Checking her piggys...

Madelyn has a new hobby and a strange one at that.....she checks her pigs and cleans between her toes at all times of the day. Pretty much any time that she thinks about it she stops, pulls her socks off and picks out any toe jam. I found her in the guest bathroom yesterday "washing" her feet with a decorative bar of soap that she found under the sink. All I know is that this little girl has a mind of her own. I can only dream of what we have in store over the next 18 years.

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Madelyn giving Layton a valentine.

This year we enjoyed watching the Missouri Tigers beat Nebraska in basketball on a lazy Valentine afternoon. Later that night we went over to our friends the Homm's house for a steak dinner. It was great! No waiting in lines, no Madelyn trying to escape the highchair, just a nice dinner with friends.

Madelyn was with us, but she was busy making eyes at her boyfriend Layton. They both had a great time playing and they did eat some dinner. Madelyn made sure she was around for the best part of the meal-- dessert!

Shelby and I are a week apart with our pregnancies and we decided that we should document the belly growth before they move back to Colorado next month. We will miss our friends greatly, but we are also so excited that they get to move "back home" and closer to family.

Party Weekend

Friday night our birthday party guests from Missouri and Kansas arrived and the weekend of Madelyn the Birthday Princess started. Saturday was the day of the actual party, but the excitement carried over throughout the weekend. We lucked out and all our snow melted and we were able to go outside for a couple walks and a wagon ride up to the park.

Madelyn's friends Bree and Layton came over for the pizza/Blue's Clues birthday party and they all enjoyed playing with her new kitchen. Poppy Joe finished up the kitchen in time to make the trip and it was one of the biggest highlights of opening gifts. We all ate lots of pretend cookies and a little bit of 'roni as in Macaroni and Cheese that was prepared by Chef Madelyn.

Today we are a little tired and trying to get back into a schedule that doesn't involve too much sugar, but we wanted to share some pictures.

Birthday Week Deliveries

Madelyn's second birthday was last weekend but her party is this weekend. She is a lucky girl, she received birthday cards and packages all last week and enjoyed each and every one. In fact, she has a box that she puts all her cards in and she gets them out a few times a day and tells me what is on the card. (ex: kitty cats, balloons, etc.) She has also been talking about who is coming to her party for weeks now!

Poppy Joe and her Great-Aunt Mary and Papa and Grandma Debbie. Unfortunately Grandma Habjan won't be at the party because she is staying around home so Uncle Dominic doesn't throw a wild party. We all understand the importance of that- Sorry Dominic! Grandma Habjan was able to come out in October when we went to pick our pumpkins and she will be staying with us for a while when the new baby is born.

Well, I will try to get around to posting birthday party stuff as soon as all our visitors head out. We have some more cleaning to get done before they get here!

Madelyn's new pet

We don't really "do" pets around our household. Mostly because I don't care for indoor pets and Brendon doesn't want an outdoor cat. So, poor little Madelyn has to get by with other things like her new "pet" Franklin the Turtle. He arrived in her Christmas stocking and the package says he will grow to almost 6 times his starting size.

If you give him a big enough bowl and lots of water he will grow within 72 hours. Just in case you haven't figured it out yet, Franklin is NOT a real turtle. He is a realistic looking plastic turtle that grows when placed in water. A perfect pet for our house!

We think that she thinks he is real. She checks on him quite a few times every day and feeds him and washes him with soap. Enjoy the pictures of Madelyn with her new "pet". I think he should have a nice long life around our home, for a least a week.

Pictures, pictures, pictures

Here are some pictures of our family at Christmas and now in January. Madelyn fell at church a week ago and cut her eyebrow open, she didn't need stitches but it was a lot of blood for a little cut! Enjoy the pictures.

It's Potty Time!!!

Christmas was great this year and full of travel. Madelyn decided while in Missouri that she was ready to start going to the bathroom on the big potty, or at least trying. So that led to starting the potty training boot camp last weekend here in Casa de Lueck. I do think that the purchase of the Elmo potty ring, Elmo undies and Elmo stickers has been the key to our success.

I read all sorts of articles about how to train your child to go to the potty and so on. What I learned through trial and error, is that the parents are really the ones that must be trained. I know that if you don't ask/take her to the bathroom there will be some sort of carpet cleanup in about 2 hours. Once we figured this out and positioned the bathrooms with all the necessities, books, clean undies, flushable wipes, stickers and something for Mommy to sit on while she waits, we are doing pretty well.

Week two is starting off with a few accidents but that is going to happen. When she is busy playing she has a hard time slowing down to make a pit stop and we end up a little soggy.