Say Cheese

Tuesday we went to get some new pictures of Mad. We realized that the last time we had her picture taken the girl hardly had any hair. We went to Portrait Innovations because you get your pictures the same day. Isn't instant gratification the American way? The people that we worked with were not my favorite in the world. The lady trying to get Maddy to smile was being so loud that Maddy kept saying "up Momma". So I would have to calm her down and try again. Then she tried to use a cow to make her laugh but all Maddy was interested in was getting that cow. The camera lady looked pretty put out that our toddler would not sit still and smile. I wonder if she has ever had a toddler?

When it was time to view the pictures I was not expecting to see much I liked. Amazingly they did capture quite a few good shots. When I look at these pictures it is amazing how big our girl looks! I can't believe how fast she is changing.


I can never pick just a few to share so I added all of my favorites. Enjoy!

Potty Time

About a month ago Maddy started to become very interested in the potty and everyone when they are going potty. So after letting her sit on the big potty a couple of times we decided to get her a potty of her own. She likes to sit on it a lot and read books or sing songs. Her baby dolls and doggy get to sit on it too. I have sat her on it when she acts like she is going to go number 2. The other day was one of those days so we rushed in, got her on the potty and she let out a big toot and said "done". I had to crack up!


Tonight Brian sat her on it before her bath and she actually went pee! We cheered and clapped and she laughed but I'm sure that is because she thinks we are crazy. I'm sure this was just lucky timing on our part but we will keep trying. Great job big girl.

Splish Splash I Like to Swim in the Bath

We have had the opportunity to go swimming a lot this summer. Our little girl has come a long way in the water. She has finally figured out how to kick her legs to help get her going. She loves it so much that she even likes to practice in the tub.



Besides "swimming" on her belly, she also likes to dip her ears into the water and listen. We are not sure what she hears but she seems to like it. Daddy showed her how to blow bubbles in the water with her mouth. She attempts this but usually ends up with a mouth full of water that she then drinks and says "aah". Gross to me but just try and stop her. She also likes to lay on her back and put the back off her head in the water. This is a great help when washing her hair. What a little water baby with a cute little bum too!

Little Monkey

As you have read before our little monkey loves to climb. The other day I was in the kitchen and noticed that Maddy had been quiet for a long time. I went to investigate and found her happily playing in the bath tub.





I could not believe that she had gotten in without falling on her head. I took her out to see how exactly she got in. She climbed up, balanced on her tummy then reached to the side grabbed on and swung her legs over.




She decided to lay down and pretend she was sleeping. I'm not sure why she thinks you sleep in a bath tub.

Future Artist?

While running some errands today I decided to pick up some washable markers for Maddy. She loves to color with crayons so I was pretty sure she would love markers too.





She was a little mad at first because she is allowed to have all of her crayons on her tray when she colors. I thought she should only have one or two markers at a time to minimize the mess.


Once she got over her fit she realized how much more color she puts on the paper with markers. She really got coloring and even colored her fingers a little bit.


When she wanted a new color she would point at the markers and either say red or green (those are the colors she says for everything). I would pick one up and she would say yea or no until we found the color she wanted. This last picture is a riot. I guess the great artist completed her masterpiece so she threw down her marker. Maybe we will brave finger paint next!

Happy Birthday Daddy

Today is Daddy's birthday!!! We celebrated by going to a Grizzlies game. We have only been to one other game this year because it is to hard for Maddy to sit still on our laps. Maddy enjoyed being able to stand at the fence and watch the baseball game.



We decided to get the hot tub so Maddy could swim and have more room to play. We turned down the heat and added a bag of ice and the hot tub turned into a warm bath. Maddy really liked going in the water with Daddy. She thought the never ending supply of bubbles was pretty cool too.



The Grizzlies staff brought us out our free hat and Maddy tried it on. I always joke about what a cute little boy she would have been. This girl can certainly pull off the hat look.





The Grandmas had a surprise for Daddy. They had ordered him a Red Velvet cake from McArthur's bakery. It was exactly like the cake we had for our wedding and is Daddy's favorite. You would have thought it was Maddy's birthday the way she dove into the icing. Daddy tries to feed her a bite of the cake but she would have nothing to do with it. She was all about the icing. We were having so much fun that it was the 7th inning before we knew it and close to 10:00pm. We started to pack up, change Maddy into her PJ's and head for home. Maddy fussed for about 5 mins in the car and then crashed until morning.
Happy Birthday Daddy!

The Zoo (yes we went again)

On Friday we had a planned field trip to the Zoo with lots of family and friends. I think in all there was 24 of us. We unfortunately started the day off on the wrong foot. Maddy had an awful night. She cried when she went down, woke up three times crying and then crashed and was still asleep at 7:30 when I woke her up. While she was sleeping I woke up to a rainy day so I decided to switch the wagon out for the jogging stroller only to find that the jogging stroller had a flat. So Brian unloaded that and I planned on picking up our other stroller from Katie when we picked her up. So I got Maddy out of bed finished packing and hit the road.

We picked up Grandma Katie (who had ran to the store for me to get the grapes and cheese I had forgotten) and Carol. We were supposed to meet at 8:30 and we didn't arrive until almost 9:00. I guess everyone has to be late once in awhile. After we all arrived we headed to the Children's Zoo where we finally got to see the baby leopard. She is SO cute.

After checking her out we headed on to the otters. One was swimming and putting on quite a show. The big kids decided to climb, slide and play in the sandbox so the younger crowd had a quick snack in their strollers.

We moved on to the goats and after seeing the Grant's farm goats I was a little nervous. The zoo worker assured me that their goats are much tamer because they are not fed by the visitors. I could not get over how calm they were. The kids got to pet and brush them and the goats really could have cared less. One little guy did try to snack on cousin Audrey's shirt and another on cousin Angie's pants but otherwise they were extremely tame. We continued on to River's Edge and saw the elephants and the dinosaurs. Maddy wasn't crazy about the dinosaurs this time so we made a quick exit and headed to the bears and penguins.

We had just enough time for a carousel ride and then were heading out to have lunch. We entered the Living world and an author selling his books stopped us and read his book to the kids. Maddy loved this and wanted to get a closer look. I bought her a copy of the book (I don't want to kiss a llama) so we can enjoy it at home. We ate a quick lunch outside the zoo and then headed home for a long nap. Summer heat has finally arrived!

16 Months Old

Our baby (if we can even call her a baby anymore) turned 16 months old today. She is changing everyday. She is usually a very happy, funny and often silly little girl who melts our hearts constantly. This month she got to go on two vacations. She was great on both and quite a trooper on the airplane rides and the car rides. We have already taken two trips to the Zoo, a trip to Grant's farm and tons of trips to the pool. While we are not attending outings we hang out at home and play in the backyard or take walks to the park. Maddy got to welcome a new friend, Landon to the world. She is so interested in him. She wants to touch him, find his nose and kiss him. She really wanted to feed him a bottle but we decided we better hold off on that one. We bought her a new (new to her) wood playground which daddy is hard at work fixing up for her. Aunt Janet will be happy to know that he is using the green approach and using just his sweat, hammer and hand saw. Maddy continues to add new words to her vocabulary. The most recent are green bean and slide. We have been having so much fun that summer is quickly flying by. Maddy is getting better using her fork and spoon. As you can see her spaghetti o's are much easy to eat off your fingers.



Maddy has always been a climber but this month she has amazed and frightened us. She can climb up onto almost any chair, couch or piece of furniture she can get her knee onto. The other night she actually climbed the wood ladder on her new swing set. She pulled herself right up the four rungs and onto the deck. If we are not careful and leave the tray off her high chair she will climb right up the front, turn around at the top and sit down. We often joke that she should wear her bike helmet all the time, but seriously she could use a helmet. Now if we could just teach her to climb down!


Maddy still loves to read books. If she had her way we would read 50 before bed every night. We usual let her talk usually let her talk us into 6 or 7 before lights out.


Happy 16 months!

Family Reunion

Today we went to the annual Sax/Rule family reunion. We had a great time with lots of family and tons of food. The pool was a big hit and if Maddy wasn't in it she was doing laps around it. I think one of her Great Aunts counted 19 laps at one time.


Maddy got to play with cousin Audrey some more. It is always fun to have these two together.


Our brave little girl LOVED the water slide. Daddy would put her up top and I was in the water to pull her up after she splashed in. I bet she went down twenty times and would come out of the water asking for more. She also jumped off the diving board but I was to busy catching her to get a photo of that. I am thinking swim lessons will be in our girl's future.

Around 6:30 Maddy was starting to wear out so we decided to pack her up in time to get home for a bath and a regular bedtime. She was still needing to catch up from her late night of fireworks.

Happy 4th of July

Happy 4th of July!! This year we decided to watch the fireworks with a bunch of my friends from work and their families. We were a little nervous since the fireworks started at 9:30pm which is about 1 1/2 past bedtime. We loaded up the wagon and walked to our friends house around 8:00. The kids had a good time playing and some of the older kids did sparklers while the little ones watched. Once the big show began Maddy would say "bang, bang" after each firework. By the end of the show she was really ready for bed and I think if she wouldn't have been in the wagon she would have been asleep on the walk home.


Aubrey, Madison and Madylin wait for the fireworks.


All the kids. Can you tell it is already past a few bedtimes.

Mean Molars

As I have mentioned in earlier posts, Maddy is getting her molars. Who knew that they could take SO long to come all the way in. Well starting on Monday Maddy was running a low grade fever. No big deal we just treated it and kept going. On Tuesday she wasn't eating much put with medicine the fever stayed under control. Since she was feeling OK we were letting her eat or drink as usual ( the girl loves milk). Early Wednesday morning Maddy cried out and she was burning up! So we got her up and gave her ice water and put cool rags on her. Well after about two sips of the water all the milk from early (no longer milk after a high fever) came up everywhere. So we changed her and cleaned the carpet. By now she was asking for a cakey (cracker). So out to the kitchen we went. So we snacked and had a little more water and then I had to force her to go back to sleep. I guess she thought it was time to wake up. Poor girl!



This pretty much sums up how we all felt at 3:00 in the morning.


The good news is we are better now!