Various presents

A treasured pink backpack from Miss Kim and the boys.

Some new outfits, thank you Dan and Nikki!

New books.

My own princess dress from Nanaw and a noisy new friend from Grandmama and Granddad.

The cake, of course.

Lately, when you call Madeline almost anything, she responds with "NO! I SOPH!" Mommy just couldn't bring herself to put anything else on the birthday cake. Let's give Mommy a hand for managing to make a cake, throw a party, and pack for her trip all in the same day!

The first year she was ready to blow out her candles on her own!

She liked eating the cake, too.

A belated early birthday

You might remember that we celebrated Madeline Sophie's third birthday a bit early. Mommy just came back from her trip, so we are just getting around to going through the pictures. Here are me and Madeline enjoying "breakfast in bed" in my bedroom.


Here we are demonstrating Madeline's new Plasma Car, which Mommy found at the coolest toy store in the world, just before Jacob discovered it at Target:

Here are Madeline's cake and presents, waiting for the party to begin:

Update: the party has been rescheduled for Memorial Day, so there is still time if you want to get in your well wishes for the three girl.

PSA: Due to Mommy's scheduled absence in June and the impending move of our friends Jacob and Luke, we will be celebrating Madeline's birthday on May 15. She will think that day is her birthday.

I am SO EXCITED about gardening this year. I even 'found' all of Mommy's extra seeds and planted them under my slide, where they are starting to sprout. Here is the first produce of the year from the real garden! Well, ok, we have eaten parsley, basil, and kale, but I was not as excited about them. We should have more green beans and some zucchini in a few days, and there are loads of litle green tomatoes on the vines!

That scallywag Madeline Soph

Argh!

I have been very creative in my play lately. My favorite game is to "build a dollhouse" out of stuff I find in my room and put my smaller animals in it. You can see I build all the furniture out of blocks, pieces from the "Princess and the Pea" game, and washcloths. Here are Ballerina Mousie and Teddy Bear watching TV:



This is the dining room table:

Here is the princess tucked into bed:

And here is Madeline with what is currently called "HER dollhouse" (to keep her from messing up mine). She can play in it for hours.

On the way to the hospital to visit Baby Andrew, Mommy and Daddy tried to explain to Madeline that it was the same hospital where she was born. She seemed unsure of this. Walking into the building, she turned solemnly to Mommy and said, "Mommy, I am a newborn baby, and I live here now."

We're not sure exactly what she meant, but she cried if you tried to argue with her. We're a little disappointed that she has stopped saying "Born-born baby" when describing babies who have only recently left their Mommy's tummies.

Mommy has been wondering if seeing Baby Andrew and Sarah would cause me to ask any strange or difficult to answer questions, but I haven't come up with any yet. I'm sure when I do, it will be a doozy. :)

Andrew Ian!

Baby Andrew Ian was born around 2:30 this morning, after almost 24 hours of labor! He has red hair and blue eyes and weighed 8 lb 9 0z. We got to meet him today, we were all pretty excited. Sarah is doing fine and hopes to be home tomorrow-- but she could really use some sleep.

More Easter pictures

Here we are decorating our eggs on Easter. You might notice Madeline's mouth is a little bit orange....
that's because she thought the PAAS color tablets looked a lot like candy.

We had Miss Kim and the boys over for a tasty Easter dinner of roast lamb.
Madeline loves it almost as much as chicken.

We go to a very traditional church where many girls and ladies wear veils to Mass. Today, Madeline had a little handkerchief in purse in case she had a drippy nose. She pulled it out and draped it over her head just like the ladies sitting in front of us.

Today Daddy was talking to Mommy about something when I heard him make a mistake. I piped in immediately to let him know that the word is "in-UH-propriate, not in-IH-propriate."

Happy Easter!

And special thanks to Uncle Kevin for our pretty Easter dresses!

Cute and silly Madeline

I enjoyed a brief visit with Nanaw and GrandTom this weekend. We read lots of stories, played games, and had a violin lesson in person.
I cried and cried when I woke up today and Nanaw was already gone.

My first violin recital

Here I am with two of my classmates, performing at my first violin recital!

Up like a rocket, down like the rain, back and forth like a choo-choo train.

POP! Goes the Weasel.

Me with my teacher, Miss Conny.

Hello from sunny Texas

It's that time of the year when you remember why it's great to live here. Wildflower time! Last year there were no flowers at all, so we're really enjoying seeing them this year. These are right outside the elementary school I will attend next fall.