Fall Break

Last Sunday was Madelyn's first full day in nursery! I dropped her off, after some selfies.

This was the best I could get- it was a little chaotic and she didn't want to stand still. 

But she was very excited and did great! See ya in two hours, kiddo.

Since the girls had Thursday and Friday off of school, we had lots of fun playtime in the beautiful weather. 

The girls are more than a little obsessed with raking these days. No complaints here! They were out there by themselves for a while raking before I meandered out to see what they were doing. So industrious! I'm not even sure we got dressed this day...

We also fit in our annual family trip to Cornbellys! There's never enough time to do everything but we had a lot of fun.

Daryn really loved this new obstacle course and was very methodical about it. (Reagan had hay in her pants and wasn't quite into it).

The corn maze!

Perfect day for such an adventure. 

Last stop- a ride on the cow train.

We let the girls pick out some pumpkins this year since we didn't end up growing any of our own. Luckily, they all picked pretty small ones.

After a long day, Maddie's grumpy face when Daryn wasn't sharing a book that she wanted cracked me up. 

Apparently they play choo-choo train now? Maddie wraps her arms around Daryn and they choo-choo around the house. They really are great friends. 

Beautiful girls all ready for Stake Conference on Sunday! It was such a great meeting. 

We're thankful for extra time to be able to spend together as a family!

Madelyn 18 months

Maddie's half birthday was yesterday. Very exciting because now she can go to nursery at church. Great for her, and even more great for us. Maddie has really transformed over the last month and has turned into the sweetest, most adorable toddler ever. Just check her out! Everything she does is so cute I want to die. 

Two days ago she helped me mow almost the entire back yard and was thrilled. Her favorite part was when we would "cash" into each other. 

Sometimes it's easier to carry Bear in your mouth when you need both hands to slide down the stairs faster.

We celebrated this milestone with a little half red velvet cake from Smiths yesterday. Maddie was like:

"What? What is this?"

"Wait a minute..."

"... Is that cake??"

"It is! It is cake!"

"I'm so happy right now Mom!"

 "YASSSSSSS"

"EAT. ALL. THE. CAKE."

"RAWR"

OM NOM NOM

Like I mentioned earlier, Maddie has made huge progress in the past few weeks. At the beginning of September, she knew less than 5 words and we were kind of worried. Recently, she has started repeating almost any word we teach her and saying some of them on her own! Whew. She understands most of what we tell and loves to follow simple commands like throwing things away, putting clothes in the laundry basket, giving something to someone else, and laying down for a diaper change. She knows some of her body parts. She plays nicely in her playpen for a good amount of time every day. She is extremely active and busy and thinks she can do anything that her sisters can. She loves them so much and gets so excited to see them. She is really happy almost all the time but will storm away and throw a little fit if she doesn't get what she want. She is obsessed with books lately and will sit in her room and look at them for quite a while. Her favorites are nursery rhymes, Pat the Bunny, and Goodnight Moon. She LOVES Daddy and waves bye-bye (BYYY) to him every morning and is thrilled when he comes home! She is very independent and wants to try everything herself, including feeding. She has a great appetite and will eat almost anything we give her. She is still huge- 34 inches (97th %- only 6 inches shorter than Daryn...) and 26 lbs even (92nd %). She fits in mostly 24 month clothes, size 5 diapers, and size 4 shoes. She rocked her doctors appointment this morning and didn;t even cry when she got two shots. She takes one nap (1.5-3 hours) every afternoon and sleeps around 12 hours at night, although she will often cry a few times during the night. She can't sleep unless she is snuggling her pink Bear. She is obsessed with other toddlers and babies, especially at the store, and waves and yells. She enjoys watching Daniel Tiger in the morning with Daryn while Reagan is at school. She is so so sweet and silly and we all completely adore her!