Gramma Pat and Grampa Bill came over to visit last night and Carter was very excited that Gramma Pat was wearing a set of beads...JUST LIKE HERS! She has a pile of Marti Gras beads that we've slowly been collecting as she loves to wear beads and necklaces. She would race into her bedroom and you'd hear all this banging and scuffling, then pretty quick, she'd come running back to show Gramma her beads she'd managed to unearth from their special hiding spot (basically where ever they last got dropped) that matched Gramma's. According to Carter, as long as they were beads, they matched--color wasn't really a criteria used, or even shape for that matter. As soon as Gramma admired the beads Carter had dug up, off she'd go to find another set. Pretty soon she had a whole neck full of beads. It was fun to watch.
And how it looks now--three days later!
We had some help. My gramma Betty was wonderful enough to donate Grampa Ben's gardening tools to the cause. My grampa died about a year and a half ago, and I feel like I'm getting to know him better through his things that I've been given than I ever did in real life. He kept immaculate care of his stuff, only bought good quality and took good care of it. Everything was clean, well maintained and worked. I really appreciate what I've been given by Gramma--which also includes the great camera I'm currently using to fill up this blog with pictures. 
I also figured I better add a picture of my fancy new bird feeder. Technically, it's Robert's bird feeder since he seems to be getting the biggest kick out of it. I really like the fancy pole that he made to hang the feeder on. It's so nice to have a handy man around! It didn't take the little birds very long to find it. I tried to get a picture with some of the finches on it, but they are pretty suspicious today.
Carter decided that her baby needed to go for a ride outside. She loaded up her doll in her toy bus and off they went. It was so funny. She made sure to first ask the baby if it wanted to go. Naturally, the smart baby wanted to do just what her mommy wanted her to (if only my kid worked that way!). 
Making sure baby made it over the bump ok and seeing if it needed some sunblock. She was trying to decide. 
Cash checking out the baby too. Earlier when she still had shoes on, I told her that they were on the wrong feet and would hurt. She looked down then looked back up at me and said "It not too bad" and off she went. Sigh. I love her so much. She's going to be every bit as independent as her mom. No worries there.
Carter loves to help do anything that you are doing (so long as it isn't picking up her messes best I can tell). Robert is particularly good at letting her help and finding jobs for her to do. So he found an extra seeder and she followed right along seeding grass with dad. We had tried to plant some grass before the monsoon, but can't tell that anything survived but the wild oats and weeds, naturally. Still, the lawn is coming along. It sure looks a whole lot better than it did for most of the winter when it was all tore up looking for the septic tank--complements of Miss Carter who flushed a box of diaper wipes down the toilet and clogged it up.
Roberts done a ton of work outside, slowly trying to get everything to look nice and it's really coming along. He says he feels like an ADD kids when he gets outside because he doesn't know where to start and every time he starts a project, he can see 4 more that seem need even more attention than than the one he's working on. Baby steps!
Carter really (I do mean really) loves having all the critters around. I'm not sure they return her love as we are still working on the "play nice" but I think she will get it (She was doing pretty good until Robert caught her holding the bunny up by his ears trying to dump him out of the cage.) Over the weekend we but the bunny out in a cage on the lawn to get some fresh grass. Carter would crawl right in with the bunny and mostly sit and torment the poor critter. She is trying very hard, but at two, I think it's sometimes beyond her just what constitutes "be NICE" versus "This would be fun to try..."
We had the bunny in the cage just outside the kitchen window so that we could keep an eye on her while she was outside...that and on the dog, Cash. He's been really pretty good about the bunnies, but he is also a dog. Note there is only one bunny and there was two. : (
Carter looked so sweet sitting out there on Sunday morning. She mostly seemed to just want to hold the bunny and snuggle with it, which she did very quietly for quite some time.
She also was hoping that dad would let her have the camera for awhile...
You can almost see her little brain spinning, "How do you make this dang thing work?" Once we got that problem solved (kink in the hose) she really loved running the sprayer. I mostly tried to stay out of the way and run the wash cloth then have her rinse it off. Yep, I was about as wet as the truck by the time we were done.
Carter was hooking Cash up to several horse halters with the idea of tying him up for some reason. I think originally she was going to try to ride him but gave up and decided she really wanted to tie him up by the trampoline so that he had to watch her jump. It was pretty funny to watch her try to lead him around. Cash would play along until he got distracted by something and away he would go dragging a squalling mad little girl. I will give her credit for persistence though. She would finally get him stopped and start all over trying to get him back to the trampoline--not sure when or where she lost her pants.
On Wednesday while Blake was over here watching Carter, We set up the sprinkler for Carter to run through the grass, such as it is. I know it's not nearly as nice as the grass as Aunty's, but we're working on it. It's already better than it was last year. At any rate, she had a great time and plumb wore herself out. She kept going out later in the afternoon and turning the water on herself and soaking down whenever she thought she needed it. Not sure how good it was for all the baby grass we're trying to grow...
We had a big thunderstorm just brush past our house last night. From the sounds of it, it was quite a storm over by Hardin, but we seemed to just catch the edge of it right here. The thunder was pretty impressive, although not enough to wake Carter up who had curled up in the baby swing-her new favorite place to sit naturally--and crashed around 5 pm. (We'd had a pretty busy day!) It hailed briefly (Thank Heavens!) and then the rain just poured down for maybe 5-10 minutes. Robert went back outside to finish watering his trees (??) and made us all come out to check out the strange clouds that were passing the wake of the storm. I suppose it was around 9 pm or so if you missed them. I'm not sure that I've ever seen any like them before or at least quite like these. The whole night sky had an orange tinge to it. 
Robert and Carter checking out the clouds. 
Carter drank that propel water all the way to town, so Blake's job during the appointment mostly consisted of taking Carter to the bathroom every 5 minutes. I certainly was glad she came along or it would have been a really long day in town. No matter how busy things get, you have to save some tme for play! After the appointment we went to the park to play and burn off some energy before finishing up grocery shopping and heading home. The weather has been so nice the last couple of days...just starting to get almost too warm at 80 degrees, but still much better than over 100.
Carter had a lot of fun playing on the slides and climbing all over. I was glad Blake was there to help chase after her and keep an eye on her. Carter still hasn't had much opportunity to play with other kids her age, and is mostly used to hanging around much older kids. We really need to work on the 'play nice' with others since she's mostly used to being the star of the show--not really her fault. We finally had to leave the park after Carter decided that the little boy throwing rocks at the slide needed some rocks thrown at him. Sigh. She refused to tell him she was sorry, so she had to leave. Boy, did that make her mad.
Robert and I were sitting in the living room talking last night when we heard Carter giggling in the other room. Curious as to what she was up to now, we took a peek around the corner and found her trying to feed our dog Cash one of the calves' bottles. Mostly she was pouring milk out of the bottle on the porch while Cash was frantically trying to lap it all up. She thought this was pretty darn funny. I guess I was just glad she was mostly outside and the milk was getting all over the porch and not the carpet! 
Robert's mom has been so wonderful with sending clothes, shoes, and other fun stuff for Carter several times a year. It has been a huge help to us since she has so far managed to provide Carter with 80-90% of all her clothes and shoes. Carter always gets really excited when she sees a new box and jumps around the house until I can get it opened up. Then she tears through it...I really should have gotten a picture of the "after the box was opened" look. It looked like a bomb went off in the dinning room. This box was full of lots of little baby boy clothes (Yay!). Carter wanted to know if these clothes were for HER baby. There was also some great stuff for Carter, including a pink Barbie sleeping bag. Carter took one look at it and just went "Oh, mom, it's SOOO pretty!". She promptly laid claim to it and had to test it out on the bean chair. I also really loved the little pink and blue cowboy rain boots (Note to Aunty: Nice thick plastic that can be worn in the corral around Picky and protect little toes!)
I had big hopes that my little girl would love horses as much as I do. They've always been a big part of my life and even more for my husband. I don't think it's going to be a problem...if anything, I think she is going to be even more crazy about them. Carter and I spent most of the afternoon brushing Picky and then I took her for a long ride--long to a 2 year old I would think. I suppose I led Picky over a mile with Carter riding bareback. She finally got tired, so I got her down and we walked, leading Picky around for at least another mile or more. She had a ball. We were up by my dad's wheat fields up above the house and the only way I could think to explain it was to tell her these were Grampa's gardens. She understands gardens but was fairly horrified when Cash, our new dog, was running through them. "We don't run in garden mom!" so she would yell at Cash to get out! Nor would she let Picky eat out of Grampa's garden. Later when Robert came home, she still hadn't got her fill of horses so he let her lead Picky (It might have been the other way around...) around and eat grass (ON MY POOR LAWN!!). This entertained her for over an hour. We are so blessed to have this wonderful horse, Picky. He's certainly earning his retirement home. 
She even tried to get Picky to come swing with her! I'm not crazy about the lack of shoes...which is why I sent Robert out to go get some back on her (or else!), but I didn't notice the lack of pants until I saw the pictures!
Carter really likes curling up on Robert after a long day of playing for a little cuddle--although I'm not exactly sure who likes the snuggle time more! (If Robert's not home, I'm a distance second best option, but I take advantage of getting my snuggles in when I can. The belly is really starting to get in the way of my lap though...) Carter even got in several naps sleeping right on her poppa's chest during our week long monsoon, which worked great right up until she had an accident in her sleep and completely soaked him!
What could possibly be better than coloring up mom's meeting notes straight from the bath? She informed me that she was busy writing her name. With Carter, clothes really are optional. And since we live out in the middle of no where, there doesn't seem to be much point to staying fully clothed at all time. We're trying to at least implement a "clothes must be on if there is company" policy, but mostly she really would prefer just prefer to be naked. I'm constantly looking outside to see clothing strewn from one end of the place to the other and Carter running around happy as can be. Seems to be that I had a very similar attitude at her age and really, who cares?
Her new smile for the camera--not sure where she picked up the idea that she needs to open her mouth wide, but it's pretty cute. Gramma Aunty sent over a whole coffee can full of old pens and Carter has had a ball trying them all out, taking them apart, and scribbling all over with them. Mostly we've managed to contain all scribbling to paper, with only a few minor lapses on the table, clothing, and various body parts. Nothing else that I can find anyway, but I've been trying to enforce a "Paper Only" policy and so far, she's been trying pretty hard to follow it--about as much as you can expect from a curious 2 year old. What's really fun is to listen to her conversations with herself while she is busy coloring or taking a bath. I especially love it when she is singing.
With all the mud, Carter decided she didn't want to wear her shoes (which at this point were all completely caked in mud) and now wanted to test how mommy's shoes performed. Ha! Those were my only clean pair!
Helping mom cook. She was pretty excited that she had gotten both the beater and the spoon--again the new camera smile. She really likes to help and while it certainly ups the mess factor, it's pretty entertaining to have her help. She's funny about certain things: I have to use a certain set of measuring spoons, only she can turn on the mixer and she gets to crack all the eggs. We compromised on the eggs and I let her crack them in a separate bowl before adding to the mix so I can first get all the shells out. I have to watch pretty closely though. Her new favorite trick is to try and sneak sprinkles in all the recipes. Not bad in muffins, but a bit strange in potato salad.
