Unicorns, Faries, Okapi's and other Mythical Creatures

Within the last 6 months, Mia's dad and stepmother took Mia and her kissing cousin KJ to the zoo. As it is with little ones, the stories that get told after such trips have 90% truth, 5% misunderstanding and 5% imagination.

Within that 5% of misunderstanding, is included the small child's misunderstanding of what was really happening, and the listener of the small child's stories misunderstanding of the tale.........ie, word pronunciation.

At three, even with all of the talking Mia does, she still has problems with the letter "L".......a lion is a "whyon", I love you, "I wuv you", etc......she is working on it, but it still poses a problem.

So, when Mia was telling her mom about the "Okapi" at the zoo, Jennifer had no idea what she was talking about. And the description of the Okapi was no less confusing. Jennifer had even asked me to try and figure out what she was talking about and I too was clueless. I mean, we assumed she was leaving letters off, or misunderstood what was being told, you know, lots of possibilities for misunderstanding.

Mia was here Thursday and it was a beautiful day, so Catherine and I took Mia to the zoo. When I called and told Jennifer we were going, she said "Make sure you find out what an Okapi is!", and I promised her I would not leave the zoo until we solved the mystery of the "Okapi"


As you can see, the only people who were without a clue were the grown-ups. An Okapi is not a mythical creature, nor a mispronunciation by a three year old, and cutting us some slack, when she tried to describe the animal, well, as you can see, it is one ODD creature! No wonder that animal stuck in her head enough to want to share the story.........ah my little sweet toot Mia! I loved spending the day at the zoo with you and Catherine. I will post some more photos later.

New Name, New Baby

I guess I am not giving out a prize for helping me give my blog a new name.........so, for now anyway, "Pretty in Pink" seems to work. Catherine set up the blog a while back for me with the pink designs and since I have two GRAND DAUGHTERS and 3 Daughters, and since I think every little girl should wear Pink.........it seems to work.........because I think it works for ALL of my girls!

Family

Jessica wanted to have a nice family picture taken. We were suppose to dress up at Christmas (when I say dress up, I mean, no Dauphin University T-shirts and such), but things didn't work out to do that (we will do it soon I promise Jessica!). In the mean time, at Thanksgiving, we were all together, and took this "casual" shot. I really like it, and my extended family, the "San Marcos Schmid's" now as I call them, are in it, which makes it extra special. The only person missing is little E..........who was not yet born.

Here is our little family.
What you don't see in the picture is the surprise on our faces when Catherine's camera started taking the pictures. She set it on top of the water well, time delayed and when it started clicking, it was like one click every 1/2 second...........and it caught all of our surprised looks. I am going to include one, and you need to look at Rex's face, because his shows our shock and amazement more than anyone else!


Speaking of the San Marcos Schimids', I went to San Marcos for New Years and spent the eve with Rob and Cindy, their daughter Sara, her husband J.W. and their two little boys Brady and Elliot. I have been taking Mia over to play with Brady since basically she was born. They are just now getting old enough to really play together and man oh man, do they have a good time. Brady is 7 months older, and a sweet gentle little boy, with wonderful manners. Sara and JW have done a terrific job as parents. Mia and Brady play and play and play and not once have they ever had any sort of disagreement. They are loud (mostly this is Mia), and they do run in circles (again, Mia), but, they sure have lots of giggles. Sara, Cindy and I went to the outlet mall in San Marcos and bought matching cuddle jammies for my two grand daughters and their two boys. Cute is not a descriptive enough word to describe these four little people in their PJ's!


The look on Brady's face when we told them to sit down and we were going to have them hold their siblings............Brady looked at Mia and said "we are both going to hold our babies"......oh, it was awesome!

Towards the end of the evening, JW was making every effort to read a book to Mia and Brady. Sitting in the living room, Mia perched on his lap and Brady beside him, he proceeded to try and read "One Fish, Two Fish". Mia, who once exclaimed to my mom "I can talk. I talk a wot". was inclined to live up to her reputation, and kept having something to say about everything in the book. Finally, with good humor, JW said "would ya'll like me to read this book, or not", where in Brady replied, "I want to hear the book, but Mia keeps talking". This was all very true, but Mia was having such a good time!

Sara has a very nice camera and takes great pictures. Apparently, she is like Catherine, and a wee bit of a perfectionist when it comes to her pictures. They neither one like to share them before they have been "perfected". But, since it was New Years and since we said pretty please, Sara went ahead and shared some of the photos with us. The one of Brady and Mia and their siblings, and then at Jennifer's request, some photos of baby E.



Can you see the dimple? My heavens, I love dimples!





Oh, by the way, I know I have referred to her as baby E now twice. This past weekend, in my opinion, I have decided she looks like Rex. I was calling her Miss K after than, and I do refer to her as Eleanor also.........so, see I still have not picked a name for her (yes, yes, I know, her parents picked a perfectly fine name, Eleanor Grace), I just mean maybe a nickname, a "love" name, you know....