Turkey Day

Karin cooked up a Thanksgiving dinner and Andy, Meme and Pepe came over.  She outdid herself this year.  Madelyn loved having everybody over and got to play a good game of chase with Pepe and spent the afternoon running all over the house.

Sitting in a "big-girl" chair is a big hit now, it's funny how kids always want to do what they see the older kids doing.

Kicking back and watching some TV, sometimes you just have to let things slide :)

Ok, I'll go back to sleep....

Somebody asked about PEPs, so here is the link. It's been great for us to connect with other parents who are going though all of the fun that we are going though, rather than stay at home and go crazy by ourselves.

http://www.pepsgroup.org/

Thankfully it seems like Madelyn's latest round of teething is just about over and we are back to our normal sleep routine. She'll still wake up here and there screaming (like there is a snake or something in her bed), but just having us walk into the room seems to be enough for her to go back to sleep.

Whenever she wants to go outside now she will round up her coat and shoes and bring them over to you and insist that you put them on. She won't take "No" for an answer, I guess she just wants to see what's going on in the neighborhood or get the mail, how could you resist that?

Walking upright up the stairs (with us holding her hands) is a big hit now. She's not terrible content to crawl up the stairs like she used to do, she would rather hold your hand and try to do it herself. Our only new food this past week has been avocado, it takes her a few bites to get started but she seems to like it. She also ate a piece of Pizza the other day while at PEPS. This is a huge deal for us, most of the time she's just not up for new foods.

Big Sisters Rock???

What's this on Maddy's T-shirt........"Big Sisters Rock".

Hmmmmmm......


Yep, that's correct! Madelyn will get the chance to be a big sister when our newest addition arrives in late May. Karin is 14 weeks pregnant with Madelyn's sibling! It took Meme and Pepe a few minutes to decipher the t-shirt but their reaction was worth the wait. And the look of surprise on their faces says it all!


We are excited about having another child and nervous all at the same time. It seems like just yesterday that we brought Madelyn home and into our lives and now were doing it all over again! Wish us luck with two little screamers. :)

Just go back to Sleep!

We've had a near perfect sleep record for the past 6 months, at least 12 hours or more, for so long that we have forgotten what's it's like to have sleep issues at all. That all came to a screeching halt about 10 days ago. Madelyn has discovered that there are monsters under her bed trying to eat her judging from the amount crying and the fight that she puts up at bedtime and when she wakes up in the middle of the night. The latest round of teething must not be helping but it's most likely a case of separation anxiety that kids go though around this age, or is it the gas that she's been passing lately? We basically had a three day/night train wreck earlier this week, with one parent being sick and Madelyn fighting us every time she got close to her crib. We've both caught the other parent standing at Madelyn's door at 2:00am, telling her off in a stern voice and trying to reason with her on why she should go back to sleep. This normally does not work and it takes one of us hanging out in her room rubbing her back for a few minutes to calm her down enough to go back to sleep. We are exhausted like we were in the first few weeks of parenthood and so ready for this phase to be over. Lucky for us everything at this age comes in phases, so if things got worse, things can get better with a little bit of TLC.

Autumn

The sugar maple has dropped it's red leaves again and it was time to take another fall picture in the front yard.  What a difference a year makes, same bumbo, same weekend and alot more hair on her head this time around.

Big grins can be had by doing anything unexpected, like covering Wyatt in leaves.  We had so much fun at the Aquarium last weekend that we went back for another visit, we skipped the fish&chips this time around but ate goldfish crackers instead.

Aquarium

We bought a family membership to the Aquarium and decided to go check it out today. Madelyn had tons of fun checking out all the fish and just as much fun checking out the other kids.

Her favorite part was the touch tanks where she stuck her hands in and splashed up a storm. All the other kids are gently toughing sea stars and our kid is busy trying to splash all the water out of the tank.

So how hard can it be to take a picture of a toddler? Out of the 15 frames above we got one good picture. Madelyn had her tongue hanging out in a few shots, her eyes closed in another and a booger got picked somewhere along the way. It seems the harder we try to pose a shot the more that we fail. She decided to try some of our Fish&Chips at lunch, I always feel bad eating fish at the Aquarium but we split an order anyhow. She also drank milk this week for the first time in months.

But wait, wasn't Halloween the other day, where are the cute costume pictures? Umm Madelyn decided that she she was not going to wear one this year, we must have missed the memo that she sent to us. We tried a few different costumes last week including this pumpkin one, every time we got close to her with it she shook her head -no-no-no. At some point you cut your losses wipe up the tears and decide to try for next year. Madelyn was a bit wigged out by her friends in costumes at her playgroup this week, as well!

Brooks

Lots of new stuff has been happening with Madelyn these past few weeks, but first a word about Brooks. Madelyn has known Brooks though Karin's Peps group since she was about 3 weeks old, he's a few days older than her. His mother Wendy, and their new daughter Georgia, come over to play from time to time.

These two have seem to have hit it off. Madelyn still loves to sit on whatever she can find and today it happened to be Brooks.



On to the new stuff, we must be in some sort of growth spurt. Madelyn has gained about a pound in the last month and she's weighs about 25lb 8oz now. She's not as much fun to carry around as she used to be. We also have four teeth on their way in. The first molars erupted from the gums about a week ago and have begun their decent. It's gotta hurt pushing that much out so we've been using Motrin on the rough nights. Lots of new words have begun tumbling out of her mouth. Hi! is still her favorite word to say but Dogeee, Katee, and dat(that) have also shown up, along with her first attempts at making animal sounds, panting for a dog, and trying to trumpet like an elephant. This usually ends up with her spitting all over the place. She knows what no and yes means in their general terms. Mom's tought her to nod her head yes if she wants more cheese and to wave her hands when she "All done" with her food, bath etc...

We've been doing little kids puzzles with her recently and it's amazing to watch her learn how to twist the pieces around to make everything fit. She'll clap her hands when she finishes a puzzle and expects us to do the same. The green couch in the family room has also been conquered. After tossing her leg onto the couch and trying and trying to get on it for weeks, she's finally managed to do so on her own. We put off teaching her how to climb on the furniture but it was only a matter of time. Meme has thankfully taught her what "On your belly" means in order to get off. On your belly also works at the playground with slides, I normally take her a few times a weekend and she'll flop over on her belly to go down. This has worked well for the last two months, but recently it's become obvious that I now need a spotter. I used to be able send her down and then go down the slide myself, but our last two attempts ended up with her going to fast and her flopping face first on the wood chips. Thanks to Dad she also got her first owie on her knee the other day while we were playing around outside in cute pink pants instead of her jeans. She knows the sound of an airplane now and will look up when they cruise overhead.

Food is always a challenge but she always manages to eat enough. Yogurt, bananas, pasta, cheese and raisins are her favorites. Bread, grapes, pears, and maybe peas get consumed depending on the mood. And of course she could eat her weight in Pirate's Booty if you let her.

Favorite bedtime books change from time to time but the sure winners are One Yellow Lion, Tails and Mrs Spider's tea party. Bedtime is as close to 7:00pm as we can get and most days she'll sleep into 7:30ish in the morning. One 1.5 hour nap is all we get now after lunch.

Pumpkin Time

We did some fun things this week! Madelyn, Mom, and some friends went to our first theater show at Seattle Children's Theater. So Cute! We saw 'The Green Sheep', which was a cute tale all about finding the green sheep. Parents & Kids all sat in the "sheep pen" while actors put on the show around us. Maddy was mesmerized for most of it and then madly trying to get snacks out of my diaper bag, however there was a 'no food allowed' policy, which made for a frantic mom trying to distract her persistent child. We'll definitely do this in the future, but will most certainly be leaving the diaper bag 'aka snacks' in the car!

Madelyn, Molly, & Grayden enjoying snacks after the show

Meme giving Madelyn a some good tickle time!

The weekend weather was beautiful, so we took advantage of it and headed out to Craven's Pumpkin Patch. Definitely a popular place on Saturday afternoon and the crowds of families & kids was a bit intimidating for mom! However, Maddy loved it - all the cute displays, the pumpkins, and of course tons of other kids for her to stare at. We made our way out to the Pumpkin Patch and let Maddy explore a bit. She had fun beating on some pumpkins and attempting to pick them up - quite funny! And, of course, we found a couple of them that came home with us! I guess next weekend we will have to carve them up.

"Hey what about this one, Mom?"

"Wait Dad, I can get it..."

Happy Baby

I'm not really sure what Karin gave Madelyn to eat the other morning but it sure made her happy. We have a few packs of alphabet and number cards that she is in love with lately. She will dump them all on the rug and place the cards back in their box with the animal side up, again and again and again and yet again. Hey if it makes her that happy we'll buy her a few more packs.

Wyatt is such a trooper with her, unless she's trying to sit on him he'll put up with the tail pulling and fur grabbing for some attention.

Swimming Lessons

Swimming lessons started this week. It usually Madelyn a few times to warm up to anything new, so she was the only kid, out of about 12 in her class, to pitch a fit. Her favorite part was learning to climb out of the pool. The poor girl thought we were done every time she got out she had a smile on her face, only to then be tossed back in again. Maybe the second lesson will be better for her.

Mobility is improving, we are seeing her run around from time to time. I think she surprises herself when doing so because it usually leads to a fall in about 10 steps after she gets going. We are down to one nap now. She let us know that the afternoon nap was no longer an option a few weeks ago. This has made bedtime easier, a dip in the bath, 2-3 books including her favorite "One Yellow Lion", into the crib and she's out like a light.

Have we mentioned how much Madelyn liks to sit? We bought her a chair the other weeks but she seems to be obsessed with walking around and sitting down on anything that she can find.

5 year anniversary photo

Port Townsend

Last weekend was spent at Fort Worden in a old officer's house with the family. Madelyn enjoyed being the center of attention and having lots of new rooms to explore. We hung out, played games and took a few trips to the beach. She enjoyed climbing on the logs, finding places to sit and sticking her face in the sand. Well maybe not the sticking her face in the sand part but I suppose every kid has to do that once or twice.

New tricks this week are walking backwards, shaking her head sideways for "NO", and learning how to grab Wyatt's tail. She grabs on for all she's worth and gets dragged all around the room, the first time it happened I was laughing so hard all I could say to our poor cat was, "You're on your own buddy." Wyatt is so desperate for attention that he'll put up with this abuse for now.

Munching on some Strawberries

UUmmmmmmmm

The fun never stops

Day by day Madelyn is showing off more of her toddler traits. Temper tantrums-check, testing out Mom and Dad's limits-check, being a pick eater-check, Seperation Anxiety-check.

She still loves the cats and has fun chasing them around the yard when we are outside. Pasta is now her number one favorite food, you would think she was part Italian by the way she sucks it down.

Checking out a book

Raisins

I'm not sure how many of you knew this, but Michael usually writes the posts. However, I had to jump on and add in bit about Raisins. Who knew how much a child could love raisins. Previously they were the food in the pantry that really just sat there.....for years. But now, its a top-shelf staple and and there is always a supply in my diaper bag.

Madelyn has days were she just goes crazy over her raisins. Last Thursday was the day for raisins. She got the bag of raisins from me and drug it all over the kitchen and family room, so proud of herself and desperately trying to figure out how to get into the bag.

And of course, at one point we had tears over the bag of raisins, most likely that she couldn't get into it fast enough!

She had to show Wyatt her raisins. He was not interested!

Letting go, down the slide....

Blog postings have slowed down these past few months and I guess we have just figured out why, we seem to be spending most of our time chasing after Madelyn, or playing with her. Pictures are also hard to come by as she is constantly in motion rarely stopping for more than 10-20 seconds with each toy, gone are the days where we could stick her on the couch and pose her for a few shots.

Madelyn continues to love her new found freedom. I took her to the playground this weekend, her favorite thing to do as always is to watch what the other big kids are doing. If they scoop up bark chips and mound them into piles, then Maddy is sure to follow suit. She loves to climb and after getting to the top of the equipment all that is usually left to do is slide back down, usually a problem with only one parent around. However we watched a 17month old named Colin slide down on his belly-feet first, so of course Maddy wanted in on the fun, so down she went. It was hard letting go of her little hands and the slide made for a good parallel of sorts, but part of process of raising a kid must be knowing when to let go. She loved it so much that she raced back to the steps and wanted to do it again. It's amazing to think that a little over a year ago we took home a newborn and now we have this little person running around. We also managed to get to the Mountlake Terrace pool for another swim session.

Another milestone this weekend was the daycare center at the YMCA. I've taken her into it a few times to get used to the place, the first time we left her, she came absolutely unglued. Saturday was actually different, she cried for about 5 minutes, the cry that peels paint from the walls and tingles the eardrums of everybody who is near, then surprisingly she settled down for the next 45 minutes and played with the toys. Her favorite activity is getting into and out of the little kids chairs, sitting down fascinates her and she's always happy to find a chair that fits her.

Still a picky eater at dinner time but thank goodness for blueberries, strawberries and most recently Pita bread.

New Shoes

Madelyn is still adjusting to life on two feet and like any one year old loves to explore anything and everything within her reach. The new shoes that came today were a big hit.
She can walk around on flat surfaces just fine, scoot backwards when she wants to and has begun to realize that the subtleties of walking on grass or an uneven surface. At the playground yesterday she wanted to get on the slide so from afar we commented, "No way she gets up on that herself", sure enough she hiked a leg up, tossed it onto the slide and climbed on, stood up and proceed to try to walk up the slide as far as she could, while her Dad ran over to act as a spotter.

Still a picky eater, she likes white bread, Ummmmmmm, blueberries and the old stand-by, cheese. Closing doors is a new trick that she's learned, often times she'll shut herself in our walk-in closet with the lights out. I guess I would be more impressed if she turned the lights on first. The cats are still her friends, she'll laugh and bend down to pet Wyatt whenever he's in the room with her.

Portsmouth, NH part II

The heat and the duration of our trip wore us out so we did not venture too far on Sunday. We spent our last afternoon in Portsmouth touring the historical museum of Strawberry Banke. A group of citizens formed the museum in 1957 when the neighborhood was threatened to be demolished. Homes that were available for tours range from about the 1680's up to the 1940's. The Goodwin house shown below was just one example of a ship captains home, built around 1812.

We woke up at 3:30am on Monday to finish packing and drive into Boston to catch our flight, I think Madelyn was about the only person who slept the night before. Google maps led us on a wild goose chase of some seedy neighborhoods near the airport on the way back to Thrifty car rental, we eventually found our way, boarded the plane and crossed our fingers. But we apparently did not have Karma on our side for the return trip and Madelyn proved to be a extremely difficult flyer. She screamed so much that Alaska took away her frequent flyer miles for the trip, apparently the first time the airline has done so for a toddler. The little woman just wanted to get down and walk around but on a crowded 737 that's just not an option.

So we pulled out every trick in the book and then some to calm her down. I especially loved the dirty looks that a few passengers shot us, yes your evil stares helped immensely in calming our child down. The tears eventually ran dry, our ears split open from the sound, she played with the two kids in the row behind us, and finally we landed in Seattle. We are happy we took the trip, overjoyed to be back home and are not getting on a plane again for a very long time.

Portsmouth, NH

We landed in Portsmouth, NH for a few days. It's a great port city with lots of Colonial and Victorian buildings still in tack, think of a city with about 10 times the number of historic buildings of Port Townsend and founded in about the 1640's to get an idea of what it's like. Last night we took a harbor cruise, the first half was great but the second half was rough due to be couped up on a boat.

Sunset Cruise

This photo is great because is shows how independent Madelyn has become at times. Just a week ago we needed 10 minutes in a new place before she would be willing to check things out on her own. Now it's more like 10 seconds to get the lay of the land and she's off and running.

Checking things out with Angus

Helping Mom pack

Fishing boats in Portsmouth Harbor