Little Miss Personality

In the past month or so, our little Madeline has developed quite a cute little personality.  It is amazing to me how much they pick up on at just 11 months!  She's aware now of what's happening when we take something away from her and lets out a loud cry letting us know she is not happy with what we just did!  Don't even think about taking a toothbrush away from her...it will not be pretty!  I had to get a toothbrush for her just so I could brush my teeth with my own toothbrush!  She also has this pitiful, fake little sad face that she makes when she is unhappy...usually winning us over every time. 

As many of you know, Madeline is our squirmiest baby...she doesn't like to hold still...ever!  She will hold her hands up wanting to be held, but then squirm back down in a matter of seconds...then do it all over again.  Her favorite thing to do now is climb the stairs...she'll usually stop halfway to see if I'm looking, then race the rest of the way up when she sees me coming.  Another thing she discovered how to do is to stand on top of the dishwasher when I am trying to load it.  I have to load as quickly as I can to try to avoid the wrath of the "Little Destroyer" as we call her.  This is the age when she is into everything.  All the contents from our drawers often end up all over the floor.

She constantly learning from her big sisters, Rose and Ava and will try to imitate them...never wanting to be left out.  She knows to draw on the sidewalk with chalk...although I believe she thinks that eating it is a better use of her time.  And just the other night at bedtime, I was reading Rose and Ava some books and Madeline was entertaining herself in their bedroom.  She found a backpack and tried to put it on her back...she almost got it right.  Then she found a headband that she tried to put on her head and walked around the room like that, carrying a blankie.  She was pretty proud of hereself:)

This is such a fun age of discovery and Madeline is such a sweet, happy little girl...we can't help but pick her up and snuggle her.

Hugs!

Preparing for the Unexpected

As a parent, you always try to be prepared for anything and everything that could go wrong at any time.  However, I think every parent will agree that there are often unexpected events that occur that you could never possibly prepare for.  Parents have to be quick-thinking and try to handle the situation with as much grace and poise as possible, even if we are truly freaking out inside.  For example, the daily dealings of a two year-old can quickly go from sweet to sour without an ounce of notice.

As many of you have already heard, we had such a situation this past weekend, when Rose and Ava posed as flower girls for their Uncle Ben's wedding.  Knowing how tempermental Ava can be, we tried to be prepared for the worst, with my Dad waiting in the back of the church, pacifier in hand, in case she freaked out and wouldn't walk down the aisle.  We had Rose and the other 7 year-old flower girl hold her hand and we tried to plan for them to sit down immediately after the reached the front to avoid distracting the guests.  Well, all this planning proved to be of no help with what actually went down that day.  After successfully walking down the aisle, Paul and I watched helplessly from the sidelines (because we both had a part in the ceremony) as Ava begins to fuss and decides to throw her flower girl basket in the middle of the aisle.  As her wailing gets increasing louder, I worry that the guests can not hear the preacher so I motion her to join me on the altar where I was waiting to read.  As she walks loudly up the steps to me, she steps on the bottom of her dress and falls flat on the floor.  Quickly I try to scoop her up and carry her out the side entrance of the church.  Luckily my Dad was quick on his feet and met me at the door so I could be back in time to do my reading. 

...Things went pretty much went as bad as they could go.  After the wedding, Paul and I replayed the events over and over in our heads coming up with multiple things we could have done to make things go smoother.  But the truth is, you can not always prepare for the worst.  We just have to try to do the best we can with what we know at that time.

Luckily God knew what he was doing when he made 2 year-olds so stinking cute...it is hard to be upset for very long!

Hugs!