INDEPENDENT

Melia is one INDEPENDENT little girl!  When she wants something, she just takes matters into her own hands.  The other day she wanted a PB & J, but Mommy was busy.  So she took matters into her own hands, of course.  But unfortunately, she couldn’t get her hands on a knife, so she just used the inside of her spray bottle (the straw like part) to get and spread on the peanut butter.  It was a mess and difficult to get the peanut butter out of, but it was definitely resourceful.

The other morning Melia got up and got herself dressed (in her swimming suit of course).  :)  Then she wanted breakfast.  But she didn't want Mommy's help.  She wanted to make oatmeal all by herself.  Here she is putting it in the microwave.

Yes, she is putting the package of oatmeal (still in the package) into the microwave.  :)  Lol!

She is sure growing up fast and it is so crazy to see.  I cannot believe she is as big and independent as she is.  A few of my ward / neighbor friends and I are doing a tot school / preschool for the kids.  There are 7 kids in the preschool and we moms switch off teaching from week to week.  They kids go twice a week for 2.5 hours a day.  Melia LOOOOVES it, and talks about it constantly.  

Melia throwing a fit about getting her picture taken for the first day of school.

Melia and Brinley -- Official first day of school photo

Heading off to school!

The first week she had school at my friend Chelsea’s house.  Melia had to miss the first day because she was barfing, but luckily she got to go the second day.  Chels sang a welcome song to the kids when she was welcoming them to class.  It says, “Hello, {child’s name}, how are you?  Hello, {child’s name again}, how are you?  How are you today?”  Then she does the next child.  Well Melia has been singing it CONSTANTLY and she will sing it to all her stuffed animals, or about the Disney princesses, etc.  “Hello, Ariel, how are you?  Hello, Ariel, how are you?  How are you today?  Hello, Cinderella, how are you?  Hello, Cinderella, how are you?  How are you today?”  It’s pretty stinkin cute to watch her play “school.”  I remember LOVING to play “school” as a kid.  The second week we had school here at our house.  It was really fun to teach the kids and they are all soooo cute.  This group of moms is sooo organized and we have lesson plans and songs and a calendar, etc. to use for the whole year.  It is so nice!  

BFF's the first week of school.

I love how they love each other.

Melia also loves to go to nursery at church.  She comes home and is so excited to tell me all about it.  Each week she brings something home from nursery whether it be just a coloring page or a little book she made or a cube she made or whatever.  She LOOOOVES it and cherishes those little things she’s made.  I have to sneakily throw them away after a week or so when she’s not looking or else my whole house would be filled with these little papers she’s scribbled on.  This week she made a book about Sundays.  It has 4 or 5 pages and she has asked us to read it to her over and over.  She now has it memorized and loves to read it to us.  J  At nursery she’s also learned a lot of fun new songs, etc.  She LOOOOVES “Going On a Lion Hunt” and she wants to do it all the time at home with me.  We have FABULOUS nursery leaders!  I absolutely love that she loves it so much.  JUST 5 ½ MORE MONTHS TILL EVERA GETS TO GO TOO!!  HOORAY!  (Although by then Melia will be in Sunbeams.)

Melia loves to get herself dressed now, and especially loves to play dress ups.  We got a bunch of new clothes from my sisters as hand-me-downs for Melia, and she was THRILLED about it, although the amount of clothes we get for her is quite ridiculous...

Has anyone seen my kids?  They're BOTH in there somewhere.

 Evera enjoyed playing in the mountains of clothes.  :)

I love how proud he looks in this picture.  He reminds me of his cousin Bronson here.

 Melia LOOOOVED the new ballet slippers, the tap shoes, and all the leotards and tutus she got!

 The next morning when Melia got up she came out wearing a bunch of her new clothes.  New purple polkadot sleeveless dress, new polkadot pink rash gard, new purple flower belt, and new ballet shoes.  QUITE THE OUTFIT!

Doing a little dance and twirl to show off her new clothes/ballet shoes.

Pointing her toe to show her new ballet slippers.

For Halloween we are planning a Wizard of Oz theme.  Melia is going to be Dorothy.  (She is OBSESSED with the Wizard of Oz.)  Ev is going to be the Cowardly Lion.  I bought his costume at Costco a while ago and Melia was insistent on getting to wear it.  NOTHING can be "just Evera's."  :)

 Ooh, and TRUST ME, you are going to want to come visit the blog when I post Halloween pictures.  It'll be quite the interesting Halloween!!!  You'll just have to wait and see!

Melia also loves to put on her own shoes.  I love it when she wears her flip flops because 90% of the time THIS is how she wears them.  :)  It cracks me up.  It cannot possibly be comfortable, but she doesn't mind.

 Having an independent two year old can be fun, cute, and convenient, especially for a mother with a 1 year old too.  But I'll be honest, most of the time, it is a DISASTER!!!  This kid is a RASCAL and a HALF!

A couple of weeks ago, Melia went on a rascally-independent-rampage.  Missy and I were upstairs taking care of the boys when we noticed how quiet it was.  ALWAYS A BAD SIGN...  So I went down to find THIS:

 I had had all of my craft stuff in a cupboard in the kitchen, until we remodeled.  When we remodeled I put everything in boxes which were in my craft room in the basement.  Well apparently Melia and Brinley had busted into the boxes and found bottles of paint.  With those bottles of the paint, they had decided to PAINT THE CARPET.  AGH!  It was a NIGHTMARE!  I about DIED.

The girls had heard me coming and had hid in the corner.  They KNEW they were BUSTED.

 Ooh I was going to KILL THEM!  Missy quickly took Brinley home (probably afraid I might beat her or something) and Melia got in BIG trouble and was sent to her room (after being bathed clean).  Then Missy came back to help me clean.  With water, rags, and my (incredible) Rainbow Vacuum Cleaner, we were able to get pretty much all the paint out of the carpet.  It was a serious nightmare though and took us about 3 hours of scrubbing.

THE NEXT MORNING, I was laying on the couch resting while Melia and Evera were playing in the kitchen.  Evera crawled out to me all white and powdery...   I went into the kitchen to discover THIS:

The previous day I'd gone to the store and bought some baking soda because I was all out.  It had been sitting on the counter waiting to be put away and apparently Melia had decided she would open the brand new box and pour the entire contents on the kitchen floor.  Just for fun.  When she saw my stunned anger, she informed me she had wanted to make a mountain.  Because that explains it all.

You'd think she would've learned her lesson after those major incidents.  But no.  I THOUGHT I had gotten all the bottles of paint and put them out of reach after the incident with Melia and Brinley.  But just a few days later I walked downstairs to find THIS:

Apparently there was one lone bottle of paint which had rolled under the chest of drawers in my craft room.  And of course, Melia found it.  And of course, she decided to paint the floor AGAIN.
I was soo exhausted and utterly pissed off, and had sent Melia to her room again.  She cried and cried but then it was silent.  I assumed she had fallen asleep.  But when I peeked in her room to check on her, I found THIS instead:

 She had decided to DUMP a bottle of baby lotion on the floor.  Yes, I know what you are thinking, "Heather, why on EARTH did you leave a bottle of lotion where she could get to it?"  But that is really beside the point because the fact of the matter is, no matter where I put things, SHE CAN GET TO THEM.  I swear the kid could scale the walls if she wanted to.  They were way up on top of her dresser in a big box where I keep her diaper cream, baby lotion, wipes, etc.  She freaking scaled her dresser to get it down!  The kid is a menace I tell you, she is a MENACE!!