my amazing hubby

today matt and i celebrated four wonderful years of marriage. it's hard to believe it's already been four years, yet in some sense, it's easy to see. we've gone from renting to home ownership to now, selling our home. we've been blessed with a wonderful, beautiful daughter who constantly brings us joy and keeps us on our toes. we've traveled a few places and had a lot of fun together.

when i set out looking for a husband, i knew i wanted to find one that would love me for who i was and am and most importantly, love God. i found him. who else, but my dear matt would want me to be as comfortable as possible and wear basketball shorts and t-shirt anytime i pleased. my dad always told me i might have to put on a dress and get a little more girly to find the right guy...nope, i wasn't going to do it. somehow i knew God would provide the man for me that would accept me basketball shorts and all!

matt is an amazing husband. he's willing to do anything for me shows he cares in the little things. for example, while i cook dinner he takes molly outside to play so i'm not interrupted. this is a huge relief since she likes to be a "big helper". matt keeps things fun and interesting with a weird dance or imitation. he's always making me laugh! :) when we had molly we were in a position where we didn't want to send her to a sitter and his job was in limbo so he quit and was a stay-at-home dad for almost 9 months. this was a great eye opener for him and now he understands that being a stay-at-home parent is a full time job and appreciates me even more! i loved that he stayed home with molly. they have a great bond and it saved both of us the stress of a babysitter. now, he's back at work, making an hour and fifteen minute drive both ways, so i can stay at home and take care of molly. his sacrifice to make the drive so we can survive on only one income means so much to me as i only desired to be at home.

there's so much more i could say but i'll save it for later. so with four years behind us, who knows what the future holds but one thing i know, there's many more to come!! i love you honey! ;)

making of a great reader

being a teacher, it's ingrained in me to constantly teach. reading was my favorite subject to teach and so i read to molly all the time. she loves to listen to books and she's already doing things that good readers do at 15 months! one of my favorite things to teach my students about reading was making connections. i loved helping them relate what they were reading to themselves, the world around them and other books they had read. molly does an excellent job of making connections. while we read she will connect things in the book to things in her immediate surroundings and even beyond. for example, if there is a broom in the picture, she points over to the kitchen where i keep the broom. tonight she pointed outside when we talked about the birds. she points to the cats when there is a cat. we talked about watering a garden with a watering can and she pointed outside where matt's garden is. molly also recognizes that other people aren't at our house and points outside. if we talk about grandpa and grandma she shrugs her shoulders and like she doesn't know where they are then points outside because she knows they're not at our house. while i may miss the classroom at times, i know i've got the most important student to teach right in my living room and i wouldn't change it for the world! :)

summer happenings

PLAY DOUGH FUN!

summer is a great time to try new things and have all sorts of fun. molly's at a great age to do this also. i'm a big fan of experimenting with things that may not be age appropriate according to package directions such as play dough. molly was going through a box with some of my school things and found play dough. i was curious to see how she would respond to the texture and such and well, she loved it! we play with it daily (all four colors at once) and make bracelets and blocks, dinosaurs and pigs. she loves to put it in and out of the containers and squish her hands in it. occasionally she goes for a small taste and rediscovers that she does not like it!

SPLISH SPLASH POOL FUN!

in one of my latter posts i wrote about molly's need for a swimming pool and my desire to get her the one with the whale slide. she got it! daddy gave in with a little prodding from me of course. but molly does love her pool. she swims a lot, well, i should say she squats a lot. this girl's going to have incredible leg muscles because she doesn't really like to sit in the pool. she has 2 ducks, a whale and a cup to play with along with the slide. it's great fun to watch the ducks and whale slide down the slide too! at first she was a little hesitant of the slide, but now, she's an old pro and loves splashing in the water. we also take molly to the public pool in our town. it's free at 7:30 which is a huge perk for us and 30 minutes is a great amount of time for molly. the pool is fantastic with zero depth entry 2 large water fountains plus two smaller ones and a frog slide. we bought her some sinking squids to play with and she loves them. they slide down the frog's tongue first and then she follows after. i'm going to miss the pool when it closes.

(frog slide at public pool)

OTHER FUN THINGS!
among swimming and play dough, molly loves going to the library. story time for toddlers has ended but i still take her weekly to check out books. she finished the summer reading program by reading 746 pages. we turned in her log on saturday and she received a number of prizes. she picked out a book dinosaur train, a toy train, and got a certificate, free personal pan pizza, free drink at the cider mill and gets to attend the pool party on july 31st. we went and used her free pizza coupon today and she thoroughly enjoyed it.

the moms club is something else i've been getting involved in because i think it's important for molly to have social interaction with kids her own age. she's been to the park to play with kids, in fact, we're going tomorrow, and starting in august there's a weekly play date for babies 18 months and under that she will attend.

painting, coloring with markers, and stickers are another favorite. molly's very artsy and loves to paint with water. she's a regular picasso! stickers are a newly discovered fun thing. fortunately i saved all my stickers from teaching because i knew they'd come in handy. i'm thinking i'm going to run out sooner than expected. this girl loves stickers and will use at least 10 a day.