Gracie Girl!

After skimming over our past posts and pondering how much I blogged about MaryKate over her 2 year lifespan compared to Grace, I have come to the conclusion that she is already being neglected! Ahh! How does this happen when I swore as the 6th child with only 5 baby pictures that I would never do that to my own kids?! Well, this post is all about you, Gracie Girl and only you!

Grace is 5 months & 20 days old and is sooo much fun! She is all smiles... except when something is truly bothering her,
in which case she screams like someone is sawing off her limb with a butter knife.

She loves to:

Jump in her jumper. She was born active! She has no desire to be strapped into a swing like MK did. She wants to be jumping, standing, rolling, & moving.

She also lovers her bouncing exersaucer, especially if Big Sissy will come and play with her while she's in it. I tried to stop MK from climbing on it and bothering her, but I realized how happy it makes Grace to have her playing with her that I no longer intervene.

Grace also loves her kick toy... endless fun. Why don't they make these things for adults? I might burn some calories if they did.

She loves bath time, especially if she gets to take it with MK. Are you noticing a theme? They play so well together! This is a picture of their first bath together over New Years and MK insisted that I should leave them alone so they could have fun without me... umm, No!



Grace loves to giggle. She loved her uncle Todd and cousins Evan & Maddie

She also loves reading. If you recall MK's reading movie when she was an infant, she was crazy about reading too. They both seem to have this passion for books in common.

James' 2 sisters had baby boys right close in age to Grace. All 3 babies look much more like their dads than their moms so we thought it was appropriate to take a Daddy picture. We hope Jasper, Sam, and Grace all become close friends.

MaryKate's Merry Magical Christmas

MK realized that she could see herself in the glass ornaments. Oh, what joy that brought! When I first put up the tree she tried to blow on every light to extinguish them like candles... Moments later she turned to me with deep concern in her face & said, "Oh, no Santa's going to swipe our tree!" (Yes, we've watched alot of Dora & she thought Santa sounded alot like Swiper). She grew so attached to the tree that she cried real tears when I took it down.

Santa brought Dora stuff! Toothpaste in the stocking made her so happy and it made Mommy & Daddy happy. Less candy and better oral hygiene!

Other than Dora all she wanted was a puppy... a small stuffed one like her friend has. He's so soft & barks/pants. After visiting James' sister Dawn, Puppy is now named Molly after their dog that she loved so much. She sobbed when we had to say bye to Molly. So MK named her puppy Molly in her memory.

Of course no Christmas is complete thus far for MK without Elmo. This year she got a TMX Elmo that walks and does tricks... thanks to a $3 garage sale find.

And last but certainly not least, MK got a little Cinderella makeup bag with "lipstuff" in it. She always begs for my chap stick or lip gloss and so I thought this .99 cent gift would rock her world. It did and like all you seasoned parents out there know, it was the gift we soon hated that we gave her. She doesn't eat it. But she rubs it all over her face, pokes her finger in it, and insists on carrying it around everywhere she goes. Bad idea for a gift.

We spent Christmas with my brother and sister's families which was heaven for MK because it meant lots of cousin time! She loves them all. My mom & most of my other siblings came the day after Christmas so we all had a blast! MK's favorite is probably "Benji-Ben" (Benjamin). They loved their baths, especially with Elmo color tablets. (sorry for the immodesty...just too cute to pass up)

Her favorite pass time was playing with Becca's enormous collection of Littlest Pets. Here Ben & MaryKate decided to climb into the Tupperware tub of pets together. Just two peas in a pod.

For New Years we drove to Duncan to visit James family. It was so fun. One day we walked in to see MK doing this. She said, "I'm feeding Molly like Amy!" My friend Amy breast feeds and although I do not, she still picked up on it & wanted to give it a try. Ha!

This is what happens when you let a little girl fall asleep with her barrettes & pigtails. Oh, we love you MaryKate! Thank you for making this Christmas so magical for us all! We can't wait for Gracie to join in the fun next year. We hope everyone had an equally happy, magical holiday season.