{Malia} Month 7

One word describes this girl {HAPPY} I can't get enough of her!  I can't give her enough kisses and I can't stop making her smile.   We are so thankful to have this little blessing in our lives.  Malia had a lot of firsts this past month . . . .

. . . . 1st trip to the ocean

. . . . 1st sacked out nap at the ocean

. . . . 1st nasty case of strep throat.  Gabe had it, then I had it and then our little sweet pea had it.  This was her sleeping after a rough trip to the doctor.  Poor thing!

She loves her daddy and her daddy loves his girl. 

Malia eats most anything now.  Her favorites: anything that I am eating.  She eats a lot of sweet potatoes, peas, bananas, beans, cereal, snacks that she loves to try to put in her mouth by herself, etc.  But one thing she doesn't love is the high chair tray table.  Sometimes she gets so mad because she wants to play with her feet.  I wish I had that flexibility.

Her nana is crazy about her!

Three generations: now I know that I'm a pretty good mixture of my mom and dad and I am starting to look more like my mom . . . BUT Malia, looks almost NOTHING like me.  Every once in awhile her profile looks like me, in fact someone just pointed that out a couple of days ago too, but she is ALL daddy and she's beautiful. 

Papa loves his grand-daughter and was pretty set on us having one just for him.  Big softy!

. . . . .  1st ride down the bouncy slide.  Yep, I hiked up with Malia in tow, one handed up the rope ladder, it wasn't pretty people.  I just kept thinking on the way up, "Please, no one notice me from behind," but I made it and down we went. 

And out she went!

Anything that can go in the mouth, does.  Malia loves her walker.   At first she could only scoot backwards, but now she's scooting all over the place.

We had her 6 month pictures taken, and received the photos last month.  I had to share this one.  It is so sweet and really shows off her big eyes.

And, Grandma gets quite a kick out of this girl.  I just love hearing Marlene's Betty Rubble giggle when she comes over to visit and hang out with us and spends time admiring Malia.

Malia is such a good sleeper.  I had to take a picture of her sleeping this way because her daddy tends to do this too.

 . . . . 1st campfire! During the campfire, I cozied her up and put this hat on her that one of my colleagues/teachers made for her last year.

THOSE eyelashes!  L.O.V.E. them!

Malia isn't a cuddly baby so when I get those opportunities to snuggle, I take them and I soak them up.

Again, I just can't stop!

. . . . . 1st bike ride! And we went on our first good hike but I don't have pictures to share.  But I can tell you this, she is in awe of the outdoors and wants her face to the wind.  When I have her strapped to the front of me, she sings as the wind hits her in the face, but if I turn away, she stops.  We are thrilled that she loves to be outside and we can't wait for the weather to accommodate our love for the outdoors.

Malia popped through her 3rd tooth this past month, and there are more to come, especially the one right next to it on the top in the front.  Hence, the sock in the mouth.

I love that these two love each other.  Please dear Lord let that continue!

Not only is this girl happy, but she makes us happy!  She's a goofball and doesn't even know it yet. 

Malia and I have been reading more and more together and our favorites are the board books that I read to Gabe a lot when he was a baby, written by Sandra Boynton.  They are great and I have them mostly memorized with the catchy rhymes and silly style.

Malia loves to be.  She is so happy and content, loves to smile and laugh and play with her big brother.  So far, she is stil living up to her name.  Calm.  Now I need to go give her kisses after posting all of this! 

Happenings

While I'm working during the day, it's so fun for Gabe to make forts.  We have limited space in our house for him to play so forts are like his own hideaway.

I took this boy out on a date to Red Robin one evening while Mike was out at a basketball game.  Of course, sis was in tow but we still squeezed in some time together.

Baseball practice has started and Gabe is playing coach-pitch this year.  We are so stoked to see this little guy nail the ball.  We bought him his own bat bag to carry his gear and I just recently bought him some Under Armor sleeves and compression shorts . . . . WITH a pocket for a cup!  He won't be using one yet, but when I discovered it, he asked what a cup was and took one look at the pocket and said, "Cooool!  I can put my knife in there!"  Yeah, something like that buddy.

Gabe is totally into Indiana Jones and had to show Mike how to use a whip to snag some bad guys, I mean chairs.  I LOVE the hand on the hip while he is perfecting his stance and instructing his inexperienced father.

Yep, we are die hard campfire fans.  We had to have one after we got back from Ocean Shores since it rained on our attempts down there. 

Gabe using his play knife to whittle away at the kindling.

Boys will be boys.  Grandma brought some big boxes from work for my little boy to create with my big boy.  And what did they come up with? . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . a tank of course, with a mobile gun on the front.  Why didn't I think of that?

Again with the Indiana Jones.  This kid loves to dress up!

Gabe is always asking to play with one of our neighbors, Devon, who is in the fourth grade.  Oddly, the older kids love Gabe and he can get them to do whatever he wants.  He'll come up with some crazy game, tell them all how to play, direct it, and sit back and watch it all take place.  Sound like anyone else you know?

Again, he LOVES to dress up!

Once a week, Gabe is allowed to fall asleep in our bed, and when we come up to go to bed ourselves, Mike carries him into his own room, which by the way is looking strange these days with Mike carrying a 62 pound 49inch tall kiddo cradle style.  This is what we came up to one night and I had to take a picture.  He told us that his animals were protecting him.  My favorite: Tigris from Kung Fu Panda right above his head.

Hey we have some scrap wood, let's build . . . . a gun safe?  I dunno.  But Gabe is serious and Mike is such an awesome dad to go out there and put all that scrap together.  Yep, they even used screws. . . . . NOW where am I going to put that thing?  Oh, these two crack me up!

While they were building, which isn't finished by the way, Gabe went through one of his milestones as a man and handsawed his first board.  Yep, he cut that whole thing by. him. self.  What a little stud!

Now, I can't be outdone, so we came inside and had an OREO race. 

I won. . . . there's going to be a day that I won't win, so I'm not going to concede now.  He was bummed that I beat him but ya know, a mom's gotta do whatta mom's gotta do.