Miriam's 2nd birthday party

Miriam had her 2nd birthday party yesterday, complete with presents, cake, and an art activity.  She slept through the first part of the party, but woke up in a great mood and was ready to get into her party dress.

We had a rainbow theme for her party, and we decorated the house with tissue paper balls and balloons.  We had some snacks (cookies, fruit, chips, cheese/crackers) and cake.  Everyone got a chance to socialize, eat some food and watch the kids run around.  Then we had some cake and ice cream and opened up presents.  Miriam did very well with both eating cake (she loved it!) and opening presents, as well as a 2 year old can.  :)

Then we got to the painting activity.  Miriam branched out and actually used one finger to paint, instead of just using the paintbrush, as normal.  We ended up having to paint inside because the weather outside was cold and windy, but the kids did fine painting on old towels and sheets in the kitchen.

Here are some pictures of Miriam's birthday party - look at how old she's getting!

Miriam's 2 year stats

We went to the doctor today for Miriam's 2 year check up.  As soon as we walked in the door, she was running around the (empty) waiting room.  But then, as soon as the nurse came to take us back to the room, she got a bit more tentative, and then as soon as we walked into the patient room, she burst into tears and clung sobbing to Mario.

The nurse came in and measured her, and she is 27 lbs, 3 oz (65th percentile) and 36.5" tall (95th percentile).  She's continuing to be long and lean!  I guess if she resembles Mario in the face, she can be long and lean like her mama. :)

Then the doctor came into the room and proceeded to examine Miriam.  Throughout this, she was getting more and more worked up that (a) there was a stranger in the room and (b) that he was daring to touch her.  She got so upset and worked up about the examination that she ended up throwing up in the room.  (It was kind of funny in a sad way - there was absolutely nothing wrong with her, but she was getting so upset about the idea of people being in there, even if they weren't really touching her, that her emotions got the best of her.  She must get that from Mario too. ;)  )

She doesn't have to go back for another checkup until she is 3, so we'll have to try to keep track of her stats at home.  Hard to believe she is 2 already...so far, we are calling them her "terrific twos"...all 36 hours of them. :)

Our sweet girl is 2 years old!

It has been a hectic, busy couple of weeks since I last published a blog post, and all of a sudden Miriam's birthday is here, and she is 2!  Our hectic weeks included Mario out of town for a week (he got to go to Arkansas for work), a car accident (only Mario was involved, not his fault and he wasn't hurt), fixing our car, getting a rental car, me getting sick (and in fact, I'm still sick) and Miriam being so sick last weekend we had to postpone her birthday party.  Whew - I'm tired just reliving all that as I'm typing!

Now onto the real focus of this post - our 2 year old girl.  :)  2 years ago, at 9:36 in the morning, our world changed forever when Miriam was born.  Since then, we've had many sleepless nights, family giggle fests, tons of games of hide and seek and many, many moments where we've reflected on how thankful we are that Miriam is our daughter.

Miriam is a spirited girl.  She loves to play games (hide and seek, tickle feet, toss and catch), help us around the house (bake/cook, do yard work, do laundry, empty the dishwasher) and be outside.  She's a great sleeper these days, and puts herself to sleep after a long bedtime routine with her daddy, that involves milk, several songs and multiple books.  She knows a ton of words and is always talking all day long, and has mastered when and how to correctly say "thank you".  It is so cute to hear her say "ank oo" whenever you give her something or do something for her.  She can identify the letters Z, Y, B and O, and some of her colors...purple and yellow most of the time, and sometimes green and blue.  (She's such a little joker though, that she answers purple first whenever you ask her about a color, and then laughs.)  Her favorite foods continue to be all kinds of cheese and black beans.  (She's discovered my special extra sharp vintage white cheddar and loves it as much as I do...it is hard to share sometimes when she used to be happy with regular old cheddar!)

We have her 2 year check up tomorrow afternoon so I'll be able to report back with her stats after that, but she's big enough that we turned her carseat forward facing now.  (She was getting really crunched rear facing and also getting carsick, so we thought it was time to turn her around.)  She really likes facing forward and always points out whatever she sees (trucks, dogs, buses) and often says "wheee!"  I've been trying to teach her about red lights and green lights too, and she often says "GO!" when she sees a green light.

Here are some pictures from the recent month, as well as her birthday cake from today.  Hopefully I'll be posting again this week with an update about her stats and her doctor's appointment!

A report on our (almost) 2 year old, the comedian

Miriam has a promising future career as a comedian.  She easily laughs at herself, and makes others laugh as well.  She's really comfortable with people she knows and in places she knows, but she isn't comfortable with strangers.  This morning at Home Depot, another little girl (also almost 2) tried to approach Miriam and talk to her, and the girl was really getting into Miriam's personal space.  Miriam kept backing up, and the girl kept moving forward and saying "hi!".  Miriam was looking up at me and saying "up, up!!"  It was pretty cute.  But when we are at home, she runs around with her arms flapping, puts animals on her head, falls down on purpose, jumps off her chair, takes off her pants and walks around in a diaper, responds by laughing and saying "meow" when you tell her you love her, and generally is a joy to be around.  The girl is definitely strong willed, opinionated and likes to have her own way, so she's started to have occasional timeouts.  However, we've started using a counting technique and giving her choices, and that helps a lot with her saying "no" or not listening to us.  She continues to LOVE being a helper, and has assisted me with many dinners and baked goods.  As soon as I ask her if she wants to help me cook/bake something, she runs to the utensil drawer and gets out a measuring scoop.  She's an adorable little girl, and we can't believe she is going to be 2 in about a month!  We love her to bits, and we feel so lucky to be the parents of this energetic, happy, comedic, sweet, helpful little girl.

She's on the move so much these days that we don't often get a lot of pictures, but we do have a couple from recent weeks.  The last one is from right before we went to a birthday party earlier today.  See how grown up she is looking?!?

A diaper and boots is the way to go! 

She wanted me to leave her room so she could read books by herself...

Messy hair after a long day of a ponytail...

Reading/listening to a book from Grandma Jan

Ready to party!