Happiness Is...

When your 16-month-old niece comes over for a visit.

We had a potluck after church, and after that we kidnapped A and took her home with us. She was so tired, she fell asleep on the car and was easily transferred right over to my parents’ bed for a good 30-40 minute nap. Here’s Sleeping Beauty – isn’t she precious? And ya gotta love the woodsy sheets... :)

When she woke up, she was in unfamiliar surroundings, and at first she thought she was completely alone (she looked to her left – if she’d looked to her right she’d of seen Auntie B sitting on the bed with her, reading!), which brought on a moment of panicked crying, which took the powers of both CG and Auntie B to soothe. But once she realized she was OK, that we were there and that everything was fine, she was ready for an adventure – exploring the house. We started with Skeeter, who was right there on the bed. A wasn’t too sure about the kitty...

...but that’s OK, because kitty wasn’t too sure about A, either!

Having ‘discovered’ the kitty, she was ready to explore the rest of the house...down the hall...

In the living room...oh, there’s that kitty again! Howdy, and how do you do again? (bonus points for naming the movie that quote is from)

The kitchen is an interesting place...

Ooooooh, look at all those pots and pans! Those would be fun to play with!

I loves that face!!! Don’t you just want to shmush her?!!

She discovered a little blue ball – a cat toy, but don’t tell her that...

...and decided to put it in her mouth...

...which was really very funny-looking...

...but she didn’t like it when I laughed!

I realized later that this photo is probably a pretty accurate prediction of what she’ll look like in another three or four years. Kind of interesting, isn’t it?

Isn’t that just the sweetest smile??!!

After a little while, we decided to go down the park (with CG, the noted photographer, in tow!). We have a very nice little park just down the street from us.

We played on the swings...


And the slides...

There was a fun tunnel to go through...

This park also has these real interesting metal funnel kind of things. There’s a little hole at the bottom, and she became fascinated with letting sand pour through the hole. We eventually moved on to sitting in the sand and playing in it, and I also buried her legs in the sand (which she thought was fascinating), but we didn’t get any photos of that.

A few videos:

I will leave you with this photo. This is just such a precious, A-face...I love this face, I love this baby...more than I ever thought I could love a baby not my own. I can’t wait to have nephews too, but this niece will always be very very precious to me. Aunt B loves you, sweetheart.