yea, daddy!

after three weeks of 9:30pm games, matt's softball team will now have three weeks of 6:30pm games. the great part about that is that madelyn, mason, and i can go to cheer him on at the earlier games. madelyn loves to cheer for her daddy! she is particularly proud of him when he bats and tells everyone around her that her daddy is batting and is going to hit the ball.

because it was an early game everyone else on the team had their families come too. madelyn was delighted to see so many kids around her age at the game. she was particularly interested in a one year old boy (seen to her right in the picture of the kids watching matt warm up for the game - madelyn is towards the middle in the blue shirt). i think that it was sort of like, "i wish my brother could walk around and play". she tried to run around with the older girls (ages 3 and 4) but they didn't always acknowledge her - not that it stopped madelyn from trying or running around with them. one of the girls did grab her by the arm and lead her over to where she had a bag of popcorn to share. madelyn, never one to turn down food, stood there stuffing her face until i called her away because the other little girl had left a few minutes ago without madelyn even noticing.


this is a picture madelyn requested i take so that she could "show daddy" how she wears her mr.potatohead pieces. i love it when she thinks about him and misses him when he is at work.


yesterday matt was pretty tired when he got home from work and he was so lucky that the game madelyn wanted to play with him was 'put daddy to bed'. she had him get into her bed, tucked him in, got him a drink of her milk from the refrigerator, gave him a kiss, and then laid down in bed with him to read him books. i went in to check on them after a while (it was pretty quiet in there) and sure enough matt was asleep and madelyn was still reading him books. she just looked up at me and said, "come, mommy. join us." "join us" must be something she learned at school. it just sounded so formal and mature to me that i had her repeat it a few times for my amusement.

i was surprised that she was being so still and quiet because she had taken a 4 hour nap and only woke up shortly before matt got home from work. we left the room and let daddy sleep until it was bath time; at which point madelyn went storming in excitedly declaring, "wake up, daddy, its bath time!," over and over.

now this one just amazes me. matt is almost always able to get madelyn to wear shoes she normally refuses to wear. i think it might be because he is getting ready to take her out to do something she really wants to do and just wants to get her shoes on as fast as possible. like today for example. she and daddy were going on a "trip" to take pictures downtown (it is something matt is doing for work and madelyn took her camera - our old one - to help). i have been trying to get her to wear these new shoes for over a week now by pointing out the heart and bow on them with no luck - in fact the suggestion is greeted with screams of "no". today daddy suggested them and madelyn not only put them on willingly, but then she told me to look at the pretty heart on them! at least one of us can get her to try new shoes... love.

"he touched my..."

i know that the title of this post sounds perverted, but this is one of madelyn's most common phrases these days. she loves it when mason touches her things and points it out when he does. she also asks him to touch her toys or other objects. we are very fortunate that she loves to share with her little brother. although, i am sure that the "don't touch my..." days are in our not too distant future.

here is a video of her playing doctor with mason. you can hear her say, "he touched my doctor", "he touched my shirt", etc. she is also trying to get mason to hold the stethoscope (aka "doctor") again after he lets it go. don't worry mason was not forced to wear the stethoscope at the end of the video and madelyn didn't cry about it (i think she looks like she is going to cry when i tell her "no").

here is another example of her telling me that he touched something she gave him. she was 'reading' him the book and that is what i was trying to get with the camera originally. she does a really great job of 'reading' him books. she tells him as much of the actual story as she can remember and then starts just telling him about the pictures. the cute part is that she turns the book so that he can see the page and asks him, "mason, can you see this page?" she does this most when he is laying on a blanket on the floor. madelyn lays down next to him and brings over book after book to read. she even includes a "the end" when she finishes one before going to get another. the book in this video is franklin wants a pet.

another note from this video is at the end when i ask her if she wants to go to bed. this is how i have been addressing thumb sucking only being for bed time. she usually just removes her thumb from her mouth, but if she does indeed want to suck her thumb she will tell me that she is going to bed and will do just that. i will go in and she is under the covers sucking her thumb with friend. she only sucks her thumb when holding friend, so if i can further limit it just to her bed room i will be happy. so far so good. love.

"no, thank you"

madelyn spent some time in her room sitting next to the bookshelf 'reading' for a while this morning. i love (and sometimes hate) that she never gets tired of her books. its also nice that she has a different favorite every day, especially with all the "again please" requests.

the book of the day was what's wrong little pookie? - over and over and over. for those of you not familiar with this literary masterpiece the basic plot is that a little boy, pookie, is crying and his mom is trying to guess why by asking him questions. we don't read this book very often but madelyn brought it out to me to read today. later she got up and gave pookie's responses when i read the mom's questions. it was pretty cute. the best part was when she said "no, thank you". this was significant because madelyn has never said "thank you" anywhere close to what it should be and now here she was saying "no, thank you" clear as i would! but when i then asked her to say "thank you" she still couldn't (or rather wouldn't) say it - that is until i asked her in this video...

here is video of her solving her shape sorter. please don't feel the need to watch it. i know that it isn't very exciting over all but i think that is pretty exciting that she can do it now (without any major frustration).

i took a pseudo sick day today (meaning that i worked but took a nap and tried to stay off the phone) and for the first time - ever - madelyn took a long nap when i needed her to take one. she slept for three hours and i got to sleep for two - hooray! i am definitely feeling better than i did on sunday but still not able to breathe very well. this is one of the weirdest things i have ever had. it is not a sinus infection and not anything i caught. i am guessing this is what allergies feel like. my head is so clogged that it is hard to hear! hopefully i can sleep well enough tonight to finally shake it.

i will definitely get some more video of madelyn this week. she is so happy to be feeling better and really loves to sing (even though she doesn't know all the words). love.

okay - its cold

madelyn and i have not been outside since 10:30am on sunday when we got home from church. it has been cold. in fact "cold" might be an understatement. when matt left for work this morning (and still at 10:30am when i last checked) it was -15 with at least a -29 degree wind chill. there were warnings for -30 to -40 so school was cancelled yesterday and today. i think that maddie and i are both getting sick of the house and wearing on each other a little. she has been quicker to fuss and cry than normal and i have been extra worn out. as a mixed blessing, it has been really busy (and stressful) at work this week and that has been a nice distraction from our containment.

i decided to try sesamestreet.org as something new to occupy madelyn indoors. there were actually a lot of games that just use the keyboard that she enjoyed playing. they aren't so much "games" as something that identifies which keys she pushes on the keyboard. i was glad to find this because we have used starfall.com on several occasions, but she can't quite get the mouse and clicking down yet. it doesn't help that we have a wireless mouse that matt and i have trouble using on occasion. i have at least gotten her to not click the whole time and wait until i get the mouse into location for the click.

today madelyn got out her animal book from the bookshelf and started 'reading' it aloud to herself. she has made sounds from books and pointed out objects on the pages by herself before, but this was the first time she went through every page and identified the item on the page. she even identified animals that i didn't know she could pronounce (i.e. "fox"). (on a side note she brought us her "panda" this morning - which she said clear as a bell.) i went to get the camera for some video, but she had moved on from the animal book (and i couldn't get her to go back to it). but here is some video of her reading from her "first words" book.

yesterday she was singing some letters to herself so i started singing the abcs while folding the laundry. when she asked me to sing it again i paused after every letter for her to repeat it. and she 'sang' the entire alphabet! (well, she skipped the "u" and went right to the "v" without me saying it first.) by the third or fourth time through she was singing every other letter for me through "g". we don't sing the abcs very often at all (like i can probably count on both hands the number of times we have) so i was pretty surprised by this. then today she was doing a pretty good job of singing "you are my sunshine" all by herself. she had asked me to sing it, but when i explained that i was still eating my lunch she started singing it to herself.

when i went in to join her playing with her kitchen tonight i was surprised to find some of our pantry items in her refrigerator! she often plays with the pantry items, but that she carried them into the other room and put them away in her kitchen was pretty cute. what was even funnier was when i asked her about the V8 soup box she told me it was "juice"; to her a cardboard box equals "juice" and to her credit, it is the same style as a juice box.

because of the extremely cold weather, we didn't spend a lot of time in the basement - it was just too cold down there. but while we were down there, madelyn discovered how to buckle her bike helmet. she was also able to release it one time by herself after i showed her how to squeeze it to release. i am always impressed by her fine motor skills.

my last story of the night is from yesterday. madelyn will lean on my lap and point to her back asking to have me "pet" her. and she doesn't want me to scratch her back, only pet it. it is just so sweet that she wants to have a moment of comfort from me. she has also asked to have her hair "pet" a few nights when she couldn't sleep. i don't know where she got the idea to call it "pet", but that is just what it is that i do. love.

this and that

okay, so last month i mentioned that madelyn was asking "what's that". shortly afterwords she stopped doing it as much. however, now its a different story! not only does she ask "what's that?" all day, but she has added "what's this?" into the rotation. and i am loving every minute of it! sometimes it is difficult to know what she is asking about because she points and sometimes she is pointing as something at a distance that could be any number of items.

it was fun today at the grocery store. she would point and say "what's that?" and i would have to quickly come up with a response without loosing track of what i was actually looking for - and i did loose track, several times.

to go with the questions and pointing is that she can point to things we ask about too. when we read books before nap time (daddy does bedtime) i can ask her "where's the dog?" and she can point to it! this makes story time that much more fun for me. and she must like it too because when we get to the end of the book she turns it back to the front cover for me to read it and quiz her again. (and if i don't quiz her she starts pointing and asking "what's that?") i am working on getting this on video. so far i have only gotten like one second because she looses focus when i get the camera.

her comprehension is getting really great too. i can ask her if she wants her diaper changed and she will go to the changing table in her room, tell her that it is bath time and she will head to the tub, when she wants milk she signs "milk" until i tell her yes, lets go get it and then she heads to the refrigerator, and last when i ask her if she is hungry she heads to the highchair and starts to climb. i think that she has climbed all the way up into the highchair at least seven times in the past two days. she just climbs up (silent as a cat) and signs for "more" when i find her. that is her sign for "eat" - we're still working on it.

back to the climbing into the highchair - well, i need more pictures. i will post more about that tomorrow. (the picture is a clue...)

she is also getting really good at her sign language - well, i am biased. she has added "daddy" to her signs. we were watching her baby einstein "first signs" dvd this afternoon (well she was watching while i made dinner for one of the neighbors) for the first time in a few months and she was trying to sign along (that is where the "daddy" dvd showed up today). when they came to the "eat" part, maddie signed "more". it gets her what she wants, so why learn the right sign, right? love.

walking

what a difference two day's makes. madelyn is probably walking 50 - 75% of the day now. when we went to the baby dedication class at our church last night the childcare workers were saying that madelyn has "the cutest little walk". here is some video of her walking at the park this afternoon. she just took off when we took her out of the stroller and after watching a little bit i ran back to get the camera. she gets a little distracted by the other kids playing the bells, but then gets going.



we got madelyn this curious george goes to the zoo book as part of our "the zoo is fun" initiative. well i think it might have helped increase her enjoyment of the zoo, but the real fun for matt and i is that george is hiding throughout the book and madelyn can point him out when we ask her to find him.

she is getting really good at pointing out what we ask her to and that is really fun for me. she can identify the zebra, lion, and giraffe above her changing table. and she is pretty close to saying "lion". (well i heard her say it twice, but matt has to hear it for it to count.) she has also added the signs for "book" and "story" to her skill set.

well, now I am caught up and should get back to posting at a more reasonable pace. love.

ridin' and readin'

madelyn was very cute reading her book in the car today when we ran out to the post office (the price of stamps go up a penny on monday). i had to pull over to snap a picture with my phone. she usually just ends up chewing on them in the car but today was a 'reading' day! (and, yes, her car seat now faces forward. her legs were no longer touching the seat because she was so squished up and we couldn't get the straps to tighten securely. plus, she had learned how to push off the backseat to make it next to impossible to strap her in when she was tired or hungry.)

what else is new with maddie? she is getting better and better with feeding herself. she will take the spoon from me when i hand it to her and put it right into her mouth without spilling anything. it takes a little bit to get it back because she needs to get a few chews in before she is ready for me to load it up again. she also loves bouncing! i go to get her when she wakes up and she sits right back down on her mattress and bounces for her own amusement. she crawls away and even reaches back for the crib when i do pick her up because she wants to bounce some more. and the crib is not alone, she also likes to bounce on the couch or anything else cushy. similarly to bouncing, she can also rock herself in the glider in her room. she climbs up in it, sits down and pushes back with her body to make it rock.

babies' finger nails grow like crazy! but maddie hit a new personal best. i cut her nails yesterday because they were crazy long after only three days since her last nail clipping! usually once a week is enough, but twice in one week is crazy. she must be having a growth spurt. neighbors are always asking how old she is when we are at the park because of how tall she is getting (and because she is an active little monkey - climbing on everything).

(there have been less videos and pictures lately because i can't take my eyes off her for a second and when i do have the camera handy she is all over it. hopefully, i can get some new video this weekend when daddy is here to distract her.)

love.

on the move

madelyn climbed up on the couch today. (i might have helped her keep her balance and not fall backwards, but she did all the work to get up there.) it amazes me that she could get her knee up high enough to climb all the way up there.

i didn't get that on video, but i did work on getting some more of her skills on video. she can just get to me and the camera so quickly that it makes filming her on my own very difficult. i have been trying to just film for a long time and then edit it down to whatever is interesting. i am going to try and get some of her signing this weekend when matt is around to help me with the filming.

she can also pull a book down and turn the pages all by herself. she will be playing in the living room and make a bee-line for the bookshelf in her bedroom. i did manage to get some of her turning pages on video today. at the very end of the video you can see how she lifts the corner of the page to turn them. at this rate she will be reading on her own in no time! what's cute is she acts like she is reading them by tilting her head back and forth while 'talking' and laughs as she looks at the pages.

i also got some better video of her 'walking' with her lion.

lastly, i want to mention that my "handsome" grandfather went to heaven this morning. he blessed this earth with his smile for 95 years. my pa-pa always said that i was his twin and that i got my good looks from him - it was our running joke. i loved him very much and look forward to seeing him again in heaven one day. i am happy to say that madelyn was able to meet this wonderful man. i will miss his smile and hearing him greet me with, "hiya, shell." very much. he was special for many reasons. love.