December

As Madeline gets older, the holidays get more and more fun. We had a blast this year, from decorating our own house to checking out the sights around town. Madeline was as happy to partake in Christmas cheer as I was to oblige her - we read Christmas books every day, drove around to see tacky lights whenever we had a free evening and did our share of shopping for family gifts. It was a month full of activity and it passed too quickly, as it always does. But we got to spend lots of time with family and with each other, which is what the season is all about.

Here are some photos from the month:

On the first weekend of December, we opened the Christmas season with our first trip to the Richmond Christmas Parade. Madeline loved watching the floats and balloons pass by, but the highlight was seeing Santa at the end.

Madeline shows off some of the produce from our backyard garden.

Decorating three trees in our home apparently wasn't enough for Madeline. She jumped at the chance to decorate Grandma and Papa's tree as well.

Madeline knows the protocol for a proper family portrait.

Madeline spend some quality reading time with her cousin Caleb during our annual holiday visit to Roanoke.

There's just something wonderful about cousins, still in their pajamas, playing in the living room on a lazy weekend morning.

Madeline checks out the lights at the "crazy house" - the tackiest place we could find, which just happened to be a couple minutes from our neighborhood. We visited this house on several occasions and she found something new each time.

Madeline and I made our annual trip to the Jefferson Hotel to check out the tree, the gingerbread house and the musicians that play Christmas tunes at noon during the holidays.

Madeline had a blast on Christmas morning. She gave me this look of anticipatory excitement even before she had opened any of her presents. (She had already seen the train and the dollhouse that were her big gifts this year.)

Madeline's 2011 Christmas portrait, taken in our living room with her favorite nutcracker.

___________________________

Having a child is an amazing experience. I don't often stop to think about it, between the day-to-day tasks and responsibilities that keep me focused on the moment at hand. But taking a step back I realize what an unbelievably rewarding experience it has been to be Madeline's dad for the past four years.

When you hear the words "your dad," you probably have an immediate and visceral response that is the result of a life's worth of interaction with your own father. Even before you start picturing specific memories of him, there is a feeling - perhaps comfort, happiness, stability - that you associate with those words.

It is immeasurably humbling to realize that I am that person to Madeline. It's an immense responsibility. I'm not just her caretaker or her friend - I'm her father. The memories and relationship that we're building now are what will always stay with her, and bubble to the surface when she hears the words "your dad."

Sure, there are tough times when you're a parent. Whether it's something out of your control - sickness, Madeline's relationships with her peers - that causes you heartache, or the occasional attitude, defiance and frustration that are inevitable as a child discovers their own way in the world, sometimes you just want to throw up your hands and throw in the towel.

But those times are fleeting, and quickly overshadowed by the good. The big moments - when she successfully sings with her preschool class on stage at the holiday pageant, or when she learns a huge new skill. And the small moments - when she gently holds my hand as we walk together, or when she looks at me with unvarnished pride when she places the last piece in the puzzle we've assembled together, and even when she simply calls my name - "Daddy!"

And that's why we're doing it again. In late June, Madeline will become a big sister as we welcome our second child.

November

It's hard to believe how quickly this year has flown by - the leaves are finished falling and the holidays are in full swing. Madeline is having a great time in preschool, and every day brings home some new craft or song to share with us. She's making gradual progress with her reading skills, although it's nothing too serious yet. She still likes identifying letters and spelling words she sees, and she can even sound out and read simple words.

(You really get an idea for how convoluted the English language can be when you're trying to teach it to a child - individual letters can make a variety of sounds depending on the situation, so it's hard to teach her firm rules. Take "C" for example - it can either sound like a "K" or an "S" - so why is there a C to begin with? I digress. . .)

Otherwise we're just having fun soaking up the season. Our house was decorated for Christmas, as usual, the weekend after Thanksgiving, and Madeline loved helping to decorate.

Here are some other pictures from the month:

Madeline bundles up during a visit to her grandparents' home for the annual Oyster Festival.

What should we do with all those leaves in our yard? Why not make a huge pile at the bottom of the sliding board?

Madeline spends some quite time putting Baxter to bed in her old crib in the playroom. She tucked him in carefully before reading him the book.

We took advantage of a mild weekend to take a hike at a local park.

We broke out the driveway chalk to draw a special message to greet mom when she returned home from work one Monday.

A hopscotch grid was also among the driveway doodles.

During our Thanksgiving weekend at Grandma's house, we made our annual gingerbread houses.

We also went to a farmers market in Deltaville, where Madeline enjoyed a leisurely hay ride - one of her favorite fall activities.

Once Thanksgiving was over, it was officially time to break out the Christmas decorations.

Madeline even helped me with some of the yard decorations - we decided to not let the fact that it was 70 degrees outside dampen the holiday spirit.

Madeline and Lucy (Aunt Hannah's dog) on the way to Grandma's house.

October

Madeline has made some big strides in the past month, inching ever closer to reading on her own. I don't know if it's something she's picked up at preschool or just in bits and pieces with her mother and me, but she suddenly is very fluent with lower-case letters - something that is second nature to older readers but is essentially the same as learning a second alphabet to someone just learning.

Not only can she identify all the letters with ease, but she's gotten very good at identifying the way they sound. A favorite game is to come up with words and figure out what letter they start with, and she's almost always right. And it's not just memorization of certain words - for instance, something will catch her eye as we're driving and she'll sound it out. She'll see a mailbox and say "mailbox" and then sound out the letters: "mmmmmailbox." And then, triumphantly, "M! It starts with M!"

We've also started practicing spelling smaller words with easily identifiable letters and sounds, like cat, dog and me. And once she learns a word, she'll pick it out in the text as we read books together. Slowly but surely she's putting this all together in her mind, and it's exciting to watch her figure it out.

She's also had some success with numbers. She's figured out that numbers generally repeat in tens, so she can pretty much count on her own indefinitely, with occasional help with every tenth number. I think she's counted up to 59 by herself, getting hung up on "sixty." But once I prompt her with that number, she'll continue on until she needs help with "seventy" and so on.

Aside from all the letters and numbers, we've had a terribly fun month. She's really gotten caught up in the excitement of fall and Halloween and has loved watching the season change.

Here are some pictures from the month:


Madeline flies a kite that she made during our annual weekend trip to a boat festival in St. Michael's, Md.

Madeline, in her role as space master, explains concepts from one of her space books to a captive audience.

By the time we made it to the apple orchard this month, many of the lower fruits had been picked clean. So Madeline helped me reach the higher apples.

We also picked up our annual pumpkin during the trip to the orchard.

Madeline soaked up the activities at the kids' area of the Richmond Folk Festival on a gorgeous fall weekend.

The weather has been so nice that we spent many an afternoon just hanging out on Madeline's swingset in the backyard.

We also made an impromptu trip to the zoo, scrapping our planned trip to the salon when we woke up to perfect weather. Madeline gathered her courage to feed the giraffes, which were very friendly.

The giraffes were also very tall.

Madeline got a kick out of leaping over every root in the trail during a weekend hike through the woods.

Madeline made a new friend when we got out the Halloween decorations - he was just her size.

Madeline got to go on two hay rides this month, and loved every minute of both of them.

Helping daddy carve Mr. Pumpkin.

All dressed up and ready to go, Madeline was a little butterfly for Halloween this year. She had a blast going from door to door - the candy was ancillary to the excitement of just ringing people's doorbells and showing off her wings.

Even though we only visited about a dozen houses in the neighborhood, Madeline scored enough candy to last a long time.

Madeline officially wrote her own name for the first time. She had some verbal guidance from mommy, but she did the writing all by herself.

Madeline could hardly contain her excitement as she unpacked the contents of a goodie bag she received at her preschool Halloween party.

September

Our big adventure for the month was a trip to the beach, and it was during this trip that we saw the first real signs of Madeline's new favorite activity - meeting people. We have no idea where it came from, but suddenly Madeline, our shy little girl, finds amazing joy in meeting and talking to people. On the beach she asked us if she could approach strangers nearby and, as we kept a watchful eye, she would walk fearlessly up to them and start asking questions. "What's your name?" was usually the first. Generally a minutes-long conversation would follow. (Lest you worry about Madeline approaching strangers, it seemed like she has a gift for choosing people who would welcome a conversation - mostly motherly and grandmotherly women and preteen girls - and we were always with her, obviously.)

The fascinating thing is that she was having real conversations - listening to questions, replying appropriately and coming up with thoughts of her own that matched the subject and progressed the conversation. She wasn't just talking extemporaneously - there was a real give-and-take. Maybe I shouldn't be so surprised - she's getting older and she's ready to start exploring the world of interpersonal relationships outside of her parents and family. But I've been impressed by her thoughtfulness and boldness, and even her skill. And while the beach was the first time we really saw this in action, she's had many more chances to practice in the following weeks at several larger gatherings we've attended. Even her preschool teacher has commented that she's been more outgoing.

On the other hand, when the AC repairman came to our house this morning, she ran and hid behind an end table!

Here are some pictures from the month:

Most of our time at the beach was spent like this - relaxing while Madeline dug in the sand.

We did get an unusual opportunity to watch a sea-turtle release that was happening just down the beach from our hotel. The timing was perfect, and Madeline got a front-row seat to witness the action.

Lacey and Madeline found a great book at the library that described the annual Mid-Autumn Moon Festival celebrated in some Asian cultures. It just so happened to occur the week we were at the beach, so we created our own festival, and were rewarded with an amazing red moon over the ocean.

Madeline taunts a crab with a stick. Probably not the best idea, but it was fun for a couple minutes.

We spent one morning making sand sculptures such as this well-decorated castle.

Kite-flying was also a fun activity as the weather turned cloudy and cold on our last day at the beach.

Madeline enjoyed her turn at the controls.

Back in Virginia, we loaded up the car with all of our favorite outdoor implements for a fun weekend at the river.

I presented Madeline with my old digital camera, and she spent hours taking pictures with it. Thank goodness it has rechargeable batteries, because she wore them out several times a day.

Our budding photographer snaps a shot of some blooming flowers.

We got a lot of rain in September and it seemed like almost every day was cloudy and drizzly. We didn't let that keep up inside, though.

Madeline was excited to start the new school year. She's happy to go in the morning and excited to talk about her day and her friends when she gets home.

August

The last full month of summer passed quickly, but that doesn't mean we let it pass us by. I had about three weeks off work in August, and we spent much of the time on adventures both near and far. We even decided to pull Madeline out of her final two-week session of summer school so we could spend our days together before the regular school year begins in September.

Aside from her abiding fascination with everything related to space, Madeline also loved running this month. She would velcro on her running shoes and just take off, running laps through the house or running circles around its perimeter on nice days. Madeline also loves cooking in her little kitchen - a present from Santa a couple years ago - and spends lots of time coming up with exotic concoctions of imaginary spices and fruits, some of which actually sound tasty.

Speaking of her imagination, Madeline has a couple well-developed imaginary companions - Daley (a girl) and Morrow (a boy). They have their own complex families and relationships, and also their own homes, which Madeline assures me are close to ours even though she often points to central Africa when locating them on the globe. While she doesn't talk to them, she often talks about them, using them in her own way to make sense of larger ideas and concepts. Frequently she'll bring them up in conversation with other people, talking about their exploits as easily and confidently as she would mention an actual occurrence she witnessed with her own eyes.

Here are some pictures from the month:

After briefly visiting the playground at the local park, Madeline loves hitting the baseball diamond, where she just runs . . .

and runs . . .

and runs.

Madeline and Granddad engrossed in some playground conversation on a lazy summer morning.

One of our many activities this month was visiting the children's garden at Lewis Ginter. Madeline loved playing in the kid-sized houses.

She also liked tidying the natural accouterments that cluttered the structures and then sweeping the concrete floors.

But the highlight of the visit - even more exciting than climbing a tree or walking through the maze or running to the top of the treehouse - was playing in the sprinklers at the children's garden.

Papa John delivers a rocket to the young slugger, who, with the support of Grandma's steady presence, knocked it out of the park, or at least well into the driveway.

Another of August's adventures was a trip to the Science Museum. They had an expansive space-themed display that kept Madeline rapt, but she got some hands-on experience in the science lab upstairs, where she viewed some pond life under the microscope.

Madeline and Mommy check out the train engine at the science museum. Trains are also high on Madeline's list of excitement-inducing subjects.

Not all of our fun was had away from home - I built Madeline an amazing fort (if I do say so myself) in the living room. She gathered some stuffed friends and read - you guessed it - space books.

Probably the highlight of the month was our trip to Maryland to visit with some relatives - Claudia and Jared - who both happen to study space professionally. Madeline was in heaven discussing facts and ideas about the solar system, reading new books about space, and watching technical videos of the Mars exploration rovers. Oh, and we also spent a morning at Great Falls National Park, checking out the amazing falls of the Potomac.

While we were in Maryland, we visited the National Aquarium in Baltimore. We had a great day and saw tons of sea life - from sharks to seahorses - but I accidentally left behind my camera!

At Great Falls, Madeline built up the nerve to sit atop Molly the Mule.

The last adventure of the month was Hurricane Irene. The storm left us plenty of debris to clean up, and also took our power for a few days. We made the most of the situation and Madeline was pretty understanding about it, but we were still happy when the lights finally flickered back to life.