Really Ought To Cut Back On The T.V.

Maya: Can you turn the t.v. on?

Me: No, because you're about to get a bath.

Maya: Awww, snap!

Team Maya

Maya earned Buddy's loyalty pretty early on. If we tickle her and get her laughing, Buddy is next to us in a beat making sure she's ok. If we're chasing her around the house, Buddy is right on our heels, trying his best to knock us to the floor in a valiant attempt to save Maya. He's always looking out for Maya.

And that includes a game of basketball.

He plays a good defense.

First Day of School

My monkey is a kindergartner. I thought it was going to be difficult walking her in for her first day of school, but since she's been in "school" since she was two, it was extremely easy. At least for that first day. I started feeling some apprehension on Wednesday when Maya's teacher reminded us that the kids need to start walking to class by themselves. I would be lying if I said I didn't have to keep myself from blurting out "Do you have kids? Do you really know what this feels like? Why do you assume my 5 year old can walk to class ALL BY HERSELF???" Thankfully I was able to stop myself from being labeled as "that crazy mom."

So, yeah, maybe I could take it down a few dozen notches.

Maya painted and cut out her hand print the night before school. As we were preparing to leave, she announced that she made it for her teacher so she could know how big she was. World's cutest kid? Definitely.

Five

I'm really glad we had Maya's big party during the school year, because I did just as good of a job staying in touch with everyone from her school as I did updating this blog.

It's a wonder I can even remember their names.

So on the big day, we kept things pretty low-key. We spent most of the day in the pool, and Maya's only requirement was about the cake. It had to be exactly as she wanted it.

Maya has her own little cookbook that contains a few cookie and brownie recipes in it. One of the sections shows different ways to decorate the brownies and she wanted her cake to be decorated just like it. She insisted that she had to help with the cake and that really took the pressure off of me when I had to make some substitutions. In the end, the cake was pretty cute and delicious!

What do you think? I think we got fairly close to the picture. There were going to be more M&Ms on the cake, but Maya was in charge of that and for every M&M that went on the cake, one or two (or five) went in her mouth.

I was able to talk her out of one request: birthday brownies. She wanted the cake pictured above, but she also wanted to have brownies so that if anyone wasn't in the mood for cake, they could opt for brownies instead. She thinks of everything.