Hocus Pocus!

Marty the magician dazzled our eyes with trick after trick this past Tuesday evening. The girls enjoyed their first ever magic show followed by a brief easter egg hunt. Our hometown library and Parents as Teachers program sponsors this fantastic event every spring.
Following the show, there was an easter egg hunt in which each child was instructed to find six eggs.

It was really cute...there was a younger boy who kept giving Maura all of his eggs. We kept encouraging him to keep them but I don't know if he ever fully understood.
The girls were also treated to a stuffed toy.

Time to open the goods. Our highlight prize was Maura's coupon for a free dilly bar at DQ. She was so excited!

Heavenly Sunlight

We sure enjoyed a tease of Spring last weekend.

Here's a shot of Sophia and I basking in the sun--a small taste of heaven if you ask me.
Since we last spoke, she's now sitting up on her own (with minimal support) and is scooting around all over the floor.
Maura is really good at pestering the cats.
In the above picture she's pulling Shadow's tail and in return here he is growling at her like a lion. Needless to say, Maura has a few scratches.

6 months old

Check out this face--it makes me want to kiss each one of her little cheeks over and over again. Look closely and you can see her pretty eyelashes. They are fairly long and have the perfect upward curl. I just love her eyes.

Miss Sophia turned six months old today. She has been busy learning new tricks. Her upper body strength is fantastic. I'll try to explain her method of getting around on her belly. Imagine her 2 arms being 2 second hands on a clock. Again she is on her tummy with her arms and shoulders strongly supporting her while looking outward. She moves her hands just as the hands of a clock would move in a circular motion. She then swings her legs around gradually and eventually she can rotate herself in a circular pattern. (I hope this make since....this is the only example I could come up with.) She also does what we call the "Stevie Wonder head shake". It's so funny... she tends to do it during bedtime while she's taking the bottle. She'll be looking up at the ceiling just chugging along and then all of a sudden she'll stop and shake her head back and forth 5 or 6 times. She then looks back at me to check for my reaction. Normally, she catches me totally off guard and I bite my cheeks trying not to crack up. I always end up smiling and she then either laughs or smiles back. I really think she's going to be a corker. We obviously love her dearly.

Winter Fun!

Obviously Punxsutawney Phil's prediction was correct! I have been longing for spring for quite some time, but instead have been trying to embrace six more weeks of winter.
On Friday we went outside for some winter fun. First off Maura and Gary filled the bird feeders.
Then it was some old fashioned sledding. As you can tell by this picture our landscape was basically a solid sheet of ice.

We decided to use it to our advantage and came up with a make shift ride. The turtle lid worked great to slide down the small hill out front.
Here we are pushing off.

We periodically came in and warmed ourselves by the fire. What a fantastic way to spend a morning on a cold winter day. We had a ball!