Happy 4th Birthday Maggie!! (now with link to pictures!)

Maggie is 4 years old! She had a nice birthday: took treats to preschool, got to open a box from Grandma Alana with lots of great stuff and got a pop-up play house from Mommy and Daddy. She really had a lot of fun with that (and Wiconi likes it too!)

The biggest part of her birthday, however, was the birthday party at ZooMontana. We had the party at the Living Wall, which Maggie and her little friends just loved. We had cupcakes and Maggie opened presents. Then we had an animal encounter with the Flemish Giant Rabbit and then we went to see Bruno the Bear. The kids had a lot of fun watching Bruno play in the water.

8 of Maggie friends came to her party: Alex and his baby sister, Madison and Keiko, Jade, Lucius, Stephanie and Trevor. Everyone had a really nice time and I bet most of the kids ended up as Maggie did: asleep on the way home.

I've uploaded pictures to Facebook and you can see them here, even without a Facebook account!

Through the years

Maggie turns 4 years old tomorrow!! 4 years ago today we were told we were going in the hospital and coming out with a baby. We were given 2 hours to go home, kennel the dogs, pack our bags and eat (Frosty and Wendy's Cheeseburger for me). The next evening at 6:58 p.m. Maggie arrived. I thought you might enjoy a senimental journey with me:

Newborn Maggie (maybe a week old)

One month
5 months

10 months

15 months

18 months

2 years

3 years

2 nights ago

More Maggie-isms

Maggie has been quite the chatterbox today.

Our day started with a trip to the vet. Wiconi was in need of several shots and her heart worm test. Maggie went with me. She was fascinated with the entire process. She told the vet about our trip to Luccock Park and how she enjoyed sleeping in the cabin, in her sleeping bag. She told the vet about her birthday party (planned for next Saturday at the zoo). While the vet was listening to Wiconi's heart, Maggie commented that she couldn't hear her heart, which sounds like "bump bump." So the vet let Maggie listen with her stethoscope. Her face lit up as she heard the heartbeat and said "I hear it go bump bump." Later when telling Daddy about it, she said "The heart said 'hi, I'm a heart."

At supper, we were trying to get Maggie to try some potatoes and peas. Earlier in the day, Daddy and Maggie bought her Halloween costume: a pink witch. In an effort to encourage her, Daddy said "Maggie, the book says that good witches eat their potatoes." To which Maggie replied, "MY book says witches don't eat their potatoes."

Maggie helped me make brownies tonight. After we were done, she hung out on the counter checking out what was there. We have 2 bananas that I'm holding on to because I should make banana bread (but I never do, so I really should just throw them out). Maggie picked up the bananas and said "Hey Mom! I'm crushing you with the bananas!" (Wish I could say she got it from the Kids in the Hall; probably the Danimals Crush Cup Yogurt commercials)

Walking the dogs at sunrise

Jingle jingle
Jingle jingle
Let's me know it's time.
Let's me know they are ready to go.

No coat is necessary.
The stars are starting to fade as
the sky changes from purple to pink
to blue
Light clouds cover
Reflect the rising sun's rays.

Jingle jingle
Jingle jingle
Dogs pulling this way and that.
Sniffing to see who came this way before.
Ears perked as dogs bark in their homes
waking their sleeping humans.

A short walk to greet the morning.
Refreshing and alerting like a nice cup of coffee
But different
I wonder why I don't do it more often.

Jingle jingle
Jingle jingle
Home and ready to start the day.

Maggie and the Stars

Last night was a beautiful late summer night. We got out Maggie's trike and went for a little ride. The neighborhood is a little hilly, so she struggled a little, but still had a lot of fun. As the sun went down, we continued to hang out in the front yard and were rewarded for this by our neighbor who was trying to get rid of some tomatoes (I will be making some salsa later this week as I have a lovely tangerine pepper plant that has some beautiful orange peppers just waiting to be picked).

In the western sky, a star shown very brightly and Maggie pointed it out. Coincidentally, I had listened to NPR on the way home and a short segment from "Earth Sky" just happened to be on Venus, which was the star we were looking at. So I thought I would use this as a little astronomy lesson for Maggie.

Me: Maggie, that star is a planet called Venus.

Maggie: It's a star planet!

Me: That's right. And it's the third brightest thing object in the sky. Do you know what's brighter than Venus?

Maggie: Um, the moon!

Me: That's right! And do you know what's brighter than the moon?

Maggie: A spider!

The big moments

This week, Maggie started her 2nd year of preschool. She is once again in the Tuesday/Thursday class, as suggested by last year's teachers. However, she has new teachers this year, one who was a daycare teacher and knows her fairly well. Maggie was very excited to be with Miss Amy in preschool. Miss Amy thinks Maggie IS ready for the Monday/Wednesday/Friday class. We've started her in T/Th and will see what the recommendation is as the year progresses.

Today, Maggie started Sunday School. I was prepared to hang out with her for the hour, but after checking out the room and showing me all the animals on the rug (they have a Noah's Ark rug), she shooed me out of the room. I wasn't quite prepared -- I had even begged out of singing on the Praise Team as I didn't think I'd make the pre-church rehearsal (and also because we were skipping church to watch the opening game of the football season ;) ) -- so I made a quick trip to Albertson's and messed around with my mp3 player (and actually figured out how to do a few things). Maggie had a great time at Sunday School. They learned about Joseph and his "coat with all the colors" and Maggie got a pencil and 2 stickers!

And with these 2 momentous occasions, I did not take pictures. I didn't really think about it for Sunday School and the past 2 years of preschool I've only thought of it after the fact. Maggie goes to preschool from daycare and if we were to wait to take her in, it would throw off her schedule. I do plan to take a day off work when Maggie does go to Kindergarten and will get pictures then, so I try to not feel guilty about not capturing these special moments.

Maggie the Entomologist

Maggie loves bugs. "They are so cute!" She loves to pick them up and watch them crawl on her hand. She also loves to squish them. Saturday, she "rescued" a grasshopper from the dogs' outside water bowl. She played with him for quite sometime, until we convinced her to let him live on her flower. Maggie told Daddy his name was "Hoppy" and told me it was "Grabby".




I sincerely doubt I ever would have gotten this close to any kind of bug at her age.

Montana Livin'

It's a beautiful Saturday morning. Rocky has been walking the dogs each morning this week, so they woke us up early. Until we can figure out how to teach them to tell time, I'm afraid this will probably happen a lot. And of course, once Rocky got up, it wasn't long before I was up, and it wasn't long before Maggie was up. While Rocky was walking the dogs, I made coffee and got Maggie settled in with "Sesame Street". When Rocky got back, he turned on NPR and asked me to join him on the deck. Our deck is on the west side of our house, so we can watch the sky turn to blue as the sun finishes rising. The cows in the pasture are lowing. Mule deer are in the meadow across the ditch. The dogs are playing in the backyard and would soon join us on the deck. Hot coffee. Cool morning.

A mule doe and her fawn (still had his/her spots) were in the neighbor's yard a few mornings back. We watched the fawn get breakfast and then bound off. Wiconi watched intently. Another cool morning.

A Montana Life is definitely worth living!