping on me). Oh, well.

In the play area, K. had fun sliding down the hay. She was a bit funny about touching it, though. She's more cautious then she was during last year's trip, but I think the wind made her less happy. She was also more afraid of the llama and goats than last year.
The thing she most wanted to do, though, was to climb up in this tractor. We were over by the hay, trying to encourage her to climb, and she turned around and made a beeline for the tractor (her great-grandpa will be so proud)! She played in it a lot the last time we were here, which was nearly a year ago.

Chop Chop

After two years and a couple of months, I decided it was time for K's "first haircut." Since her hair is curly, I didn't feel compelled to try to do anything particularly short or involved, just to try to even up the ends a little bit. My friend S, who is my go-to person for all things curly, came over and trimmed K's hair. K. did great--she sat politely while we combed and snipped
K. is napping now, so I'll have to take some "after" pictures later.

Smiling Rider

I think the actual reason for the grin is not just the joy of riding Neigh, but that I asked K. to go upstairs to take a nap and she ran over to her horse to ride.

Regardless, it's good to see her so happy.

But this is still what happens when I ask her to smile on command. That, or an odd, scrunched up smile with her eyes closed.

Teething Troubles and Fun Song

K. pretending to be happy despite teething unhappily:

She always comes over to me to look at the camera after I've taken her picture. Note: that's my big belly she's snuggled up next to in this photo.

K., with a face that describes how she's actually feeling at the moment:
Here K. is singing a song. Her tunes have started to become recognizable, though the words are often past her vocabulary (I mean, she doesn't really do sentences of more than 2-3 words--how can I expect her to sing entire phrases in a song?) So in the car on the way home, she was singing "This Old Man" and to make it easier, I suggested she just sing using the word "car." As she is whenever I pick up the camera, though, she gets distracted before she's done and comes over to see what is on the camera. Oh, well. Here is the car song:

123 to the Zoo

K. had her first trip to the zoo today with our friend B. and her son. I love animals and anticipated having a great time, and hoped K. would be similarly interested, as she's always intrigued by the ones she sees at home. Well, she was definitely not sure about the big animals we saw near the beginning--there were some monkeys that creeped her out a bit. Then we moved on to the cutest pair of brown bears who were wrestling and playing and romping. I figured "hey, she loves her stuffed bears more than anything else at the moment. I bet she'll love these!" Yeah, I was wrong. She was Not Happy about watching the bears, though eventually she unburied herself from my shoulder to take a look at them.

She softened a little when we got to the lemurs and flamingos (along with some ducks--exotic!). And we distracted her a little with a snack of goldfish crackers. But then we found something that really interested her and moved her to the edge of her seat:
"Nunnies!" "Hi, nunnies!" K. exclaimed. They wrinkled their noses at us and hopped around, and she was in her happy place. We walked by some other cute animals in the kids area, which she greeted also (and she said goodbye to the llamas when we walked away).

And we went on the carousel. I figured with the bear episode that it would be best to skip the pony rides (real ponies) and wait until she is, like, eight and requests to ride. But this was her first time on a carousel animal that went up and down. She giggled a couple of times, but it was always that laugh that might turn into a cry. It never did, and I think she had fun.

Then my camera ran out of battery juice, but we had lunch and went to the dolphin show. She had a blast! She smiled hugely and giggled and clapped through the entire show and was enthralled! After that we walked through the aquarium section and she looked at the fish and walked up to the shark tank where she almost pet a shark! Hmm...I seem to remember her aunt going through a "shark phase" in childhood. It turned out to be a most enjoyable trip!

Phonics Phun with Phriends

The following happiness has been brought to you by the letter "I."

K. had been playing the alphabet song on the refrigerator magnet, and she and her friend L. started dancing. Too cute!

And the video thereof:

Then L. was trying to teach her how to do a somersault:

And how to do a hand stand against the wall:

K's try. She actually did have both feet on the wall at one point, but my camera missed that.

Sorry about her PJs--she actually was dressed in a cute dress this morning, but is in a phase of liking to dress and undress herself, so she took it off and replaced it with something else--the only thing she can get to in her dresser. I'm proud that she picked out a matching set!

I'm also proud that, when she has friends over now, she actually sometimes interacts with them as opposed to just playing in a similar location to them.

Mall Play

I went with a friend to the mall (briefly, as there were children with us). We stopped at the play area to let the little ones run around, and K. had a great time. She's really started to be interested in running and climbing, and sat in the car (the red one in the background) and pretended to drive. She climbed up on this pig all by herself, which reminds me of a cute story that I need to add to this blog...So her friend S. was over (he's 8 months old) and K. was playing sweetly with him. At one point, she grabbed his cute baby toes and said "wee, wee wee!" Awww--and a reminder to me again that she really picks up on everything that we do!

The Many Faces of K.

K. was watching TV the other day ("T.T!") and completely lounging in the chair. I didn't want her to loaf too much, so we started fooling around.
The goal, of course, was to get a really cute picture of her--smiling.

This is as close as we came:

But the outtakes are pretty cute, too.

Cuteness Potential

This had the potential to be a really cute post with pictures of K. and her friend L. sitting at the kitchen island waiting patiently for a banana snack. Unfortunately, despite my best efforts, the cute photo never quite made it.
So we have these instead.

Cute kids, though!

Feeling Crafty Crafty

I found the cutest fabric (in corduroy, my favorite!) that just begged to be made into a dress for K. I finished the dress yesterday. The pattern I could find in the silhouette I wanted was short sleeved, so she'll wear it over a top with sleeves. Maybe a brown top, but perhaps this one. So she's a bit obsessed with bananas at the moment ("nanny!").
And I might make it a tad shorter, but she's a growing girl and I want her to wear it this fall and winter, so she'll deal with the current length.

And I made one for her sister, too:

Skills Practice

K. is in a phase where she repeats things over and over. It's her way of learning. Here she is changing baby's diaper (actually, this is "doll"--she distinguishes between her two dolls without hair and the one with).

Our friends passed along some dress up clothes and a pretend makeup kit, which K. loves! She has been using the hairdryer non-stop. She turns it on, dries doll's hair, then turns it off and combs it. She has spent some time "drying" her own hair, and Dad was lucky enough that K. dried his as well.
"See, look how pretty you look now that I'm done with you!"

I thought it was really cute when K. held this mirror up so she--and doll--could see themselves in the mirror.

Leggo my Legos

The other day K. was playing with her legos (thanks, K. Senior!) and she made a huge tower of all of the similar blocks. I'm pretty proud of her!

On the Porch

After church, K. took some time to enjoy the porch of her new house. "Well, it's time to go in for lunch. I hope you've enjoied our little time outside."