Snack Time

I’m a very routine kind of person.  Mally and I do the same thing every morning, afternoon and night.  But there are times where you need to switch it up.  So yesterday afternoon we had snacks on the kitchen floor.  We also got to eat our snack out of a little cup!  Oh my!  What fun was had!

I love watching her little hand get those treats out of that container!  Adorable!

She also does this trick where she spins in circles on her butt.  Here she is spinning and shaking her cup.  I even captured treats flying out of the cup!

On the Go Photography

Now that Mallory has entered the crawling stage I have to enter a whole new photography stage called… think quick!! 

I was feeling adventurous yesterday morning so I dressed her up… er… um… put a necklace on her!  : )  I get her in the chair set my settings, or so I thought.  And then looked at my screen and saw these dark pictures.  Ick.

Made some adjustments.  Too bright!!  And now she wants down already I have only taken 3 pictures and they were all dark!

I’ll put her on the floor.  AHHH!  Forgot to change my settings again!!  I have to be quick with her because she won’t sit still but then I forget to set my camera up and then she is gone light a bolt of lightening.

I mean gone!  She is heading right out of the room! 

Down the hallway!  I’m still trying to set my camera as she crawls away and it is not working!  My brain can’t think fast enough!

  Wait!  I should really brush my teeth while I’m crawling by the bathroom.

  Enough of that.  Lets go!  I can brush while I crawl!

Back down the hallway and I have finally turned the camera to auto!  Enough is enough!  : )

She stopped to pose for me!  Aww!  Good thing I was on Auto or this picture would of never turned out.

Brush some more!  She has three teeth you know!  It takes a lot of brushing to keep them sparkly white.

My books!!  See my toothbrush back there!  I brought it with me all way from the bathroom!  Silly girl!

Uhoh!  Elmo is on!

One last sweet picture from our little “session”.

Back to brushing teeth…

and reading books!

Chapter 2

I think it is official… we have reached the second chapter in Mallory’s world… Toddlerhood!!

She has perfected sitting on her own.  She has modified her crawl (yet again) into this sort of half sit half crawl position.  That way when she gets to her destination she doesn’t have to work so hard to sit.  LOL.  She is off the bottle!!!  Okay it has only been two days of no bottle… but I packed them away and she now drinks milk from a sippy cup.  Before she would drink anything from a sippy cup, but you put milk in it and she wanted nothing to do with it.  Speaking of milk – I’ve started to transition her to real milk this week also.  I’m on the verge of getting my OWN body back!!!  I’m so very excited to leave my little friend in the closet to collect dust for awhile!!  : )

Oh and this week I found Mallory like this when I went to get her from her nap.

Hi Momma!

She was so proud of herself!! 

Now getting her to take a nap is a little challenge.  Especially since her sound machine batteries are dying and it only plays for literally 5 seconds and shuts off.  Yesterday I went up there and she is sitting up, banging on the sound machine… I think she was trying to fix it for us.  : )

Yes she is going to one of those that has to fall asleep to sound.  The other afternoon we were at my parents house sitting outside and she was so tired so we put her in the truck in her car seat to take a nap.  She fussed.  I told Jesse to turn the radio on… she was asleep in seconds!

I remember when I was an awkward middle schooler and my cousin, Megan, was a cool high schooler.  She had me come stay with her on a school night!!  We did such fun things like go to a gymnastics meet and then I think the basketball game.  Oh and then we went to the cafe to drink coffee and smoke cigarettes.  Anyway, that night when we finally came home to go to bed she had to sleep with the radio on and I could not fall asleep for nothing!  Good songs would come on and I would have to wait for it to end… and then another one!  Here I have turned Mally into that girl.  : )

Who do you see in this next picture?  I can’t put my finger on it.  I either see myself or my sister… or even my dad.  My Dad’s baby picture is in the hallway at my Mom’s house and when I walk by it I think I see Mally.  Even the tax guy said, “You look like Grandpa John.”

Mally, No Yelling.

I can’t tell you how many times I have said that in the last week.  Some where some how – she found her outside voice and yells all the time now.  It is kind of like a scream, but she doesn’t get a high voice, she goes deep.

I have told her ‘no’ so many times… but I don’t think she really understands what I am telling her.  She looks at me funny when I tell her no.  Sometimes she thinks I am playing and laughs at me… which causes me to giggle and then she really thinks I am playing.  I have to quick turn around and leave.  Guess what she does?  Yells again.  I’ve tried ignoring it – that doesn’t work!

She is not a very patient girl – so she yells if she wants me to hurry.  She also gets bored easily – so she yells if she is bored.  She yells if you are not doing something right while changing her.  She’s a yeller!!  : )

Then Maggie (the dog) sassed me yesterday!  I’m not lying!  It was a full on sass!  A little old man was walking by and Maggie was going nuts.  Barking like something was going to eat us alive.  So I look out the window and see the guy walking.  I open the window and tell Maggie to go lay down.  Nope, she keeps barking.  I step outside and try to catch her and tell her to go lay down.  I finally get her to lay down and I tell her to stay and I start walking away and she barks one little bark in my direction.  I whipped around on my heel and she is just looking at me like what are you going to do about that one?

Now if you walk by my house you can hear Mally yelling and Maggie barking.  We really do look like the nuts of the street.

Special Note just for myself so I can remember later:

Mally can sit up by herself now.  She gets in the crawling position and stands on her tippy toes with her head down and looks as if she is going to crash on her head and bam… she brings her feet forward and she is sitting.  She is also getting way better at crawling.  She is starting to figure out how to move her hands and knees together.

Cousins

Last Friday I went to help my sister move into her new house.  I shouldn’t really say help – basically we sat on the floor with the kids and watched them play with each other.  Garrett was sharing his graham cracker with Mallory – like big huge pieces.  One time we looked and Mallory had the whole cracker in her hand shoving it in her mouth!  I screamed (Shannon was holding her) and she looks down all calm like and takes it away and breaks it into pieces for her and tells me… Lynn she would of been fine.  Ugh.  You can tell she has had two babies and this is my first. 

Then there is Elly and Mally – those two are going to be best buddies.  I was holding Mallory and Elly was jumping up and down yelling boo.  Mallory had a toy in her hand and decided to drop it… which Elly made silly sounds and picked it up and gave it back to her.  Then it turned into a game with huge fits of giggles.  Mallory would hold that toy out to be dropped, wait for it to the hit ground and bust into giggles. 

Mallory holds in her giggles so when they actually come out they come out at full force and sometimes spit comes flying with it. 

They played this ‘game’ over and over.  It never got old for either one of them.

Their *new* house is so much closer to us now, so hopefully we will see them more then once a month!

One Foot in the Air

I set Mally in the grass for the first time yesterday.  She wasn’t a big fan.  One foot could not touch it!  She held it up in the air.

  

This one can’t touch the grass.

This one is okay to touch. 

 

Meanwhile back at the ranch the Frey boys are hunting crows.

10 Months!

I am having a hard time with my baby growing up.  I know everyone told me it would happen fast… but I didn’t think this fast.  I have already forgotten everything about the newborn stage.  The other night I told Jesse I can’t remember getting up in the middle of the night for feedings.  Was I tired?  He can clearly remember.  Hahaha!  Strange how that happens.

It seems like she is starting to understand when I talk to her.  When I say, “Where is your itsy bitsy [spider]?”  She puts her pointer finger and thumbs together and moves her arms up over her head.  When she is walking holding onto my fingers and I say “Lets go read stories.”  She walks over to her books on the shelf.

She loves to read stories and sing songs.  Patty Cake.  Itsy bitsy spider.  Where is Thumbkin.  Tinkle little star.

She has two teeth now.  The other bottom one is working its way in.  She now brushes her teeth in the morning. 

The only time I ever see her sit still is when I let her watch a little Sesame Street.  She loves to watch that show.

Someday Mallory is going to look back at these pictures and go, “Mom what were you thinking?  Yellow flowers and pink stripes?”  And I will giggle and say “That was cute back then.”  I do this to my Mom all the time.  I gag at the pictures of me dressed in my stone wash jeans with t-shirt and LA Gear shoes with short boyish hair… and my sister is super cute with a frilly dress on and her long hair in a side ponytail holding her doll.  "Mom!  Why did you dress me like that?  Why did I have short hair?”  She tells me… “Lynn that was the style back then!”

Mommy’s girl!  She will fake cry to try to get back to me if some else is holding her.  You can totally tell her fake cries too – they are funny.  Although sometimes that fake crying will happen all day long and it is just me and her.  Those are the days where I dream of bedtime.  : ) 

Pointing.  She points to noses.  She points at the pictures in her stories when you read to her.

Her eating habits have changed recently.  She is starting to become picky.  Like tonight we gave her some pureed ham from Easter and she spit it out.  She has never actually spit food out, on purpose, before.  I’ve been trying to let her do more self feeding which she is a huge fan of. 

Summer is that you?

We had a fabulous week of weather.  One day it was even 82!!!  I sure hope this is a sign of a long hot steamy summer!!  : )  We haven’t had one of those in a very long time.

Now that it has been warmer Mally has been running around in short sleeves.  Oh my does this girl know how to make rolls cute, or what!!

I went to the mall yesterday with her and she was way too funny.  As I am pushing her around in her stroller she is waving to everyone that walks by.  Then if someone stops to admire her and talk to her – she puts on her biggest smile!  When she spotted another baby/toddler/kid she would squeal, scream, giggle and start jumping up and down in stroller. 

Yes, now that it is warmer I busted out the leggings again.  She has tons of leggings – I think it is the style for babies/toddlers this summer.  Even her Easter dress has leggings!!

You can’t see it very well in this picture (above) but her feet ooze out of her shoes.  I have to put her in a size too big just because of the thickness.

We spent tons of time outside this week and Maggie was never far behind.

Mallory *LOVES* Maggie!!  In the morning when I am getting her up – every once in awhile Maggie will come up in her room and when she spots the dog she squeals and jumps!  I have been saying “puppy” when ever she spots Maggie and now she says something what sounds like “up” when she sees Maggie!