Happy Birthday to Meisje!

Meisje had a wonderful birthday today (as far as we can tell :).

This is my new favorite video - She's singing Happy Birthday to herself and enjoying her birthday blueberry muffin.

Meisje's Dutch

Meisje is speaking more and more Dutch lately. Just in the last week, I remember 4 or 5 times when she spoke clear Dutch in answer to a question or in response to her Papa. For example, Papa always asks her "Heb je hulp nodig?" (Do you need help?) and a week or two ago I noticed that she would start saying "Hulp!" when she needed help on something - clearly Hulp, not Help. And this weekend, she said, "Hulp. Hulp nodig!" Very cute.

I am trying to remember some of the other things she has said recently and will have to ask Papa to help me remember to write them down when she does ... one thing was that as we have been occasionally hiding Easter eggs or at least playing with them, she does sometimes call them eieren instead of eggs.

I love to watch her develop and we are so tickled that she is clearly learning sone Dutch words as she goes along, too.

Meisje "pretending" to sleep with Ava's help

Meisje and Papa in the tunnel

Beep beep!

So, Mama and Papa often say, "Beep, beep" when someone is in their way and they want to get around them. Kinda like in the car, you know? I don't think Mama realized they did it until a few weeks ago, I started saying it too. It makes them smile, which I like. What I don't understand, though, is when I said "Beep, beep" to a box on the weekend, it didn't move!

[Mama's note: True enough. On the weekend, there was a box in Meisje's way and she said, "Beep, beep, box!" to it, hoping that would make it move. And she did look a little perturbed that it didn't move!]

Meisje's new obsession

One word: Elmo.

I bought her an Elmo sticker book for the flight to NC for my best friend's wedding and it was a godsend, as it entertained her the whole time (and the whole flight back). Since then, however, "Elmo, Elmo, Elmo" is the first thing she asks for when she wakes up and yesterday was the first thing she asked for when she came inside from playing after Papa picked her up from day care.

She is definitely obsessed. It's quite cute, most of the time, expect for when she insists on bringing it to me and reading it immediately, regardless of whether I am cooking, brushing my teeth, eating breakfast, whatever!

Pasta bowl

[Mama's note: Meisje has discovered that she can pick up her bowl to finish whatever is in it (like Papa drinks the milk out of his cereal bowl). It's quite cute, although this video of her turning pasta sauce upside down on her head meant she went straight into the bath after dinner!]

Meisje and her shadow

[Mama's note: Last weekend we went to the zoo and Meisje discovered her shadow. This video doesn't do justice to just how cute she was, but it gives you a little flavor of the cuteness. She is saying, "March, march, march" as she is marching around - that's what they do at day care to go from one place to the next.]

Apples Apples Apples!

Last week at day care we talked about apples all the time, drew some apples, made apple muffins, rolled apples for fun, ate lots of apples, ate applesauce ... Apples Apples Apples! That's also the newest word I say that Mama and Papa understand. And this weekend, we had more fun with apples because we went on a trip to where there were some to pick off trees ... and music to listen to, and a hayride to go on, and a toy train to climb on, and hay piles to climb on ... so much fun!

Mama said to tell you she will post pictures soon.