Our Maddie

Maddie is so much fun! She has an amazing vocabulary, a photographic memory, a silly sense of humor, and a little bit of attitude all wrapped up in a string bean body!

Here are her stats:

WEIGHT - 26.4 pounds - 14%

HEIGHT - 36 inches - 32%

HEAD - 19 inches - 45%

Maddie is a total sponge and loves to learn new things. She loves floor puzzles and will work on them for hours. She builds them and then tears them apart and assembles them again. She loves the anticiapation of finishing the puzzle, so before she places the last piece in the puzzle, she looks around to make sure everyone is watching. Then she put the piece in upside down just to draw out the moment even longer. When she finally finishes the puzzle, she runs around the room shouting, "Maddie did the whole puzzle!"

Here she is with three of her favorite puzzles - she likes to dump all the pieces in a big pile and do all three puzzles at the same time.

Maddie goes to preschool story time at the library and she loves it. It's such a cute little program. They have songs with actions, story time, and a craft. Maddie loves the toddler section of the library. I'm so happy she loves the library as much as I do! We can be bookworms together.

We spend A LOT of time at the park. Yucaipa has lots of beautiful parks with big open areas of huge trees and lots of green grass to run around in. Maddie is like her mom and hates to wear shoes and socks. She is constantly taking her shoes off and running around barefoot at the park.

Maddie at Seventh Street Park. She calls this park "Turtle Park" because there is a stone turtle sculpture for the kids to climb on.

Maddie is such a sweet girl. She calls the other kids at the park "friends". I love how she looks at any new people as friends - I should be more like my Maddie.

I love this girl :) She still has the most intense eyes and the longest, thickest eyelashes I have ever seen on a little girl.

Maddie sitting on a caterpillar climbing structure at Wildwood Canyon Park. She calls this park "Ladybug Park" because she thinks the caterpillar she's sitting on looks like a ladybug.

Maddie loves music. She loves to learn new songs, especially ones that include actions. Grandpa pulls out his guitars most Sunday nights after family dinner. Maddie loves to play along with Grandpa. He is so sweet and patient with her. He lets her use his "picnics" (guitar picks) and pluck his guitar. He also prints out sheet music for children's songs and plays songs she knows. She thinks Grandpa is so amazing that he can play "Hokey Pokey" or "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" on his guitar. She frequently makes requests for him to play songs from Toy Story or Lion King. She just assumes he knows every song.

Maddie & I were waiting at the pediatrician's office for the doctor to come in and she decided to sing some songs. Here is a medley of "Itsy Bitsy Spider", "Popcorn Popping", & "Wheels on the Bus".

Maddie loves to sing to Macey. And Macey just eats it up. They are in love with each other. Here is a Maddie original called "Roxy Tonight". She loves Laura, Bryant, and their dog Roxy. She frequently sings about them, plays pretend and names her toys after them, and asks about them.

And here is a spirited rendition of "If You're Happy & You Know It". She sang this one with her cousin Adam. This is one of her favorites.

Maddie's other fun thing to do is attend tumbling class. She goes to Tumble Tots and learns all kinds of fun things. They are so great with the kids - the instructors teach them stretches, songs, and gymnastics tricks. Maddie just loves it. She asks to go to tumbling every day when she wakes up.

Here she is at circle time, stretching and listening intently to the instructor.

She has so much fun every week - this is a real Maddie smile.

One of the stretches is sung to "Humpty Dumpty" and it's Maddie's favorite one. She re-enacts it at home all the time.

Look for Maddie to be joining the USA gymnastics team in about 15 years. Here are the beginnings of a backflip.

At the end of each class, the instructors pull out the parachute and let them play with it.
 

They finish up by letting the kids ride on it while we sing "Ring Around the Rosy". Maddie looks forward to it every week and just squeals with delight as she spins in the middle with her friends.

Maddie such a wonderful big sister and such a joy in our family. We love to watch her grow and develop each day. She keeps us laughing all day long.

Macey Bug!

Macey is 3 months old and has completely turned into a happy, content baby! Her first few weeks were a little rough. She had some gas/acid reflux issues she needed to grow out of.

Here is her list of milestones so far...

Hold head up - on her birthday!

Smiling - 2 weeks

Cooing - 5 weeks

Sleeping through the night (medical definition - 6 hours) - 6 weeks

Batting at toys - 9 weeks

Laughing - 11 weeks

At 3 months, she is perfectly happy playing in her exersaucer, bumbo, or jungle play mat for a long time. She absolutely adores Maddie and loves to watch her play all day.

And in the most exciting Macey news...

SHE IS SLEEPING ALL THE WAY THROUGH THE NIGHT! She consistently sleeps from 10pm to 7am or later - that's NINE hours! Wahoo! I owe all of her good sleep habits to her Aunt Jessica who has faithfully taken "night duty" since the night we came home from the hospital. She is my own personal baby nurse! What new mom gets to just go to bed and not wake up every couple of hours with their newborn? Lucky me!

 

Here are some fun pictures of my sweet Macey baby over the past few weeks...

 

First smiles starting to appear! Such a pretty girl.

A video of Macey cooing - I love those sweet baby noises.

Grandma Eatough LOVES to bathe her grandbabies. Macey took a bath in Grandma's kitchen sink one night and loved it. Naked pictures of Macey are so funny because they show how truly big she is. She has major fat rolls and a big muffin top tummy. I love how her chunky cheeks sit on her chest hiding her invisible neck. She is so different than my string bean Maddie!

Grandma Eatough is such a fun grandma! She calls Macey her Angels lucky charm because every time she watches an Angels baseball game with her, they win!

Me & my Macey bug!

Love that chunky face! 

Uncle Richard is such a softy when it comes to his nieces and nephews. He loves to hold the babies and play with the toddlers. He always asks my girls for hugs and to hold them. Underneath that fake smile, he is secretly loving holding his newest niece!

More smiles!

Macey's 2 month check up was on April 12th - here are her stats...

Weight: 13.5 lbs - 92 % (no surprise there!)

Length: 22.25 in. - 35% (oh no, I hope she's not short like me!)

Head: 15.75 - 72%

I couldn't resist taking a picture of my fat, naked baby on the exam table. She was cooing at her pediatrician and having a fun time making the exam table paper crinkle under her arms and legs.  

And then came the shots :(  In true Macey fashion, she sucked down the oral immunization faster than you'd believe. She thought it was quite tasty. But, as you can imagine, she did not care for being stuck in her legs. Oh well, maybe one day she'll thank me for immunizing her against all the scary diseases. Maddie came with us to the doctor and was very protective of her sister. She didn't want the doctor poking around in Macey's ears or mouth. And she was the first one to console Macey after her shots. She is such a good big sister - or "fister" as she pronounces it.

Macey is really into textures right now. She absolutely is in love with the sweet baby blanket Laura made for her. She finds it in her bed, curls her chubby hands around it, and chews on it.

We love our sweet Macey girl & can't believe how much she changes every day!

A Visit from the Farrs!

One of the worst things about moving from Arizona to California was leaving Laura & Bryant. We love them so much and spent a lot of time with them. Laura was a second mom to Maddie. We all cried when we moved. But, Laura & Bryant came out for a quick visit and it was so fun to see them!

They brought their sweet little dog Roxy with them which just thrilled Maddie to pieces. She has missed playing with "Rockies". They came to the park with us and Maddie had so much fun playing with them.

Laura got to meet her new niece Macey and the first order of business was putting her in a super cute outfit and matching bow. Laura was always so great about dressing Maddie up and pulling out her next size up clothing. Maddie & Macey are so lucky to have you for an aunt! 

Maddie took Roxy on lots and lots of walks. Poor Roxy probably slept the whole way back to Arizona after Maddie was done running her all over Southern California. 

Laura & Bryant took Maddie to the beach for her first trip to the ocean! Macey was still a little small for that long of a trip, so they took Maddie for an adventure. I sure missed her, but I'm so glad she went. She had lots and lots of fun.

She came home and told me all about the big lake (the ocean), the sand, and the birds. 

She had lots of fun feeding Nutri Grain bars and graham crackers to the seagulls.

Maddie on the pier. 

Maddie just soaking up the So Cal beach reading a good book with some good snacks. 

Headed down to the water - I bet it was FREEZING!

Such a sweet picture. My baby's toes touching the Pacific Ocean for the first time!

Laura & Bryant took Maddie down to the water and told her to run away from the waves. She took that advice a little too literally and kept running and running and running. She is so silly.

Maddie's idea of heaven - endless sand to play with, get dirty in, and draw pictures in. 

Looks like a snake to me. 

That's my Maddie girl! 

Laura & Bryant, we miss you guys so much! Thanks for a super fun visit and for being such a great aunt and uncle to my babies! We'll see you soon!

PS- We are SO EXCITED to see Baby Farr in November! What a lucky baby to get you both for parents! What a miracle. Prayers are always answered!

Wildflowers in Yucaipa!

The wildflowers this spring have been amazing after an especially wet winter. We took Maddie out to her favorite park so we could take a walk through the wildflowers. She had so much fun!

She has recently discovered dandelions and how much fun they are to blow. She calls them "diddy-wyons" and tries and tries to blow the dandelion apart. After a while she hands it to me so I can blow it for her. While the dandelion seeds are floating around, she runs around in the cloud of them and yells "BUBBLES!"

The trail was beautiful all lined with wildflowers.

Maddie loves the park. She asks to go every day and we usually end up there every day so she can run around and soak up some sunshine. She likes the slides and swings, but she mostly likes to explore. She is a wanderer. She loves to find rocks, flowers, and dirt. She was in heaven with all these wildflowers she could pick.

 Maddie sat down against this fence post to smell some flowers.

Love this picture.

My Maddie flower in a sea of flowers. She couldn't believe how many flowers there were. She kept saying, "Look at all the fwowers!"

Hiking up the last part of the trail. The scenery in Yucaipa is such a beautiful backdrop for photos.

Maddie loved sitting in the flowers and did not want to leave!

Smelling the flowers - she's learning how to actually sniff things. Usually, she picks up a flower and blows on it, imitating the sniffing noise.

We are loving the beautiful spring weather in sunny Southern California. Hopefully the wildflowers stick around for a while - they are amazing!