My sweet girl!

Okay, so all of my posts could have that title - very unoriginal, but really, Maleah is my sweet girl. Yesterday, I was at my mom's helping her with some bookshelves. We were both fairly busy with our hands, so Maleah was just kind of doing her own thing - favorite thing at Grandma MB's is to play with the magnetic letters on Grandma's fridge. Anyway, after who knows how long, we noticed Maleah kept singing, "happy day". My mom and I were both trying to sing any songs that we could think of that said happy day. Last night when I put Maleah to bed, I started her lullaby CD (one of my favorite things - "A Child's Prayer"). I started singing the first song to her and she started singing it with me! The song is "I am Like a Star". Well, in it there is a line - "happy things each day". That is what she has been singing! The video clip is not that great, but I was trying to do it alone today - I will get a better one with Rex later, but wanted something up now.

Here, Spider, Spider!

***Jenn, do not read the following post***

Okay, so if you know me at all, you know I love spiders. There are certain species I love to kill, but none the less, I love them. Well, today I looked at Maleah's diaper bag to make sure it was fully stocked for Grandma's house, and noticed some wispy spider webs around the little side, bottle holder, pocket thing. I have seen quite few baby spidees lately, so I figured one had made itself a little home and I would pinch him before he made himself too comfy. Well, I used a pen to pull out the webs, expecting to find the baby somewhere in the webs, no luck! Then I stretched opened the pocket (elastic around the top is not so helpful when looking for spiders) and took a peek inside to find a GINORMOUS SPIDEE! I quickly smashed the pocket as best I could from the outside, hoping to squash him, then I got my (absolutely, adorable, PINK) rubber gloves and reached in to make sure he was gone . . . phew! No more fully intact spidee. I did however get each of his pieces out of the pocket. His longest legs are more then a half an inch long!!!!! Yikes! Maleah doesn't get to play in her diaper bag anymore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just to clarify, I still love spiders, just not when those yucky ones invade my space.

Ft. Lauderdale

Yay for the beach!

Maleah loved the sand, sun and waves!

Books, books, books!

Since Maleah was about 7 months old, she has had her favorite books. First was That's Not My Princess, a touchy feely book. Since then - Are You My Mother?; Llama, Llama Red Pajama; Ten Little Ladybugs; Mommy Mine; I Love You As Much; Monster at the End of This Book; Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star (with ASL signs), etc. Well, tonight I was putting her to bed and we read Dr. Seuss' ABC boardbook. We have read it a couple of other times. Before we finished it, she pulled the book out of my hands and started flipping through the pages. She pointed at the doughnuts and duckdog and said some Maleah talk. I said, "I see doughnuts and a duckdog, that page must be 'D'" Then she said, "D, D, D" Then she turned to some other pages and said more Maleah talk and looked at me as if for a response. OOOO! The beginnings of early literacy - remembering repeating phrases! She is such a cutie.

Bedtime fun!

(This picture is really from her birthday - 7:00 AM, but is shows her in her crib) I really have had good intentions to keep up this blog. I really need to use it like a journal (but I am horrible at journal keeping as well). Tonight was one of the funnest nights putting Maleah to bed, so I have to share. To start off - Maleah didn't get a good afternoon nap today, so she was a bit grumpy at dinner and didn't want to go to bed. I asked Rex if he could do it and he said, "yes". Usually she goes down easier for him than me - not tonight. She screamed for about 10 minutes (longer than usual), so I decided to go get her. Her scream was not her usual, "I don't want to sleep" cry. It was pretty moany. She was happy to see me, but still crying. I got her out and sat in her rocking chair with her. She calmed down and eventually started playing peek-a-boo with me using her blanket. She is getting pretty advanced these days - pulling the blanket slowly down, so she can peek or pulling the blanket to the side, so one eye peeks out and she blinks it slowly waiting for you to see her. So Adorable!!! Well, we had a little tickle time. She has never really been a real laugher, so when you do get a real laugh out of her it is precious. Her laugh is absolutely addicting! We have been working on identifying face parts - eye, nose, chin, cheeks, etc. So we played this game for a while. She loves to carefully touch her eyelashes and mine. (side note - when she sees me putting on mascara on in the mirror, she pulls herself up and "puts on mascara" with her finger) Anyway, this game turned into a kissing game and Megan can attest that Maleah's kisses are intense. Once she has her mind set on kissing your lips, she will not let anything stop her and you can see her determination in her eyes. So fun. Well, she kept going back to touching my eyelashes and then giving kisses, so I showed her butterfly kisses. She is hooked! She giggles, when I butterfly kiss her on her nose and moves my head back and forth so she can get kisses from both eyes. When I finally put her back in her crib, she still wasn't completely happy, but a quick butterfly kiss on her nose helped quite a bit! I absolutely love being Maleah's mom!

First Real Blog Post!

Okay, so I finally have something to say. YAY! I ran . . . okay,walked/jogged my first 5K! It was so much fun. It was for the Art City Days in Springville. I did it in 40:58. Not a world record, but it felt good. It was raining and freezing cold. Maleah was not really happy about being out in the elements at first, but eventually she fell asleep. Salem Days Fun Run, here we come!

Convert - finally!

I love to read all my friends' and families' blogs, but didn't dare start my own. Well, today is the day. I did it. It is created. I will keep it updated (okay, that may be a resolution fated for failure, but it is worth a try!)