my artiste!

enjoying some painting time this afternoon! 

Lauren's friend, Aaron

Lauren has a lot of friends at the gym, but she really looks forward to seeing her friend Aaron. He is a sweet 4 year old with a 3 year old sister, Everley. He asks me every day if he can come home with Lauren and she talks about him nonstop at home. She always wants to wear a dress for Aaron and looks forward to his arrival at the gym every day. 

Lauren with her best friend Aaron and his sister

Lauren and Everley posing in the toy box

Lauren's coloring skills

I am always impressed at Lauren's coloring skills. She is getting really good! 

swimming with Violet

Natalie and Violet came over to swim today and while Colson napped we really enjoyed ourselves. We hadn't seen them in a while, so it was nice to catch up! We got out and dried off, but an hour later, we all wanted to go swimming again. This time Violet borrowed Lauren's other Ariel swim suit so they could match and Colson had woken up, so he joined crashed the party... 

Such little ladies... 

well, kind of! They really loved that we let them pee in the grass today. They had to pee about 15 times each (not exaggerating- I guess they were drinking a lot of pool water!?) so we decided to let them pee in the grass so we wouldn't be spending our afternoon in the bathroom!

high fives!

best buddies!

Lauren these days

Lauren is such a character these days. She says the funniest things in such a matter-of-fact tone that it makes it even funnier. It is so much fun to hear how her brain is working since she says just about everything she thinks. I also love all the imaginative play she does now is so intriguing to hear her play and talk to her imaginary pets and role play with her princess dolls, babies and of course, Tiger (Rajah). Out of the blue this morning, Lauren said to me, "Mommy, when you get another Christmas tree and then I will wear a dress and I will sit on Santa's lap. He will not like my clothes only a dress." Tonight she was telling Jason, "I want to go camping. And mommy and you and brudder can come. First we have to put up a tent. The we get all the sticks off the big sticks and make a fire for the marshmallows and crackers. Then we bring the chairs in and go to sleep" She also had drawn a map and diagram for him to follow so he would know how to take us all camping. She is so thorough...can't imagine where she gets that from?! She is also always making lists and needing to organize her "cow-ander" (calendar)... 


She is very into princesses, flowers and animals- especially tigers, lions and parrots. She loves to drive with her windows rolled down. She likes to pretend that we are on a train and she is the "weeder" (leader). When driving anywhere she notices every type of flower, bush and tree and asks about their colors and how they grow. She is always very concerned about the animals and prays for them every day. 


Purple is her favorite color and picking flowers is one of her favorite things to do.

Lauren is so sweet and she will come up to me or her brother or dad, give us a big hug/kiss and say, "I love you so much". Precious.

Lauren is also very concerned about her fashion. Everyday she refuses to wear anything but a dress and asks me if I will wear a dress also. She likes to change her outfit several times a day and likes to make sure that everything is matching. Lauren's sense of matching can mean by color or theme. For example, she has a red, white and blue dress with some stars on it and she calls it her "Twinkle Little Star" dress (oh yes, every dress has a name) and the things that match with this dress are not always red, white or blue, but they have to have a star on them. She picks out candy treats that are stars and insists on wearing that dress when she eats them. And if I cut her peanut butter and jelly sandwich into a star? Well she has to wear that dress of course!

One of the things Lauren is confused about these days is temperature. She will tell me her feet are cold and she needs to take her shoes off. Or that she wants to be warmer and she needs the air conditioner on. I am not sure when this all started but it seems to be pretty consistent these days.  She  understands that H is for hot and C is for cold on the faucets though.

Lauren misses her old friends a lot and talks about them all the time - and yet she makes new friends all the time too. She is really nice to all the kids I see her interact with and she is always inviting them to play with her. She has a best friend "Aaron" at the gym that she just adores. Actually, they both really like each other. They run up and hug when they see each other and they play together, run around and have fun. It is so sweet. Lauren is always so disappointed when Aaron isn't there for her to play with. 

I can't wait to see what the next few years brings with Lauren. She is so much fun and creative. She is stubborn and over dramatic. She is loving and sweet. She loves to snuggle and hug yet very independent. She is the best daughter I could have ever imagined and I am so blessed to be her mom!

punky

We still call her punky-- She has so much spunk (attitude)... 

love this picture

matching...

I bought these matching shirts for the kids months ago, but I haven't been able to get Lauren to wear it yet (due to her dress-only days but today I bribed her with some candy)

I wanted to play with some settings on my new camera, so I took the kids outside to play together.

picking flowers

digging in the sand

trying to get a picture inside...FAIL

2 little monkeys

I put the kids in Colson's crib today for a quick couple pictures (mostly because I couldn't contain them any other place!) They both had a great time and loved jumping on the bed! 

My two little monkeys, jumping on the bed...

raisin bran

I haven't been buying cold cereal for the kids for a while. Colson still isn't interested in it and nothing really seemed very healthy or wholesome. I finally caved and bought Lauren some organic Raisin Bran this weekend and she ate it this morning with almond milk. She takes a few bites and exclaims, "Mommy I wud (love) this cereal. Thank you so much. It is like a big treat like on Mudder's Day"

Lauren was so excited to eat cold cereal and she felt like she was having a big treat with her raisin bran! I loved it!

Lauren's responsibility chart

I started a "sticker chart" with Lauren last week. It is actually a magnet board, but we call it a sticker chart. Lauren really understands and can see what she is responsible each day and loves to go down the list and tell me about them. 

1. Eat Healthy - which Lauren typically eats very healthy, but she has been pretty resistant on eating her vegetables lately. So for Lauren this is "Eat my bej-a-bles" 
2. Brush Teeth - We always brush Lauren's teeth before she goes to bed and then she gets a turn, but we have been trying to make her morning brushing her responsibility. So this line is just if she brushes her teeth in the morning on her own. 
3. Share - This means sharing with Colson mostly, but also with other kids at the gym and playgroups. She does great sharing with everyone but Colson...and as you can see from last week we really need to work on this one! 
4. Clean Room - Lauren is responsible for having her room clean every night, which basically means her dirty clothes are in the hampers, her shoes and books are back on their shelves and her toys put up. She usually doesn't play much in her room, but the clothes and shoes seem to pile up throughout her multiple wardrobe changes throughout the day. 
5. Be Nice to Others - The options for chores were slim for a 3 year old, so I chose this one for how she acts and speaks to me (and other adults). Lauren can talk "naughty" sometimes and will say "no. I am not doing that" or "no. I won't". Mostly it is her tone of voice that gets her in trouble and she is very aware of her expectations, so this has been made another "responsibility" each day. 

If Lauren gets all 5 "stickers" for a day, then she gets a "twinkle little star" treat- basically a sour patch kid in the shape of a star. If she gets 3 days of 5 stars, then she gets to get water balloons to play with and all 5 days will be a small toy that she gets to pick out. Right now she is really struggling with getting all 5 stars- especially with the sharing! 

Lauren's gymnastics outfit

I had planned to get Lauren an outfit for her gymnastics and dance class, but when Aunt Caitlin came, she brought an adorable leotard that Lauren fell in love with. She calls it her "dress with the panties on it"

Since I wasn't very successful at getting pictures at gymnastics last week, I took a couple before we left this morning. Lauren was all about posing for me...

not sure what she was doing here...

exactly!

at the museum with Aunt Caitlin

Today we decided to take Aunt Caitlin to the Science Museum. Lauren really loves this museum and Colson is getting old enough to really enjoy it as well. The first place Lauren wanted to go was the gymnastics area-

Aunt Caitlin with her niece and nephew

Colson trying out his balance

See my pretty dress? (and crazy hair!)

Ta-da!

We headed downstairs and we got a ride on a Segway. 

Lauren really enjoyed it and was a natural! 

I tried all morning to get a picture of Colson smiling, but he never sat still long enough...

and the one time he was still- he didn't smile! 

sweet siblings

I just love these two! 

our Daaawg!

oh sweet Loudoun! or as Colson says, "daaawg". 

Loudoun is such a good dog with the kids...he gets poked and pulled and climbed over several times a day and just lays there... He has developed some good escape skills and had frequent  unsupervised walks  in our neighborhood lately. 

he also likes to roll and rub in the grass and often gets covered in burrs - which is why we started shaving him...the burrs were impossible to get out of his long hair and would just mat- at least now we can see them and get them out.

my pretty girl

Lauren couldn't wait to wear her new dresses from Aunt Caitlin! 

and her new flip flops- even though we all tried telling her they didn't match!

Lauren loves to pick flowers! 

and another messy one

and when Lauren saw me taking a picture of Colson she wanted me to take her picture also. She was pretty messy too! 

Notice her dress...We came home from an outing and she promptly changed clothes and came to the kitchen announcing she was in her "dinner dress". The girl must change her clothes 4-5 times a day...