A collection of Miriam pictures

I've been up since 4:15 this morning mentally planning for our garage sale today, so I've been spending some time going through recent pictures of Miriam.  She's such an amazing, funny, full of life and personality child.  We went car shopping last night (long story, more below) and she ran around the car lot following Mario and the salesman, shouting "I following Daddy, I following Daddy!"  She was super cute with her pigtails and her balloon bobbing up and down.

She's also little miss independent...some of the things she likes/wants to do on her own:
-put on her pants, socks, shoes, coats and pajamas
-unlock the house (which takes forever!!)
-water the flowers/bushes in the front yard (along with her parents, if we are in range of the water!)
-feed the cat, both food and treats
-push the cart at the grocery store and Costco (and she tries to tell us "no help!")

I've only got 3 days of school left and I'm really looking forward to some time at home with Miriam.  We will only be around for about 1.5 weeks before heading to Minnesota, and I'm hoping we can make it to the zoo and the park at least a couple of times.  Mario also got a new "big toy" for Miriam for the backyard, so we'll be spending a lot of time out there.  She loves it and was watching him pressure wash every piece, waiting for him to put it together.  It is pretty cute...he searched for weeks and weeks to find one for her, and I know she loves it!

We've had some problems this past week with my car, and ended up taking it to the shop on Monday afternoon.  The rest of the week the 3 of us carpooled in the morning, which has been fun to spend that extra time together.  We found out at the end of the week that my car will need a new transmission, so we are going to get that replaced and then decide what to do.  We are having a casual conversation about replacing my car, either this year or in the next couple years.  I think, at that point, we'll end up getting a minivan.  I'm not anxious for a minivan necessarily, but the ones we saw have a lot of storage space and will (eventually) make sense for our family.  Plus, it makes me giggle a bit to think of Mario driving a minivan. :)

Here are some pictures of Miriam from recent weeks, along with pictures of our (newly organized) living room:

Trying out her hew rolling backpack (for our upcoming trip)

Helping Mama make muffins

She always sniffs the ingredients and then says "yum, is good!"

"Nummy, corn in my tummy!"

She likes us to do synchronized eating, where we all take bites at the same time...

My favorite part of our new living room....tubs and organization! 

Independent girl, putting on her own shoes! 

Miriam's big toy