baby (doll) love

My girls loved their baby dolls. they always have. In the bedroom we call the nursery, some of their favorites sit on a baker's rack, where they can be seen often.They span the ages and interests of the girls. Some of them are more time and play worn than others.
Someday, the grandbaby's favorite doll might join the dolls on the shelves in the nursery. For now, it stays in her arms a lot of the time or in a carrier or a stroller or a doll bed. That she is six and a half and still loves to play with her "best baby" makes me very happy. She has a number of dolls, but this one pictured here with her, is far and away her favorite. It was a gift from me and the Hub/her granddad. We bought it before she was born and took it to the hospital with us to gift her on her natal day.
She whispered to me the other day that she wants a new doll buggy for her birthday in July, when she will be seven.
Again, that makes me seriously happy!

a big mail day

On the same day recently, we got a package from a sweet friend who made a birdcase full of fancy Easter eggs for us, an invitation to a tea party and a thank you note from some little darlings in Florida. Sometimes I forget just how much fun receiving  old fashioned mail: cards, letters and packages really is! This day was a reminder!

Pampered

So here she is, propped up in my bed, with her Ipad, drinking lemonade with blackberries and fresh mint
and eating chicken with ranch dressing. That is what she wanted to do and where she wanted to do it. And we let her.
After all, she danced her little heart out and brought home more awards than I or the Hub/her granddad believe. When spends the night it's all about her.
If we pamper her and spoil her a bit, well... isn't that a grandparent's job?!


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New friend

We went to my Mom's yesterday for lunch. Usually when we do, there are cousins near  my grandbaby's age for her to play with. Yesterday, there was not. Either because she found the adult company lacking  or because it was so nice outside (or both) she ventured out into the backyard. There she found a baby bunny.
She ran back inside so excited that we all gathered 'round to see. The little thing did not seem all that scared of her or bothered by the noise we made. Mother said they'd seen a little rabbit in the yard before.
The grandbaby determined that she should share some of the carrots from her lunch with the rabbit. She was able to get very close to him before he hopped away. He no more than disappeared into the lattice work under the shed until she was poking the carrots through for him to enjoy.
She claims she saw a whole nest of them when she peeked through to serve that carrot dinner. My mother/her granny decided that maybe "rabbit" they'd seen previously was one of any number. Certainly there were carrots enough for a whole family of them. And the grandbaby surely must be able to see there through the dark under the shed... given that she eats carrots, too. At least when there are not rabbit friends to feed them to!

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Easter table

Here are some of the highlights of our Easter table:
1. hymnal open to some Easter favoritees
2. bunny plates centered onto dinner plates from our wedding china set
3. Max Lucado's "The Final Week of Christ" a book we've read from every Easter for 20 years.
It's a bit battered, dog earred and marked up but grows more beloved as time passes.

the grandbaby and the granddog

My daughter's little hound is something of a diva. She gets lots of love and lots of pampering on any given week. Her most recent "spa" treatment included a blueberry facial and a new hairdo, called a Japanese cut.
While we can't compete with that kind of thing here at our house, one thing is for sure: the little diva dog gets a lot of love and attention when she visits... especially from the grandbaby.

Getting ready for Easter

The grandbaby loves to work along side us regardless of what chores we are about. It is one of the things I love most about her.
Friday night, I was polishing silver to use on the dinner table for Easter. She was most interested in helping with the rubbing and wiping. I guessed she would tire quickly of the chore but she did not. She stuck with me all the way to the end of the task.  She did a good job. Some the reason is probably due to her looking to handle the sticky paste used to clean the trays and utensils. But she is a trooper and is enough like her grandmother to like to see the fruits of her labor clearly.
In this case that was her own reflection in the items she cleaned!

Easter bonnets

We didn't wear hats to church on Easter Sunday. I really wanted to but couldn't talk any of my girlies into joining me. I wasn't willing to go solo in that regard so I attend Easter Sunday service hatless. After lunch, though, I was able to talk them into wearing our version of Easter bonnets to tea. They were unadorned but pretty, nonetheless. Next year I am starting early to try and convince them to wear hats to church with me. Who knows, I might even convince them to add some embellishments to the hats in anticipation!

Eastertime tea

Another holiday, another tea party for my girlies. They dined on huge strawberries with cream and drank their tea with slices of citrus and local honey. A good time was had by all of them. As it always is.

Easter lunch

There was spiral ham, steamed asparagus, fresh fruit salad, green
 beans almondine, sweet potatoes yeast rolls, stuffed eggs. bread
and butter pickles. monster stawberries with whipped cream.
cherry pie. lemonade with a peeps and lemon garnish.
It was all delicious.

Eastertime decorations

We went all out on the Easter decorations this year. The grandbaby made sure of it. She likes
to help me decorate for holidays now and there
is something about leaving anything in the boxes
that just does not appeal to her.
We didn't this time! They were scattered through
the house in little vignettes and with little themes.
We enjoyed putting them out and enjoyed having them out.









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A blissful, little Easter

Most Easters we spent with a host of family and friends 

attending services together at church, celebrating the Resurrected Christ.

Typically there is the coloring and hunting of eggs the playing of games the taking of pictures. This year, between the weather and schedules and an illness in our extended family, we found ourselves at our own home with just the immediate family. I cannot say I didn't miss the larger family gathering, but our little Easter  celebration was altogether blissful.

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fisher folk

My daughter's beau, there on the left, would likely be described by the  character played  Sally Field played in "Steel Magnolias" as "outdoorsy." The boy does love to hunt and fish. Fortunately , so does she. She has been her Daddy's companion on many an outdoor adventure. She has field dressed the game they bagged as long as any of us can remember.
In the pictures above, the they'd been "perch jerking" ... whatever that is. If she looks happier than he in the photos, it might be cause she is having more fun. Well, maybe not. But I've never seen a photo of him so happy about a

fish that she pretended to kiss it!

looking like spring

It looks like Spring outside and it looks like it inside, too. 

Among the signs of Spring nearby:

Narcissus and daffodils from the yard in a fingertip vase.

A birdcage full of embellished eggs.

Herbs waiting to be planted in the little kitchen garden.

taking the back roads

Driving through the countryside in the springtime is just  blissful. I take the backroads on purpose so I can watch the progress of the buds and blooms and gentle greening. I snapped some pictures one recent afternoon to record some of what I saw along the way. I wanted to share them here with you.

an Easter parade in progress

Over the years we've collected more than a few Easter figures(ines). Some of them have decorated the children's Easter baskets. Others have been gifts from Sunday School children in classes I've taught or girl scouts whose troop I led.Some are the gifts of relatives or friends. Some I've found and bought. 

None are particularly value, except sentimentally.

I've displayed them on window sills and in baskets, across the mantel over the fireplace and on bookshelves at various times. This year, the grandbaby and I set them up as an Easter parade.

I am not sure how we came up with the idea but before we were through we'd

that dress

One of the things we went to Tulsa for on Saturday was to try a certain white eyelet dress with capped sleeves on the Grandbaby. I had seen the dress when my Baby daughter and I were shopping for Easter while she was home on Spring. i intended to order it online but then thought better of it and decided that I was cutting it a bit close if she was to wear it for Easter.
If the size or still did not work, we could find ourselves in a bind. I do not like to find ourselves in a bind. Hence the trip to pick it (among other things) up.
We walked into the store to do just that. Immediately, the Grandbaby spies another frock hanging on a rack near the one I'd picked out. She wanted to try them both on. When she did, it turned out that her choice was much better than mine. The little dress she selected suited her coloring and was of the "swirly" style she loves so much.
Needless to say, we got the dress she wanted. And the matching hair bow.  She wanted to wear it out of the store and the sales clerk cut off the tags once we'd checked out and folded the little things she'd worn into the store and bagged them for her.
As she was doing so, the sales clerk told us she had been debating which dress to purchase for her own granddaughter and the question was now settled. She was going with the same one you see pictured above.
She got compliments every where we went the rest of the day. At every stop, in every shop, she drew admirers. When we went to dinner, it was the same. After dinner, we took a walk along the Arkansas River. There I snapped the pictures in the collage above.
Her auntie snapped one, too. She was swirling and twirling. One can almost hear the laughter, even in black and white (the tone used for what became said auntie's cover photo.)
What we did not take pictures of  (sadly) was a spirited game of "Mother May I" we played at her insistence . The auntie/baby daughter's roommate and a friend who was visiting them, along with the Hub and I all participated. Again. she drew a crowd. This time, it was made up of people waiting for tables at a busy restaurant on a Saturday evening.
I just hope none of them took pictures.

Snaggle

Friday evening, when I went to pick up the grandbaby to spent the  night, she had a big surprised waiting! She's lost another tooth. Next to the newly lost one, her permanent tooth has just peeked through. These two together have left her looking pretty snaggled. The tooth fairy came to our house Friday night but not before getting careful instructions as to procedure. We did ok, I think.
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