--Visitors from Ohio: Grandma and Grandpa swung out west for a couple of weeks, arriving just days after Aunt Lesley had gone home. They were here during the nicest, longest stretch of genuinely warm/hot weather we've had so far, so the pool finally got some extended use at last (instead of just a quick dip at the end of the workday like we'd been doing). Annika and her grandparents got along like gangbusters, as usual, and since R. had put together our newly-arrived patio table and chairs, we all spent a lot of time outdoors, eating dinner out on the deck nearly every night. It was a really nice time, even if I was sad not to be able to drink a few beers with all the other grownups!
--Rough patch in the sleep routine: With the longer, warmer summer days, plus more family dinners, we've been getting Annika to bed later than we'd like, and she's waking up in the night more -- don't know if that's related or not. But she'll call for water, or just "I need help!", so we go up. One night she sat up and launched into a long discourse on her colored ceiling fan (which we're not using, because it's ineffective and noisy) and what Daddy will do to fix it or get a new one . It's never anything urgent -- so we're hoping this passes soon.
--The Fourth of July: The fireworks (ordnance!) people have around here makes Pacifica look like a kiddie birthday party ... and the cops aren't nearly as aggressive about stopping it. In the late morning, we took the whole fam to a parade R. found out about in a neighborhood nearby -- such a fun, low-key operation, in which each street in the neighborhood made float based on a theme (this year it was cities -- which ranged from Las Vegas to Gotham). There was candy thrown (which was of course Annika's focus), music from the floats, a lady handing out real mai-tais from the "Honolulu" float (I gave mine to Grandma) -- a good time was had by all. Then we grilled out, eating on the deck while impatient people all over the valley started shooting off their fireworks before dark was even close (and they kept going till midnight!).
--More talk about the baby: Annika has all kinds of questions and observations about the baby, plus an ever-expanding list of things she'll do for him and teach him (and it's always him; she's quite convinced it's a boy, and often refers to it as "the brother"). She likes to kiss him/her goodnight, and one night she said "Good-night, baby!" into my belly button, waited a second, then turned to me and said, "He didn't answer!" Then she laaaaaaaughed and laughed.
--Such memory! She can recite huge chunks of dialogue from Yo Gabba Gabba! verbatim, with the inflections and different voices and everything -- it's really kind of wild to hear her do an entire segment word for word.
--Class trip to Happy Hollow: I was one of the chaperone/drivers for her class trip to Happy Hollow, an amusement park for kids (all the rides are geared toward the 3-8 year-old set). We went last year, but unofficially (since the trip was on a Friday) -- she had even more fun this year, since she wasn't afraid of the carousel (rode it three times in a row), and was all over the other rides too. The kid we were carting around with us was an OK kid, but WOW is it harder to keep track of two maniac three-year-olds instead of just one, and while pregnant ... ugh, I was so tired at the end, I lay down as soon as I got her into bed for her afternoon nap and slept like a rock for over three hours. But she had a blast, so it was worth it.
