Weekend with Daddy (22 months)

Greetings! My apologies for the late blog. Mommy was gone all weekend. When she got home last night we just had playtime instead of blogging. But I'll talk all about my fun weekend with Daddy in a bit. Sneak preview though--I got to go on my very first carousel ride!

This is one of my really fun new tricks. I call it "Look Ma No Hands!" I start out doing a yoga pose called downward facing dog. Next I lift up my hands and giggle. It is really a lot of fun.

This week I had my usual activities. At school this week I made a monster. Again, I was a model child during the separation time. Only a few tears when Mommy left and then I just played with all of the fun toys. When Mommy came back to get me I was shaking maracas and having a good time while some other kids were by the door screaming and crying. On Thursday I had dance of course. There were some older kids in my class because of MEA break. I really liked dancing with the older girls. It made me feel so grown up! I did a lot of my own choreography again. Mommy signed us up for the next session of dance class so I get to dance all winter long! Yay! I love dancing!

It may be fall and everything is dying, but I still am really into watering the plants. This is the only thing left blooming after a lot of cold nights. Mommy is willing to just let it die and be done taking care of it, but I'm very insistent on making sure it is well hydrated.

This is a picture of me watching Dinosaur Train while Mommy does her hair and makeup. Don't I look cozy?

Every day I find Daddy's sleeping shorts and insist on putting them on. I can do it by myself and I always think it is so funny to wear his shorts. I don't, however, think it's funny to take my picture as you can see! Not impressed, Mom!

Ever since I started drinking water in a cup at school, I've wanted to do it more often at home. Mommy bought me some special cups that are easier for toddlers to drink from. A bib is necessary since I spill quite a bit. Mommy told me I needed to sit if I was going to have some water so I plopped down right next to the fridge.

Look at that form! Take that sippy cup! We've only been practicing with water so far. Mommy says she's not ready for me to take on other more messy liquids.

As I said earlier, Mommy went away for the weekend. She and some friends headed to Chicago to commemorate the fact that they are all turning 30 this year. So it was just me and Daddy! On Friday we headed to the zoo. There was a baby giraffe!!

This is me saying "Hi!!" to the baby giraffe. I was really friendly to the animals but the giraffes were my favorite.

This is me and a reindeer. I thought they only lived at the North Pole but apparently they also reside in St Paul.

The sign might say "Please Do Not Feed the Lion" but don't take it too seriously. I'm not really a lion!

It was such a nice day that I thought I'd get a little more shoveling practice in. You really never can be prepared enough for a Minnesota winter!

Daddy thought it'd be more weather-appropriate to head to the park and dig in the sand so we did that! I needed some help with the digging. I'm sure by next summer I'll be able to do it myself.

After dinner and a bath it was time for jammies. All week I had refused to wear my new Dora jammies but by Friday it was time to try them out. Posing with me is my new Dora doll.

On Saturday Daddy and I went to Underwater Adventures at the Mall of America. I was really hoping to run into my friend Sharky but he was nowhere to be found. I had to be satisfied just seeing this picture of him!

There were lots of big fish and sharks in huge tanks but I preferred the tiny fish in the smaller aquariums. Dora got to come to the aquarium too! After the aquarium we went to Nickelodeon Universe. It's the amusement park inside of the mall. I got to go on my very first ride, the carousel as you saw in the first picture. I had so much fun on it that as soon as the ride stopped I asked for "more!"

On day three of "Daddy/Daughter Adventure Weekend" we went to the children's museum. We got there bright and early and there was hardly anyone there. Don't worry, we weren't skipping church. Our church is meeting Sunday nights for now. Anyway, it was great! I got to drive the bus without a bunch of older kids getting in the way.

I did all of my usual activities going to my favorite exhibits.

This was a new activity for me. There was a Japanese art exhibit so I got to try on a kimono. I really enjoyed doing some stamping in this exhibit as well.

Since Halloween is coming up soon they had a special exhibit called "Spooky Hollow". We listened to a story about walking through Spooky Hollow and then we crawled around a giant spider web. It was fun at first but I got scared about halfway through. There were also some fun creepy crawly animals in the brook that you could touch. I thought that part was really fun! And of course, I had fun "picking pumpkins"

A girl can never have too many purses right? I have a lot of things so I require many purses (and a Halloween bucket). On Sunday night Daddy and I went to church. When we got home Mommy came home a little bit later. I had a great weekend with Daddy but was glad to have Mommy home too!

What else is new with me?

• One of my favorite things to do is to push the handicapped button near doors so that they will open automatically. I say, "push!" Last weekend when we had dinner with Grandpa and Grandma D and we were sitting at a handicapped accessible table. We knew this because the handicapped symbol was on the table. I kept pushing the symbol and looking up to see what would happen. My parents were impressed!

• When Mommy came home last night we sat down to read books before going to bed. I picked up my "feelings" book. Usually Mommy reads the pages to me, but I surprised her by "reading" it! Without prompting, I looked at the pictures and said, "happy" "sad" "shy" "angry" "messy" and "silly"

• I'm really into Dora. I call her "Dodo". I also can say "Boots!" and "Backpack!"

• Bath times now require a big bath sheet "shield" for Mommy and Daddy. I like practicing my swimming kicks while floating on my back. It makes for lots of splashing!

• I've pretty much given up on eating hot cereal in the morning so now I eat Multi Grain Cheerios and milk. I'm really good at feeding myself cold cereal and I like to drink the milk out of the bowl. I wonder where I learned that from?

• A lot of times my parents get frustrated with me during meal times as I am a really picky eater and sometimes meals take way longer than they should. But in the midst of the stress, I can often offer some comic relief. A couple of scenes from recent meals.

Scene 1: Megan is 45 minutes into a meal.

Mommy (exasperated) "Megan! Are you eating or playing?!"

Megan (matter of factly) "Playing."

Hey I'm honest!

Scene 2: Dinnertime. Everyone is done eating and Megan hasn't eaten much

Daddy: "Megan! Are you going to eat?

Megan: "No."

Daddy: "What do you want to do then?"

Megan: "Dodo" (Dora)

• I'm learning new words every day! So many that my parents can't really keep up anymore.

I've become quite the dancer as you'll see in my music video below. I'm rocking out to my Elmo Dance Party CD. The 2nd video is me at the children's museum in the "recording studio".

Have a great week!