This is Not my First Rodeo

This is the last week of the Livestock Show and Rodeo here in Houston and we finally made it to the Rodeo. It was an almost perfect day to go. Grandpa, grandma Tita and I were all free on a Monday when it's less crowded and the fact that it rained earlier in the day made it even less crowded. Lizzy had everything to herself and there was no waiting to see anything.

I think Lizzy was in a bit of shock to see all the farm animals she loves in one place.

Lizzy especially loved seeing the baby piglets she said she wanted to give them a hug.

Lizzy also enjoyed seeing the baby chicks. She seemed very excited to see chicks!

We have pictures on our computer of different rabbits and Lizzy was very surprised to see actual live rabbits.

Lizzy petting a rabbit

Looking at small animals

Grandma Tita and Lizzy

Lizzy and I went into the petting zoo area and Lizzy was a little unsure about petting the animals. As Lizzy walked into the petting area she accidentally stepped on a goats leg, the goat didn't flinch but Lizzy got freaked out. Eventually she pet a few goats and happily waved bye bye to the animals.
We had fun as a family. Lizzy is learning and growing so fast that this visit to the rodeo is very different than last year's visit. Last year Lizzy was a small infant riding in my baby wrap just looking around at everything new to her, this year Lizzy walked most of the time and was identifying animals and their noises, she also ate the same food we adults ate and enjoyed being together with family. Every year Lizzy will grow, learn, and understand more and more. Every moment with Lizzy now is precious time, she will never be this age again.

Easter Basket

I know it's early and maybe it's because it's early spring and Lent has started but I made Lizzy's Easter Basket already. I don't like to wait until the last minute and I try to get things done early so I have time to do other activities with Lizzy when the time comes. But I thought I would share what's in her Easter basket for anyone looking for ideas on a toddler Easter basket.
Inside Lizzy's Easter Basket:

• Bunny hand puppet (Lizzy has sooo many stuffed animals but no puppets so I thought this was a better idea than another stuffed animal)
• Chick finger puppet
• Alphabet and first words flash cards
• Kazoo
• Kid size gardening tools and gardening apron
• Strawberry planting kit
• Easter rubber duck
• Egg Coloring Kit
• Summer Board Book
• New swimsuit and Hula Skirt
• Bubbles
• Bingo dot pens (I hear toddlers love these)
• Peeps (I didn't want to include any candy or sugary treats but I changed my mind she can try peeps since she loves marshmallows).

I got most things at amazon.com, the rest at dollar tree and target. I love shopping online because I can find things I want for Lizzy that they don't have in stores. I also love the dollar tree and target dollar bins for seasonal small gifts great for easter baskets.

Toilet Learning Continued...

Lizzy is still toilet learning but the good thing is she absolutely loves it the bad thing is she doesn't have to go very often and when she does she doesn't go in the potty. Right now it's more of an activity for her to put her underwear on and sit on the toilet or potty and she thinks it's a fun game. As parents I think we need more patience and time dedicated to this because at most she's in her underwear about an hour at a time then we switch her back into her diaper. The good thing is she is interested and learning about the potty. She can now pull her underwear and diaper on and off, she knows when she has to go and tells us once she's gone, she knows her potty books and tells us "bye bye diaper" when she's got her underwear on. I see some progress in her toilet learning.

Color Sorting

Lizzy helped me paint some egg cartons for some activities we have planned. We used sponge brushes, washable paint and egg cartons. I can't stress how important washable paint is because Lizzy managed to unscrew a bottle of this paint and poured it all over the carpet in her room while I was gone for 1 sec! When I went back into the room she kept saying "purple, purple, purple" she had spilled the purple paint everywhere! The good thing is it was washable paint and we have a stream vacuum cleaner that got it right up.
These round sponge brushes are great because Lizzy is able to dip the brush in the paint and stamp the color right into the egg carton.

This is the egg carton Lizzy painted. We used it to sort her colored lacing beads.

These lacing beads have been great for Lizzy she uses them to learn her colors, count, name shapes, and she laces them, the string is also very long so she walks around pulling the laced beads like a pull toy.

Girly Girl

Grandma "tita" loves make-up, fashion, and all that girly stuff and of course when Lizzy goes to grandma's house she gets into all the make-up and goodies on the vanity. Grandma tita did Lizzy's hair and Lizzy was telling everyone she looked "pretty". I tried to but her hair in a pony today and she took it right out.

Lizzy is developing quite an imagination, at home she pretends her butterfly castanet is a makeup compact and pretends to but makeup on.

Homemade Bath Paints

Ingredients:

• Clear hand soap
• Cornstarch
• Food coloring
• Baby food jars

Directions:

Fill the baby food jar 3/4 full of soap then add one tablespoon corn starch and about 10 drops of food coloring and mix well. I whipped these up real quick (excuse my feet in the pic).

Lizzy had fun painting on the bath walls!

Clean up was quick and easy

Preschool Open Gymnastics

Lizzy really loves going to the open gymnastics for preschoolers where she gets to run wild and try all the equipment but today she didn't stay long. After 15 minutes at the open gym Lizzy went and got her little backpack and left out the door! I caught up to her and she said she was "ready" (ready to go). Either she didn't feel well (I think she's getting sick again) or she didn't like the set up today (not all the equipment was set out today). We left open gym, had lunch with tita, then went home for a nap.
I actually tried to get a video of Lizzy today but I didn't get very much : ( ... maybe next time I will get a better video.

They just got lots of cute toddler leotards in at the gym but Lizzy didn't give me time to look at them. I can't wait to get her a cute little leotard to wear when we go to open gym. (maybe next time)

Hiking Trail

Lizzy's first time on a hiking nature trail. Lizzy was riding high on daddy's shoulders most the way. She usually loves to walk and run but the trail was long and Lizzy tired out fast.

Shamrock Matching

I had a bunch of leftover shamrock cut outs so I've been thinking of ways to use them this month. Lizzy does great with puzzles and matching and she's learning shapes so I though I could make a shapes matching game with these left over shamrocks.
I could not get a good picture of Lizzy with this activity because she was all over the place.
She did great finding the pairs and she would set them on her chair when get found the pair but this activity didn't hold her attention very long.
After she found the pairs the first time she was done and off to something else.

Silly Straw Smoothies

Smoothies are great because you can pack a lot of fruits and even veggies into a tasty treat that a toddler will drink. Lizzy loves smoothies and for her this is a treat and she gets lots of fruits and veggies in. I also love the bullet blender because it's so convenient to make one drink at a time in one cup and the clean up in minimal.
Lizzy found some silly straws I had left over from Lizzy's birthday party favor bags last years she she really wanted to try it out so I let her. A little messy but fun.

Rock and Roll Shamrocks!

A fun and easy way for toddlers to explore with paint is marble painting. Find a box and put some paper on the bottom of the box ( I used shamrock cut outs), add some marbles dipped in paint to the box and move the box to roll the marbles with paint over the paper. Since, we were making shamrocks we used blue and yellow paint as the paint mixed together it magically became green.

Lizzy liked this activity. Her favorite part was dropping the marbles into the paint cups and watching them roll in the paint. Lizzy is starting to think painting is a daily activity like play dough and drawing. Lizzy will ask to play with play dough and draw everyday and lately she has been asking to paint everyday.

Fun Times with Family

Since we discovered the toddler play area at Chick fil a this is now somewhere we frequent when we got out. Lizzy's uncle Christian or "tio" as Lizzy calls him and Briana or "nana" came to play with Lizzy at Chick fil a. There was no one there and Lizzy go to enjoy herself trying everything out.

Uncle Christian and Lizzy

Whhee....wee...Lizzy loves the slide and she loves Briana.

As we were leaving they were giving out milkshake samples. Of course Lizzy did not pass that up and slurped down the whole thing!

More from the Zoo

The Houston Zoo

Mike has been working on the mission for shuttle discovery through the week everyday so today he finally got a break and on his day off we all headed to the zoo! Lizzy was much more observant of the animals this time unlike our past visits where she seemed to people watch more now she is animal watching. She also knows the names of most of the animals and she likes to say bye bye giraffe or whatever the name of the animal is as we walk off.
Lizzy in her wagon. Lizzy doesn't use a stroller so our only option is this wagon but she prefers to walk or be carried.

Lizzy by the fountains. I think she wanted to get in.

Mommy and Lizzy by the giraffes.
Daddy and Lizzy brushing the goat.
Lizzy's first time petting a goat in the children's zoo area.
Daddy and Lizzy sitting in the bat exhibit.
They have a carousel at the zoo so I thought Lizzy would enjoy this like she did the one at kemah but she refused to sit on any of the animals so we sat together on the carousel bench and she was fine.
On the way home she fell asleep. It was a lonnngggg day. We were all exhausted by the time we got home.