Royal Wedding

We certainly did not get up at 3 am to watch the pre-wedding hype, we didn't even wake up at 5 am to watch the actual wedding itself.  We did DVR the wedding and wake up at 8:30 am to do a lot of fast forwarding and some watching.  I kept promising Finley that we would see "White Princess" soon.  She loves her Pink Princess and Blue Princess Little People.  It took what seemed like forever to see Kate Middleton and once we did, Finley asked to go downstairs and watch Sesame Street.  The funniest part was when she asked "Where is Mommy's hat?"

Easter Basket

Finley loves Peeps.  Finley loves chocolate bunnies.  Finley loves pastel M&Ms.  Finley loves Reeses Peanut Butter Eggs.  Finley is an all over Easter candy fan.  And as an added bonus, she got a My Little Pony Ferris Wheel. 

Boat Shopping

This past weekend we headed down to Clear Lake to do some boat shopping.  Finley loved climbing all around the boats.  She especially loved this red one.  She was up on it twice and both times she had to be forcibly removed from the boat.  She much preferred shopping for boats indoors as to outside.  I wonder if she realizes that boat shopping is the only time that she will be on a boat while it is indoors.  We start swim lessons with her in June once we get back from California.  There is a two week swim lesson session for every weekday and then it goes to once a week after that.  She will be ship shape in no time!  Finley was also excited about the "Finley potty" on board.  Now only if I could get her as excited about her Finley potty at our house.

Coloring Easter Eggs

Finley was super excited to color Easter eggs this year.  At the gym, Miss Michelle and Finley always decorate eggs with paper.  She was super excited to get her hands on the real thing.  I had saved all the eggs from our first two Easter egg dying sessions.  Sadly, Finley decided to pick up the egg carton that I had stored them in.  Before I could run over there to intervene, the egg carton was opened and most of the eggs were on the floor in pieces.  Only three eggs survived.  Ah well, means we can make more this year. 

City Centre

We met up with some of Clifton's co-workers and their kids last night at Discovery Green.  Finley was so happy to see Jahan, her friend from playgroup.  His mom is in my playgroup and his dad works with Clifton, such a small world.  Finley was slow to warm up to all the activity, she was happy to sit in her chair and observe for the longest time.  But once Rameen started chasing the kids and acting like a monster, she was all over it.  Clifton thought Finley needed dessert, so they got the biggest chocolate cake slice possible.  He insists that he only had two bites, which means Finley polished off the rest. 

Early Easter Present

Finley got a package from Aunt Joan today, of course she wanted to open it as soon as she saw it was for her.  I figured why not...  I asked Finley what she thought was in the package and she said "shoes!"  It was not shoes, but it was an adorable baby doll all dressed up in her Easter bunny finery.  Finley asked for her pack n play full of her dolls right away and wanted to feed the new baby a bottle.  She then proceeded to feed all the baby dolls in a row.  It was so cute!  Thank you so much Aunt Joan!

On a non-baby doll related note, other than a slight runny nose, Finley is all better.  No fever for well over 24 hours, which means so is no longer contagious and more importantly, it means we got to hit the gym together today.  We didn't do anything else today, but tomorrow we will try and get out even more.

The Home Stretch...

I think we are almost done with this illness.  Finley's fever is pretty much gone and all she has left is a horribly runny nose.  Finley has done so much artwork, I am running out of space to hang it all up.  And she is insistent that it gets hung up when she is done.  Notice the large stack of artwork that I have no place to hang anywhere.  I am going to be so happy to get out of the house tomorrow with Finley.  We are just going to hit the gym and see how that goes, Finley is so excited to get back to the gym and I am so excited to be able to get out of the house.

Quarantined!

A true multitasker, eating soup and painting Winnie the Pooh. 

The pediatrician said Finley would be contagious until she is fever free for 24 hours.  That hasn't happened yet.  She was up at 5 am yesterday with the fever back in full force.  A dose of Tylenol and an episode of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, then she was ready to go back to bed.  She kept asking "Where are we going today?" and I felt so awful that we couldn't go anywhere.  We painted, colored, played stickers, built with blocks and watched lots of Mickey Mouse. She was super happy with being able to eat whatever she wanted and drank lots of juice.  She didn't want to stay in her jammies, so she picked a pink dress to wear.  Last night when she went to bed, she asked for her big comforter.  I think she must be getting really cold with the fever at night.  Breaks my heart. 

Too Cool for School

This week I had my final lunch with the students I volunteer for. Because of testing, the students only had a half hour to meet, so I decided to take Finley with me. Normally, she stays at Courtney's house when I visit the school because I am there a lot longer. The kids were SO excited to see her since I often talk about her in my letters. One of them told me she wanted to take her home, she would just tell her mom that Finley was her cousin. Um, yeh, I am sure her mom would buy that! Finley was wary at first, every kid in the class wanted to give her a hug. Sadly, I am fairly certain this is where Finley caught her virus. Makes me so scared to send her to school.

104.1 Fever...Still Smiling

What a day! We woke up early to prepare for playgroup at our house, ten friends were coming over and I had to get the French toast casserole in the oven. This meant I had to actually set an alarm to wake up on time. Thankfully, I didn't need the alarm and woke up early on my own. And so did Finley, which is really rare, since she usually enjoys sleeping in. While I was changing her into her dress she told me her room was windy and cold. I figured the A/C had been on too high for the night and maybe we needed to re-direct the vent again. We got ready for playgroup and the chaos began. Ten toddlers sure can have some fun in two hours. Finley was pretty whiny, which was odd, normally she is all about playing with her friends. At 12:30 pm, she asked to go down for a nap. Now this is really strange, normally she likes to stay up until at least 2 pm. I figured it was because she was up so early this morning and she went right to sleep. When I got her up from nap, her little body was hot to the touch. I took her temperature: 104.1. Poor Bug! I got the ear thermometer and took it with that, it was 103.7. I gave her some Children's Tylenol and got her some juice to try and get her hydrated. She promptly threw up the juice all over her blanket while I was on the phone with the doctor's office. They told me to come in right away. I raced to the office and Finley was acting so normal and happy. I snapped this picture in the waiting room. Our pedi said a virus is going around and said to just keep adminstering Tylenol and Motrin. As long as she keeps acting "sweet and happy," there is nothing to worry about. Phew. What a rough day. And I feel so terrible that we have potentially gotten ten friends sick.

Fort

Last night I went out for sushi, I had to come home early and what did I discover?  Daddy and Finley had built a fort in her room.  Believe it or not, every animal in the fort came from her crib, she is still a major crib hoarder.  Nearly every night she asks for an additional animal and to take her books to bed.  All the blankets were from her crib as well.  Of course Wrigley had to join in the fort fun.

If the Shoe Fits

I had ordered Finley some pink Pumas from Nordstrom.  Even though I printed out the shoe size sheet, they were too big.  Finley and I made a trip to Nordstrom to get her foot fitted properly.  Our Nordstrom did not carry the same shoe, so they are being delivered this week.  Finley was great with the sales associate, she listened perfectly and he determined she was a perfect size 7.  Finley also loved the silver Toms, but we were in a hurry to get to the gym, so we didn't get a chance to try them on.  I think I may go ahead and order them since she liked them so much.

Astros Home Opener

This past Friday was Finley's third trip to the Astros Opening Day.  I can hardly beleive we have done this twice before.  Opening Day One and Opening Day Two were both so much fun, it is such a nice tradition, I hope Finley never misses an Opening Day.  Finley ate a hot dog, enjoyed the kids' area and watched all nine innings of the baseball game.  Even though the Astros lost, we all had a great time.  We had been to the ballpark a couple days earlier to get her outfit, it was a challenge finding Astros gear for a toddler at any of our local sports stores.

Zoobilee Zoo

This week was Zoobilee, which is a fantastic event for zoo members.  We went last year, I cannot believe how much Finley has grown!  She really got to participate a lot more this year.  There were free carousel rides, giant slides and of course, collecting stamps in your passport.  Finley even went through the bouncy obstacle course, I was amazed she made it through all by herself.  She got an adorable tote bag, coloring book, crayons and froggy pencil board for all her passport stamps.  Finley also got to pet a big bunny, the zookeeper told her "two fingers", but she translated that to "two hands" and buried both her hands into the soft bunny fur.  There was no Little Bigs afterwards this year because it has since closed, which is quite a bummer.

Beautiful Ballerinas

The green hair bow with white polka dots was Finley's selection. I was so happy she actually picked something that wasn't a perfect match!  And can I take this bench home from the JCC?  I totally love it.

Finley's Trip to the Final Four

Well, technically, the NCAA Championship game since we didn't go to the games on Saturday.  We were lucky enough to get suite tickets to the big game and there was even a ticket for Finley.  Tipoff was 8:20 pm, way past Finley's bedtime, but it was such a big event, we figured we had to take her.  We took the light rail to Reliant Stadium and Finley was so excited to go to the basketball game, though this time there were no bears, just Bulldogs and Huskies.  Once we got to the suite, we saw the actual championship trophy inside!  One of Finley's most favorite things to do was to crack open peanut shells, she didn't like the peanuts, but was happy just cracking them open.  She had all sorts of snacks, but her most favorite was the ice cream cart that came with about 3 minutes left in the game.  The ice cream held her over until the end and we saw UConn defeat Butler in a pretty sad game.  Finley made it through the whole game, but was asleep before we got on the train to go home.  She told me today that she wants to go to the basketball game "gain!"

Happy Birthday, Riley!

Gorgeous Miss Riley turned two yesterday and had the most fantastic party on Saturday.  The whole ride over to the party Finley kept asking what color the cake was.  Seeing as I had no idea, I told her I didn't know.  She told me it was pink.  And she was right, pink strawberry cupcakes.  And for the first time Finley ate all the frosting AND the cake part.  There was a jumpy house, a swing set, sidewalk chalk, a bubble machine and all sorts of fun riding toys.  Finley was acting really shy, which is not normal for her.  Even with her BFF Max.  Happy Birthday, Riley!