Last weekend, I came down with the WORST 24 hour stomach bug. I won't go into any details but it was bad. And of course Matt was out of town because doesn't it always work out that way? Since I couldn't even pick my head up off of the couch, there was no way I could take care of Caroline. My mom and Matt's mom came to the rescue and took care of both of us all weekend. Since I didn't get to do anything fun with Caroline all weekend and since I was such a blah mommy, I decided that we needed a mommy & me fun day yesterday.
I had some things planned for the afternoon, but I let Caroline choose whatever she wanted to do in the morning. After eating her favorite breakfast (blueberry muffins), she wanted to read books and cuddle in my "big bed". That was fine with me ;-) Then she wanted to watch a video. We had recently checked out two new Dora movies from the library and Caroline picked "Super Babies"
After the video, Caroline couldn't decide if she wanted to color with markers or go to the park. I made an executive decision since it was such a pretty day yesterday. We loaded up in the stroller and off to the park we went.
Right before I took this pic, Caroline said "Watch mommy! I swinging like a monkey"
Tapping with some sticks
Caroline now informs me she is "too big" for the baby swings :-( She wants to push them from the outside and will only sit on the big girl swing.
All done park--worn out and thirsty. We went home, Matt came home from work to join us for a quick lunch, then Caroline took her nap.
After nap, I needed to run an errand to Home Depot. Thanks to
Brittany and Jessica's a.maz.ing packet (Jessica's blog is private or I'd link), I had an idea. We went by the paint section and saw this:
Caroline kept saying "look...mickey mouse ears" over and over. She couldn't believe it. We picked up two of almost every color and took them home to play (this is a wonderful, FREE idea)
Caroline loved sorting and matching the cards.
I didn't know if she'd be able to match two of the same colors together but she did great. And I could tell she was so proud of herself. We did this over and over again.
She would have played with those cards forever but we were running out of time and still had one more fun activity to do. Matt came home just in time to help us dye Easter eggs. I've been wanting to do this with Caroline since she was born. I always had the BEST time dyeing eggs with my mom every year when I was little. She would always surprise us...my brother and I would come home from school one day in March or April (before Easter), walk in the kitchen, and she'd have everything set up for us to dye eggs. My brother and I would get so excited. So I am glad Caroline is finally old enough for this fun tradition.
Caroline couldn't believe the colors the vinegar turned after dropping in the color tablets. She would look down in the cup and say "wow"
Pointing out all the colors..."wow, green" "wow, yellow" and on and on
"Egg in there, egg in there!!"
Dropping in a tablet
We only colored a few eggs this year because I wasn't sure about Caroline's attention span. We'll definitely do more next year. She loved it! First thing Caroline said this morning when I went in to get her out of her crib..."Eggs dry, now decorate them" (I had told her last night that the eggs would be dry this morning and we could put stickers on them). She obviously thought of this right when she woke up.
Our finished product.
It was great to have a day together for some good mommy/daughter time. We were both in need of it! Being a sick mommy just doesn't work well when you have a toddler...hope I'm not that sick again for a looooooooooooong time.
And Caroline got to wear a "Happy Birthday" crown while everyone sang Happy Birthday (I don't have a picture because parents aren't allowed in the class...some of the kids get too upset if parents are around)
(random pic of Caroline giving her baby breakfast before MDO)
In addition to celebrating her birthday, Caroline also got to celebrate Easter and go on an Easter egg hunt at MDO this week. Her Easter basket wasn't the right size for a hunt so we had to run to my mom's house for a better basket.
"Cheese"
