Strawberry Fields Forever

Last weekend we took a trip out to Carlsbad to go strawberry picking. It was so fun to be together as a family and to do something a little different. I hope we can do this every year.

I loved how Maia counted while picking strawberries. 1,2,3!

Easy Toddler

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Running List

Here are excerpts from a running list that I have of Maia's funny stories.

04/13/2010 (23 months)

This morning Maia was in the bathroom with me while I was getting ready for the day. I saw a penny on the floor and showed it to Maia. She picked it up and said, “Grandma’s money.” (She usually finds coins in Grandma’s bathroom and puts them in her pocket.) I told her that yes, it was most likely Grandma’s money so we’d have to give it back. She looked at the penny, then pointed to the picture of Abraham Lincoln and said, “Jesus!”

Also this morning, Maia was in the tub playing with a squirting toy fish. She wanted to fill it with water so she put it under water and squeezed the fish. A bunch of air came out and made a raspberry noise. To the reaction Maia said, “fishy toot!”

04/08/2010

Last night I was getting Maia ready for bed. I opened up her pajama drawer and she wanted to pick out her jammies. So at first she saw the jammies with cars on them and said, “Cars!” I started grabbing the car jammies when she saw the popsicle jammies and she said, “No! Pocko-hocko.”

03/13/2010

Today Maia wasn’t feeling the greatest. She had been sneezing all day with a cold. In the afternoon, the Porter’s threw us a good-bye picnic at the park. We were on our way to the park and Maia was in her car seat. She suddenly sneezed and tooted at the same time to which she commented, “Bless you toot!”

Later tonight I was putting Maia to sleep. Sometimes I will tell her all the people that are going to ‘nigh-night’ so she knows that it’s time for everyone to go to bed. Tonight she started with “nigh-night Gramma” and then I named off some people. “Nigh-night Amy. Nigh-night Chris. Nigh-night Autumn. Nigh-night Lyla.” I continued naming off all the cousins and aunts and uncles. Maia then chimes in, “Nigh-night ten.” I don’t understand and so I say, “nigh-night ten?” To which Maia continues and says, “nigh-night seven.” Can you tell we’ve been counting a lot lately?

03/02/2010 (Maia 21 months)

Maia’s first prayer that I could actually understand what she was saying:

Hey Fadder,

Bath,

Maia bath,

Maia Gramma bath,

Amen.

Then she wanted to pray again:

Hey Fadder,

Amy,

Amy bath,

Amen.

She loves her bath and she loves to bathe in Grandma’s bathtub.

Where is baby?

Here is Maia singing "Where is Baby?"

Artista

Maia is a very artistic child at her young age. She loves to paint, draw, and color (with crayons, markers, colored pencils, sidewalk chalk, and anything else that leaves a mark).

Her pants aren't usually this colorful.

The only thing the Easter bunny left in her Easter basket this year was a package of sidewalk chalk.

While Brian and Xochi were in Hawaii, we were so lucky to have Marin, Santi, and Abram stay with us. We took a day trip to Pretend City where Maia painted her first painting. It was actually very impressive (to us). She did a great job and almost filled the whole paper.

Maia and Abram.

Maia also loves music. She sings constantly and always requests that a song be put on in the car. She has learned so many Primary songs and nursery rhymes. On Tuesdays we go to the library for story time where Maia gets to sing, dance, listen to music, shake musical instruments, and listen to stories. She LOVES library days.

I got Maia on camera singing "Where is Baby?" in February while we were in Wyoming. I love it when she sings. I hope to get her more recent songs on camera soon. Unfortunately, while the video was being uploaded, Maia turned the computer off and now I can't post it. (Thank you, Maia)

Here are Maia and cousin Andi at library day. This is one of their favorite parts- shaking the instruments along with the music.

Maia is also very imaginative and takes great care of her little baby doll and her stuffed animal, "Snow Puppy." Often times she'll take Snow Puppy's white paws and cross them and make Snow Puppy pray, or make him wave bye-bye to daddy. She makes sure that Snow Puppy is tucked in at night next to her and makes sure that he also gets to read bedtime stories with daddy and Maia.

Wyoming (February)

Maia and I took a special trip to Wyoming to play in the snow with dad and Lainie. There was so much snow! I had never seen so much! It came up to my waist. Maia didn't really know what to think at first but she sure looked cute in her snow gear.

Dad dug a snow chair out for Maia. Behind her you can see the top of the balcony railing...kind of.

Maia did NOT like sledding. She cried the whole way down the driveway. BUT, she LOVED building a snowman.

Check out all the snow on the roof. It was insane!

One of my favorite parts of the trip was Maia just singing and talking. I finally got a couple songs on camera. I love this one of Maia counting to ten and then her sweet words of love.

It was a fun trip.