I'll just call it May.

There has been a lot going on around here and I thought since it is the first of June, I'd do a little recap of May before it gets away from me!

It's going to be a little scattered and a little random.  Lots of pictures and a few words here and there :)

It's raining as I write this, but this past month has been full of sunshine and we've been taking full advantage of it. Madi just loves playing with her friends!


Marlie hanging out at our play date. She is almost always smiling and couldn't be any sweeter :)


Daddy's been working like crazy, but he always finds time to snuggle with his girls and they just eat it up!

This one melts my heart.

Madisyn has a new found obsession with the vaccumm. She LOVES to use the hose to get in all the corners. Yeah, she's hired!




Still hard at work!


See...always smiling!


You've probably noticed in pictures that Marlie's left eye crosses in jsut a bit. We took Marlie into an eye specialist to get it looked at. I wish I would have taken more pictures. This place was AMAZING. These pictures were taken in the wating room. So fun and very kid friendly.

It turns out that Marlie's crossing is an illusion because of the way the skin around her eyes and the bridge of her nose looks. It's called Pseudo-Strabismus. We will go back in 3 months to make sure there's no true crossing by then.


It was kind of ironic how crossed her eye looks in this one right before we went into the exam room.


This princess loves a good movie, just like her mommy.
I bet you'll never be able to guess what movie she's watching in the first picture :)
We went to Renton to see a children's play, but when we got there, they had just sold out of tickets. We were a little bit bummed, but decided to make the best of it. Instead, we went to the movies and saw Rio in 3D. It was very cute and Madisyn LOVED it!


Madisyn's imagination has taken flight this past month! I love watching her dream and create. She knows how to find joy in whatever she does. She sings a song while she's picking up her toys and dances around like a princess all day. Oh and dragons are everywhere we turn these days, but there's usually "so little and cute" haha.  I want her life!


This was a very common scene this past month. She loves to just sit outside and breath in the fresh air in the warm sunshine. (she didn't want me to take pictures. once she realized I had the camera out, she brought on the sass!


We walked to the "swing park" as Madi likes to call it, (which is a few miles away) quite a few times lately. I put Marlie on the swing for the first time and she found her new favorite place to be! I love watching my girls smiling and giggling with eachother.


My dear friend from school is a flight attendant for Virgin America. One Sat morning she sent me a text letting me know she was going to be in Seattle that day. I dropped David off at work and headed over to spend the evening getting lost in Seattle with her. We had a great time and it was so fun to reminisce about the good ol days.


I have a HUGE weekness for all frozen yogurt. There just happens to be a very yummy place litterally right across the street from us. Let's just say, we take walks over there quite often :) That yummy goodness just calls my name!


Madi wanted to me to take a picture of her and then she said "can I take a picture of you mommy?" How did she do? Not too bad for a first timer. I just have to teach her to move that finger off of the flash and I think she could be the next Greenwood photographer :)


Another beautiful day at the park. I'm so glad I brought my "big girl camera" this time. These girls are my treasures!










Last Saturday, the girls and I went to the Seattle Folk Festival with David's family (he had to work). It was crazy crowded. I saw and heard a few things I wished I hadn't, but in all, we had a great time. The music was so fun and some of the shops were just incredible. I'm always amazed at the things people can create with their hands.









This guy just walked up to us while we were sitting on the grass eating a snack. He handed Madi a bird and she kind of freaked out, but she warmed up the the idea and thought it was so fun. (I wish I had a better picture!)






Yesterday was a stressful and by the time the girls went to bed, I just needed to get out. (David was home, don't worry.) I took myself to the movies and I'm so glad I did. I saw this movie and it was incredible. Just what I needed to get away from it all and step into another time. I really loved this movie. So well done!

My princess

Here's a little peek at my princess.

Madisyn is a wonderful big sister. She is so full of love and always wants to help comfort Marlie. She loves to hold her and help me change her diapers. She sings her songs and says while stroking Marlie's cheek "awe it's ok sweetheart" when she's crying. It's really the sweetest thing. It brings so much warmth to my heart.

Now, because she is doing so well with her sister, I just figured nothing had changed and that it wasn't really affecting her in a negative way at all. Boy was I wrong. Let me show you what I mean.





Here we have just one of the what seems like 100s of examples of Madi's recent pleas for attention. She dumped out an entire bottle of baby powder in her room WHILE she sat in her pants that were soaked in pee. Double whamy.



She did this little art demonstration while I was feeding Marlie just a few feet away. I actually handled this one quite well. I was very calm. I made sure she understood that what she did was wrong and then we cleaned it together. I can't say the same for the countless other incidents we've been having in these past few weeks. Lets just say sometimes there's yelling, lots of time outs and even more tears. I was just getting so frustrated. I was so done with cleaning up a new mess every time I turned around. I thought I was going to pull my hair out! My patience was running really thin to say the least. Just when I was ready to throw in the towel, a very simple though occurred to me.

My daughter was screaming for attention!
Every time she did something naughty I would drop everything and give her attention. It was negative attention, but she didn't care. I would touch her and talk to her and focus on her. Why didn't I think of this weeks before? I told David my realization and we immediately put it into action.  I set aside Madi time every day now even if it's just 5 minutes here and there to let her know she's loved. If she's throwing a fit I ask her if she needs some love. That is usually the case. Last night I was putting her to bed after a great day. No potty accidents, no tears, no timeouts. She decided that she didn't want to go to bed and boy did she let me know. She started crying and throwing her arms in the air. I picked her up and twirled her around a bit while singing "if you're happy and you know it" ironic :) It worked like a charm. Thank goodness for inspiration. It has saved my sanity!

Here's a few other things we've been doing together during our mommy madi time.


We made cookies and she was so excited. She pretty much did everything except the eggs. She was so proud and we had a blast! She even did some dishes. Bonus! It's so much more enjoyable to clean up a messy kitchen with a happy girl than to clean up a messy room torn apart by an attention deprived girl.




Another thing we enjoy doing together is playing with puzzles and blocks. Madi is such a genious. Seriously. She has me in awe sometimes. Look at the way she sorted all her blocks. I did not do that. They are all arranged by color and shape. When I was teaching preschool that's the kind of stuff I was teaching 4 year olds and they still had a hard time with it. I didn't tell her to build it that way. She just has such an amazing mind. I love seeing her grow and learn and I'm so glad I realized how important mine and David's love and attention are to her right now.

I just love this girl!! I always want her to know that regardless of how many other kiddos I have. She will always be my princess.

Presidents Day

This "by 2pm I have no energy" thing is not very good for blogging. haha. I'm just a little behind, but better late than never right?

Anyways, we had a really fun pres day weekend. The sun was shining and we took full advantage of it.

First off, I give you the many faces of Madisyn. (the first one is what we get when we say "smile". i love it!)

These are daddy's toys...

These are Madi's toys :)

We really need to get her a little trike! This little car is a little young for her. Good thing her birthday is in less than a month!!! I'm going to have a 2 year old. YIKES!

We dusted off the tennis rackets and planned on hitting a few balls back a forth and ended up playing for 2 hours. Not exactly pros, but we had a blast!

2 weeks ago....check!

1 week ago.... coming soon!

Tomorrow....we're going to Vancouver for the 2010 Olympics! Now that's going to be a good post. Oh my. There's no hope of catching up now. Oh well :)