Madeline wanted to wish everyone a Happy New Year by providing this little video snippet! Madeline loves to dance, especially to the new CD she got for Christmas. It’s from Dan Zanes and Friends and Mommy and Daddy like it too. The song featured in this video is “Go Down Emmanuel Road.” You can buy it on iTunes if you’d like. Enjoy, and we’ll see you next year for more fun and excitement!!!
Oh boy, WHAT a Christmas Day. Madeline may not “get” it yet, but she was a real Energizer bunny today. We woke up this morning and went downstairs to open presents. Madeline is a little afraid of the TMX Elmo but enjoyed the blocks and the jack-in-the-box.
Then we went to church and Madeline made friends in the crying/baby room.
On our way home, Madeline fell asleep so we put her down for her nap around noon. After that we went to Jenn’s Uncle Flavio and Aunt Terry’s house where Madeline proceeded to run around in a circle for about 2 hours straight, dragging Daddy with her almost every step of the way. They have a dog named Kennedy who is so sweet and Madeline just loved her so much! It was great to see everyone and Madeline really had a ton of fun.
After that, it was off to Nonni and Pop-Pop’s house for MORE GIFTS AND FUN! There was a lot of great stuff there but the big hit was her rocking horse. Once we put her on that, we couldn’t get her off. And we were all surprised that she knew what to do. We’ll name the horse “Seabiscuit”, because of the (admittedly weak) connection Madeline has to the ‘Biscuit (and Daddy loved that book).
Anyway, Madeline showed no signs of letting up once we got home, and we FINALLY put her to bed a 9pm!
We’re both pretty sure this was the greatest day of her life, and it was such a blessing to be able to enjoy it with her.
Merry Christmas!!!
Madeline is fast asleep upstairs with visions of sugar plums (or sugar Elmos) dancing in her head.
Tonight, we went over to Uncle Bob and Aunt Leigh’s for dinner and to exchange gifts. It was great to see them and Harrison, as well as Grandmom and Popper of course. It’s so neat to see Madeline and Harrison together. They had lots of fun playing with Grandmom and Popper. Madeline was really cracking up!
It’s really amazing how fast these kids grow up, and it was awesome to watch Harrison open his presents because he “gets” Christmas now. Madeline is still a year or so away from that, although she did really enjoy her new piano(s) and the Dora car she got.
All the excitement wore her out pretty quickly, and she needed to rest up for more Christmas fun tomorrow, so we called it an early night and headed home to wait for Santa.
Enjoy the pictures and have a Merry Christmas!
This Saturday we went to visit Aunt Bridget and Uncle Chris. Uncle Chris is very talented with the camera and asked if Madeline would model for him so he could take some photos for his up-and-coming side business (which will be a big success, we’re sure), and of course we were more than happy to oblige! Click here to view all of the pictures.
Thanks for having us Aunt Bridget and Uncle Chris. We had such a wonderful time that day. We love you (and Madeline really, really, loves your dogs).
We’re a little late with this post, but Madeline’s first birthday has come and gone. It’s hard to believe that it’s already been a year. Sometimes things seem to be moving so slow, and the next thing you know a year has gone by and your daughter is eating her first birthday cake.
We are truly blessed to have such a happy and healthy baby (ok…toddler) as well as such an amazing and supportive group of family and friends who have helped out greatly whenever we’ve needed them.
Madeline is now really walking around, so much so that I finally relented and put up baby gates this past weekend. She’s also now totally off the formula and bottles (HOORAY!!!!) and she’s moved up to the next room in daycare. Today was her first day and she did great. I think she enjoyed seeing her old friends who moved up a couple months ago.
What a year…we can only imagine what’s in store for us this next year!
Well, it’s been a couple weeks since she took her first real steps, and for the most part she still prefers crawling to walking, but she’s starting to make the transition now.
Happy Halloween everyone! As you can see from the pictures, Madeline was a ladybug this year…her first Halloween. We went to the Media Halloween Parade on Sunday which was a great time. Unfortunately, since then Madeline has come down with a little cold and Mommie now has a stress fracture in her foot!
As a result, we took it easy Halloween night. We just went around to a few houses to show off the cutest baby on the block! 
Hard to believe that at this time last year, we were still anxiously awaiting Miss Madeline’s arrival. My how time flies!
Anyway, hope you all had a great Halloween and don’t eat too much candy!
A bit late on this post, but last weekend we took a trip over to Linvilla Orchardsafter doing a 5k in Wallingford with Grandmom and Popper (where Popper won an award for coming in first place in his age group, way to go Popper!) It was a beautiful day and we got to take some nice pictures over at the Pumpkin Patch! Madeline was all eyes of course and couldn’t take her eyes off of the gigantic scarecrow they have there, but most of all, enjoyed pointing to all pumpkins and saying the word over and over and over again. She will now point to our pumpkins, cats, and even her Daddy and say Pumpkin. What a riot. All in all it was a great day and we hope you enjoy the new pictures!
Steve and I have been walking with Madeline for some time now and she loves to just hold on to our hands and walk all over the house. Steve also plays “the standing game” with her where he lets go and sees how long she can stand on her own till she falls down, and she adores it! She gives the biggest belly laughs from “the standing game”.
So tonight we decided to let go while she was walking and see what would happen, (we do this all time too, but Mads usually falls right down) and low and behold, our little munchkin was taking steps towards us by herself and was VERY proud of her accomplishment, she was clapping right along with Steve and I. Of course she is taking no more than 5 or 6 steps at time, but as they say, practice makes perfect!
Now the fun really starts, right?
We’ll make sure to get video up once Madeline has honed her new skill a little more.
Bye for now.
so tonight i noticed madeline pulled herself up by the TV stand and “walking” side to side, so i thought i’d see how she did with her little “walkie” toy.
look out, kitty kats!!!!!
