sleepy

A quick post: we had a busy, fun, BUSY! weekend with play dates, birthday parties, and lots of good times. But it didn't leave a lot of time for picture-taking and blogging.

Even naps got short shrift. Maisie didn't blink for the camera - she's fast asleep here. On Saturday we ran to Target to pick up a birthday present for our friend who turned 3. Even though she'd had a nap already, and Target is maybe 10 minutes away, by the time we got there she was completely asleep! We tried to wake her up but she wasn't having it, so Aaron carried her the whole time. She woke up when we got home, and was pretty confused. "Target?" "No sweetie, we already went to Target. We're home now." "Waah! Target!!"

happy (almost) Valentine's day!

Maisie's daycare is having a Valentine's Day party tomorrow, so tonight we made cupcakes!

It was a pretty easy process as cupcakes go - we used a boxed mix, instead of making them from scratch. Aaron added the ingredients while Maisie mixed, then she put the paper cups in the muffin tin and I filled them. After they baked and cooled, I frosted them, and then she decorated them with sprinkles.

The box said it made 24 cupcakes but it was wrong, or else perhaps our cupcakes were larger than intended. Anyway, we only got 16 cupcakes! And we need 15 to send to daycare. We let Maisie eat the one extra, like the selfless, giving parents that we are. But there's still a lot of frosting left, and she's in bed, and Aaron is out of the house, spending time with friends tonight. Now I just need to find something to put it on...

Happy birthday Bryce!

Today we traveled up north to help celebrate the third birthday of my cousin Saara's little boy, Bryce!

Bryce's birthday party was held at the Lake Superior Zoo, in Duluth. We got there a little late, just as he was opening his presents. So Maisie stood and watched with my mom and with my uncle Bob, Bryce's grandpa.

After presents, there was cake, of course.

After all, what's a third birthday party without cake?

You might not be able to tell, but that's Dylan sitting next to Maisie! Among other things we missed by arriving late, we missed out on face painting. Dylan was a cheetah. (Clearly, right?)

After the party and a walk around the zoo on a beautiful day, we went to hang out with the family back at Saara and Brent's place just outside Cloquet. They have a beautiful house out in the country, where they have (among other things) chickens!

Maisie got to get her first truly farm-fresh egg. It lasted about 10 minutes in her possession, but that's okay, there were plenty more where that one came from!

After checking out the chickens and breaking her egg, it was time to play outside. She declined a snowmobile ride, but had fun building a snowman and decorating it with colored water, shoveling, and especially throwing snowballs.

Dylan, Bryce and Maisie all threw snowballs at my cousin Dave, in town from California with his wife Ali, who threw the snowballs back at them. I joined them outside to find Maisie yelling "I get you, Dave!!" and giggling like crazy. It was hilarious!

And in Maisie's case, Dave would usually just hand the snowballs back to her.

drumroll please...

It's a girl!

A poll, and two year old fashion

Maisie is convinced that we're going to have a boy. If you ask her about the baby in mommy's tummy, she says "I have a brother! Baby boy!!" She's so certain about this that our daycare provider asked me if we'd found out the baby's sex early, because Maisie had been talking all day about her baby brother.

Well, we haven't found out yet, but we're going to - Monday morning! So if you have a guess, leave it in the comments. Maisie, Dylan, and Aaron think boy; my sister thinks girl; I have no feeling about it one way or the other. I'll post the results tomorrow and we'll see who's a good guesser!

A few posts ago I showed you what happens when Maisie picks her hat. Well, recently she has started getting very vocal about her entire outfits.

Yesterday she insisted on wearing a shirt with polka dots in primary colors, along with pink and red striped pants and a hot pink hat that I made for her. We tried to convince her to wear a different shirt (she loves those pants), but no dice. She got a lot of smiles at the zoo.

Today, we went to the children's museum.

Maisie wore the same pants with her pumpkin hat and a red striped dress. Her outfit was only slightly less crazy looking.

I feel like if we really wanted to, we could get Maisie to wear less flamboyant outfits. Maybe we could buy all matching clothes, or something. But I feel like as long as she's dressed appropriately for the weather outside, we're okay. And honestly, I kind of love how colorful and bright her clothes are - I feel like it matches her personality!