THE LUCKIEST: "Some Things Never Change"

By Sara Evans

In a world that keeps turnin' and movin' so fast
When you can't hold on to nothin' and nothin' seems to last
It's so good to know that love still remains
Ain't you glad that some things never change?

Melia is growing up WAY too fast. She is such a big girl. She is doing so many things herself these days. We're still working on potty training but she's doing awfully well. She likes to get her own food and her own drinks. She likes to put on her own shoes, and sometimes even dress herself, or at least try. She even says prayers all by herself. She loves to thank her Heavenly Father for everything she can think of, especially her family members. Instead of asking him for things, she thanks him ahead of time. :) When I help her say prayers, I'll tell her, "Say, 'Please bless that we can sleep good tonight'" or other such things, and instead she says, "Thank you we will sleep well tonight." Some may laugh that she mixes it up every time, but sometimes I'm not so sure. Perhaps she just has such faith that she doesn't have to ask, she knows, so she's thanking him ahead of time. :)

Here she is reading scriptures with the family. She INSISTS that she has HER scriptures when we read together as a family. For some reason she calls these two photo books of her cousins her "pink scriptures." So she sits there with us and looks at her picture book very intently acting like she is reading along. It's pretty darn cute.

Here she is doing her personal scripture study. :)

Here is Melia with her "preschool class." We do a "Joy School" of sorts with a couple other people in the neighborhood. This day was "Hibernation Day" at my house. We studied bears and how they hibernate for the winter. All the kids came dressed in their pajamas and brought their teddy bears to school. Matthew's teddy bear was a big hit. I cannot believe Melia is old enough to be in preschool!

Here is Melia with her best friend Brinley. Brin just lives a couple houses up the street and they do "preschool" together. Melia ADORES Brin who is just a little over a year older than Melia.

I love these cute girls!

Melia is just silly sometimes. She does weird random things for no apparent reason sometimes and she just makes me laugh. One day Melia just decided to climb up on the TV stand and lay there. I had to take a picture because she looked like she was planking. Lol.

Melia LOVES to pay that she is the mommy and I am "Melia." :) She always wants me put me to bed for a nap. First she wants me to sit on her lap (LOL) in the rocking chair and she sings me songs like "Rock-a-bye Baby" and "I Am a Child of God."

After that she has me lay down in her toddler bed, she covers me with blankets and then she tells me not to cry, she'll be back soon. She walks out, waits me for me to pretend to cry, then she runs back in and tells me it'll be okay and that she'll hold me. She keeps going in and out over and over with me pretending to cry for as long as I will let her.

I cannot believe she is not my baby anymore. I remember when CHIEF was my baby. Then came Melia, now there's Evera too.

Melia got these rings for Christmas and she LOVES THEM. My favorite part about it though is that she likes to wear them facing her palm so she can enjoy them better. :)

Melia also always wants Evera to enjoy everything with her. She loves to try to get him to wear things and play with her toys. She is very good at sharing with him, but half the time he doesn't want to do whatever it is she wants him to. This one was cracking me up . . . Melia wanted Evera to wear some of her rings and bracelets and she also made a bunch of her bracelets into a necklace and put it on him. She LOVED it and he was SOOO mad. Perfect boy/girl moment! :)

However, no matter how much she grows, some things haven't changed. The other night I went in to check on Melia before I went to bed. She was sound asleep in her bed, like this...

I of course had to laugh, and immediately had to grab my camera.

And as I photographed my baby girl, asleep with that cute little bum in the air, I was immediately whisked back in time a couple of years to simpler times with my sweet little angel.

I got out a bunch of our old baby toys for Evera and Melia immediately got a hold of this little soft rattle cube that her cousin Lizzie made for her before she was born. I took this picture and had a flashback.