We took the girls back for their first visit to Cali in the 18 months since we moved, and they had a blast.

It was fun to see a lot of our old friends, and Maddy especially loved getting a Santa hat at Dave’s Bix reunion party, as well as her playtime with six of the craziest Yahoo! offspring…

We also celebrated our nephew Jimmy’s 21st birthday, as well as Dave’s birthday of course.

Dave got very “special” treatment this year, because Maddy had saved up a lot of quarters to buy him tokens at Chuck-e-Cheeses. They had lots of fun playing all the games and redeeming prizes.

The girls enjoyed celebrating the holidays more than ever this year, including making gingerbread houses, caroling with neighbors, and having Grandma (Ba Noi) in town for a visit.

(They kind of liked opening their gifts, too.)

My mom (Ba Ngoai) and I took Hayden for her first viewing of the Nutcracker (Maddy was supposed to go but got sick right before and was devastated to miss it). Hayden watched intently the entire time, and enjoyed sitting on Grandma’s lap. After Maddy recovered, Dave took her to her first symphony performance, where she loved all the holiday music.

And after Christmas, we had even more fun outings – the Portland Art Museum, the Alvin and the Chipmunks movie (Hayden’s 1st, with amazingly no squirming or fear of scary scenes), and ZooLights.

It’s going to be tough to start 2012 with nearly as much fun as we ended 2011, but I’m sure we’ll manage. Especially now that we’re getting more home performances like “the Dance of the Lemon Fairy.” Here’s just a short excerpt of the long show, which Maddy and Hayden regaled us with the other night:

I’m SOOOO excited for Christmas this year, it just can’t come soon enough. Mom says I have to think less about what I want Santa to bring for me, and think more about what I could give other people. So, I told her I’m going to take the whole family – mom, dad, Hayden, Jimmy and Uncle Gavin – to Chuck-e-Cheeses. Then she explained how you have to pay money to play those games, which is kind of a bummer. But I decided I’m old enough to do chores.

So, I help mom do dishes and clean my room and vacuum the kitchen, and she gives me shiny quarters! The only annoying thing is that Hayden always wants to copy me and so we have to fight over the vacuum now. But that’s okay, because I have a pretty good stack of coins no, so I’m not bothering with the chores as much.

Besides spending lots of time doing chores, I’ve also been really enjoying school lately. I kind of enjoyed the tennis class I took last month at first, but then I told mom it was harder than I thought to hit those balls with my racquet. Running around the gym for soccer is easier, but I also get tired from that sometimes.

I’ve also had a few very special activities that I want to tell you about. I took mommy to see Pinkilicious: The Musical for her birthday, and it was so cool! My favorite part was when we got to meet the actors at the end and they signed my playbill.

Then we got to have my cousins Elijah and Eva come stay with us for a couple days, which was my favorite kind of chaos. It was even better when we got to go stay with them the following week and help Aunt Maren take care of my itty bitty cousin Lorna Lia. I just loved holding her and Hayden gave her lots and lots of kisses.

After that, we had a super fun Thanksgiving with everyone at our house. Grandma helped us put on a “show” for the grown-ups, and I ate 4 kinds of desert.

Then last week, Grandma took a bunch of us to see Christmas Revels, a show about the longest night that had lots of dancing and singing. I got to dance all around with the audience and actors for the Lord of the Dance song.

Hayden still isn’t as good as me at talking, but I pretty much know what she’s thinking at all times, so I’ll fill you in on the Hayden happenings also. She paid close attention during the whole Revels show, and loved watching the musicians play their instruments. She actually got scared during two parts (even though I told her it wasn’t real), and she turned around to lean on mom’s shoulder so she couldn’t see the stage. But then when those parts were over she turned back around and was fine.

Lately, she’s been learning lots of letters from playing with our computer and likes to try to sing the alphabet song. She also loves to play hide-and-seek with me, mostly the part where you count and then yell “here I come!” She’s getting better at using the potty, and even does it at school now. Hopefully Santa can find panties small enough for her to put into her stocking.

She definitely has her favorite things, like this Pete Seeger story/song called Abiyoyo. When it comes on in the car, she says “Abiyoyo favite!” When my favorite songs come on, though, she says “doan yike it!” and tries to get mom to skip them.

The other day it was so sunny out that mom took us to a park we haven’t been to in a while, and as soon as we turned on the street of the park Hayden yelled “duck park!” That was pretty impressive, since we were still far from being able to see the park or even see the duck pond.

Oh, and I almost forgot to tell you about my scary accident. This week we were decorating our Christmas tree, and I was soooooo excited that I couldn’t hold still. After dumping every single ornament in a pile on the ground, I ran down the hall to get something and on my way back I wasn’t paying attention and ran full speed into the door frame. I was pretty shocked that my face had hit the wall so hard, but luckily mom and dad were right there and put lots of ice on my bump and my fat lip. Today, you can barely even tell anymore, ‘cept for a few purple spots.

Love,
Maddy

In addition to lots of fun playdates with neighbors and cousins, we:

- Completed the Library Summer Reading program, and enjoyed performances by BJ the Clown and a bizarre family of magicians.

- Went blueberry picking twice, once at a local farm and once with Eva and Maren in Salem.

- Enjoyed a fun visit from Grandpa Busath, Nana Angel, Crystal, Addi and Bennett, including lots of family time and a trip to OMSI.

- Went to the big summer party put on by Parks and Rec and got beautiful butterfly faces painted.

- Hosted the Noonans (Leigh, Jim and Blake) all the way from AZ/RI and did nearly every fun Portland thing to do, including Multnomah Falls, the Portland International Rose Test Garden, the Oregon Zoo, the Nike employee store, splashing in the waterfront fountain downtown, and going to see the Winnie the Pooh Movie.

- Went to Oaks Amusement Park, the local teeny-bopper haven, where we rode some fun rides and marveled at the clientele.

- Spent a day at the Oregon State Fair, where Maddy had her first “volunteer from the crowd” experience in the Crazy Animal Races and even won a prize for successfully cheering on a goat.

- Hiked and picnicked in beautiful Forest Park with Lorna and the boys.

- Had fun sleepovers at Aunt Sarah and Aunt Maren’s houses while Dave and I spent a weekend in Vegas. While there, my cousin Kendra gave Maddy a sparkly magnet, to which Maddy said “I really love this magnet, I’m going to remember this day for the rest of my life.”

- Visited Aunt Sydney’s, where Maddy had her first horse ride on Tilda. Even though she was really nervous at first, once Sydney convinced her to give it a try she didn’t want to get down!

And of course, we also had lots of silly sisterly moments hanging out at home, just like this one:

We kicked off the celebrations in NY on Sunday with some presents from Dave’s family – an adorable stuffed monkey and a bunch of super-cute dresses. Then on Wednesday, it was her actual birthday, and Hayden started off the day by opening a cute present from her Grandpa Busath and Nana Angel – an adorable soft doll that giggles when she hugs it. Later, Maddy and I made some cupcakes to bring to our weekly neighborhood playdate where we celebrated at the park with a few friends. Then we went out to dinner with my mom, and sang Happy Birthday when we got home with a funny-looking mini cake I made for the occasion.

On Friday, our present for Hayden finally arrived from Amazon, but with critical parts missing. It is a standing easel (Hayden LOVES to draw), and I let the girls play with it briefly before putting it away to wait for the replacement easel that hopefully won’t fall over onto the girls every 5 minutes. Luckily Hayden has very low (actually, no) expectations about her presents and didn’t seem to mind the issues.

On Saturday, we had a little birthday party for Hayden at the park, with all her cousins and even some bonus guests from California (Nicole, Glen, Sierra, Lily and Micah just happened to be in town visiting family). We had tons and tons of bubbles and Hayden enjoyed the mayhem, despite being run over twice by bigger kids riding her own tricycle. She loved all her presents – some cool stickers, books and a tambourine from the CA contingent, really neat books from Lorna, Maren and mom, and a beautiful Alice in Wonderland musical snowglobe from Gavin.

To top off the week, on Sunday we even got to go to Lily’s 2nd birthday party (she’s 2 days older than Hayden), which was a real treat because we’ve missed the last few Leverich birthdays since we moved to Portland.

We got to go on a big airplane ride and I tried my best to stay up all night, but I ended up sleeping for a little bit. When I woke up it was morning and raining in New Jersey and me and Hayden slept for a loooong time while Daddy drove us to Albany. I was so super excited to get there and see Aunt Monica and my cousins TJ, Jimmy and Malcolm. Malcolm graduated from high school and I was almost as proud of him as I was in love with his cute graduating teddy bear.

The next day we hopped back in the car again and brought TJ along for a weekend on the Jersey Shore with new (Emily, Jacob, Tommy, Sarah and Olivia) and old (Greg, Karen, Faris, Lisa, TJ and Heather) friends. We slept some more in the car, and then had lots of energy for the BEACH in Point Pleasant. Hayden wasn’t so fond of the sand the first day, but I kept telling her to “try it and you might LIKE it” and she finally joined me in some digging.

Then came the BOARDWALK, which I loved except for the times when I was busy whining and being bratty because I’d skipped my nap. Despite my bad behavior, I still got to watch Daddy win and loose at Whack-a-Mole, and I got to go on super-fun airplane and swing rides with TJ.

On Monday, we played some more with all our new friends and then said goodbye and hopped back in the car for another nap on the road back to Albany. The rest of the week we had lots of great family time with the cousins, aunt, uncle and grandma, and visiting special people, like the DiPietros, Barbara and daddy’s high school friends Elana and Margaret.

My favorite part of the whole week was probably going to Build-a-Bear with Aunt Monica and picking out a fancy outfit for my new Hello Kitty doll, who I named Hello Sparkles. She is so beautiful and fabulous. Hayden got a cute teddy bear with an SU t-shirt, and dad named him Watson (the name of the college dorm where mom and dad met).

Thanks to everyone who took the time to see us and especially to you guys who spoiled me rotten – you know who you are!

- Maddy

P.S. When we got back we had a super-fun block party with all our neighbors on the 4th of July. I loved eating lots of watermelon and treats, blowing lots of bubbles, watching fireworks, and riding around like a crazy woman on Hayden’s tricycle.

In addition to quickly figuring out how to ride her bike, another big milestone this month was Maddy learning to write her name, as can be see in this lovely drawing:

(If you look closely, you can see that she labeled herself. You’ll also notice that as she was running out of space, she drew each of her family members smaller and smaller.)

Maddy finished up sessions of her swim and soccer classes, and in July she’ll start pre-ballet, which she’s very excited about. She also said goodbye to her much-beloved Goddard School, and she’ll miss all her wonderful friends and teachers there. We’ve switched both Maddy and Hayden to a smaller preschool/daycare that seems great so far, even though it doesn’t offer all the perks of Goddard.

We also had LOTS of cousin visits and as always Maddy loved her crazy time playing with Sage, Jude and Eva, especially this performance and “game“:

Summertime here we come!

Easter egg hunt at Maddy’s school:

Cousins egg hunt / Uncle Gavin’s birthday party at his new house on Good Friday:

Dinner and egg decorating with Ba Ngoai (grandma) and Uncle Gavin on Easter Sunday:

When putting the girls to bed tonight, Dave was reading Hayden her favorite book (Love You Forever), while I was trying to get Maddy dried off from her bath and into her PJs.

Maddy also loves that book, so after I got her diaper on (yes, she still wears diapers to bed…), she decided to ignore her PJs and focus on helping Dave read the book. On each page, she sang along with the lullaby the mother sings in the story (”I’ll love you forever, I’ll like you for always, as long as I’m living my baby you’ll be”), while Hayden looked on.

After about 3 or 4 rounds of the song, Hayden was looking at Maddy with her typical deadpan stare, and I said something like “look at how serious Hayden is.” Maddy replied with “she’s wondering why a naked person is singing to her.” I wish I had a photo to document the scene with Maddy’s nakedness and Hayden’s facial expression so you could fully appreciate the humor.

In other news, here are some photos of our fun visit to Indian Beach at Ecola State Park Sunday:

And here’s a video of Maddy running in the waves with her Grandma:

Maddy absolutely loved it, and Hayden was mesmerized as we hiked over, under, and behind waterfalls. It really was beautiful, and I was able to enjoy it thanks to having TONS of help with the girls. My Aunt and Uncle, and their sweet, super-helpful kids made a huge difference by pushing/carrying strollers, and taking care of and entertaining Maddy and her cousin Eva, who also joined us. Maddy and Eva made best friends with older cousins Sarah and Brynn, who were sure to point out every cool plant, tree and view to the girls (including the spot where someone apparently fell from a ledge and died last year – eek).

Maddy did amazing walking almost the whole way, and didn’t complain about being tired and muddy barely at all until the last hundred yards or so, even though we were hiking for 5 hours and she didn’t get a nap until the car ride home at 5:30. Hayden just sat in the stroller the whole time looking around and we barely heard a peep from her. She must’ve been exhausted though, because she finally passed out at around 3:30 while we were behind a roaring waterfall and her tired cousin Elijah was in the seat next to her screaming his head off.

Of course, this amazing outing included a few more-ridiculous-than-usual mistakes on my part. What kind of idiot brings a flimsy cheap double stroller to a 5-mile hike in the woods? In my defense, it held up well and the paths were maintained and somewhat manageable for a jogging stroller. But you sure do learn about the shortfalls of little wheels and limited steering functionality very quickly when the gravel in the path you’re on gets bigger and bigger and is joined by a gazillion tree roots. And it’s super-fun to carry a heavy stroller up a billion stairs (not that I did – thanks Uncle Andy!). Needless to say, I’ll be sore for days.

Oh and cheep, worn-out Target sneakers in the mud? Not so good. Poor Maddy’s feet were soaked by the end of the day.