The Salad Days

For mother's day we went to the park for a picnic. We brought lunch and a blanket, and sat down by the river. Sean spent the whole time waist-deep in the water, and by the time we persuaded him to come out his teeth were chattering, and his feet were blue and pruney. Carter was tireless in her determination to get a rock into her mouth. I think she thought that because we were trying so hard to stop her, they must in fact be delicious - which made her try all the harder. The weather was perfect - high 70's, clear skies, and a slight breeze. We couldn't have asked for a nicer day. Hopefully this is the first of a series of weekend outings to come.

I cut the back lawn today, and we were spending some time back there playing in the dirt. The sun was shining, the breeze was blowing, the birds were chirping - at least, I think they were birds. Every time an (alleged) bird chirped, sean pointed to a nearby tree and said "a cow, a cow!" It was half anouncement and half question, as though he were looking for confirmation. Needless to say, Lori and I were somewhat amused. We tried to correct him. I said "it's not a cow, Sean." He thought for a minute, cocking his head, and replied confidently - "a pig, a pig!" The whole event was humorous enough to inspire me to draw this simple comic to commemerate the occasion.

Guess who's sitting up? It started about a week or so ago. And she's loving it, because now there are a lot of different toys she can play with.

	This afternoon, while carter was getting ready to eat her lunch, I noticed that she was wearing different clothes than Lori normally dresses her in. And for some reason, she looked much more grown up in those clothes. She looks less like a little baby, and more like a little girl. In the pictures on the left, she was getting anxious for lunch and decided to try to eat her feet instead. In the pictures on the right, she's just being her adorable little self. You can see that her hair is starting to come in, and I can't wait! Pigtails and barettes - here we come!

Carter likes to play this game lately - if you stick your tongue out at her, she will stick hers out at you too. She really seams to enjoy it too, as she grins and laughs the whole time. And she's got such a cute little pointy tongue.

I just love this photo of my three favorite people. Sean and Carter were both playing with the piano, and somehow Sean was not having any trouble sharing with her. Hopefully this is the beginning of a trend, where Sean will show more interest in playing with his sister.

Well, let's say "piglet", at least. She's too cute to be called a pig. But regardless, this is a picture of something she's been doing lately. We lay her down on a blanket, and she grabs a corner of it and does a complete roll, rolling herself up in the blanket in the process. She looks so sweet, does she not?

Sean has really been into counting things lately. And just over the last couple of weeks, I've been trying to get him to recognize, or read, the numbers 1 through 5. So most nights we spend at least a little time where I write a number on his doodle board, and he tells me what it is. When we were done, I walked into the kitchen, and I heard him saying "five, five" to himself. When I came back out to the living room and sat back down with him, this is what I saw on the doodle board. It's backwards - but amazing, right?

I've been talking a lot about how much Carter and Sean look alike in general - and especially how much Carter looks like Sean did at her age. Well here is a pair of pictures to really show you what I mean. The one on the left is Carter, and the one on the right is Sean. But isn't the similarity sort of cool?