When we were in Palm Springs we bought some flash cards with the alphabet and numbers on them. Kayda LOVES them! I was surprised by how many of the letters she knows! Speaking of knowing letters, she is starting to talk like crazy. It seems like she's trying several NEW words a day! She started talking a lot while we were in Palm Springs and now she is just going nuts! She is saying: green, pink, purple, yellow, red, brown, black, blue (she can recognize all these too), train, plane, bunny, deer, truck, one, two, tree, bird, duck, cat, dog, potty, hot, hat, hold, help, apple, room, bubble, bath, pool, swim, walk, up, please, more, tv, ball, sit, come, drink, water, cup, pop, ant, bug, open, bee, home, house, eat, food, no, yes, fish, chip, cracker, snack, go, stop, down, done, in, inside, outside... wow there are so many I really can't think them up all at once! I need to start a list and add to it every time she talks. She is stringing up to five words together. My favorite was when we came home from Palm Springs. Grandpa G picked us up at the airport and the whole way home she said "no home go pa house".
Speaking of accomplishments Dillon is starting to talk/make sound effects some now too! He says: bye, dada, ball, fish and he has a whole bunch of sounds that he makes that mean something but don't sound like the word just yet. He makes the sounds: vroom, woof, moo, baa, and grrr. He is trying to hop like big sister and is getting better and better at climbing up on things like the couch. It's hilarious when he wants out of the bath tub. Kayda can climb out so he tries. He basically gets one leg laying up on the edge of the tub and leans forward. He DESPERATELY wants to do things on his own!
We borrowed a doggy door that fits into the sliding glass door and when Daddy was mowing the yard last week Dillon sat there with his head hanging out it to watch. He is FASCINATED by anything that makes noise, vaccuum, mower, weed whacker...anything loud.
It is so much fun watching them learn to do more things and seeing how excited they get when they realize they can do something new. It's kind of bittersweet though. They grow up WAY too fast!
A couple of weekends ago we went to the park with Grandpa G. The kids LOVED it. Kayda took off running as soon as I let her. She went straight to one of the climbing spots that she was too little for not so long ago.
She did really well, Grandpa G helped her with it but she's so good at it now you don't even have to hold her anymore, you just stay close by.
Of course whatever Kayda does Dillon wants to do too. He walked over to it but he's still little enough that his "climbing" is really Daddy moving him from bar to bar!
Both of the babies enjoyed the slides. Dillon went down with Daddy the first few times and then he started going down on his own.
One of the things I like about this park is that there is the big play toy and then there is also a toddler sized one so he could climb around a little easier. Not that he stayed there, Kayda and Dillon both used ALL the toys pretty thoroughly!
One of the things Dillon kept going back to were the rocking toys. There is a duck, a frog and a car. He enjoyed all three, he could even rock himself (only a tiny bit). Kayda figured out how to get on and off by herself fairly quickly and then went off to explore everything else.
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he still likes the rock wall. She climbed up that with Grandpa G's help. She's starting to figure it out well enough that we just need to be there to catch her...just in case. She's getting so independent. Dillon wants to be independent but just isn't physically big enough just yet!
Grandma G went with us to the park another day, it was just the two of us and the kids so unfortunately we were both too busy to take pictures but once again the kids had a great time! Grandma got a small break from the constant trailing after one or the other of the kids when Dillon decided that he just wanted to sit and watch the big tractor drive around on the ball fields. I think we may be dragging Grandma G out a little more frequently since the weather is getting nicer, they're both too busy to take to the park alone. Then when summer comes we can alternate between both Grandmas. It's a wonderful thing having so much family close by!
Last weekend we finally decided to take on the project that is our front yard. We added several garden beds (I'll put pictures on once we have plants) so it actually looks like we care about our yard now. Not that Daddy didn't keep it maintained it was just BORING. So we were outside ALL day Saturday and Sunday. The kids thought it was just great. Kayda knows very well that she has to stay with us and Dillon is picking up on the whole "stay out of the street" and "stay where we can see you" ideas very quickly. We had 10 YARDS of dirt delivered on Sunday and spent the day filling our garden beds. Our little ones didn't go anywhere near the dirt pile... until two of our neighbor girls came over to play with them. The four kiddos played inside for a while but soon enough Kayda wanted to come back out which meant ALL of them came back outside. In no time at all the older neighbor girls had them all climbing on the dirt pile. They were very good with Dillon, holding his hand and helping him work his way up. Next thing we know they have created a "dirt slide". All of them, with the exception of Dillon, were sliding down the side of the pile. By the time Tazz and Kylie had to go home all of them had black bottoms, black feet and little bits of dirt just about EVERYWHERE. I felt like I needed to send a note home with the girls "You knew there was a pile of dirt in our driveway". I don't remember ever having a dirt slide but I certainly remember climbing the HUGE piles of bark my parents had delivered from time to time. It was one of our favorite play things, until we had to help move it. I'm glad that my kids have someone (our neighbor girls) to show them the fun, incredibly messy things they can do.
Dillon and Chase hung out for a little while playing in the mushy sand before Dillon's attention span ran out. Chase eventually crawled his way into the water. Dillon wasn't as brave as he was yesterday. 
He can handle walking out to the middle of his shins but after that he keeps putting his arms up to be picked up. I guess he's used to being in someone's arms in the water. I'll have to work on that. 
He had a great time with his cousins. He played in the sand with Chase, tried to give Ella some water and was chased by Jarrett, unfortunately I don't have a picture of that one...I was chasing him too. It was pretty crowded and he's quick! Dillon is really big into kid watching, not people watching, just kids. He spent most of his time watching the other kids play. Occassionally he would be entertained splashing the water or digging with a shovel but for the most part he just wandered around and watched other kids play.
Kayda also followed Jarrett out into the water pretty frequently. Fortunately for me she listened pretty well when I told her it was time to turn around. I guess it helps that Jarrett was a very good helper and never wandered too far out for Kayda to come with. Though as you can tell from the picture she got in pretty deep, this is her standing and running in the water, not sitting. You may also notice she has a GIANT grin on her face, I'd say we did a pretty good job making them love the water!
