Social Butterfly

Seriously. This kid has the life.

She hangs out with a social crowd, and seems to always be the life of the party.

Saturday our friend Sandi had a birthday party/housewarming party. We headed over there early evening. Several friends from work were there. I just put her down in the sun room and she made herself comfortable. Hung out with my boss, loved both of my boss's sons (ages 15 and 7). She played with them forever. And of course (the other) Uncle David - aka Baby Whisperer- was there. She loves him. Just grins ear to ear when she sees him. We stayed there right up until her bed-time, and she was none the worse for the wear. She really is spoiling us.

Sunday morning we headed to church. We hadn't been in two weeks. So, I don't know if it's because we haven't been in two weeks, or whether its because Eileen has become that much more mobile, but she was feisty! Not misbehaving - not yelling or crying or pitching a fit -just being social. She kept blowing raspberries at the priest as he read the Gospel. During the sermon she kept saying 'babababababa' quite loudly. And seeing as we were in the front row, this was quickly going from cute to rude. So I made my way to the back of the church to hang out with the other parents and listen through the speaker and watch through closed doors! We'll give it another shot next week, and if she's still on a mission to par-tay.. well our days of front row church people may be on hold for a couple of years.

And then, then the fun began! We went to IHOP! Eileen got to eat her first pancake. Let me rephrase that: Eileen got to devour her first pancake. She absolutely loved it. She's been eating more solids lately-- little baby raviolis and cheese slices. But she is generally pretty picky when it comes to new foods. Not pancakes. One little taste and then she gobbled it up. So cute. Of course we took pictures.

(pause here for Erin's social commentary: The table next to us was a family of 4. Mom, Dad, teenage daughter, and a son about 4 years old. The daughter sits down with her ipod in her ears. Stays that way about 10 minutes. THEN she took out the earbuds to talk on her cell phone. All while mom, dad and brother sat and chatted and ate breakfast. Now I don't know the circumstances. I have never been in that situation -raising a teenager. I shouldn't pass judgement. But I hope to high Heaven that I am never that parent that would allow my child to act in such a manner. Besides the lack of manners, it's just downright sad).

We thought about going to the pool, but it was really just too hot to even do that. If she were older, or if I were by myself, I would have parked there all afternoon and basked in the summer heat. But she's still too little to be able to handle it, so we decided to go see some model homes in a new development.

It is a fantastic concept.. basically a village in the middle of town. Single family homes, town houses, loft style condos. Several large parks. Retail - shopping, movies, restaurants, and a small grocery store. It is in the early stages, no retail is there yet.. just some of the homes. The idea is that you don't really have a yard, you go to the many giant gorgeous parks. You don't have to drive anywhere once you're home. Need a gallon of milk? You can walk to the little grocery store within the village. This whole concept would be ideal for Josh and I, seeing as how he's not able to drive. BUT since the houses start at about $400,000, it is not likely we will ever actually live there. But hey, we can dream.. and we can wander through the (air-conditioned) model homes. And I did indeed find my dream home. Craftsman style, and actually not much bigger than the house we have now. Gorgeous kitchen opening up to the family room. Master on main. Bedrooms, loft and bonus room upstairs. Very open and airy. Arched doorways. Even a firepit out on the patio. And half a million dollars.

Of course, one thing that did not occur to me was that I'd be carrying Eileen all over the place. From house to house. Upstairs and downstairs and back up again. Inside and out. Hot and cold. Did I mention the stairs? And did I mention that she weighs around 24 or 25 pounds. And did I mention we looked at at least six houses? Wait, did I tell you there were stairs? And now I get to brag: because despite the heat and all the stairs, I was NOT out of breath! And, my arms did not ache. In fact, I didn't even really notice that I was starting to get a little tired of carrying her until we were in one of the last houses! It seems that my 5:30am workouts are paying off. Now, I will admit, that later that evening, my back was aching, so it did catch up with me!

And now here we are and it's Tuesday morning. Still hot as hades here. Two weeks ago we had a load of rain and our yard turned green and the flowers were gorgeous. Now it's been in the high 90s, with heat indeces (fancy word alert) in the 100s, and we've had not a drop of rain. So the yard is brown again and now my flowers just look nasty. They are long and 'leggy' looking. I will be pulling them up soon and waiting it out til mum season.

That's about it from our world. Catch ya later!