Alyce Likes Heels

Alyce is such a girly girl. She has taken to wearing Mom's shoes around the house including her heels. It started off by Alyce digging through Mom's closet and pulling out a box of shoes. After a few tries Alyce finally got her feet into the straps and off she went.

Later on it was time for dinner and we brought Alyce and the shoes down with us. Big mistake. What is even more fun the wearing heels to a kid? Wearing heels on a loud floor. The shoes on our kitchen tile made an awful racket which Alyce thought was just great.

Dancing With The Stars

Our little girl likes to perform. Not just for Mom and I, but for anyone willing to watch.

One way Alyce likes to perform is to use a microphone from our Rock Band video game and sing with any performer on the t.v. It could be an artist on the Today Show, someone from American Idol, or even Hanna Montana. How does Alyce sing you ask? Well she can't say the words and she can't really carry a tune. What she can do is hold the microphone up to her mouth, say "wooo!" a lot, and shake her cute little behind. We have a video of her doing this somewhere. I just need to go find it.

The second way Alyce likes to perform has just recently appeared. Alyce likes to dance. Surprisingly she is very good at it too. The only show that I know her to dance to is Dancing With The Stars. If Alyce is in the right mood and the music is good she will join the dancers for the entire length of the song. What is most cute about her dancing is how well she can mimic what is on the t.v. Look below for a demonstration of the cuteness that is Alyce dancing with the stars!

Alyce doing a swing dance:



Alyce dancing to Funky Town:



Alyce dancing to Don't Be Cruel:

Alyce's First Toy Crush

Alyce has a toy crush; her first one. A toy crush is a term I made up to describe a love of something very intensely but has the ability to fall out of favor very quickly. A good example would be a kid loving Sponge Bob Square Pants. He could love it one day and be bored with it the next.

Alyce's toy crush is for a TV show and not a toy but the term still applies. This TV show is called Little Einsteins and is produced by the Disney Channel. It isn't much different than any other kids show. There are animated characters, that sing, dance, and play. The show is moderately entertaining because each episode features a piece of classical music and artwork. I don't know why Alyce likes it above all others. But like it above all others she does. Anytime the show is on she will sit in a chair or on the couch and not move for 3o minutes. She does interact with the show in that the kids do certain body motions and prompt you to do the same. Alyce goes along with them if we do the motions too.



We understand that excessive TV watching isn't the best for young minds, but this thirty minute show has been a godsend for Mom. With her baby induced nausea and fatigue a thirty minute respite from having the chase a kid around the house is very much welcome.

An Evening At The Park

Last night we wanted to get out of the house and decided to go to a play ground. We went to the playground at the early childhood development center where they have lots of playground equipment appropriate for Alyce's age. We left for the playground after Alyce's nap and dinner putting us there a little before 7:00.

Alyce must have seen something when we pulled into the parking lot because she started squealing with delight even before we stopped the car. Once across the parking lot she practically ran to the playground.

I did most of the playing with Alyce because Mom was feeling tired and a little sick. Alyce rode every slide on the playground about about a million times and never seemed to tire of them. Alyce also walked across the some stepping stones, and we spent some time pretending to drive a red jeep.

As the evening wore on we knew that we were going to be leaving soon so we tried some advice to make a transition to a new activity easier on Alyce. Five minutes before we left we told Alyce that she had 3 more trips on the slide then it was time to go. Of course she responded with her stereotypical "No." We gave her additional reminders every time she went down the slide until the last time. When we told her it was the last time on the slide she climbed up the slide and then started to procrastinate. Eventually she did make it down the slide and we had to stand firm to our earlier statement on it being time to leave. Naturally Alyce wasn't very happy with that decision, but rather than throw a tantrum she got little unhappy and picked up a hand full of bark mulch.

Deciding to cut our losses we let Alyce carry her bark all the way back to the car. When we got the car Alyce dropped the mulch onto the ground, waved bye to it, and said bye-bye. Such a polite little girl.

A Trip to the Zoo

On Friday July 4th we invited my brother Tom, his wife Mary, their son Jack, and Grandma to come along with us for a nice day at the Zoo. The weather was great and Alyce and Jack were both in good spirits. Of all of the animals we viewed the Hippos, Elephants, and Penguins were the big hits. They all tend to move around a lot and their habitats are easily viewable from a stroller. Alyce is starting to get to the age where tooling around on the stroller only lasts for so long before she starts asking to get "down" and pointing at her stroller belt buckle. As long as we keep moving and she has a juice box we don't hear too many complaints. Sadly we did have to leave before the rest of our party because we had to get Alyce home for a nap. We had a Independence Day party planned for later that night and we wanted Alyce to have as much sleep as possible. She was going to be staying up past her bedtime for the second night in a row at this point.

Vacation Odds and Ends

Well the vacation is all over. We made it back home yesterday around 2:00 and we were glad to get back. There is only so much time away from home a person can take. Back to that wonderful routine. I figured I would paste in a few odds and ends of pictures taken during the trip.

A favorite movie I captured via my cell phone is of Alyce at a Children's Place store. I think she has her mother's and grandmother's shopping genes.



This picture is from our first and best day at the pool. The weather cooperated the best and there were lots of water toys to play with. The pink ring pictured was one of her favorites.