The Katie Bug

Melly's letter to Uncle Eric

I told Melly that we were going to write letters to Uncle Eric. I told her that she could write whatever she wanted. This is what she came up with:

Mad Eric,

I love you! I want something so special to play with at your house. And Mom, I love you to the moon and back. I like to snuggle with Eric. I want something to play with at Katie Matt's house. I like chicken flying up in the air. I like Eric flying up in the air. I want duck flying up in the air. I love you to the moon and back. I want a DVD to watch a video. I learned about ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ now I know my ABC's next time won't you sing with me. I like Eric's computer to play on and not to work on. I like Mom's hair on ice (yes, she actually said that...I don't know). I am a child of God. And I like ice skating...gibberish...fake Spanish words. I love you!

Love,

Mad Melly

Interesting right!? As weird as Eric is I figured he would enjoy it...We did.

The Pledge

This girl is amazing.

Learing A Lot

Alex a new home

The other day I was talking to Melynn, this was our conversation:

Mom: "When we have a baby (someday), does she want a boy or a girl?"

Melynn: "mmm...maybe both"

Mom: "No, How about a boy?"

Melynn: "But what will we do with Alex? Will we find him a new family?

Mom: "No (laughing hysterically) we won't. We love Alex. It's okay to find dogs new homes, but not my kids.

Melynn: "So would we have two babies (counting Alex)?"

Mom: "Yes"

I guess because we found Lola a new family that meant that when we had another baby (someday) we had to get rid of another one first.

Also Alex now says the word "de-wish-us" (delicious). So cute. I was making breakfast for dinner and as I was scrambling the eggs Alex commented, "yum, eggs, dewishus". He is growing up so fast.

They wanted this....

A couple of days ago one of the kids brought me the Duct tape and asked me to tape them. I know they don't look happy, but Alex got mad when I took it off. Melynn looks like she is missing a hand. Awesome.

We have witnesses

On Sunday we went over to my Mom's for dinner after the second Conference session. About five minutes after we got there I told Melynn that her cousin Kabe was outside if she wanted to go play with him. I opened the door and she excitedly running to go out only to trip midway and smack her nose on the corner of the open door. She instantly started crying. I picked her up to comfort her and see if she had a nose bleed or anything. The only evidence was a small diagonal line about a 1/4 inch long on the bridge of her nose. It was so light that it looked like a scar from a past injury. She asked Grammy for a band-aid and was set. We never heard anything about it the rest of the evening. In fact when my brother asked what was on her nose (the band-aid, implying what happened) she simply replied "a line". She didn't remove the band-aid the rest of the day.

The next morning she woke up and came in to do her usual snuggle with Peter but instead of pestering him awake she went back to sleep for another 2-3 hours. When we woke up we noticed that her face looked like this:

Look at all the swelling. You can see it better up close.

Yeah you'd think you wouldn't want to put your finger in your eye after that but I guess she did.

The photo above actually goes at the bottom of the photos. It was taken today.

And now today looks like this:

We went to the doctor yesterday. She did really well during the x-rays. All they said was to give her pain meds and that it was a clean break, her nose looks straight and she should heal nicely. Also that the swelling should go down (which it has some) and that the bruise will get worse and the dark bruises will move around her face. She is such a trooper. PLEASE KEEP IN MIND THAT THESE PHOTOS DO NOT DO IT JUSTICE. IT LOOKS MUCH WORSE IN REAL LIFE.

And this is a picture I took of Alex in the car. He fell asleep chewing on his favorite blanket. He loves the satin edge. I've had to sew it back on twice.

"My Children"

Flashlight Repair

All day Melynn has continuously asked me if I would change the light in her princess and the frog light. I kept telling her it was the batteries that needed changing and that I would do it later. When Peter got home from work Melly brought these items to her dad.

And she asked him: "Daddy will you change the light in my princess and the frog flashlight?". He laughed.

This year we went to see Santa at Grammy Houser's work. I think that the pictures look better than the ones we got last year at the Mall. We were really worried about Alex freaking out on Santa's lap, but as you can see he did so well. In fact he loved it so much that it was hard to get him to leave the building. All he wanted was to see Santa again "Santa, Santa, Santa". Melly was so excited to see Santa, she laughed a giggled all the way there, she practiced what she was going to tell him that she wanted at least a dozen times and when the time came she froze for about a minute. She then preceded to tell him the following: "I want a Unicorn Pillowpet and a geddi-gens (backyardigans) ball, Lola popped it yesterday and we need another one.". Just so that everyone knows Lola popped that ball about four months ago. She really doesn't understand time. I always enjoy going to see Santa because you never know what is going to happen. We've been pretty lucky so far.

Also these are our Christmas cards. I made them up a few minutes ago so feel free to get one printed off if you don't get one either in the mail or personal delivery. Click on the photo to take a better look.

Happy Holidays Everyone!

Dreams Confused with Reality

During nap times I usually let Melly watch TV in the family room while Alex sleeps and I get things done. Somedays she does really well with staying down there and others not so much. Today she did really well. Come to find out she had fallen asleep. This is our conversation after two full hours of not hearing a peep out of her:

Mom: Hi Melly, What's up?
Melly: Mom, I fell asleep
Mom: Oh yeah, that's good that you took a nap.
Melly: Yeah...Something woke me up....I think it was a squirrel.
Mom: Oh Really? Honey I don't think that there are any squirrels in the house.
Melly: Yeah, it went "tssst" and woke me up.
Mom: Okay?!

This is the first time that I'm sure that she must have been dreaming about squirrels and something that it did must have woke her up. It was so funny and completely threw me when she told me it was a squirrel. Anyway I hope you've enjoyed this story as much as I did.

The Cleaning Critic

For those of you who don't know the nightmares of having linoleum it can be difficult to thoroughly clean. There are grooves and patterns that dirt gets stuck in. I spent two hours yesterday just scrubbing the bathroom floor on my knees with a scrub brush and 409. When I was done it looked amazing. I had pretty much gotten all the dirt out. There are two paint spots from when we painted the house that are stuck there and we haven't removed them because someday we plan to replace the flooring.

A few hours later I'm getting ready for a date with Peter and Melly comes waking into the bathroom and says, "Mommy you cleaned the floors."

I responded, "Yep, I did"

Noticing a small black dot of paint she says, "Mommy, there's a little bit of dirty here."

I responded, "Yep, I couldn't get that spot off."

Melly: "Oh and a little bit of dirty over here."

Me: "Okay Melly, you don't need to critique my cleaning job. But, yes that's paint too. I couldn't get it up either."

Another Conversation with Melly

Melly: Where do we live mom?

Wendi: Pleasant Grove

Melly: and KayMatt?

Wendi: Orem

At this point she pauses trying to think who to ask about next.

M: Scott and Jen?

W: American Fork

M: (with a twinkle in her voice) Oh, Spanish Fork

W: No, not Spanish Fork, that's were Nate and Gill live and George, you remember George right?

M: No, I'm not studying those people there.

Another Melly Encounter

Last night we went to Walmart to do some Grocery Shopping and to pick up various other things. We had a feeling that tonight was going to be a bad night and Melly proved to be a trial of our patience. Somewhere between the light bulbs and the milk I had had enough and threatened,"If you don't stop it right now you're going to live in the parking lot.". She looked at me funny, but didn't look real concerned, plus she had calmed down for the time being, so we went about our way to finish the shopping trip. An hour later we were finally buckling the kids into the car. As we drove out of the parking lot Melynn pipes up in her very concerned sweet little voice "I don't want to live in the parking lot," which started me laughing when she continued by saying, "I want to live in Pleasant Grove!" Which only caused me to laugh harder. After gaining control I did explain that I would not make her live in the parking lot.

Oh, and yes, I do realize that one day she will call me on my empty threats to make her live in the parking lot, but I take solace in knowing that last night was not that night.

P.S. Melly Quote of the day: "Lola's biting me like a crocodile!"

Funny Things Melly Says

Number One:
I was getting melynn out of her room from her nap when I notice her bows were gone from her hair and she had been pulling on pigtails, trying to pull them out. I stopped her on the way out of her room and asked, touching a pigtail: "Whats this? Where are your bows?" she responded in a happy tone and a skip in her step: "They're just hangin' out!" and she was off to get some "smarshmellows" from Daddy, leaving me laughing hysterically.

Number Two:
I scissored Melynn between my legs and this is our conversation:
Melynn: Mom I don't want you to.
Mom: why are you so grumpy?
Melynn: I'm grumpy cause I don't want your legs there.

Number Three:

A few days ago we went to DI, we told Melly that if she behaved she could pick out a toy from the toy aisle. Of course the toy she picked out was a little plastic Dora. The next day we found the Dora toy with her feet all chewed up. I got upset and asked Melly why she was chewing on her new toy. She responded, "I got the mosquitoes off mom." We were completely baffled. Then on Sunday we were sitting on our bed and I look over and Melly is chewing on her toenails, first off that's super gross, and second she's pretty flexible to be able to groom all her toe nails with her teeth. Completely aghast I said, "Melly, that's gross, don't bite your toenails." "But mom, I'm getting all the mosquitoes off." We're not sure what she thinks the mosquitoes are doing on her toes but she's taking care of them, no need to worry. Peter even showed her his bare feet and asked where the mosquitoes were, she pointed to a little scab where he cut his toenail too short (with clippers, not his teeth ). She's so full of ideas it just a joy to watch her grow up.

Baptized

We went to my niece's baptism today and my Step-Sister (Alice) was telling Melynn not to touch the glass around the font and Melynn responded without hesitation and probably without really listening, "I forgot my swimsuit!". I couldn't help but laugh. It couldn't be more of a Melynn response. She did put her hands behind her back and kind of leaned on the glass to look in. After the baptism she ran over to me and said, "I want to get baptized?", my response was "Not for five more years, Honey."

As Peter got up to join the circle for the confirmation Melynn said indignantly, "But daddy, you don't have your swimsuit!"

About 30 seconds into the confirmation she escaped and joined Peter in the circle. He didn't know what to do with her, and couldn't do much without breaking the circle so she sat at his feet reverently for the rest of the confirmation.

She's just so full of personality, it gets frustrating at times, but she's our little sweetheart.

Dora Tent

I went to check on Melly during nap time and this is where I found her.

Melly's 3rd Birthday

Today is my baby's 3rd birthday. I really don't know what to do with that. Part of me wants to cry because she is growing up too fast and how beautiful and totally independent she is getting. It's sad that she no longer needs me for things for example her bed time prayer they are short and sweet and to the point. I love you so much my sweet little girl. You are and will always be my little Princess. Sweetest, cutest girl in all the land.

We had a birthday party yesterday where everyone came from our family. She had a blast playing with her cousins and aunts and uncles. Anyway I will post some pictures and videos tomorrow. Mostly because my camera in downstairs and I don't want to go find it. Good night all.

Melly's Bargaining Technique

A little while ago while helping Melly go to the bathroom she says to me: "look mommy a dime (penny)". I respond "Let me hold it and you can have it when we go to the store next time". I thought nothing else of it until a few minutes ago when Melly brought it up. Our conversation went something like this.

Melly: "Mommy, give me a quarter."
Mommy: "No, remember I said you could have it when we go to the store."
Melly: "Mommy, give me a dime."
Mommy: "No!"
Melly: "Give me a dollar."
Mommy: "No I'm not giving you a dollar"
Melly: "Give me a dollar and a bag?"

I think I couldn't say anything I was laughing to hard. I don't think she really understands how to bargain. In due time I guess.

I think she learned to ask for money while we were grocery shopping at Macey's on Friday when she saw a Grandma give her grandchild a dollar to buy their own treat. When Melynn saw this the light bulb flipped on. "I want a dollar, Mom!". You can probably guess my answer.

Success at last

I am happy to say that Melynn is finally potty trained. Yes she still does have the occasional accident 99% of the time she remembers and is great at telling us that she needs to go potty.

About a week ago we got a puppy (see previous post), Peter's brother (Scott) and Sister-in-law (Jen/Jenalee) wanted to see her and offered to take the puppy and the kids to the park while we ran an errand. When we picked the kids up after we were done and we were putting the kids down for the night Melynn out of no where says to us "I went potty in the park...outside". Peter's response was something like "Really...why did you do that, who told you that?" Melly's reply "Jen helped me". I guess as soon as they got to the park she needed to go. Jen didn't know what to do so Scott told her to let her go outside and to not tell mom and dad. Rule #1 Jen, Melynn can't keep a secret.

My point is that we are so proud of our Beautiful BIG girl and that the time that I was dreading is finally over.