Lay Lay's 2!

Lay Lay is officially 2, I can’t believe it. She has grown so much over the past 6 months. At 18 months, she was barely talking, now she never quits. At night when I rock her, I have to tell her to be quiet and even then she always responds with "otay", "why", or "sooop" (stop)! She sings constantly. I have never heard a child her age sing as much as she does. Maybe she be a singer when she grows up. She is constantly singing or humming a tune. Her favorite songs right now are the songs from our bible school this summer and “Jesus loves me”. Every time we get in my car, she yells “bible schoo”, meaning she wants to hear the bible school songs, then she yells which number she wants to hear, “7 peeaase”, then she yells, “turn it up”!

She can count to 15 but always misses the number 9. Funny story about what all she can say/sing. The other day I had the video camera out recording her singing and talking. She sang several songs, counted, sang her ABC, etc. I asked Dave and Lydia what else she could do so that we could record her, Lydia told her to sing “twinkle, twinkle”. I didn’t have a clue that she could sing “twinkle, twinkle little star” but she did and knew every word to it. Dave and Lydia both laughed because MAMA was wrong!

She has taught me a new meaning to the word independence. She doesn’t want you to do ANYTHING for her. And even though it might take forever, she really can do anything. Occasionally she will come find someone and ask “hep peeaase”, help please. She has very good manners, she says please and thank you often. I tell Lydia that she has taught Layton good manners because she has such good manners!

The girls continue to sleep together. I don’t know how Lydia gets any rest though. Layton kicks, slaps, hugs, flips, talks, giggles, bites, YES BITES in her sleep. Several weeks ago, Dave had to go to Nashville for school for 2 weeks. I let the girls sleep with me several nights while he was gone. One night Layton bit me on the hand. She never woke up but I sure did!

She is almost potty trained. She was doing so well but our camping trip set her back a little. Miss Darlene has been working with 2 other little girls during the day so that has helped tremendously. This week she has gotten back on track and done perfect!

I know this picture is horrible but I couldn't help it! She looks so darn cute in her Dora panties!



One of her favorite saying’s right now is “I see”. She wants to see everything. Even if she can already see whatever it is I am doing or watching, she still say’s “I see”. Another favorite saying is “Sooop”, meaning stop. If something happens, “sooop” is her automatic response. I hear it at least 50 times a day!

She has started pretend playing with baby dolls and us. She has really started playing with baby dolls more and more and she tells us all the time “see ya later, going work”.

This year we had 2 separate parties for her. My girls are very fortunate to have 5 set of grandparents, so we had gradparents over on Friday night and friends on Saturday. It worked out perfectly. She enjoyed showing out for all her gradnparents on Friday night then on Saturday afternoon, she enjoyed her friends being there. AT both parties, when we sang to her, she sang too! For weeks leading up to her birthday she sang "Hap Birthday to Ayton" a million times a day. I thought she would be shy at her parties and not sing but she proved me wrong. She enjoyed every minute of all of us singing to her!





Mamaw gave Layton some dollars! You would have thought she gave her a million dollars, Layton loved it. When she opened it and all the money fell out, she got very excited and starting saying "dollar, dollar"!





"Ydia" is helping pick little sister up so she can blow her candles out! Miss Darlene made her a Dora cake. It was so cute! Layton loves Dora. The funny thing is, she doesn't watch the show!!





All of her buddies on Saturday!




She continues to be a silly girl. She is always saying “watch dis”. It is 100% competition between her and her sister. She is always trying to get a reaction. And sometimes if you don’t react to her she says “sooop”! I cannot imagine my life without her. I am so grateful for my little monkey!!

Our first camping trip!

I did it, I survived camping! This past weekend we were one with nature, staying at Jellystone National Park in Van Buren, Missouri. We went with about 35 others from out church. We left Friday afternoon and came back Monday afternoon. Lydia was so excited that after we picked her up from school Friday afternoon (2:45) she stayed in the truck, buckled up ready to go until 4:00! I’ll admit I was anxious because as a child, I HATED camping but this time was different. Lydia had enough excitement that it spread to me. After packing what seemed like everything we owned, we set out. We got there around 8 that night. By the time we set our tent up and unpacked everything we didn’t get settled until around 10. Layton and I went to sleep around 11. Dave sat around the campfire with all the guys talking and Lydia enjoyed playing spy’s with the kids. Before I went to bed, I told Dave to make sure their feet were cleaned off before they got in the tent. The next morning I woke up to see Lydia covered in grass. Her white shirt was no longer white. I could have sworn she had more grass on her than was outside. I asked Dave why he didn’t try and get her cleaned off and his response was that he cleaned her feet! She explained that when you spy on people, you have to crawl around in the grass. Needless to say, she loved every minute of it! Around 4:00 am that first night I remembered why I didn’t like camping. The first night was humid, hot, sweaty, stuffy, etc...

The next day, we went tubing down Current River. After seeing a snake within the first minute, Lydia didn’t want to get back in the water. The scenery was beautiful and it was nice just floating down the river. After lunch, Layton fell asleep just like normal, in the tube on top of me! After we got back from tubing, Lydia got upset with me for making her take a shower. In her opinion, you aren’t supposed to take showers while camping! She was fine afterwards, when we walked out of the bath house and a face painting booth was set up! Both girls got their faces painted and of course Layton smeared hers immediately! That night we enjoyed sitting around the camp fire making smores and talking with everyone.

Sunday was a day of relaxing. The weather was cooler and the wind blew all day. It was perfect. We had cornhole tournaments all day. My girls enjoyed running freely from one place to the other. I couldn’t ever get Layton to take a nap so at 5:30 that afternoon she fell asleep standing up. She slept until 7:45 the next morning. We packed up and headed out Monday morning. Lydia was such a sleepy head that we just put her in the truck and she never woke up until we were an hour or so down the road! We stopped off by Lambert’s on the way home and had a delicious meal. It was a perfect way to end the trip.

I enjoyed being away from home; no laundry, no cleaning, no cooking, no tv, nothing but nature and friends. It was relaxing and I enjoyed watching the girls have such a good time. Our church has gone for the past 4 years but this was our first time of going with them but it definitely won’t be our last!

Cornhole Tournaments!





He must have won!




Layton talking to one of the youth.




Playing in the tent!







My baby was T I R E D!!



After a hayride one night. They made the kids balloon bracelets.