Spring is in full bloom here as we find ourselves outdoors more and more. We spent three hours this afternoon just playing in the yard together - enjoying her new swingset (see picture below), doing yardwork and just reclining in yard chairs looking at the trees above. Madeline always seems happier when she's outside, and that's generally where I prefer to be, too.
In March we had to do a little readjustment with Madeline's bedtime. I mentioned last month that getting her to stay in bed was becoming an epic battle of wills every night. She would hop out of bed and come looking for us several times a night, for no specific reason. Finally we decided to just put up a baby gate on her door at bedtime, and let her sort herself out. And it seems to have worked astonishingly well. After the first night she was an absolute angel the next day, and now bedtime is much smoother.
Otherwise, Madeline is enjoying life. She loves preschool - which she attends twice a week - and playing outside, as I mentioned above. She also loves reading, and probably spends more time engrossed in books than she does with any other activity. She reads to herself, she reads to her stuffed animals, she reads to her parents and family members. And when she's not reading, she loves being read to. Holding a book seems to be her default state.
Here are some pictures from the month:
Madeline loves making music. To take this picture I had to interrupt our jam session and put down my guitar.
Instead of going all-out and starting a real garden, we're taking baby steps this year and growing some vegetables in pots. Madeline has been very involved in the planting and watering, and is enjoying watching her very own lettuce and carrots grow.
Madeline writes thank-you notes after her big birthday celebration. She's too young to write her alphabet, but gets excited when her doodles happen to look like real letters.
Madeline and I enjoyed a picnic on the back porch on one of the first picnic-worthy days of the year.
Grandma and the Little Gypsy. Madeline wore her nicest party dress to celebrate Papa's birthday, but needed to bundle up before heading to the beach to check out the snails. She might have been mismatched, but she was warm.
One of Madeline's favorite places to sit in the yard is the daffodil/ivy patch.
Madeline was the recipient of a new (to her) playground set this month, thanks to a friend of mine whose son had outgrown it.
The new playground has a very fast slide - it looks like she's about to slide in the photo, but in reality she sat there for about 10 minutes building up the nerve to make her descent. Once she did it, though, she ran back for more.
