First Boo-Boo

On Thursday Hadley and I went to the park to play for awhile. Hadley likes to first scope the place out looking at all the kids, checking the equipment, etc. Then she heads for the slide. She loves the slide. Every time she goes down she says, "Weeeee!" and when she gets off she starts clapping for herself encouraging those around her to join in the fun. Yesterday she thought it'd be more efficient to go up the slide.

You can see the other little girl off to the left thinking, "Hey, my Mommy tells me I'm not supposed to do that? How come she can?"

Hadley also loves to sit on all the park benches.

But her favorite thing of all to do is go play with in the soccer games that are going on around the park. There were three going on yesterday morning, and I was able to distract her from them for awhile, but at one point she saw two boys playing with about 14 soccer balls and she took off screaming with delight, "Boy! Ball! Boy! Ball!"

Hadley also had her first skinned knee yesterday. I knew it was only a matter of time before this happened. She was walking around with Jesse and I at the train station and she fell down. Surprisingly, she was not upset at all. She was more intrigued with the new color of her skin. For the rest of the day she was pointing to her knee and saying, "Boo Boo."

Look at those cute little legs.

More!

"More!" is one of Hadley's favorite words, especially when referring to getting "more!" books off the shelf and "more!" cooking spices out of the cupboards. So in the enthusiasm of Hadley when she says "MORE!" here are a few more pictures of our weekend.





We got a chance to visit Cole and Chase, Hadley's cousins on the Ayanoglou side. I'm sorry I don't have any pictures of that, but I can say Hadley had a very good time. She can't say their names yet, but she can point to them and say, "Boy." something she loves doing to any boy she sees. She also gave Cole and Chase lots of hugs and kisses.





On Monday, Shani was very kind to drive us to Detroit so we could stay in a hotel the night before our flight. (We thought this would be easier then driving at 6am for 2 and a half hours the next day. We were right). We stopped in Lansing again to give Hadley a chance to get the wiggles out. MSU has a very cute children's garden that Hadley loved.

As you can see, she is very fond of boys. Even though the one below is not real, Hadley still had to give him a little pat and a hello.

Our Trip to Michigan

Warning - this entry might be picture heavy. I know that fans of Hadley will be thoroughly disappointed.

We had a great time in ol' GR this weekend. Hadley did a great job on the plane, and after how easy the flight was and how much fun she had running around the airport, I don't think we'll ever drive again.

We flew into Detroit where Shani picked us up and drove us to her place in Lansing so Hadley could have a nap before the rest of our trip to Grand Rapids. Hadley found some beads in the back of Shani's car and decided that these were the greatest.

The excitement of the weekend was seeing Mallory perform in Dance Guild at Calvin. Jesse went on Friday night.

While he was at Dance Guild, Hadley had fun playing with all the toys Grandma and Grandpa Feyen had for her.

On Saturday morning, we went out for breakfast at one of the greatest restaurants of all time - Marie Catrib's. Anyone who is near the Grand Rapids area - even you Chicago folks - NEED to visit this place. You will not be disappointed. Forget Russ'. Forget Jody's. This is where you need to be. Hadley liked it, too.

On Saturday night, it was my turn to go see Mallory. I was so excited that I was the first in line in the FAC! My mother-in-law and sister-in-law told me to calm down, there would be PLENTY of seating but I said, "Listen here, ladies. I want a seat front and center to see Mallory. If that means I need to be there at 6pm for an 8 o'clock performance, than by golly that's what I'll do!"

I wasn't allowed to take pictures during the performances, but here we are with the Dancin' Queen after the show.

Mallory did a great job, and it was fun to watch her dance. It was also a treat to be back at Calvin 10 years after I graduated. The dorms smell exactly the same. As soon as I walked into BHT, I was right back to my pop tart eating, Diet Coke drinking, 90210 watching self. Of course, I wasn't a resident of BHT, but you get the idea.

That's all for now. Sesame Street is over and it is time to go to the park. I'll put the rest of the pictures up later.

Compromise

Hadley was pretty ticked off with me this morning because I insisted on changing her diaper in the middle of Sesame Street. The horror! So I told her I would change her diaper and then put her clothes on in the living room while she continued to watch Elmo and Co.

And then twenty minutes and a lot of screaming later.....
"Thanks for putting clothes on me, Mom! You're the greatest! I'm sorry I put up such a fight." I swear that's what she said. Hadley is an extremely advanced 1 and 1/2 year old.

At the Cherry Blossoms

Hadley took a trip to see the Cherry Blossoms with her Grandma and Grandpa Lewis over the weekend. She had a good time exploring the Mall and seeing what there is to see. Here are some pictures:


Every Dutch girl needs to find herself some nice tulips to stand by. I'm pretty sure it's the law and also, on the Calvin College application.



I think in this picture she's trying to find ol' George "doubya" to ask him a few questions about the way he's running things.

"So Grandpa, can you explain to me why we can't climb over this fence?"

Yum! Oatmeal!

A Visit from Auntie Shani

Last weekend we all enjoyed a visit from Hadley's Auntie Shani, and I'm just now sitting down to write about it and get the pictures up. I'm sorry I didn't get to it sooner, I am in the middle of a rather "heavy" homework assignment for my writing class - write a short story that's 10 - 15 pages long. And the scary thing is that we have to bring it to class to be critiqued! I think the only time I wrote 10 - 15 pages was my junior year in high school, and that was with the help of Celena. We had to do some sort of research on the Shenandoah Valley and waited until the last minute to complete a semester long project. I remember she and I being very sad that we had to stay in on a beautiful weekend in May and work on something that had to do with the great outdoors. At least the topic could've been about flip flops or coffee or something I actually enjoy. Oh, but this blog isn't about ME - it's about my daughter, so here we go.

Hadley just loves Shani. When she woke up in the morning and saw Shani, she ran to her with her arms wide open. Hadley was happy to have Shani read lots of stories to her all weekend long, one of them, My World, which is the companion to Goodnight Moon is one of Hadley's favorites and no one can figure out why. It is a rather strange book to say the least.

We were out and about all weekend long because the weather was beautiful. We stopped in to browse the books at Barnes and Noble, and while Hadley has taken an interest in books, what she really enjoyed doing was riding up and down the escalator with her daddy.

I realize this last one looks a little alarming but Hadley was OK. If you want to be nervous, come over and watch us try to help Hadley up our three flights of stairs in our building while carrying a diaper bag (and sometimes coffee).

We also made a trip to the National Zoo which was our best trip yet. This was the first time Hadley seemed to really enjoy looking at the animals. (She can tell you what a dog, cat, cow, duck, and sheep say.) Her latest obsessions are babies and people her size, any kind of animal, and school buses so she was in her element at the zoo.

I'm not sure what Hadley is looking at here. This could have been the point in our visit where I walked out of the exhibit because there was a sign that read something along the lines of "Our animals are not behind glass and are running around wild. Please use caution." Why anyone would continue to hang out in such an exhibit is beyond me.

I think Jesse's giving Hadley the scientific name of a very small monkey in this picture.

I can't remember what Hadley and I are looking at here, but you can tell she's intrigued.

And here's Hadley trying to get someone's attention by giving him/her a big grin. Who cares about animals when there are all these people around?