Bang the door all day

Mia is a pretty quiet kid, but every now and then something gets her wound up. Case in point: barking dogs. Mia has discovered that she can look through the back screen door and see what's going on in the back yard. This is a very exciting development when you've only been alive for 15 months. But she gets really wound up when the dogs start barking at our neighbor's dogs. I think she's trying to rally with them, like when inmates clang on their cell bars in solidarity. So now we need to keep the door closed when the dogs are out.

Big game huntress

Buying gifts for Leigh is tricky. Usually he either buys or asks for what I'm going to buy him a few days before I have the chance to get it. But this Christmas he had absolutely no idea what I was getting him because he didn't even know it existed. It's a home version of his favorite arcade game: Big Game Hunter. Not only do I think this game is a little barbaric, but I think it's pretty boring to boot. But he made me play it with him so he could have someone to compete with. I reluctantly agreed.

Then I was amazing at it!

Add "video game huntress extraordinaire" this to the list of awesome skills I have. Now he's just jealous that I beat him.

More efficient bathtime

One hat, two winters

From 2009:

From 2010:

At this rate, we might get to enjoy this fabulous hat for 2011, too.

A post from Leigh: the poop diaries

So tonight was the opening night of Tron. We decided to go watch it on opening night, because well we haven’t been to an opening movie night in years. So we packed up the car dropped off Mia at Tiamo’s house, for some nice Friday night play time. The movie was BEAWESOME (Beyond+Awesome) My second favourite movie of the year after Harry Potter 7. We returned to Tiamo’s house to fetch Mia. She was all happy to see us. And then we were made aware of an incredible discovery. While Mia was taking a bath in the kitchen sink (her favourite thing to do at Tiamo’s) she had the urge to go to the toilet. So what does one do when they need to number 2…well they number 2 of course!!!! So my mom says Mia had this big grin on her face and was sitting contently and at peace with the world. All of a sudden 2 little brown things (poop) were floating in the sink!!!! Mia pooped in her Tiamo’s sink!!!!!!!!!! I think she was paying for the babysitting services with the only thing she could think of…..poop. That’s my KID!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The best of sports

Mia is the best sport I know. She goes along with whatever. She does whatever. She doesn't cry or fuss. She's so sweet. Her good temperament was proved again tonight, when we had to take her to see the doctor.

She's been wrestling a cough for a couple weeks. It's been pretty faint and sometimes it disappears completely. Well, this weekend was a different story. The cough got serious and Leigh and I agreed it was time to see the doctor. No time to wait for that. Mia had a really hard sneeze and her nose started bleeding. It was so awful. Then she threw up. We decided to avoid the emergency room and go to an after-hours clinic that's affiliated with our doctor's office.

We only had to wait about 45 minutes, and Mia was such a champ. Look at her. Even with a dab of blood on her nose, she's smiling. How can we be so lucky to have such a well-tempered kid?


To pass the time, Leigh decided to give Mia a little entertainment by pushing her around and around the waiting room in a wheelchair. She was a little leery at first, but then every time Leigh put her back on the floor, she wanted back in the chair.




By the way, Mia has an infection in both ears, but the doctor said she would be totally fine. She's got some antibiotics and will be good to go in the next day or two.

Happy birthday, Jesus!

We celebrated the birth of the Prince of Peace by playing a xylophone shaped like an alligator! Hooray!

This Christmas was so much fun. Mia was old enough this year to open presents, though she didn't really get that we were tearing up the paper for a reason. It was still so much fun!



My grandparents gave Mia a pair of tiny, hilarious moccasins. So, of course, we both had to put our warm house shoes on.

They also gave Mia an outstanding bow, which I immediately put on and she immediately took off. Oh well. I'm glad Leigh snapped a picture to document the 1.3 seconds of adorableness.

I got an AWESOME pair of rain boots and rain boot liners (who knew those even existed? they're so great) from my Uncle Jeff. Leigh gave me this beautiful headband from my favorite shop in Oklahoma City. I love it!


I got Leigh a video game for Christmas, but that's for another blog post. After we opened gifts, Grandma Peggy and PawPaw Bob came over.

How to build a desk

Mia got the most fabulous present ever from Steve and Susan Bergman, some family friends of ours from Mountain Home. They gave her the cutest little desk! Mia loves it, especially the little-person-sized stool.

Mia enjoyed watching Leigh assembling the desk with a screwdriver:


But watching is never enough for Mia:


Mia helped Leigh put the top on the table:


Then she helped him clip the paper to the desk while it's propped up like an easel:


Mia is thinking, "I will use this stool when they aren't looking to climb into the entertainment center."

We had a little trouble with the desk's top at first, so the next day we were still playing around with it. Mia, of course, immediately tried to help out. She used my keys as a screwdriver and messed with all the screws. It was a very serious affair.

Spaghetti to the forehead

So Leigh decides to let Mia feed herself. Surprisingly, this descends into madness. Notice the two spoons and the spaghetti sauce on the forehead.

I shot this video after Leigh had wiped her all up and given her a new bib.

A baby in a manger

The nativity at the church attached to Mia's daycare is baby-sized. Therefore, Mia felt compelled to participate.

Who was at baby Jesus's manger? Mary, Joseph, the three wise men and a giant, giant baby!


Hallelujah! A savior is born!

Merry Christmas everybody from Mia and her parents!

Santa's tiny wrapping elf

South African yummies

Tonight we celebrated with some of our closest friends at our fourth annual Very Tribal Christmas. We were a total mess with invitations this year, so our apologies if you received your invitation, like, two hours before dinner or if you never were invited at all. You were not alone. (For some extra context, we still haven't finished mailing our Christmas cards. Yeah.)

Of course I was too busy talking to take any pictures except for these:

Anyway, the dinner was fabulously fun, and I loved having the chance to cook and try new things. I meant to take pictures of the food immediately after I finished cooking the food, but I suspect I was too busy talking to remember to do that. So, there's no proof of the sausage rolls, crab cakes or pizza, but I have proof of three other things. They're easy to make.

Malva Pudding

This is my take on the traditional South African dessert, which is pronounced malfa instead of malva. I used Oprah's recipe from her girls' school in SA but made the cake into cupcakes ahead of time. It was designed so that people could eat them as they wanted because malva pudding is served hot. I put the cupcakes out and then served the sauce in a sauce pan with a spoon. It worked out pretty well I think, and we had some left overs that Leigh and I can enjoy later.

Mint Pudding

I nabbed this recipe from Leigh's aunt this summer. It's so, so, so simple and so, so, so delicious. I served it up in cups so it wouldn't get messy, but it's normally served in a 9x13 pan. I think next time I'll add some corn starch or something to make it a little firmer. Here's the recipe:

* Smash up shortbread cookies or vanilla wafers in the bottom of the cup/pan.

* Sprinkle chocolate/mint chips on top. (I used the Andes kind that I found with the chocolate chips, but Leigh's aunt used chocolate and a sort of rock-candy style mint.)

* Use a mixer to blend 1 part caramel sauce to 2 parts cream.

* Pour on top of the cookies and mint.

* Chill overnight.

Minted Mango

I got this recipe from a cookbook that Leigh's mom got me last year. It's actually minted grapefruit, but turns out you can't buy grapefruit in bulk. So we had a little switch-a-roo.

* Boil 1 cup of water with 1/2 cup of sugar and smashed up mint.

* Pour over a pan of mango (or whatever kind of fruit). Use a flat-ish pan so the liquid seeps into the fruit evenly. The real recipe says to strain out the mint, but I think it looks pretty so I ignored that part.

* Chill overnight, stirring whenever you remember.

* Serve cold, at room temperature or warm. Whatever. We did room temperature.

Christmas 2010, No. 1

Ready for Christmas? Round 1.

We went over to Tiamo Jill's house to celebrate Christmas/Hanukkah. (By the way, have we mentioned that in the past year Mia has become 1/4 Jew and 1/8 Quaker? True story for another day.) We really enjoyed having a nice supper and celebrating with Jill, who gave Mia two fabulous educational toys. Mia particularly loves her new "laptop." Leigh showed her how to use it, and now she probably has her own blog and Facebook page.

S'more s'mores

We went to the best food party of the year: Soup and S'mores! Jenni and Ryan make all kinds of soups and then we make s'mores outside. Fantastic. Leigh gets quite excited about this. Why? Because South Africans don't have s'mores. They have lots of good things, but this isn't one of them. So sad. So we ate and ate and ate. Oh. And hung out with friends and stuff. That was nice, too.

Should we be worried?

No. Seriously. Should we be worried? Our kid has a serious fascination with cleaning.

The first bandadid

Look at this poor kid!


OK, so she doesn't look too put out by her owie. How did she end up with a mildly black eye and a nasty looking scrape? One word: Skye. As we know, Skye is one jealous bird. But this didn't come from anything cruel. Mia was trampled while walking through the hallway. (We've decided it's the equivalent of walking down the street when a herd of rhinos stampedes you out of nowhere.) Skye bumped her and Mia fell right into the corner of the door. Ouch! She cried for real for that one. It was sad. But of course she immediately got over it.

Then the next day, we discovered that the little scrape was bleeding. It was bandaid time. The first of many, many, many I'm sure.

Intruder in black

As usual, Skye likes to interfere. At least Mia keeps on reading her favorite book, Icy Antics.

Sometimes you gotta dance

Mia got the dancing bug during Taco Tuesday.

Yellow block of victory

She holds this little yellow block like it's the greatest trophy ever. A sweet, sweet victory for Mia!

Something had to give

We needed more space for Mia's dishes and baby food. Something had to go.

Bathtime salad

Mia loves, loves, loves bathtime - as we have already established. But she especially loves taking baths in Tiamo's sink because all of Jill's kitchen stuff is within reach.

The duck tub

Just an update: the duck tub continues to be hilarious. Because Mia is so all over the place now, it won't be long before we have to say goodbye. We will all be sad.