Christmas Part III Christmas Day

On Christmas morning Dadda and Momma woke up with a cold. But we had to muster the energy to go over to Great Grandma and Grandpa Patterson's for Christmas.










First, some presents with Momma and Dadda.





Eating Bows.






Eating more bows that night.














By the Christmas tree which has my jumperoo under it...(photos coming soon)












Grandma Paula has the best bows to eat.

Christmas wore out Momma and Dadda who are still recovering from nasty colds (Momma more so than Dadda, she missed two days of work!) but I'm just happy as can be and enjoying all my new stuff. Thanks families!!

Kisses!!

Christmas Part II Grandma Jo's Part II

Here are some more pictures from Grandma Jo's. Needless to say, she absolutely loves her cousins and thinks that big kids are the bees knees.













Watching Pete jump.













Maya and Maisie playing.









Maya meets Darth Vader.

Christmas Part II Grandma Jo's Part I

Grandma Jo's Christmas had a lot of activity going on which fascinated and excited Maya. All those cousins and all that paper!! Gifts being handed out and ripped opened! She wanted to put it all in her mouth.













Maisie takes a break.

Christmas Part I

Maya went to a lot of family Christmas gatherings so I've decided to have several posts just to include as many photos as possible. First up, Grandpa Greg and Peggy's.























































Maya and Daddy crash in Grandpa's magical vibrating chair. Kinda like a bouncy chair for grown ups.

The Long Roll

This is how I roll. Yeah, I'm a rolla'...





















Who needs crawling when you can roll down the hall to Momma's lens cap?











On Thursday is Momma's Work Christmas Party, and on Friday we go to Grandma's for two Christmas' in Ames!

Monday's

Oh man oh man, I just have to get these TPS Reports in by 3 O'Clock or it's back to the soup kitchens for me...

Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving we went to Grandma Jo's in Ames and we also went over to Grandpa Greg's. Maya was so happy to final get to meet her Uncle Aaron, Auntie Leah and especially her cousin Maisie.





Maya so loves kids. She just watches them constantly and follows them with her eyes, much like a mall security guard, but slimmer... So she got to play with Max, Maisie,and Nika and loved every minute of it. She was a good baby all weekend and let everyone hold her without any fussing. (Daddy says she's just glad to be out of the house finally!)











(Here is Maya with Grandma and the taggie blanket that Grandma made for her, she loves to sing to her taggies.) On Monday we went in for Maya's six month check up and found out that she's in the 85th percentile for her noggin and her height (27 inches!), and in the 55 percentile for her weight (16 lbs. 9 ounces). And last night she only woke up once for milk! Six whole months! How time does fly.












Just for fun, here's a picture of Max showing Maya how to do The Force, you can see that she's getting because she's lifting her hands up like Max. Soon she will be a Jedi Master like her cousin Max.

First Tooth

Today Maya is officially six months old!! And of course a big milestone had to accompany that so yesterday Maya started sticking her tongue out, a lot. Just darting it out over and over, prompting mommy and daddy to say, "It's so cute!" And we'd stick our tongues out back at her. Tonight, mommy did some investigating and found the beginnings of a little toothie coming out on the bottom row. So, she's just feeling her toothie with her tongue (she's doing it in this photo I took this morning). So cute!

Now that it's quite chilly and Maya can't go to the park every other day, she enjoys looking out the window. She's like a kitty when they look out the window and talk to the birds. She'll stand up on the couch (with some help from Momma), stare out the window and talks.









Maya has also learned how to yell "momma" or "dadda" when she's crying, usually when she's mad crying. It's not really "momma, dadda" it's just "waaahhhmmamamamammadaaadaaadd", but we still look at each other like, "whooa, did you hear that?"

Here she is talking to her taggies.

And here she is snuggling with Auntie B after her 8k race..Brynna's 8k not Maya's. Maya can only do a 5k, this year. Next year she's going half marathon for sures.

Eatin'

This is Maya in the big girl high chair. She's not quite sure what to think of it. It's pretty big, we have to stuff the side with pillows, and the back so that she doesn't slip out. If we feed her in her bouncy chair she kicks so much (eating is exciting) that food goes everywhere.




I wish I had more pictures today, but it's been cold out so we've been stuck inside. Maya loves taggies. Anything with a tag on it is instantly in her mouth and being talked to while in there. She talks whenever she puts anything in her mouth, but tags are her favorite. It's a good thing she's getting a taggie book for Christmas!!

We are looking forward to going to Ames next week so that Maya can meet her cousin Maisie for the first time. Maya is also probably looking forward to playing with Pete and Charlie, she loooves kitties. Mommy and Daddy are looking forward to eating yummy food (and Mommy is looking forward to putting up the Christmas tree at Grandma's).

Maya, on being beautiful

People are always telling me how beautiful I am. I know, I know! Momma and Poppa are constantly saying how cute I am. I have strangers holding me at the bookstore saying it, I have strangers coming up at the grocery store saying it, and those Grandma lady's say it too.

But can't you all see how smart I am too? I know three other babble languages, most importantly I can say "I'll have the sweet potatoes instead of the peas thank you." I can kick out morse code on the floor that states, "They're out of bananas, send more bananas!"

I am a food connoisseur and my palate takes great delight in chicken and sweet potatoes puree, and of course mushee bananas a la...mushy. Unfortunately, I also enjoying talking about my food while eating. Sorry, I haven't learned manners yet.

And as the picture above clearly shows, I am "The Kitty Whisperer." (Although Trek is trying to bat at me and attack me, we are clearly bonding in this moment).

Super cute, super talkative, super funny, and super intelligent. I pretty much am the awesomest "almost" six month old in the tri state area. But I heard about this baby in Tulsa who is a close second....

Baby Frida

On a cold and raining November day (sunny and 70 one day, raining and 40's the next) I give you a little brightness.

Baby Frida.




After Mommy wove her two braided buns out of felt and figured out how to make it stay (for photos only) on her head, we took her over to her Grandma Paula's for Halloween. We took a few pictures and then mommy forgot the battery with charger AT Grandma's so these are the only pictures we have from that night out! After Grandma's we went over to Brandon and Lori's for a little party. Eventually Maya changed into her pumpkin pajamas, which Mommy pointed out, "makes her a diva like Beyonce, she changes outfits at parties."




Maya's eye shadow unibrow didn't come off for a couple of days.
Mommy and Daddy are trying to be 60's German art student, and Bob Dylan...what you didn't see that? Oh, it's cause you can't see the whole outfit..yeah, that would totally make a difference...sort of.


This week she's kicking as usual (harder! ninja kicks, or soccer kicks), talking about politics (but that's winding down), enjoying her IKEA kitty that Brynna got while in Minneapolis (actually she just seems to, right now, enjoy the long white tags on it)and she learned that Maya controls the rattle. She used to just occasionally rattle her rattles, as if she thought, "Hmm, what an interesting sound, where's it coming from?" Now it's, "Yeah, I make the music, I'm in the band."

Except, Maya controls the rattle right into her face.

For Those in Portland

I am so lucky to have such a sweet, talented, loving, funny, smart, beautiful "almost" nine year old niece.

She kisses dogs she's never met before.





She thinks pigs on farms plus spiders equals Charlotte's Web.
















She'll Talk your ear off about Colonial Times and you'll walk away having learned a lot!






She writes her own plays, you'll probably see her produced off Broadway in ten to fifteen years.







She's Nika. Just plain ol' wonderful Nika.