Liberty

*These were just some snapshots we took of Liberty with our own camera. The "real" photos will be coming soon.

**For those of you that don't know, you can click on each picture to view it larger.

Liberty's First Carousel Ride

I've been wanting to take Liberty on a carousel ride for awhile now, but I figured I'd wait until she'd really enjoy it. My friend Melissa, and her daughter Maeva, and Liberty and I took a trip to Columbia yesterday. We decided since Liberty & Maeva had been so nice through all the stops, that we'd reward them with a ride on the carousel at the mall. We first ate lunch in the food court and sat by the carousel. Liberty was so excited to see all the different animals on the carousel and kept talking about the "hop-hop." Finally, we went over and Liberty picked the "hop-hop." Well, unfortunately, she was absolutely terrified of the ride! She did not want to be up on that "hop-hop!" She would start calming down until it would go up again, and the expression on her face was total fright! As soon as the ride was over, she was happy as can be. Maeva rode it again, and Liberty had a ball watching Maeva go around and around. Apparently, Liberty feels the same way about the animals on the carousel as she does real animals - she loves to look, but not touch!

Working backwards

I'd like to apologize to our faithful blog-readers. I've had a hard time keeping up our blog for the last few months. Now that I'm so behind, I have a hard time getting motivated to post. So, I've decided I am going to work backwards. I am going to post what is most recent, and then hopefully, slowly but surely, I can get caught up with the older events. I will postdate the posts, so make sure to scroll down and read all our new posts. Wish me luck! :)

PS...I know the video of Liberty dancing doesn't work anymore. Apparently using the song was copyright enfringement. I'll have to post it without the song one of these days.

Easter Celebrations

For this month's SAA Children's Social we had an Easter egg hunt. We expected about 75 kids, so there were over 800 filled plastic eggs, of which I probably filled at least 500 of. The hardest part was finding 800 places to hide eggs! We had the hunt behind the TCC (ATSU's gym) in a little grassy/foresty area. It was absolutely freezing, I think around 25 degrees, so it was short and sweet! Liberty enjoying walking around and putting eggs in her basket. She collected a whopping 7 eggs! She's says "E!" very excitedly for "eggs."




After the egg hunt we went to the Farm & Home store and showed Liberty the baby chicks, ducks, and rabbits. She loved waving and saying "hi" to them, but she wasn't interested in touching them. Trever held one of the ducks up to her and it pooped on Liberty's pants. Luckily, she didn't notice, but it was pretty gross! Thank goodness for baby wipes! Interestingly enough, Trever & I started thinking about buying a rabbit for Liberty. There was a really cute white one that I wanted to buy. We even looked to see how much a cage was, and contemplated the idea, but decided against it. After all, the last thing I want to do is clean up after an animal! Plus, I don't know if Liberty would ever even touch or hold the rabbit, so there would be no point. We still laugh at how serious we got thinking about it!

I got this brilliant idea to color easter eggs with Liberty. We were at our friends' house, so while the guys went and played racquetball, we painted eggs. I realized quickly that Liberty is too young for coloring eggs! We started with blue, and it was a huge mess! She just wanted to splash the colored water everywhere. I ended up just giving her a bowl of water to play in, and she enjoyed that. Maybe next year :)


This year was definitely the coldest Easter we'll ever experience (hopefully). It actually snowed Easter day! To be honest, it was a little disappointing to wake up to all the white. On Easter day we started the day off with early morning church. It was actually nice to take part in the important part of Easter first, and set the mood before moving on to the not so important Easter stuff. The Easter bunny came later that afternoon, which was nice to wait. To be honest, the Easter bunny wasn't really that exciting this year. Liberty got a few fun things: Mrs. Potato Head, a cute book, and a few other things. She also got a super cute little Easter package from my Mom and Becky with a cute duck purse, and little chick that cheeps, and a book about farm animals, and Liberty loved everything. She is totally into animals and the sounds they make, so it was perfect! Unfortunately, Liberty wasn't very cooperative with taking a picture in her Easter dress. She looked SO dang cute! I loved the dress Heather sent to her awhile back, and she looked darling it! Finally, we had a tasty Easter dinner with a few of our friends. I contributed a ham, calico beans, and dessert, consisting of homemade strawberry ice cream and angel food cake. Despite the cold weather, it was a really nice Easter.

Daddy-Libby Time

Although it has been cold more than we would like it to be, every once in awhile we have a nice “warm” day. Anywhere between 50 and 60 degrees is awesome! During Trever’s spring break there was a day or two that was nice enough for Trever to take Liberty on a bike ride and on a run. Trever took Liberty on her first bike ride in the Chariot with her helmet on. They rode up to the lake, and stopped and played at the playground for awhile. Trever and Liberty were able to have quite a bit of “Daddy-Libby time” during the break, which was nice for all of us.

Spring Break

For Trever’s spring break we took a little trip through Illinois. First, we drove through Quincy so we could eat at Tiramisu, this amazing authentic Italian restaurant. We also stopped by Hobby Lobby and Old Navy for a little shopping. Quincy was a good half-way point for the trip. Then we headed to Springfield. We got checked into our hotel, and then went to a few stores. We had dinner at Chili’s, and then headed back to the hotel. The next day we hit up some of the Abraham Lincoln sites, which was our main draw for visiting. We were able to walk from our hotel to most of the sites, which was nice. Besides the chilling wind, it was a nice sunny day in the 40’s. We saw Abraham Lincoln’s home, the old Capitol Building, the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library & Museum, and Abraham Lincoln’s tomb. It was all really neat and very interesting. After the sites we had dinner at Panera and then a little more shopping at the mall. While I went to a few stores, Trever took Liberty to play on the playground, which of course she loved! Trever and I were happy with our shopping because we both got sunglasses – his were $15.00 and mine were $12.00 – big spenders! All in all, the trip was great, and we were really glad we decided to go.

We got back home late Tuesday night, so we were able to enjoy the rest of the week at home doing some fun stuff, and also getting some work done around the house. We always look forward to breaks, but it's always hard to get back to "real life" afterwards. We just figure, the sooner Trever gets going again, the sooner he'll be done, though.

Brown-Eyed Girl

I hope you enjoy this as much as we do. Liberty's personality is definitely portrayed accurately in this video! When I was recording this I just kept saying over and over, "Dance, dance, dance!" And then "More dancing, please, more!" What a girl!

***By the way, she doesn't use a binky. She found it the other day, and just thinks it's fun to chew on every once in awhile.

Petting Zoo

The high school FFA put on a little petting zoo for the community. Unfortunately, we got the wrong information, and got there after it was over. Luckily, some of the students and their animals were still there. Liberty was very apprehensive at first, but eventually got a little more comfortable with being close to the animals. She loves to look, but isn't quite sure about touching! She got to see some sheep, goats, a rabbit, baby chicks, and a puppy.

Fun with Liberty

Everyday is full of excitement with Liberty around! It seems like everytime Trever comes home from school, I have at least one funny story to tell about Liberty and something new she learned. Here are some of the latest:

Here's a good spot for a snack!

Do you like Liberty's bedhead?

Just hanging out!

Liberty can wink! (She really does do this intentionally)

Liberty learned how to climb onto the chairs and up onto the table (or in the drawer). Scary! Now we have to make sure all the chairs are pushed in.

Liberty's new stove set. She loves stirring the pots and giving me "bites" in between her own bites. (Only $4 at Walmart!)

Liberty's new boots. She loves them! The first two times she wore them, she screamed when I tried to take them off. I let her nap in them the 2nd time.

Snug as a bug in a rug! She loves her blankies!

Liberty is always coming up with new things to do to keep herself entertained while I cook. This time, she kept spreading her blankie out and laying on it. Only problem was that as soon as it got wrinkled from laying on it, she'd scream, and then have to straighten it out again.

Catching up...

I'm finally back to the blogging world after almost 2 month hiatus! I'm sure we were missed greatly by all you fellow bloggers. Between going to AZ for a few weeks, then leaving my camera charger there, and just trying to get back into the swing of things, I haven't had a chance to get caught up. I'm still about a month behind, so be patient!

For the record, I postdated my posts so they'd coincide with when they actually occurred.