Sweet Mom Moments...

Addison is such a sweet and wonderful blessing and I am enjoying her so much! As I pulled out of the parking lot after dropping her off at school, I realized that we have reached a turning point this week where she is happy to be dropped off and let me leave her there at school with her friends. While she has always enjoyed school, she doesn't always enjoy the drop-off part and usually gives a shout and a cry when I'm leaving - but as soon as I walk out and watch the camera to see what she does when I leave, she is always immediately fine and playing, so I think she does it for my benefit. So, this week, she has turned a corner by just walking in and sitting down or going to play with her friends. She usually points out some of her friends to me and tells me their name. She knows them all and we usually talk and sing about them at home also....especially Jonah. :)

I wanted to share with you also that Addison has started sleeping in a toddler bed this week and she is doing well so far (only 2 nights). I am amazed at how much she has grown and how much she is developing mentally and physically each day.

Here are some pictures of her in her newly converted toddler bed.

Last night, as I was trying to get her to go to sleep (not an easy task, as many of you know - she takes after her mother), and I was laying on her bed with her (a new fun thing for me since the crib is down) and singing songs to her. She asks for silly Camp La Vida songs that I usually sing to her to get her attention (as she squirms and screams) like Hagalena Magalena (she says "Hagwene"), The Little Green Frog ("Green Frog"), and one of her favorites from Dooley and Pals, the name game - she identifies this one by saying "do Elmo....do Addison....do Abby" or some other name or object and then I sing the name game with that name/object. It's really quite hilarious to me when she asks for these specific songs.

Anyway, as I was singing and she was trying to keep herself awake, she turned on her Jungle light/sounds thing attached to her bed and as the blue light was shining on her and she was contently watching it, I was just staring at her in amazement. She is such a beautiful child and I am so thankful to have her in my life. What a blessing it is to be a mother, and I really never thought that I would feel that awesome about being a mom.

So she looks at me with this big smile and starts asking me that whole "How old is she...20 months" thing that she's come up with lately (I don't have a clue where it came from). I burst into laughter, so of course, she did too. So it became a back and forth thing where she would ask and I would start to answer and burst into laughter and she would too. Or she would burst into laughter as she was asking and we would just laugh and giggle together. I began to think that this isn't exactly a great bedtime routine because she is getting no closer to sleep, and then I decided that I don't care because these are the moments that you remember when you need a smile and that stay with you forever - these spontaneous moments that turn into wonderful memories later. I want to hang on to those as much as possible.

Then she put her arms around my neck and gave me the biggest hug. I said "I love you, Addison" and she said "I love you too, Mama." It was just one of those moments where everything is right with the world and you know you are exactly where you need to be.