happy birthday, uncle derek!

today is uncle derek's birthday. while madelyn wanted to talk to him on the phone, all she would say is "bye" at the end. we were just surprised that she wanted to talk to him because she has been refusing to talk on the phone lately - even to daddy. anyway, matt and derek's parents are here with us so we all went out to dinner and had a toast to derek's birthday. i hope that you had a great one!

this morning madelyn and i (and mason) went to the first of a new class - puppet playtime. i should have brought my camera in with me and will try to remember it next week. it is a pretty loose class but there is a puppet making craft - this week it was a paper plate sheep puppet, some books about the theme - sheep, a puppet theater - with fabric sheep puppets, and singing at the end - today, you guessed it, sheep songs. madelyn was really excited about the puppet theater and was really cute with her huge smile peaking through the 'stage' window.

this blurry picture shows madelyn holding her sheep puppet. she lost interest in gluing on the cotton balls after attaching only four - they were supposed to go all the way around the face in the middle of the plate. like i said, she really liked the puppet theater and had to check it out as soon as the other kids started to make their way over.

after we got back to the house we had a quick snack and then took nana to the park while papa worked and napped. nana was a good sport about pushing madelyn on the swing and going down the twisty slide - more than once. madelyn had a lot of fun playing with nana and another little boy who came to play. we headed home after madelyn decided that she was ready for lunch. after lunch, madelyn had a lot of fun playing with papa in the playroom. i am not sure what all they were playing, but there was a lot of noise and laughter coming out of the playroom.



we were lucky that daddy could come home a little early today. he got home a little before madelyn woke up from her nap and got to spend some time with the kids before we headed out to dinner.

on wednesday night we went to matt's softball game and madelyn was trying to talk with a little girl that was eating some snacks and drinking juice. here was madelyn's ice breaker - "its a nice day, huh?" it was all i could do not to laugh out loud. she has been commenting on the weather a lot lately. mainly to say that it was "hot out today." she just says these things sometimes that make her sound so mature beyond her years.

happy birthday again to uncle derek! love.