Over at the Ellis’ house, Lori gave Evie her first ride on a tree swing, which Evie loved.

After the swing, Evie gave her classic “MANE!” (plane) double-point. There was no plane, of course… but this is what she does these days when she’s very excited. The strange thing is, when there is an actual plane, she’s probably only about 75% as excited as when she’s pointing out pretend planes.

And here’s Evie with her pal Sam, who’s great with her—despite the fact that all of Evie’s attempts to pass the football usually end with the ball bouncing off of her head and dropping behind her back. She’ll get there….

There had been some rainy days last week, which gave Evie the chance to try on her new raincoat.

But Saturday was by far the nicest day of the year. Not too hot, but plenty of sun. We decided to head in to Rhinebeck to do some shopping for friends’ birthday gifts. Evie had to bring out her new shades—mostly so as not to be recognized.

It’s never long before Evie decides to let down the cool facade and sneak in a cheesy grin or two.

Evie spent the last part of our trip riding on my shoulders, alternately pointing out non-existent airplanes (”MANE!”) and attempting to steer me like a horse, using my sunglasses’ stems as reins. (In other words, the usual.)

She’s a little shy on camera, but here are a few of Evie’s latest animal sounds, names and other words.

I almost had to bleep her attempt at “GrandDad”.

We headed over to my friend Simon’s house yesterday for his daughter Grace’s 7th birthday. Evie loved feeding the chickens (including a bunch of 3-day-old chicks, not visible in the pictures).

There was a fantastic moonbounce in the front yard (I think these are called “bouncy castles” in the UK), so Emma decided to let Evie go down the slide solo. The first run went great, which I didn’t catch on tape. Evie’s second solo run, however, was a little bit of a catastrophe:

After a few seconds of bawling, Evie was game enough to try again, though this time on Emma’s lap. Things went much better.

Non-accidental words to date: Mama, Dada, Lenny (her stuffed cat), up, down, ball, bubble, pop, cup, hi, bye-bye, night-night, boo!

Possibly accidental words (or words said in context only once, never again to be repeated): Book, powder, light, and high-five (”hine dive”).

Okay, more stuff to come soon—I swear—but in the meantime, here’s what I’ve been up to. (Well, not this week, since Emma and Evie are out of town, but in general.) Evie’s nana—here for a quick visit—can be heard laughing in the background.