Turnin' Two at the Zoo!

My baby girl is not a baby anymore!!! She turned TWO on Saturday, and we celebrated the entire weekend- but the grand finale was her party at the zoo on Sunday!! Before I get to the pictures- here are the most adorable things about her at 2 years old:

-She's 25th percentile weight, and 90th percentile height.

-She LOOOOVES school at Tigerland- and we LLLOOOOVE her teachers!

-She's really into animals, what type of environment they live in, and of course the sounds they make. (Hence the zoo party!)

-She made up a game where she finds as many shapes as she can in the "real world." She gets especially proud when she spots an oval or triangle.

-She sings along with songs now and it's precious. Most recently: "I will rriiiiise" with Chris Tomlin on KSBJ on the drive home from school.

-She's still obsessed with Shamu weeks after our Sea World trip. She talks about his jumps and splashes non-stop.

-She amazes me everyday with knowledge that she is just soaking up from the world around her. She told me just the other day that we were driving in a "forrest."

-"Toy Story" is her favorite movie, and "Blues Clues" and "Fresh Beat Band" are her favorite shows.

OK, here are some cute pictures! There are a TON more wonderful pictures of many more people that were able to make it out, so check out the Snapfish album, too: http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=5689928013/a=89282753_89282753/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Starting off the weekend with cupcakes at school for the birthday girl on Friday!

My sweet birthday girl on the actual day of her birth: 9/25.

Arriving at the zoo for her birthday party! Sporting one of the party favors, the animal sunglasses:

The hit of the morning: the cupcakes MiMi ordered!

One of Ada's BFF's from school, Chloe! The other Tigerland friends we invited didn't make it- most of them were home sick with a nasty bug that's been going around school. :(

Kendra and Luis made it!!! (Despite the fact that I'd accidentally booked the party on the Texans vs. Cowboys home game which we all had tickets to... that really meant a lot to me that they came!)

Deep conversation with Uncle Drew.

Her favorite Great-Grandma, MorMor!!!

My shabby job of painting her face like a zebra....

Ada and Bella making up their own game....

Ada and Bella, future Aggie roomies!
Daddy leaving to make it to the Texans game... a little apprehensive because he is taking all of her presents!

Carousel rides for everyone! Probably Ada's favorite part of the day!

Exploring the zoo....

Ada and MiMi:

Riding in her new wagon with her friend Knox- not sure what happened to her lenses!

Again- many people didn't make the blog- check out the Snapfish album or my facebook page! I'm in a lazy-blogger phase and I didn't feel like uploading any more pictures!!! :)

Random Update

I've been neglecting you, www.thedailydowell.blogspot.com. Life is fine and dandy: I'm feeling loads better, we are all doing fine, work and school are going well. I'm teaching Chemistry still, but got 2 sections of Anatomy & Physiology as well- love the subject, love the class, love having two preps most of the time. I'm also Student Council sponsor this year, which is all good fun, too- I'm just doing the bare minimum with it for now, though.

We are super busy these days, so there are not a lot of fascinating happenings around the Dowell house. (Not like the million posts from this summer were fascinating to anyone else- but you catch my drift!) But there have been some cute pictures here and there that I thought I'd post before I forget about them forever! Here ya go:

Apparently this is how cool kids eat their dinner:

Naked box head!

Ada has been wanting to hold hands to and from school some days- and I looove it! Love this girl!

Playing in a late summer rain storm:

Playing at the mall playground- it's been too hot to do anything outside since July!

Ada is going to be TWO YEARS OLD on Saturday. I cannot believe it!!!! Her birthday party is at the Zoo this year, and I might be more excited than anyone else!!!! We are sending cupcakes to school tomorrow for her mini-celebration there- getting the weekend started early! I'll post a TON of pictures of the festivities very soon, I'm sure!

Sea World Adventure!

Hello long lost blog! It's been a while- I'm starting to feel better, so I might start posting more soon! (Betcha can't wait!)

So, here's a little background info before I write about our Labor Day weekend: Casey broke a big account at work: yay! And by big, I mean they had about 2 weeks to fill something like 60-something spots at Comcast. So- Ada and I went almost 3 weeks (and weekends) without seeing Casey- booooo! As proud as we were of him- it was REALLY rough on us at home, too. When you are just starting back to school (which is exhausting), being 7, 8, & 9 weeks pregnant (which is MORE exhausting), and being the sole caregiver of a very active toddler (which is the MOST exhausting!)- it was a recipe for fatigue that I am not even going to complain about because you just can't fathom it. Plus I hate complaining and complainers- so I'm leaving it at that. Anywho- Ada was SUCH an angel (and has been since I got pregnany sick- seriously. I never knew how easy an almost 2 year old could be!), and we missed out on a lot of family time- we decided to take advantage of the three day weekend and head to San Antonio or a little Sea World and Riverwalk action! So, here ya go!

Resting up on the drive over to SA:
First stop: the new baby seals!

A lot of the pictures I took are of Ada's expressions- I couldn't get enough of her that day!!!

Feeding the barking sea lion- which was HILARIOUS to Ada!

Waiting (with a sinus and eye infection- the doctor squeezed us in the day before, thank goodness!) for the sea lion show!

"WOOOOHHHH!" -Ada

"OH WOW!" -Ada, while clapping

Squealing!

Oh my gosh, this picture is SO unflattering- but too funny not to post!

Mommy and Ada and #2:

"Cheeeeze PIZZA!" -Ada

Obligatory Family Shamu picture!

Patiently awaiting the dolphin/beluga whale show "Azul."

Sittin' in the Splash Zone (with a random chicken toy I'd dug out of my bag)!

"Wooooooohhhhh!" -Ada

"WWWWWWWWWWWWOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWW!" -Ada

So tired. So stuffy. But being a trooper and having the time of her life!

Zonked out in between Azul and Shamu....

Still sleeping in line for Shamu.....

Well rested! "He's SWIMMIN'!" -Ada

"Splashin!" -Ada

Entertaining herself in the hotel room. (Hotel Contessa- I've ALWAYS wanted to stay here, and we got a steal on it since we booked it less than 24 hours before.... I guess they needed to fill up some more rooms! It was amazing. It'll be hard to down-grade back to our normal places next time we go!)

Stuffy, smiley girl!

Our favorite Riverwalk restaurant- Casa Rio. Yum!

"Hallo? MiMi?"

Going to sleep in a BIG big girl bed! (Where I slept with her since she kind of sleep walks!)

Ada's first trip to the Alamo- of thousands I'm sure!

Drive home on Sunday- annoyed right now at Mom and Dad's rendition of Pearl Jam's "Jeremy's Spoken." "STOP IT!" -Ada

We had an AMAZING time- I've paying for it in sleep and throwing up since we got home yesterday, but it's all worth it! I'd do it every weekend if we could!!!

Ada's Mod Pod

Ada's new room is finished! I started this sucker before I was pregnant, before I was sick, before I was exhausted, etc.... so it's been slow going since I repurposed the furniture! But, here it is, in all it's glory! Ada LOVES it- today, I had just moved her mattress in to take the pictures so I could officially end the project and check it off my eternal to-do list. And she turned on her lullabies, crawled in bed, and begged to go night-night at 5pm! So, we are giving it a go tonight in the big girl bed in her big girl room! (More on that in a second.) First, here is the Mod Pod!

And here we are, getting ready for bed on night #1 in our new big girl room!

Picking out 1,000 books:

"Night night! So comfy!"

Insert fake yawn, then fake snore:

And this is how I left her the first time- like any typical night reading books in bed....

Until about 2.5 minutes later when she realized she had total freedom. You should have seen the sheer glee on her face when she peeked around the corner and realized for the first time she could get OUT! Here she is hiding in the hallway after being asked to go back to bed:

Sneaking around commando style!

SO, this is where the cute pictures end, and the real work began! I laid down with her and tickled her back for a while to help her get accostomed to the dark with the door closed. It is actually one of my favorite memories in her entire 22 months- she kept saying "lusch you" (aka Love you), and it totally melted my heart! After I left her, I heard her playing with her radio... And now the entire house is being blasted with maximum volume zen-lullabies because no one dares to re-enter her room until we know she's out to turn the volume back down!!! Updates soon...

Guess What?

Ada has an announcement. She's gonna be a....

BIG SISTER!

This is why I've been totally absent from the blogging scene lately- I feel like poop! I'm only 7.5 weeks along, but my first Doctor's appointment was last week, and we saw a baby and a strong heartbeat already! Baby Dowell #2 will join us on or around April 1, 2011!

Shapes Galore!

This really isn't anything special, Ada's known her shapes for months- but I just thought this was cute! Plus I've been MIA for over a week, and I know you all are probably having withdrawals from my pointless posts! :)