Just because...

I hardly ever get to be in a picture with my sweet girl...

Party!

Aunt Haley called and asked to "borrow" Marlee for a party last weekend. Bill and I were not invited (fine, I rather drink a margarita than hug Limpy the clown anyways...)



Haley's friend Emily and her son, Kale were there as well. And apparently Kale and Marlee got along great!
Hugs!


See ya!


After this, Haley was in charge of the camera... we got one picture.
mmmm, cake

What?

Catch up

I was doing so well with the blogging for awhile... oh, well. Besides the ol' "we're so busy" excuse, I have a better one. My computer died. So long sweet mac book, you'll be missed. Anyways, I had to get a new one and get everything up and running and then figure out how these silly PCs work. ::sigh:: I miss my mac...

Anyway, we have been busy! Mimi and Papa got home from their trip to Rome and Greece and came for a [too] quick visit. Marlee was all about the Papa that day, making sure he never got to watch any football!




Mimi got a little snuggle time in though.




Of course, there may have been a little bribery involved...







We took a little walk to the park.








And Marlee shared her toys!


Mimi is helping train Marlee early... good thing, because neither Bill nor I do windows...



The next day she slept until almost 7! Seriously, that never happens. Usually its more like 5:30. We hope they will come visit again... soon.

Some Marlee math...

Stick finding
+
Bird chasing
+
Conductor hat wearing
+
Train riding
+
Snow cone sharing
+
Pigeon feeding
+
Fire truck sitting
+
Rock laying
+
Dolphin hugging
+
Swing giggling
=
The perfect day!!

Need some visuals?

We spent today at Zilker Park enjoying the beautiful weather! We all had a great time... in case that wasn't obvious!

"Look Grandpa!"

Grandpa S came to visit this weekend. Marlee remembered him right away and made sure that he participated fully in everything we did! Poor guy barely got to sit down the whole time he was here!

She had a lot to show him:






She also seemed to think that his job was to chase her... constantly. Here is a super short video clip. It makes me laugh... I think she was trying to outsmart Grandpa!

Trick Treat or Treat

"Treat or Treat" was Marlee's version last night. I guess she knows what she wants.

We had a great time. Originally we were supposed to go over to our friend's house to go Trick or Treating with Lauris and Dustin, but poor Dustin ended up sick.
Bill and his Dad went to San Antonio to watch a football game, so it was just the two of us - a girl's night out.
I took Marlee to a little school carnival near her daycare and then we stayed in that neighborhood to Trick or Treat. I brought the wagon and Marlee brought the cuteness.

She was a little weirded out at first and didn't want to go up to the houses, but after 2 or 3 times going with me, she realized what was going on and couldn't get up to the doors fast enough. She also loved seeing all the kids and people in costume and was gleefully yelling "Hi" to everyone we passed.

It was hard for me to get a lot of pics, since I was by myself, but here are a few.

There she goes!


Checking out the goods:


Helping me out (she decided I wasn't moving quick enough):


So proud of herself!!

My mom got a cute little basket that went with her costume, but she refused to carry anything except the big plastic pumpkin... and I had to pry that thing out of her hand!

A lot of the houses had scary music playing, complete with people screaming. Marlee thought this was funny and when she would hear it, she would do her best horror movie scream back. I caught it on video, but it is very dark, so you can only hear the cuteness this time!


I think it was a very successful Halloween! Almost every house we went to commented on how cute she looked and I have to agree!! Thanks again for the great costume Mimi!!


Marlee's daycare had a Halloween party of Friday and all the kids dressed up. We didn't want to send Mars in her real costume, because we were worried about it getting messed up, so I found a cute one on Craigslist for $5! She liked it and actually wore it for a while!
Here she is walking into school. She has a little swagger these days that makes me laugh... I think you can kind of see it in this picture:


Hope everyone had a safe and happy Halloween!

It's (Almost) Halloween!!

Our weekend was filled with pre-Halloween activities. We went to a local pumpkin patch and stumbled on their little fall festival, complete with an African drum circle... Marlee dug it!


Bill got in on the action...


And we even got a pumpkin:


Sunday, we went to the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center for their Goblins in the Gardens party. All the kids were in costumes - there were lots of princesses and ninjas, but only one Little Red Riding Hood!

Unfortunately, Little Red wasn't into posing (what else is new, right?) and instead just wanted to play in the dirt.


"Can we hurry this up? I gotta go meet Grandma."


She did, however, decide that she likes Trick-or-Treating... or at least the results of Trick-or-Treating.


And, I actually got to be in a couple pics!

say cheese!

Marlee will finally say "cheese" when someone is trying to take her picture. Or when she sees a camera of any kind, or a cell phone, or the TV screen (I'm not sure about that last one...)

Her "cheese" is sometimes cute:

Wearing her FIT shirt (or as she calls it, her "cat roar" shirt) in honor of Aunt Abbey.

Sometimes, her "cheese" is a little over the top:


And sometimes, she's just silly:

These are her Mr Potato Head teeth. She put them in her mouth and started "cheese"ing away. I assumed she wanted her picture taken!

Love (and pumpkins) blooming

Do pumpkins "bloom"?

Anyways, Marlee and I spent the day at a really cool pumpkin patch with my friend Lauris and her son, Dustin. Mars and D-Dog are old friends (remember this?), but they have just recently decided to take their relationship to the next level...



As you can surely see, they have skipped the casual dating thing and moved right on to the "let's dress alike so everyone knows we are a couple" phase.









Here, I think they were having the "where is this relationship going" talk.


She's still an independent little lady though, and enjoys her "me" time!

Painting:


Boating:


Eating (an entire cup of homemade strawberry ice cream!):


And refusing to pose:

What big eyes you have... (a preview)

I've decided to spill it and give everyone a sneak peak of Marlee's Halloween get-up!

Mimi made it for her, and it is so stinkin' cute!


On her way to grandmother's Mimi's house...






Just about the cutest thing ever right?

I say just about, because I have some pretty cute things to show you. Last weekend Marlee and I went to a Halloween Party/fundraiser. Everyone there got their picture taken in costume. Marlee wasn't at her best that day - she didn't want to wear her costume, didn't want to wait her turn and really didn't want to smile for the camera. But, she did want to check out all the other little ones in their costumes! And who can blame her?
Wanna check them out? Click here. You'll recognize Marlee... she's the one with the expressionless stare. You know, her normal(95% of the time) reaction to someone taking her picture.

I just love watching her do this...

Please, can I have a pony???

We spent a rainy Saturday at Cabella's (a big outdoor sporting goods store) and Marlee fell in love with a horse...



She's working on her "pretty please" pout...



She gave up on that one, but then we came across the lollipops with little stuffed horses on them. She saw the horse, saw the stick and assumed...



If you can't tell, she's trying to ride it. Like a stick horse. The picture doesn't do it justice, but it was hilarious.

And 'Mimi' it is...

Marlee decided that Grammi Pammi doesn't suit her, and has officially renamed Pammi 'Mimi'. It's very cute!

Mimi came to visit last weekend.

We went to feed the crazy ducks... (seriously, they chased me. I lost a shoe, it was scary).




Played with some new toys...


Played chase (her favorite!)...





Ate some mexican food...





And got the cutest Halloween costume ever!! Mimi made it and brought it with her. I'm going to make everyone wait until Halloween to see it though. Trust me, it's worth it.

Gymboree

We've been going to Gymboree since Marlee was about 6 months old. And every month, when I see the debit from my bank account, I question whether or not we should keep going. We pay a lot for a 45 min class once a week. Part of me knows that we should cancel our membership and use that money for something practical. Then we go to class and I see this:































And I think, who needs practical??