Showin' the Love

Lily got these great window crayons from Grandma and Grandpa for Valentine's Day. She put them to good use today making a welcome home display for Ryan. Yes, that picture is from this afternoon and yes she is wearing her PJs. She has a fever and sore throat today, so we had a very relaxed PJ day.

This is what our finished creation looked like. Lily suggested she do the first letter and I do the second and that we switch back and forth for the whole sign. I started to say that wouldn't work because we would have to do all the letters backwards, but then I realized when I thought about the words we were using that most of her letters would end up being the same backwards and forwards. Wasn't that fortuitous?! I started out by doing one of her "e"s because I thought it was too hard to do backwards, but when we came to the second "e" that was hers she suggested that she could just do the upper case "E"--- brilliant! So that's what we did. As for that "N", well I started telling her about doing it backwards, but I stopped because "N"s can be confusing enough and I knew Ryan would know what it was supposed to be. That big heart on the top was Lily's idea, she decided everything about it and sent me for a stool so she could reach the perfect spot.

This is Ryan's reaction. I think he felt the love:-) Lily was so excited to do it and had so much fun with it. She even left "secret kisses" for Ryan. They are red ovals with her name written by them. I just love my kids. They are so awesome!

Little Girl Dolls Make the Difference

Lily and I went to the store together. We were walking by the little girl clothes and Lily feel in love with a dress. It was purple (of course) with a bow on the front and a matching dress for a doll. It was 40% off and I had a gift card so I bought it for her. She was tickled pink. Then I realized all her dolls are babies. Little bald babies. She put the dress on one of her baby dolls happily enough and played with it for a while. Then I remembered something.

I spent the evening digging through boxes and eventually found my old dolls. There are two that I had that were close to the 18" size that is so popular right now, My Friend Jenny and My Friend Becky. So we gave them baths and washed their clothes and Lily has barely put them down since. She takes them everywhere. Jenny stays the closest, but mostly it's both of them. It's so sweet. She's played with dolls before, but this is something else. She absolutely loves them. They are a little skinny for the dress matches her new dress, but she doesn't seem to mind at all (she's a little skinny for most of her clothes, too!) She mostly has them in the outfits they had on from when I was a kid. 

The other day I noticed her dolls didn't have shoes on. I thought it was just like her other baby dolls- sometimes they just don't have anything on and it's no big deal. Then we went to leave the house and of course the dolls had to come with us. She grabbed her dolls and ran to her cubby to put her shoes on and I saw this...

Isn't that just the sweetest thing you've ever seen? I didn't make a big deal (I took the picture later when she wasn't around). I just waited to see what happened. When we came back she took off her shoes and took off the doll shoes and lined them all up again. She's melting my heart, that girl! I think she may be ready for her own big girl doll soon! It's a big moment. I'd better start saving now! I wonder if I should let her decide which big girl doll to pick or just pick one I love. My favorite was Samantha and she's not available anymore. Maybe Lily and I can pick out a new favorite together. This calls for a trip to the library.

The Things They Say...

I was putting Lily to bed and just like always I said, "I love you. I'll see you in the morning." As I was walking out Lily said, "Don't forget to tell me in the morning." She meant she wanted me to remember t tall her I love her in the morning. Awww :-)

We were walking through a store where we picked up a rain jacket for Ryan. He had decided he wanted to keep the jacket on after he tried it on, so he put the hanger across his chest and into the arm holes. He said, "Hmm, this would be comfortable if the metal thing weren't so cold." Some ladies passing by giggled at him and he said, "Why does what I say always make people laugh?!" For those that know him well you may be able to picture his face, eyes rolled up and his lips in a tight straight line looking shy trying to hide the smile that's threatening to explode from behind them.

Don't hear that much

As I bent down to pick Lily up from the step above me she said, "You're soooooo tall, Mommy!" I'll treasure that little tid bit since it's not something I hear much at 5'4".

Never Forget...

Never forget how cute and innocent they are at 3. Yesterday we went to the Orioles' game with Grandmommy and Granddaddy. Lily didn't watch much of the game, but she found ways to amuse herself. At one point she came over the the seat next to me. She situated herself with her back on the seat and her legs up the back. She played for a while tipping her head over the edge and laughing as if it were the funniest thing in the world. Lily has a very contagious laugh, watching her enjoy herself brings a smile to my face almost all the time. She plays some other games with herself, or so I thought. The next thing I know she's looking over at me with a big grin on her face and says, "The people LOVE me!" I guess she was entertaining the people behind us as well;-) It was so funny because she was just innocently trying to say that the people behind us liked her, but it sounded so diva-esque. One might have thought she was a Broadway star the way she made her proclamation with such confidence and feeling;-)

Lily and Her Princesses

Lily has these 2 inch tall princesses she just loves. She plays with them constantly. She packs them up and takes them places with her when she goes places. It's really sweet. Unfortunately, 3 of them have broken. One a while ago and two recently. I tried to fix the first one with super glue, but it didn't hold. Since she loves them so much and they only cost about $10 for the pack of seven I decided to get her new ones. It was quite a task since stores don't seem to be selling them anymore. I found some on Amazon. I ordered the cheapest one that was supposedly never opened for twice what I had originally paid. I sucked it up because she really does love them. They came today. I would never have bought them if I saw them in person. Lets just say the colors are intense, including on the faces. It didn't seem to matter to Lily as she dropped to the ground right there in the doorway to open them. Of course she had her little princess purse with the current princesses in her had so she took those out as I removed the others from their package. Here she is introducing them to each other.
You can see here that each princess is saying hello to her counterpart from the other set. This set has a new princess the other one didn't, so later all the princesses are turned toward Pocahontas and said hello. She was like a rock star with all eyes on her, "Hello Pocahontas," repeated for each of the other princesses. I love this pretend play stage. It's so fun!

Hair Salon

Lily and I played our first game of hair salon. She found the detangling spray I use on her and Ryan and started spraying in my hair. I think she was trying to tease me and expected me to make her stop, but I didn't. We both decided to go with it. She told me she needed to get something and she ran up to my room and got my hairbrush. She brushed my hair and did something that was supposed to be styling it. Then she turned my face to look at her and said, "Look how pwitty!" I love having a girl to do girl things with. The best part is she is not a frilly girly girl. She's a real down to earth, fun girl who likes her femininity, but it doesn't define her. LOVE it!

Little Helper

Lily came into the kitchen while I was making dinner last night. When she noticed I was cooking she tilted her sweet little head and said, "Can I give you a hand?"

Where does she get this stuff? I don't think I even say that. It was very sweet though. She helped me add the spices to the spaghetti sauce, but that was really all I had left to do for a while. She seemed satisfied enough with that.

Sweet Song

I was singing Lily her normal bedtime songs tonight and she was singing along. Not too much unusual about that until I was singing "Jesus loves little Lily." She usually sings "Jesus loves Ryan" which makes sense because I usually do their songs together and sing "Jesus loves big Ryan" before or after. Tonight as I sang her part she sang "Jesus loves Mommy" all on her own. [melt] So even though it took an hour to put her down tonight I can't be too mad. What can I say... the girl knows how to work me.