Morning

This morning MLO woke up early, earlier than I wanted to wake up.

She came into the room and tried to get me to wake up, I refused telling her I was waiting for the clock to turn a certain time.

She laid down with me and wiggled around, trying to get me to open my eyes.

Didn't work.

So, she climbed out of bed and went over to daddy's side.

She woke him up, by telling him she loved him "this" much (opened her arms all the way). He smiled and gave her a big hug back. She then gave him a hug and said she loved him SOOOO much.

After a kiss, she pauses.

"Can you wake up now daddy".

She is using the system.

Been so bad, good mom, bad blogger

I have had a rough few months, my father is pretty ill and we are dealing with the bouncing between hospital and home and his desire not to die in the hospital.

So, all my personal blogging time got taken up in that and I haven't been here.

MLO continues to be amazing and funny. Few things:

1) She shot up over an inch in one month (I measured her at 3 1/2 and checked it one month later after an instance from her grandmother that she grew a lot).

2) She loves babies, she has a special connection with one of my friends little ones, whenever they see each other they break into huge grins.

3) In her bath tonight she said she was pretending to wash another baby she knows hair.

4) She loves calendars and we set up one just for her so she can mark the days and see when she has things (especially parties) coming up.

5) She is in a weekly gymnastics class and wants to go all the time (but we have it on the calendar so she can see what day it will be on).

6) We took her ice skating after watching the world championships on TV. She had a great time and wants to go again. We took my sister as when she was young she wanted to be an ice skater but she grew too tall (she is now 5'11" and that just doesn't work in ice skating).

I am sure there is more and I will try to come back and include, for my own later memories more than anything else.

Animal Noises

MLO loves to make animal noises, we go over the different animals and their noise while we are driving places. It makes a fun game that keeps her happy on even long drives.

Today she added a new animal: a snake.

She kept hissing and hissing.

Then she had to sniffle and giggled, I asked her what was happening.

She said, this is what a snake sounds like with a runny nose: "sniffle".

Sayings

MLO is asking all sort of questions.

The best two over this weekend:

We were talking about how we had to keep buying her new pants because she grows so fast:

• When my body gets bigger how old will I be?

Driving home after shopping all day:

• Is this the way to my house? Why did you put my house over here?

Singing

My daughter is definitely enjoying anything that involves learning new songs to sing. She comes home almost every day with a new song being sung.

She sings in the bathtub, she sings in the car, she sings while making us dinner in her little kitchen, she sings to her baby.

Tonight was the perfect moment and example of how much she loves singing.

While watching her movie she started singing, I wasn't really paying attention but eventually noticed that she had gotten quieter and quieter. I couldn't understand the words she was saying anymore.

I looked over and her eyes were closed and she was mumbling her song. A few seconds later she stopped singing and she was out.

She sang herself to sleep - I love it!!

Puzzles

MLO has always had a sort of engineering inclination. She tried taking things apart from a very early age and loved putting things together.

I got her a puzzle for her second birthday (over a year ago) and she loved it, quickly mastering how it worked. Since that time I have bought several more puzzles and she loves putting them together, taking them apart and then putting them together again.

She is so fascinated with puzzles that in a toy store, I can tell her I will buy her one thing, the thing she will choose is a puzzle.

So for now, whenever you walk into my house, you find a completed puzzle on the floor. You know that MLO has accepted you as a friend, when she asks you to do a puzzle with her.

Pre-school

MLO started preschool, she is growing up so fast and it is so exciting and a little sad.

The first day I was all prepared to be there all morning, maybe all the way until lunch.

Other kids get dropped off, hug and kiss their parents and push them out the door or just waving goodbye.

After being there for about twenty minutes she tells me it is time for me to leave, she gives me a hug and a kiss and pushes me out the door.

Every morning since then (Monday, Tuesday and today) it only takes about fifteen to twenty minutes and she is ready for me to leave.

It is a great thing and yet I sort of wanted her to want me around a little more. I love how affection she is with me, how much she loves having me around all the time.

Oh, my little one is getting so big.