Recently...

Recently, I've been bad about charging the battery for my camera.  This means taking more pictures with my cell phone - which (sorry, Apple) doesn't have the best camera in the world.  Please excuse the quality of these photos!

Recently, Sarah has been very, very into pretend play.  She loves to dress up.  Sometimes it's a princess dress with gloves, a tiara, high heeled shoes, and oodles of jewelry.  Sometimes it's just her underwear and a cowboy hat...

 Recently, she's also been very into acting out specific events with her toys.  Here, the zoo animals are, according to Sarah, walking to the park.  She told me, "Their mommy told them they all have to hold hands to stay safe."

Ironically, the animals are all walking toward the octopus toy, which Sarah has declared to be the "bad guy toy."  He frequently grabs one of these animals and uses is clip to diabolically tie the animals to Kate's jumper.  Sarah then lets me know that Mr. Octopus is misbehaving again, and I have to go talk to him to let him know that he will lose privileges if he doesn't let go of the animals by the time I count to three.  (It should be noted that this particular behavior strategy works far better on Mr. Octopus than it does on Sarah!)

Recently, Sarah has outgrown the hooded towels we have been using with her since she was a baby. (Take a minute to feel my heartbreak over that!)  We've moved from using post-bath hoodie towels to using a robe and a small towel for her wet hair.  She's pretty proud of her new outfit...

Recently, it's also been pretty cold (record lows, in fact!), so Sarah has been able to wear her 2014-2015 winter hat a lot!  Her first knitted hat was a monkey.  Her second winter she wore an owl hat.  Last year, she had a monster hat.  This year it's a hat with two mice on it!  I think she has one more year of cute knitted hats, and then it'll be cheap fleece hats that I won't mourn if they are lost at elementary school.  (Stop.  Feel my heartbreak again!)