Iron Gate Winery last weekend

9 months old!

Susanna is already 3/4 of a year old! People are just always saying how babies grow up so fast, but let me say it again! It is no joke. 

At this stage in her life, Susanna is already displaying her geniushood by saying Mamamama and Dadadada in the right circumstances at times, imitating words like hi to  aiiiihhh, and trying to copy her sisters' chants. She doesn't crawl and doesn't appear to move at all, but some how stealthily gets wherever she wants to go by leaning forward onto her criss-cross legs and then sitting up again. She can stand up and cruise a teeny bit, but mostly is content to explore in sitting position. Take something she was investigating and you will be met with a blood-curdling scream. Give her something interesting and you will receive an intrigued and satisfied smile. She is as cheerful as can be except around dinner/bedtime, which let's be honest, is a hard time of day for me too. Here she is in a ( rare-for her ) brand new outfit, which I thought was very chic and representative of her South Florida and Brazil heritages with the palm trees. 

Baby shoes, etc.

A few things tonight. . .  

First of all, ack! Look at these shoes. They are so cute. However the cold hard truth is that I am far too seasoned of a mother at this point to be throwing money out the window for baby shoes to use as decorations for the changing table. Babies do not wear shoes. Shoes are for walking. When you are cuddled up in a comfy bed or easy chair, do you like to wear sandals? Neither do babies.  They can't walk and they live in comfy beds and easy chairs. I feel like taking a picture of Susannie's adorable feet in these adorable shoes in the store was really the best way to enjoy them. Now we all can admire the shoes, but I didn't have to buy them. : D

Next, look and this precious wild fairy with empty glitter glue containers taped to her shirt as bud vases for the flowers she picked from our yard. I never know what she will come up with next. (See facebook feed for additional hilarious episode with Nora and glitter glue.)

Another reason to love our neighborhood? The Local Yogurt truck now parks right around the corner from our house on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. It's just the excuse I needed to incorporate an ice cream treat into the weekly routine. . .  who are we kidding, I needed no excuse, just this kind of convenience. : )

Next, another still life by Ella. This is one of about forty pictures she took the other weekend in this beautiful little shop we stopped into--a boutique with lovely women's clothing and also bridal stuff. This poor bride was trying on dresses and Ella was in raptures. We have about half a dozen pictures of the bride taken while we repeatedly called and ushered Ella back away from the mirror where bride was showing gowns to her friends. Why did we not take my phone away faster? But she does have a good eye for a photo sometimes.

Last, today we had a picnic at Duke Gardens after preschool when lunch bunch was full and their lunches were packed already. Look at these three, they could almost pass for sisters eh?

Sunshine girl

From the day Susanna was born, I could tell she was sweetness. It is so funny to see little personalities unfold--I really feel like I could see the beginnings of each girl's personality even in their newborn little selves. But boy was I right about Susannie. She just loves to be happy. She does fuss heartily if she has a legitimate complaint, but she loves to have a good time. She will look at you, squinch up her face into a delighted flirty smile and laugh, just to make a little joke. You can have whole conversations with her that are just, "ha ha! ha ha ha hahaha!!" She is our little sunshine girl who just seems to love life and laughter. I can't wait to know her as a more developed person. I think she's going to be really fun.

Arty Party!

We had Ella's 5th birthday party at Bull City Craft. We love that place--they were our business buddies with Stay & Play and the owners are just great people. Also they throw a great birthday party, especially for a budding young artist like our darling Ella. It may have been the most enjoyable party I have ever hosted, partially because I felt like I was attending rather than hosting. It was so easy. And fun. The store is so cute, the kids all loved the crafts, we just brought coffee and cake and hung out with Ella's friends, and then we got to go home to our house which was just as we left it. Ahhhh. The ease of the party away from home. : ) The most complicated piece of the whole thing was the cake. Ella had been describing and drawing me pictures of what she wanted, which was basically a wedding cake, for months. I do what needs to be done in the kitchen, but am not a natural cook, and this was a bit out of my league. Thankfully my friend Kelly passed me a recipe and some tips and I was able to make something that Ella was happy enough with. (Thanks Kelly!) Clearly I am not ready for Cake Boss, or whatever that show is. But I did make a cake with two tiers. It's a first step. The decorating of the cake actually proved to be the most tricky part. Icing a cut cake edge is no joke. Also, strawberries are slippery (duh, how did I not realize that would be a problem?). But it did taste good. Here are the photos of the whole event. I think the birthday girl had a blast too.

The cold does bother me.

This winter, I bought myself a sweatshirt that says "The cold never bothered me anyway, just kidding, I hate winter." My evolving relationship with winter is a thing going on in my life right now. Growing up in South Florida, I imagined winter to be like a magical fairy-land. The idea of snow and wearing boots and sweaters and having a fire in a fireplace and drinking hot chocolate were so romantic to me. I could not wait to get to the land of the north and live the life of coziness and adventure and lack of sweatiness I imagined.

So I went to college in Chicago. The first few years it could not get cold enough for me in winter, though I was a little challenged by what to do with a scarf, how to deal with hat hair, and not liking frozen nose hairs on especially cold days. But year by year winter got a little less exciting and a little more annoying. It was hard to see people when everyone was huddled inside, it is boring to wear a coat every.single.day. for months, and arghhh static electricity and dry hands.

I landed in NC, which by Florida standards, is still the frigid north--it SNOWS up here after all. But the thing about this brand of winter, is that while it is not so nostril freezing cold, it winds up being dreary and brown and gray with less of the excitement of intense winter. Thankfully it only lasts about four months. But still, I have now learned that it is indeed depressing to deal with gray skies for months, and that truly, you get sick more when it's cold. I didn't believe that for years, but now especially as the mother of three small children, illness is my absolute biggest complaint with winter. If my kids get sick, it also means I don't sleep and worry and can't go out. So it's like I get sick four times as much as I used to. If I am the one actually sick, I can't rest either. So. Yuck. For dreariness, illness, isolation, and lack of sleep.

But then, every now and then in winter it snows, and as I suspected all along, it is absolutely magical.

Praise the Lord I am writing this in the early, life affirming days of Spring and it will be a while 'til we deal with all grumpy old winter again. But here was a happy, snowy day. Maybe one day I will be able to appreciate the rest of it too.

Return to Florida in February

This February, we went to Florida again! This is part of my great plan for enduring our harsh North Carolina winter. We plan our visit to our lovely Florida family for the time of year when it's best there and worst here. Thanks Mom and Dad for taking us in! We love you! There were several important components to this trip. First of all, we did it--we took our first family trip to Disney World! These first two photos were taken immediately upon our arrival and we were SO EXCITED.

Later on, the girls changed into their uniforms for most of the rest of the visit . . .

Except they changed back into their normal peasant garb for a trip on Splash Mountain. We love this photo.

It was really an emotional day. When we met Belle, Ella was so overwhelmed with not knowing how she should act when meeting another princess that she sobbed all the way through the line right up to her initial greeting, but Belle was ever so gracious and Ella was able to muster a dutiful smile for this photo. Sweet girl.

It was a loooong day. This is the walk out of the park. It was about 8. We hadn't eaten dinner. So we topped the day off with a trip to a restaurant before finally getting in the absolutely mandatory per mom, post-Disney bath around 10. Nora was beside herself and had to be carried through the whole thing. But ahhh the memories we made. They both wanted to go back the next day. Thankfully, we could not.

It was off to Grandma and Granddaddy's house!

We had a great time visiting our cousins, playing at the beach etc.

Ella is the oldest of all the Malone cousins, and the youngest, Isla was less than a month old at the time of this visit. About 2 minutes after this last beach photo was taken, Jacob fell down in the surf causing much terror and 3 grownups (Meg with a babe in arms) running to save him. He was fine. But a lot of our visit involved, "where is [insert toddler name]?" "So anyway as I was saying, last week we . . . [preschooler name] stop that!" Again. We made a lot of memories and it was so wonderful to be together.

The girls also did their annual flower planting with Granddaddy while Susanna and I watched.

And when we got home, it was practically to a new house! While I had been down south, Paul had been diligently tackling a huge house project and really it was almost complete when we arrived. This photo is from the morning after the plastic came down. Hurray!!

We are still working on getting the finishing touches set up, and then I will take some nice pretty photos of what the space looks like now. We did get some new couches, pictured below in the store.

 And there you have it! That took us halfway through February at least!