A few new favorites…

Daddy put together Maeve’s new play kitchen this weekend and it is a big hit! In fact, last night Maeve cried when we told her she had to stop playing kitchen because it was time for bed. She says “chicken” though which is adorable. When we got home this afternoon from a fun morning playing in the Millennium Park fountains with our friend Mia, she walked in and saw the kitchen and exclaimed “oh boy!”

Maeve also has zeroed in on some favorite books and shows. She was hooked on the Neighborhood Animals Baby Einstein video (much to my dismay, although I do like how it shows real animals most of the time) and now has gone back to a prior fav – That Baby DVD which has contemporary music with hopeful messages (Christine McVie, Natalie Merchant) and pictures of kids singing and dancing. It has a companion CD that we listen too all the time in the car, but the DVD is such fun to watch. She is off Elmo and Dora, which is ok by me for now! She requests several books before nap and bed time, so we are reading 4 or 5 now as part of our routine. The current favorite book is Binky, which Maeve will sit and read out loud to herself – we think it is from memory and not her actually reading it, but she turns the pages at the right time!

This afternoon consisted of two favorites – Maeve stopped several times on our way to the store to bend down and kiss her shadow on the ground. She also waved to it! This is a big improvement since it was just a couple of weeks ago that she discovered her shadow and was afraid of it. She loves oranges, so we bought one at the store and she carried it all the way home, kissing it several times. She only dropped it twice!

It’s supposed to stay hot this week, so we’ll likely be back at the pool or in the baby pool in the backyard most days… We were invited to try a My Gym program with a friend from playgroup too, so we’ll do that before music on Thursday. We are looking forward to a trip to Grandma’s this weekend for Auntie Beth’s bridal shower too! Is Maeve really going to be 22 months old already???