Kitty cat fell on his bum-bum-bum!

Grandma recently bought Madelyn a subscription to Ladybug Magazine. It's perfect for Madelyn's age!

At the back is a comic strip called Molly and Emmett, about a young girl and her cat. Madelyn is in love with this strip, and the day after I read it to her, she was acting it out and reciting it verbatim!

Her favourite part is when a bird scares Emmett the cat so hard, he falls on his bum.

She starts laughing so uncontrollably, she can barely finish telling me what's so funny!

Madelyn: hee hee hee... Kitty cat fall on his bum-bum-bum

She laughs at this until all the air is gone from her lungs, and then proceeds to utter a huge gasp as she refills her oxygen.

It's adorable!

My sleeping beauty

It's just after midnight, so it's officially the last day of January, 2011.

My little Roo is having a restless sleep - just about a half hr ago, she started crying, but she wouldn't open her eyes when I went in to see her. She was dreaming.

We calmed her down, bundled her back up, and she rolled over and was quiet.

Then a few minutes later, same deal.

Rinse and repeat.

This last time, just now, Daddy went in to see if there was anything he could do. Madelyn gave him a subconscious peek into the movie playing in her dream world: "Piggies are (inaudible) on tv."

And with that, she rolled over and fell back into a silent slumber.

Because of this latest and greatest sleep talkin' that she's been doing, I decided I can't rely on just my memory anymore to keep these precious moments emblazoned in my brain, so here is a short list of some of the memories we have in the past couple of years of what our little Roo has said in her sleep:

- her very first instance of talkin' in her sleep, approximately a year and a half ago (wow, HALF her life ago!), was when she was well into her passion for the Mr. Men series. After having watched her Mr. Tickle dvd on repeat on numerous occasions, it's no surprise that her first audible dream had to do with that subject. Dono and I came in to check on a somewhat restless Roo in her bed, and while we were admiring her as she slept, she said, "No more milk Mr. Tickle." So obviously, either Mr. Tickle had already either given her some milk in her dream, and clearly she had had enough, OR perhaps Mr. Tickle was drinking more than his share. Either way, WOW!

- more recently, just after her 3rd birthday, Madelyn received a Handy Manny tool set from Uncle Robin, Taylor and Makenna. She LOVES this tool set. It is very loud. Dono and I don't care for it. ;) One night, just a couple of weeks ago, as we went in to check on her, I unravelled the blanket from between her legs and arms to cover her up, and she rolled over and said, "Handy Mandy" (because THAT'S what she calls her tool set!). Nice to see she's enjoying playing with that toy in her dreams, because as annoying as it is, if it were to ever "break", she'll be able to reconnect with it in the quiet of her mind!

- just last week, I couldn't sleep, so I crept into her room to make sure she was comfy and not contorted in any way. I picked her up (even though I'm not supposed to - she's just s'darn cute!), and her blanket was caught up in her little feet, to which she told me, as she continued to sleep, that she still wanted to wear her slippers. How sweet!

Then of course tonight's episode of whatever the piggies were doing on TV just makes me not want to sleep again - I would much rather sit awake in the darkness of her room and watch and listen to her breathing and wait to hear any more precious little gems she may decide to share about her dreams. I love these little insights into the mind of my baby!

Madelyn and her friend, Kangaranga Roo (sent with love from Grandpa!)

New Year's resolution: MORE BLOG POSTS!

Our little pumpkin is growing up WAY too fast. I mean it.

She will be 3 in just a few short days.

I've already asked her to stop growing, but she doesn't seem to listen. She's a Capricorn. She is inherently stubborn.

Aside from the fact that her and I can have conversations with each other (lately the content has been about Santa and how he ate his cookies and milk and how Rudolph ate his leaf! - she is QUITE the chatterbox, and I love every second of it - she uses real words about two thirds of the time!), she LOVES to sing. And play the piano. And as of late, thanks to Daddy's gift for me, the Roo LOVES to play the (MY) harmonica! Guess that means it's time to buy her her own!

She loves to colour, and is quite the little artist already! Just yesterday she surprised us with a series of triangles she drew (and caught herself off guard with them, too!). She even put a happy face in one of them! I'll have to get Daddy to scan 'em in - they're in her sketch book that she takes with her everywhere (so that whenever she has the urge to draw, she can indulge!).

The latest and greatest in Maddy'isms:

- she can count to 30, most of the time she leaves out 15. I don't know why. But she's very good with her numbers! "One, twoooo, free,...."

- she LOVES her Chipmunks DVD that Grandpa sent her. Classic Disney stuff. She watches that over and over, along with Dora. She has entire scenes memorized, and she will reenact them if the mood strikes. Sometimes it's complete with props. She is amazing.

- she loves to imitate puppies and kitty cats. LOVE this!

- she snores sometimes! (or as she calls it, sleeps with her nose!)

PUUCHINI!!!

It was pretty hot today, so in an effort to distract Madelyn from all the fun stuff in our backyard, I tried to get her interested in eating supper so we could head straight inside to our cool house.

As I took her out of her car seat, the following exchange took place...

Daddy: Alright, Madelyn! Do you want to go in and have BIG NOODLES?!?! (Her term for Beefaroni!)
Madelyn: No! Daddy, I want to have Puuchini!
Daddy (perplexed): Uhhh... sorry, what do you want?
Madelyn: Puuchini! Puuchini!
Daddy (not wanting to seem stupid because he doesn't know what Puuchini is...): OH! You want Puuchini!
Madelyn: No, Daddy! I want to have PUUCHINI!
Daddy: (thinking) Could have sworn that's what I said... there must be some subtle nuance with my double-"u" pronunciation that's causing some confusion here..

Luckily, as soon as we got in, Madelyn was distracted enough with her pencil crayons that I could just make the Beefaroni I'd planned on making in the first place! Whew!

In the meantime, guess what I'm going to look for next time I'm at Safeway!

PS - it is entirely possible that she was just hoping to listen to some opera when she got inside, but we haven't introduced her to Puccini. Probably never will. ;)

We're not on Kinver anymore, Toto!

A couple of funnel clouds were spotted in Winnipeg today. This one came halfway to the ground on Kinver avenue, a block or two from Madelyn's daycare!
Luckily, she's still in Kansas, Toto!

Tomorrow, I'm off to buy her some ruby red slippers so that she can make it home if, God forbid, the next one touches down!

The Roo plays her version of Where's Waldo?!

My little girl couldn't fall asleep without her (aptly-named) Kitty Cat this evening. So I located said Kitty Cat, and she gave big big snuggles to her friend. Then the Roo asked for Floppy Bunny. So I found Floppy Bunny.

And, well, I decided, why stop there?

As you can see, she had no problem falling asleep surrounded by all her friends!

Reba, Raggedy Ann, Woodsy, Cora Cow, Monkey-Do, Chickadoodle, Freddie Frog, Teddy Bear (and not shown, the culprit who started it all, Kitty Cat)!

On another note, for the information of all those wanting to buy this child more toys, SHE HAS ENOUGH!!! :)

"Have a surprise for you, Mommy!"

These precious little words were being yelled at me in an eager little voice as I was making supper tonight, through the open window in the kitchen.

Turns out when Daddy took the Roo for a bike-a-cycle ride, she took it upon herself to load up the back carriage part of her trike with "cooorns" (pine cones) for Mommy!

This is what I saw when I went outside to see what my surprise was:

She was so proud of herself! And she should be, she picked the best cooorns on the block! When I asked her how many she picked for me, she proceeded to "count": "Oonnnne" (as she moves 3 to the side), "Twoooooooooooo" (again, drawing this out long enough to move more than 2 over to the "counted" pile), "Freeeee, fouuuur..." all the way up to 11, before she decided that 6 would be her final number! What a thoughtful little girl we have!