The Official Announcement

Dan proposed to me this past Sunday! We were in church and I askd for a tissue. He handed me a waded up tissue from his pocket (after assuring me it was clean) and when I unwrapped it I discovered my ring. He asked me to marry him and of course I said "yes!" He later said that he had the ring in his pocket because he was waiting for the right moment and he wrapped it in tissue to keep it from getting scratched. I "busted out his hiding place" when I asked for a tissue so he decided the time was then!

We're very excited (as is Madeline) and we haven't set a date yet. We're thinking we'll go the small and simple route with a nice party afterwards for all our family and friends. Or maybe we'll steal "Grandpa Hairy's" idea and have a captain on a cruise ship marry us! I'll keep you posted!!

Funny Madeline Moment

"Is Grandpa Harry called Harry because he has a lot of hair?"

Sheets on sale

This is a comment I left in response to my friend Sara's post about a night of vomiting (her child's, not her own.) Her question was...ever done laundry at 3:45 in the morning?

"why yes I HAVE done laundry at 345 in the morning due to projectile vomiting!! So...you're in good company. But nothing made me laugh harder than when I heard Dan in the other room ever-so-sweetly comforting Madeline after her first round of puking when suddenly, while looking up at him and listening intently, the next round hit...square in the face! Better him than me!"

That night really was a hellish one. Dan thought for sure after the first three rounds of sickness that she couldn't possibly have an ounce of fluid left in her. But she proved him wrong...a few more times as a matter of fact. He was a trooper though, getting up with her (almost) everytime and dutifully changing her sheets. Eventually we ran out of sheets and neither of us were excited at the prospect of the gift we'd find on them in the morning so I got up and did laundry.

So this is what parenthood is, huh? Yikes... we need to buy more sheets.

We Rhyme from Time to Time

Madeline loves to rhyme...it seems to be her speciality as of late. One day she asked me what rhymes with "duh." I said "absolutely nothing because that's not a word you're supposed to be using (on account that I told her it makes her sound sassy AND somewhat unintelligent.)" She ponders this a moment and informs me she thought of a word...

UMBRELLA!!!!

I couldn't think of a single way to gracefully admit defeat.

Boys Will Be Boys

Dan and I went out to dinner with our friends Suzi, Shaun and their new baby Sabine (see link to Sabine's Diary for beautiful pics.) This is the first time I've seen Sabine with her eyes open so we took some pictures. After seeing these I told Dan I wasn't going to let him into anymore of my photos. Of course I'll reconsider if he promises to do the laundry and dishes for the rest of our lives ;-)
Ironically, I was the one that had the huge margarita!!







And here are our lovely friends Shaun, Suzi and Sabine....

They like me?

One of my dance groups has had some growing pains the last few years...you know the kind: 10 high school girls and one boy with emotions and hormones running high with sharp tongues and a natural sense of competition. Don't get me wrong because this is a great group of kids..but they have their moments. So I had them do a little project that was presented to me as a high schooler in a dance group of very similar people. They wrote down one nice thing about each person in the group and then I compiled all the comments so that they could each have their own sheet. The things they said about each other were great...some of it was dance related and some of it had to do with general personalities and positive traits. And some of them even went to far as to write "Madeline" in on the bottom of the page and write a little something about her. She's around the studio almost as much as I am so they've gotten to see a lot of her personality. They said things like: I bet you'll be the next Gabriella (High School Musical) or Hannah Montana, you're the greatest singer and dancer I know, you are so funny and you always make us laugh... So I read these to Madeline at dinner that night. Her eyes lit up! She was so excited that all these big kids had such nice things to say about her!!! She turns to me and says, "they like me? They really like me??" She was being so sincere that I absolutely had to stiffle my chuckle at her reaction. "Of course they like you, Madeline!!!"

A truck day, a snow day and a Shirley Temple

Dan has introduced Madeline to his co-workers a few times now and of course, they get a huge kick out of her. She likes to check out all the big trucks and go see what all the guys are up to. From time to time she gets a special treat of getting to check out one of the big ones up close.





Once the snow started to fall, Madeline and I anxiously awaited the moment where there would be enough on the ground to run and jump in. Well, it didn't take long! This photo was taken the night the snow began. By the time it stopped we had around 8 inches of snow! Now if only we had a good hill to sled down...





So we took Madeline to a bar. Her first trip to one I'm sure. But don't panic...it's not as bad as it sounds! It was a Sunday afternoon and we were invited to a retirement party for someone I worked with. Our party was the only one there and now that there's no smoking in public places all was well. She bellied up to the bar like a pro, we ordered her a Shirley Temple and Dan explained to her about all the different tap handles.