2 Years, 9 months

In three months (from this past Friday) Maggie will be 3 . . . wow! She's very much in the holiday spirit. In this video Maggie recites her favorite part of "'Twas the Night Before Christmas":

Some of Maggie's favorite Christmas activities are: covering up a number on our magnetic Advent calendar every morning, getting a piece of chocolate out of her Advent calendar from Memo, finding her elf's new hiding spot each day, and watching a Christmas show and reading Christmas books before bedtime. She was so excited today when she counted only 7 days until Christmas!

This afternoon Maggie helped me wrap Christmas presents for several hours! She was totally engaged the whole time. She helped me select wrapping paper for each gift, watched me cut the paper, told me how to fold it, and helped me tape. Then her job was to select a gift tag that matched the wrapping paper. After I wrote the name on the tag, she stuck it on the gift, then stacked it on the gift pile. It was very entertaining to us both! Don't ask her what you're getting, though, because she probably remembers (she even remembered when we duplicated a gift tag, and who had a gift tag just like the one I was writing!)! We talked to her about keeping these presents a secret (an idea in her head) until the person opens it. Brendon took Maggie shopping for a little while this afternoon, but she hasn't told me what they bought yet! She told me one thing about what she saw at the store, but I reminded her that her shopping trip was a secret.

Maggie has had a lot of firsts this past month, as you've read about on the blog, such as going to the dentist and to the movies and performing in her first program at church. She has also started tracing letters.

Here are some funny things she's said in the past month:

As I was eating butter beans one night at supper, Maggie asked me, "Mama, you got peanut butter beans?" Maybe she would eat them if I called them that!

Holly: "Are you okay, Maggie?"
Maggie: "Gobble, gobble!" (as she was eating cereal)

Soon after Maggie's first dentist visit, I had a dentist appointment.
Holly: "I'll be brave."
Maggie: "Don't cry, Mama. It'll be fun!"
Holly: "Will I get a sticker?"
Maggie: "No . . . yes! A Mama sticker!"

This morning at breakfast:
Maggie: "Attention, everyone!"
Holly: "Where did you hear that?"
Maggie: "The teacher."

Last night I was lying with Maggie at bedtime. Without prompting, Maggie clasped her hands and said, "I need to pray . . . Star light, star bright, I want a star to come to my house!"

When asked to sing some of the songs from her program at church, Maggie sometimes says,
"I can't. I don't have a program."

Maggie is definitely on the "nice" list and has a big week ahead!