a day at the park

Since Daddy was home on Memorial day we went to the park in the morning. Thanks to my good friend, Nancy, we have a backpack to put her in and we decided to try it for the first time on our walk. Daddy carried her and I carried the camera bag.
She loved riding on Daddy's back and was smiling and babbling the whole way. We hiked through the woods awhile and then went up to where the playground was. First she got to swing. A little boy came along with his parents and got in the swing next to her for awhile, which she loved (she's our little Miss Social!) and then we headed over to the rest of the playground. This was her first time on a playground, other than swings. She wasn't quite sure what to do, so I had to help her climb up the steps. She loves climbing steps like a big girl--picking her foot WAY off the ground to put it on the step, but Mommy or Daddy has to be holding her hand to do this.

She doesn't really like slides too well, so I went down the slide with her--these already-had-a-baby hips don't really fit too well in a toddler slide! It wasn't a comfortable ride down. But she seemed to enjoy it a little more than when she normally goes down a slide.

Then Daddy showed her the chimes under the slide. She loved moving those back and forth and making cool sounds. That was the highlight of the playground....until she realized that she was walking on mulch. I think I've mentioned how much she enjoys picking things up. Well, sticks, leaves, and mulch top her list. So when she realized she was standing in a huge field of mulch, she immediately stooped down, filled both hands with as much as she could grab, and proceeded to shove a piece in her mouth. When does the mouth thing end???? We got ready to go after the mulch eating and hiked back through the woods to the car. Before we were even out of the park she was asleep! We wore the poor girl out. It was a fun family morning.

She's learned a new word: HOT! The other day Daddy was cooking steaks on the grill outside and she saw the smoke coming out (no, he didn't burn them!) and pointed to it. Daddy said, "It's hot!" So she whispered, "hot." Daddy praised her so she started saying it over and over and over. It's the first word she's said that actually sounds just like it's supposed to sound, so it's so cool to actually hear her speaking a real word! This morning I was making her a scrambled egg and she saw steam coming up from the skillet and said, "hot." So cute.