Hard Knocks

I took the baby over to the local memorial for a change of scenery and to potentially get some decent pictures of her.

This memorial has special meaning to us here at casa Mig's. There is an engraving (for those of you who know me, and my past, note how I'm only saying engraving and steering completely clear of a certain key word that was used to "find" my first blog) of my Father-In-Law's name and the years he served our country. I never met him. He passed away when my husband was 13, of pancreatic cancer. I can only hope that I am the person he would have wanted his son to be with. I'd like to think that I am.

Not my point here. So we went. This is one of the baby's favorite places.

She likes to walk around the benches.

But mainly ... she likes to run around the flagpole (notice in the picture, the particular item that is dominant, I will never, ever, ever, ever (oh and), EVER use it here.

More running. More laughing. Where she gets the energy to do laps, I have no idea.

Here's a close up of the engraving.

Here she is SMILING AT ME! It was just after I took this picture that she turned and went to climb up on that little wall you can see behind her. Because she had her back to me, I'm not entirely sure what happened. I can tell you, I heard skin hitting cement, I ran. She cried. There was blood. At her mouth, covering her hands, her shirt, my shirt, my hands in what seemed like seconds. We went home and I assessed the injury. Her poor little lip and nose swelled up like balloons as I fed her freeze pops and Motrin. I cannot even being to describe the anguish. Even though it's normal to be fearless at almost two, it is hard to get past her beautiful face with the gigantic boo boo on it. The pediatrician saw it today and assured me she'll be fine. He also mentioned that it is going to look alot worse before it gets better.