Maddie, in all her Maddie-ness

This evening was spent listening to Maddie chatter on and on and on and on about... everything. Mike and I have never really seen her quite so animated. It was hilarious; I love to hear the things that come out of her mouth. Tonight, she said, "Jill Shafer, I love you so much. Let's get married!" Ahhh, how I love this little chicky.

For You, Jesus

Maddie was very busy painting her cross this morning (more on that later) and I caught this video. :)

California Baby Explains Earthquake

We had a fairly large earthquake tonight. Normally, I don't get overly anxious about them, but tonight's... Well, it freaked me out. It started out slowly and quickly escalated to the point where I thought our family room was ripping apart. In all my intelligence, I ran down the hall screaming, "Mama's coming, Maddie!" We're all okay and had a grand time walking around the house and finding all the things that had fallen. She kept saying, "'Nother mess, Mama!"

We all need a little holiday

So a few weeks ago, my parents took Maddie to lunch and this Kidz Bop CD was the fabulously wonderful parting gift. We listened through the first few songs, but as soon as she heard "Holiday," it was all over. It is now on repeat in my car (and if you're confused, that means that all I hear every time we're in the car is this same song). She dances and she sings and she cracks me up.

Little Maddie Video (Totally Random)

This MY Animals!

I'm really proud of the way that Maddie shares. Ha!

A Post on Waiting, Sassiness and Finger Paints

I hate this feeling of, hmmm, anticipation that I so frequently get these days. I wake up, usually in the middle of the night, with such a strong sense of waiting. A sense of waiting for something to happen. It bothers me and it upsets me, and I can't pinpoint exactly what is causing it.

Certainly, there are a lot of unanswered questions and unsolved issues at hand. Divorce is a painful enough burden as it is, but when you factor in custody, a foreclosure, work... Maybe this is where my upset stomach comes in.

And, it doesn't help that I've been having these extremely vivid dreams, ones that rock me out of sleep and leave me nearly breathless. I keep dreaming that Mike walks in and he's laughing. It's like he's his "old" self and he wraps me in a hug, says that I'm so silly to have dreamt all this up and that we can all go back to our "old" lives now. It's been three nights of this dream and I'm tired of it. It hurts and I don't want to have it anymore.

But, I think in a (big) way, that's exactly what I have been waiting for. I've been waiting for the storm to end. I've been waiting to wake up and get back to the life I used to lead, one that wasn't so filled with headaches and heartache and worry. As I begin to comprehend the fact that I'm a different person now, that also means that I have to release what was.

I guess it's that, that release of who I was and what we were, is causing me to be anxious. I'm anxious and I'm waiting. And like I said, I don't like that.

Moving on though...

Maddie's new thing is saying, "No way." We all know she's been sassy since day one; the girl is super expressive, so really this shouldn't come as a huge surprise. It's been a few days of the no-way-attitude, and it never fails to make me smile (though, it's definitely something I should break her of by preschool, huh?). I took this video this morning:

And finally, yesterday I went to get Maddie up from her nap. She was standing in her crib, shouting, "Mama! Paint! Paint now!" What a way to wake up from a nap, huh? I gave her finger paints, she freaked out about paint being on her fingers so we got sponges and brushes. And, I didn't freak when she completely and entirely mixed the pots of red and purple paint together. That is huge for me. :)

Fishy Love

Dumbo!!!

Maddie (sorta) knows some letters :)

Maddie Colors (sort of)

Maddie's Sense of Humor!