So many changes...

So many changes have taken place in our little Arya's life in the last month or so. She is growing up before our eyes, and we can hardly believe it.

The week that we returned from our vacation in Florida (yes, I still need to post some pics of that!!), Arya transitioned into her own "little big girl bed". Yes, she slept in our bed for all but a handful of nights in her first two years of life, and we were actually fine with that. We liked having her near us and when we would think about putting the littlest person in our family in a room all alone while the oldest people got to stay together, we just decided to keep letting her stay in our bed!! But as she has continued to get bigger and as we think about the fact that eventually there will probably be another little one on the way (and only so many people can fit in the bed!!), we figured we had to get her used to sleeping on her own.

She has been sleeping in a crib for naps at Grandma Carol's house (when she is there on Tuesdays) for the past couple of months, and she had shown more interest in playing in her own bed at home, watching the mobile, etc. So, when we got back from Florida, we kept talking up how neat her little bed was, and a few nights after our return, she stayed there all night. A couple of days later, her daddy converted her crib into a toddler bed, which she thought was really cool. She was really excited about having a big girl bed (especially since she has seen these big kid beds at her friends' houses). Anyway, we (amazingly) really haven't had any trouble keeping her in the bed. (Of course, sometimes, when she doesn't want to go to sleep, she gets out of bed, but once she is asleep, she has stayed there all night all but about two nights. (One morning she woke up and came in around 6a.m., the other night it was around 1a.m.)

She likes us to tuck her in at night. She asks us to "till the soil" on her back or tummy, which is a little game where we pretend to plant a garden on her. The other thing that she loves is for us to "paint her face". That is where you pretend that your finger is a paintbrush and you go over each feature, "painting" it as you go. "I'm painting your eyebrows...and your pretty brown eyes...your eye lashes...your little nose..." etc. She has to keep her eyes closed if she wants her face painted or the soil tilled, and both of these things tend to relax her and get her to fall asleep.

So, the transition is going well, but Rajeev and I both still kind of miss having her with us while we sleep though!!

Sidewalk Chalk

Yesterday, Rajeev and I needed to get some yardwork done, so we got out the sidewalk chalk for Arya! She had so much fun, and she was absolutely covered with chalk by the time she was finished with her artwork! She especially liked helping me draw flowers and fireworks. Here are a few pictures of her in action.

Watch out, here I come!!

Drawing fireworks.

Our silly little girl!! :)

Do I have anything on my face?

"I'm paying."

Yesterday morning, Arya and I had been playing the card-matching game, "Memory." Since she's still young, we play an easier version of the game where we spread out all of the cards and we try to find as many matches as we can. After playing for a while, I'd gone into the kitchen to take care of some things. Arya soon followed, with a couple of the little 2"x2" cardboard cards in her hands. Soon she started running the cards through the gaps between the kitchen cabinet doors. She'd start at the top, then slide it down the little slot, start back at the top, and slide it again.

I didn't realize what she was really doing until she looked at Grandma Carol and me, and said, "I'm paying!" "Painting?" I asked. "Playing?" asked Grandma. "No, I'm PAYing!" Then it hit me, she was pretending she had a credit card and was sliding it through the machine to PAY!! It was hilarious!!