Day of Birthday Parties

Yesterday was a day of Birthday celebrations. We started the day at Vaughan's 2nd Birthday Party. Kenna had a blast and kept her daddy very busy! I think she would have stayed in the swing forever!! When she finally decided to move on from the swing, she and Daddy spent some time in the bounce house. She is getting really good at all this jumping!!

Her favorite toy of the day was Vaughan's red car. I think she stayed in it for an hour! She kept wanting Daniel to push her around and around and then she would take a turn driving for herself. Daniel said that she is going to be a good NASCAR driver because she can only turn to the left. :) (Christmas present, maybe?)

She definitely made herself right at home in that car. She even had her water bottle in the seat next to her.

We left that party to go to Daniel's parents to celebrate Michael's (9-19) and Nathan's (9-24) birthdays. We had a great time and the food was yummy!

JD was definitely ready for the cake and ice cream!

Kenna was waiting patiently for her piece of cake (her second of the day!) and spent some time snuggling in Daddy's lap.

We missed Jackson's first birthday celebration in Arkansas this weekend....too many parties!

Happy Birthday everyone!

Wiggly Play Center

Kenna and I had a play date today! We met Tara and Vaughan (Daniel and Ryan had to work today) at the Wiggly Play Center in Frisco for a little bounce house fun. We started off in the toddler area where Kenna and Vaughan spent some time on the little rocking horses....they rocked and rocked!

It didn't take long, though, before they were ready to move on to bigger and better things. We spent a lot of time jumping in the bounce houses and going down all of the slides. Kenna had a blast and her mommy was worn out! Tara and I were right behind the kiddos the whole time so we didn't take any pictures of the bouncing. It was a great way to expend some energy on this rainy morning and Miss K came home and napped for almost 3.5 hours. She absolutely loved it and we can't wait to go back!

Labor Day Weekend

I hope everyone had a great Labor Day Weekend! We made a fun, fast trip to Lubbock and Muleshoe to see the fam and had a blast! Kenna was wonderful in the car and that made the trip even better!

We spent Friday night with Amy, Charlie, Abbye, and baby-on-the-way in Lubbock. Those two girls have so much fun with each other! Of course, Kenna was very excited to see her Mimzi on Saturday and, when Mom went out to the car to get something, Kenna followed her with her "going to grandma's" suitcase. She was ready!!Once we got to Muleshoe, we spent a lot of time up at Dad and Mom's new house...it is looking great and we can't wait for them to move in!! They have more pictures posted on their blog.

Kenna and Abbye continued their fun in Muleshoe and took turns jumping on the bed.On Monday morning, Kenna got to have her first solo horseback ride. She loved riding Lotto and didn't want to stop! She got to where she would barely hold on with one hand while the other was swinging beside her....natural born cowgirl!

Her favorite was when she and Abbye got to ride together. I think it made them feel more secure, since they could feel the other person. I really do think they would have gone on and on forever if their Poppy would have just kept leading them around.

Kenna gave Lotto a big hug when she was done riding the "neigh." (Abbye called Lotto the "or" while Kenna called him the "neigh")

Kenna's Momma even got in on the action!

Once the girls were done riding the horse, they moved on to motorized transportation. Kenna had a blast and just kept looking for more buttons to push! I think she wanted to go faster...my little daredevil!

Can't wait to do it all again!

Jumping and Too Many Pictures?

Kenna has decided it is time to learn to jump. She doesn't get very far off of the ground and, even then, it is a full body activity. It is so much fun to watch! Tonight, Daniel was cleaning up part of the garage when I got home from work and had the radio playing. Miss K decided to show off a little of her jumping skills along with her previously seen dance moves.

You may have noticed Kenna's lovely red chin in the above video....we had our first fireplace injury. From the time she was able to move, she has not been allowed to play by the fireplace and she knows it. She will usually walk right over to the hearth and then look at you and say 'no no.' Well not yesterday! As Daniel was telling her to move away from the brick, she turned around too quickly and fell down, scraping the skin off of her chin....poor baby! Hopefully this will be her only fireplace-induced injury and that it will help her learn that she needs to stay away from the fireplace!

I guess that Kenna has gotten used to the camera being pointed in her direction. We have the red-eye flash turned on and it will flash a few seconds before the real flash. Apparently, Kenna has grown to expect the flash from the camera and is not used to us using the camera to video. I thought this was too cute. We have laughed and laughed at her facial expressions....all because she is waiting for the flash.

Kenna's new fav

Just had to start out with a cute picture of my little princess....she is getting so big and just loves to smile for the camera these days. Of course, she also thinks that the closer she is to the camera, the better. That definitely makes for some interesting pictures!Kenna's newest favorite toy was something she found on Daddy's desk the other day. Once she saw the calculator, she instantly claimed it as her own. For three full days now she has walked around with her calculator while she "cal coo waits." Apparently she has been doing some heavy-duty math work! (She has watched her friend Abby - Cindy's daughter - who loves to play with a calculator - we guess that is where she picked it up!)

Last night, as Daniel was putting her to bed, she kept saying "moor calcoowait moor calcoowait". He finally had to put her down with the promise that she could play again in the morning.

After Kenna's bath tonight, I was letting her play with the plastic cups in one of the kitchen cabinets while I tidied up the kitchen. I heard her asking for water and when I turned around to hand her a sippy cup full of water, this is what I found....

I guess she wanted to get it on her own! Little Miss Independent! :)

Puerto Vallarta

Daniel and I just returned from spending 5 glorious day in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. We had such an amazing time! Puerto Vallarta is on the Pacific side of Mexico and is surrounded by rain forest and mountains. It was really neat to get to see the forest, mountains, and beach all at the same time. We stayed at the Dreams Puerto Vallarta and this was the view from our room. Gorgeous! The tower of the hotel that you can see in the picture had recently been remodeled and most of the pictures on the website are from that tower (complete with hot tubs on each balcony). We did not stay in that tower, but we loved our room all the same...it was great.

We spent 90% of our time sitting in the beach chairs under one of those little huts you can see in the pictures. There was plenty of room for 2-3 chairs and we just sat and read/relaxed/talked. It rains almost everyday in August in PV, but it would only rain for an hour or so in the late afternoon. Several times we just stayed in our chairs and watched it rain from under our little roof.

We did make a trip into town one morning. The Malecon is a popular boardwalk/beach because of its life size sand sculptures.

One of the tours that we did take was the Outdoor Adventure by Vallarta Adventures. The tour includes a ride up the mountain in a Unimog (picture below....a little interesting) before going the rest of the way up the mountain on a mule. Daniel's mule was named Diablo...had me worried for just a little while until I saw how tame they really were. After arriving at the top, you work your way back down by a series of ziplines and rappelling. We were speeding above the trees, sometimes into pools in the river, and rappelling down waterfalls....it was amazing!! You were not allowed to take your camera on the tour because of the water involved, so we just have a few shots from before we really got started.

And that is all the pictures that we took....I know...we didn't do too great of a job in that department, but we were too busy just hanging out! Probably one of the best vacations ever!!

Kenna got to spend the time with her Grandpa and Grandma Boyd, Mercy, Solomon, and several of her other uncles. She seemed to have a blast and even got to spend some time with JD! Thanks everybody for helping keep our little girl entertained....Mommy and Daddy sure did miss her!!

New Sippy Cup?

Kenna really, really wants to drink out of a real cup. We keep several Tupperware-type glasses in one of the bottom cabinets and she plays and plays with those cups. She feels very special when Daddy puts just a little bit of water in the bottom so that she can take a real drink.

Tonight, I fixed her bedtime cup of milk (in a sippy cup) and then went to put her dirty clothes in the hamper. Apparently she decided that she needed to still drink out of the real cups - even if the liquid was in her sippy cup.

She was not happy when I tried to take her make-shift cups apart and chugged her milk as long as she had her 'big cup'...hey, whatever works!