Mama's Memories for M: Rocking, Hiking, and Resting

Maliana ~

Daddy (with a little help from friends) kicked off your week with a huge surprise for you ~ the Fresh Beat Band concert! You were so excited all day, not even having a clue as to what your surprise was that night. You both met Mia and her daddy downtown and even Mia played along with trying to trick you, suggesting that maybe you were going to a soccer game. When you found out what was actually in store for the evening, you were pumped! Tremendous double daddy/daughter date success! I am so glad you got to spend time with these guys and of course, your daddy too!

why do I get the feeling we could be seeing similar
pictures of you two at concerts, years from now?

even Daddy was stoked to see the FBB!!

Thursday is always a tough day for me, since it's almost the weekend (but not quite) and I am usually exhausted (to say the least). In spite of my dog-tiredness, it made me so happy to get a text from Daddy letting me know how great of a morning you had had. He was proud to report that you had sprang out of bed and got yourself dressed (head to toe) without any prompting at all. So awesome!

When I picked you up at school later, it gave me more much needed smiles to see the outfit you had chosen to wear...

trendsetter

Were you wearing a boldly striped shirt underneath an open button down plaid shirt with no corresponding colors whatsoever? Sure! But did you do it all by yourself? Yep! So proud of you!

This week I also signed our whole family up at the local YMCA in order to increase our health and make getting fit a family affair. I even took you with me and got to work out the very next day after signing up while you hung out in their 'child watch' program and did fabulously. Afterwards, you were excited to take a tour of the gym and began plotting when we could all go swimming together.

Along with feeling like we made a really good decision to join the Y, here's how I shared my gratitude on Facebook later:
~ reason #79 I am grateful for my kid today = picking her up from her first night at the on-site Child Watch while I worked out at the Y and the worker went on and on about how sweet she is and asked me to please bring her back. #mademynight #kindwordsgoalongway

The weekend finally arrived and found us making banana pancakes before going hiking in the woods behind our house. All on your own, you suited up and begged one of us to take you to go looking for bugs, critters, and animal tracks. It made me remember how much I loved to go exploring with my uncles, Matt and Mark, when I was little too. I would hike all over their farm, tagging along with them and loving every minute of hanging out with 'the older boys'. There's nothing like nature as a child's best playground. Brought back fun memories taking you out like this in our own little woods and watching your excitement as you marched along with Abby, spotting this or that in the snow.

all geared up from head to toe

this was pretty much the only critter spotted...
our pup, Abby

you determined we were very far from home
(psst...not really)

using your bird callers to call for help from Daddy
(just like you'd seen them do in the movie, The Croods)

And upon digging out the bug box pictured above, here is a snippet of our conversation...
~ upon finding this locust shell from last summer in your bug box ~
Me: "Can we please throw this thing away now?"
Mali: "Noo! It reminds me of Buddy!"
Me: "You named the locust we watched climb out of this shell last summer? "
Mali: "Yeah!"

I love my bug lover

That evening I headed out to Aunt Lindsey's bachelorette party while you and Daddy went over to Uncle Joe and Aunt Tina's and then later you spent the night with E. You girls stayed up, read to each other at bedtime, hid and spied on whoever you could, and just generally had a giggly good time.

clearly you and Daddy had a hard time
letting me go out to the bachelorette
party...getting ready was like an
obstacle course!

snuggled up and reading in bed

spying on Sam

Since it was a long night for all of us on Saturday, we hit a major wall on Sunday. We had to stop and press pause, climb into bed and relax for the afternoon once getting you home from E's house. It was a good call too or else I have a sneaking suspicion someone would have ended up in a strait jacket by dinnertime.

mandatory quiet time on Sunday afternoon

Once we'd gotten a little rest, Daddy helped you make a craft you had seen on YouTube...I love when Daddy does stuff like that! He also discovered he has some fairly clever crafting abilities too...a bonding activity and self-esteem builder all the way around. Ha.

major good daddy points!

Later you begged to go grocery shopping, yes, grocery shopping with Daddy (I know...weird, right?), but hey...it's a win since a) I didn't have to grocery shop and b) you got more time with your Daddy! Evidently, you were still extremely tired as I received this text from Daddy about halfway through your trip...

sleepy driver

Monday was an extra bonus for the weekend since we both got to stay home in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. day. We had some really nice extra time together...randomly deciding to trek out to Three Creeks Metro Park for a worm composting seminar where you got to build your very own tabletop worm composter. You are very excited to hopefully have lots of worm babies in about three weeks ~ let's hope this works!

you made me put the night crawlers in, but
you did the rest...we'll see what happens!

crossing our fingers for worm babies

Once home, we stayed in, relaxed and enjoyed the smell of Guinness stew from the crock-pot, snuggled, made each other laugh, and awaited the arrival of our visitors ~ Audrey Ayi and Lao Lao! Both stopped by for a bit that afternoon and evening. It was so nice to see them and spend time together. Lao Lao helped you for a long time with your latest Kiwi Crates full of crafts and science experiments. Audrey played your beloved LPS with you and gave you a bath before heading home.