The Past Couple of Days...

Margaret Mary has been loving the Ellaroo sling a friend gave us. She asks to get in the sling and then will bring me this one (we have several different slings). I love the pic of her blowing a kiss. I was asking her to give ME a kiss, but she had her own idea in mind.




MM LOVES to color and is getting really good at it. At first she would just scribble a little bit and then be done, but now she fills the whole page with circles and scribbles.



I've found a new way to hold her hair back: pigtails! This is MM showing you her goofy face.



MM also has been arranging a little audience for herself when she plays the piano!

My Sweet Boy

Henry (almost four months old!) sleeps most of the day, gives BIG smiles to anyone who smiles at him, laughs belly laughs when I sing and dance for him and is just downright goofy. We love him so much. He still is not a fan of the carseat and cries a lot in it. If I sit in the backseat and dance and sing for him, he will stop crying and laughing hard. It is funny to see him go from crying hysterically to laughing hyterically and then back to crying hysterically when I stop.

Piano

I almost forgot this in my last post.

MM still loves the piano. She will climb up on the bench, ask for a book (she wont play unless one is up there) and then play and sing her heart out. She sings songs all day long. The other day she sang one about "hot cookie," hehe, but she will sing about anything: bowls, dogs, mama, Hen-yay, papa, horsies, etc.

Margaret Mary Update

So, I've said many times how adorable this age is (she is now 20 months), and each day Margaret Mary does even more! I want to fill you in on a few recent happenings...

First, Margaret Mary's little prayer life. She LOVES praying to Jesus, dressing up like Mary, singing out of prayerbooks, putting as many rosaries around her neck as she can find, and kneeling. The other day I asked her if she would pray with me. She got a big smile on her face, turned toward our altar, got on her knees and held her little hands together until I said "amen," to which she echoed "amen!"




Second, her tastes. I'll start with her hair. It is getting sooo long that we have to pull it up in a side ponytail to keep it out of her face. I refuse to cut her bangs! We need to buy more clips, but she pulls them out and therefore we lose them soo easily. She gets really frustrated when her hair is in her face and she will ask for a "bow." I'll go get one, and she will fuss a little and say "ouch ouch medicine (one of her favorite word combinations)until I'm done. She will then look in the mirror, give herself a big cheesy smile and make goofy faces until I put her down. Silly Girl. Speaking of "ouch," we bought her some footed pajamas the other day. She was SOOOO excited and insisted that I change her into them for her nap. As soon as they were on, she started pointing to her feet and saying "ouch ouch medicine." I knew it would just take her a while to get used to the feeling, so I tried everything to distract her but she held her ground. The footed part of the pajamas were ouch and she wanted them off. I eventually cut the feet off and she was happy. In the picture below, she is telling me how "soft" her pajamas are. :) She also likes this pair a lot (I think they are kinda ugly) because they have shoes on them.



Last, Margaret Mary LOVES "Hen-yay" and is really starting to play with him. When he is on the floor, she wants to lay down beside him and play with his toys. She will put her face right up to his face and yell "hey baby" or just say "Hen-yay" over and over again with different intontations. When Henry is fussing and I can't get to him at the minute, she will go up to him, pat his belly and shush him. So cute. She also likes to help a lot. We only use a paci with Henry at night time and when they are both playing on the bed, she will find his paci, put it in his mouth, look up proudly and say "help!" as in "I helped!" Today she asked if she could help me breastfeed Henry! Here they are reading a book together.



We love, love, love our little Margaret Mary

Outside With Margaret Mary

MM loves playing "ou-side." When you ask her what she wants to do, she always says "go car." Sometimes she even says "go car" in her sleep!

MM and her Horsey

MM loves to add "y" to lots of words. Help has become "helpey," up has become "upey" and so on. It is so cute. Today, Margaret Mary wanted to wear her "horsey," which is a sweater that my memaw made me when I was a little girl. It is knit and on the arm is a horse, complete with a flowing mane. It was obviously made in the 80's, but MM LOVES it. Sorry for the blurry pics, but MM refuses to sit still for the camera these days.

Ball!!!

MM is at a really cute age. She is able to express so much. The other day she drew a "ball" for the first time and was sooooo proud of herself. She wasn't able to duplicate it, but it makes me wonder if she has inherited her father's amazing drawing skills! She loves coloring and is really good at helping me pick up all the crayons when she is done. So far, she knows yellow, purple and blue.

Henry Rolls!

Our New Stroller

Jason and I bought a used double jogging stroller so I can go out for some runs a couple times a week. I love it, MM loves it, and Henry will put up with it for about 20 minutes. Getting them in their jackets is a battle sometimes, but they look so cute in them. We think that Henry looks like the younger brother from "The Christmas Story" who cants move because he has on so many jackets! I love the pic of them laying on the floor together. I was taking a pic of how funny Henry looked, and MM started laying on the floor imitating Henry. She does this alot: imitating his sounds, how he stuffs his fingers in his mouth, how he plays on Mama, it is amazing how observant MM is!

In the Kitchen with MM

(Sorry the pics are so large. I am having a hard time finding a way to post pics taken on my phone to the blog. Dad- do you know how can I get pics from my phone onto my desktop?)

Today Margaret Mary and I made cookies for Jason and his friends. I was in a big hurry and was debating on whether I should make them fast and get it done or let MM help me and who knows what could happen with that. I decided to let her help and we had a ball! I measured everything out and she dumped everything in the right bowl. She helped me stir and make the dough into balls with our hands. You can even see her stealing choc chips out of the bowl in one of the pics! We had such a good time and I was glad that I didn't miss the opportunity to have this quality time with her.

Stories

Margaret Mary's growing ability to express her thoughts is amazing. She is constantly telling stories, aka, retelling us past events using the words she knows. For example, everytime we go out and swing, she points to the tree where Jason threw the rope up in the tree to hang up the swing and says "papa!" Or if I get her a cup at breakfast, she will tell Jason "mama, cup" (aka "mommy got me the cup." You have to know the context to get her stories, but it is still amazing.

The other day the neighbors' puppies came up and knocked Margaret Mary off her bike. She was screaming, the dogs were on top of her, Jason was beating the dogs, it was quite an event. (Dont worry, she is fine). Later on that day, she was talking and re-told us the story using her words. "Dog," then she pants like a dog, "bike, ouch, papa," (then she hits her hand, imitating Jason hitting the dogs). Jason and I were stunned. Our little girl is growing up!