Emma update: 3 (and a half) year olds are so cute

This post has been really delayed, mostly because I've been so busy at work and doing other things (we're getting ready for some home improvements) and blogging has slipped off the priority list. :( Yet, I had been compiling some of these tidbits on Emma for several months, and most everything still pretty much holds true today.  But note that most of this was written earlier this past summer.

Emma is just at such a stinking cute age!  I recently asked her if I could freeze her at this age, and she agreed.  So, if I could just find the right technology, I have her permission to keep her this size and age forever.  :)  

This girl has style!

Can you see her hair standing up (due to the plastic bucket over her head)?

Her size, her sweet tone of voice, her (mis)pronunciation of words, and other cute antics makes her just this irresistible bundle of cuteness.  This is a very short summary to capture of a few of her cute antics, but I'd have to have a video camera on her 24/7 to adequately capture all of the adorable, witty, and funny things she says and does.  

Cute words:

Balilla = vanilla

Waps= wasp

Bahsketti= spaghetti

Mirrah = mirror (this may just be her Aussie influence though!)

Breakfakst= breakfast

She also still says "opymeal" for oatmeal and has somewhat of her southern accent for hotel ("hoe-tail").   

Emma also likes playing pretend cooking and taking care of baby dolls.  She loves making us pretend play-doh foods. At our recent garage sale, she was putting her baby dolls in the high chair seat and pack-n-play that we had set out to sell.  At one point, her baby was sitting in the high chair with a play bottle sitting on the tray, right during our sale. 

Dress up time!

Emma also loves to sing.  While she sings along to songs from her favorite movies (such as Moana, which she can sing the words to most of the soundtrack, or Trolls, or Frozen), she also makes up lyrics and sings songs on her own too.  Some of her lyrics seem to be inspired by things she sees or has done, most of the time is non-sensical phrases strung together.  The latest renditions have been while we were in the car on our current road trip, and the lyrics focused on "we're on a family trip" or "family adventure" (where "adventure" was pronounced something like "abenture"). 

A great day for the park

Emma also still really loves puppy dogs.  She still love Maya, and Maya's puppy Mia.  She also has her dalmation puppies (Ralphie is the small one, but the name of the bigger one changes, from Mommy to Pepper).  She also has a new tiger stuffed animal, which she named Sophelia, that she carries around nearly as much as her puppies.  Before our recent road trip to visit my dad, she asked if the people we were visiting had dogs and when I told her they did, she got way more excited about that than the fact we were visiting friends and family.

Eating her chocolate bunny and painting with her new paints from Easter

She did great at her latest dental check up.  Just like we did for ski school, I started telling her stories about "Hollie" going to the dentist.  Hollie is a 3-year-old girl, just like Emma, who went to the dentist and got her teeth counted and cleaned.  She had to open up big and say "ahhhh", and the polisher tickled her teeth.  Emma loved hearing this story and so I kept telling it to her in order to prepare her for what would happen in her appointment.  And I think it was a huge success, because Emma did great and let the hygienist and dentist do everything they needed to!  Emma ended up getting three prizes at the end, whereas Hollie only got one (a bouncy ball), so Emma was pretty proud of herself!  And she should be...she seemed to actually have fun at her appointment, so that's the best we could have asked for!

And she recently got a "new" bike, upgrading from the tricycle to Evan's old 12-inch bike (with training wheels).  She's now learning to use the peddle brakes, since her tricycle didn't have any brakes!  

Growth and Development:

Emma knows her colors, and can recognize most of her upper case letters, as well as can write several of her letters too.   She can count to ten, and almost to twenty (she still often skips one of the teens).   She's definitely ready for preschool (really pre-K), which she'll start in August. She is starting to wear 4T sized clothes and size 9 shoes.  

Behavior challenges:

Emma has been such a great and easy kid so far.  In the last couple weeks or so, she's starting getting a bit more emotional and stubborn.  She's started getting really sad at goodbye times, and will even cry when I drop her at daycare again.  She also gets pretty emotional when things don't go exactly her way and then the waterworks start and often we can't console her after that.  Nothing seems to cheer her up and she doesn't choose any choices we give her.  I will be happy when this phase is over.   She also has started to refuse to do what we ask her to, and even when we give her an ultimatum or a final choice, she won't budge.  Therefore, she's started to get in trouble probably more times in the past few weeks than she ever got in trouble her full 3 (and a half) years so far.  Again, hoping these are short trial and error phases with her. 

The flip side to her emotional good byes and her missing us so much, is that when I get home at night she is over the moon excited to see me.  I LOVE how she rushes to greet me when I walk in the door.  It completely melts my heart to hear her shriek "mommyyyyy!" as she runs to find me when I get home.    She also doesn't want us to leave her at bedtime (so bedtime has also been more challenging lately), and she can sure stay up late, laying in bed singing or talking, for quite some time after bedtime. She loves for us to snuggle with her in her bed as part of her bedtime routine, and she loves back scratches and giving me butterfly kisses (and she likes me to give them to her too, but they tickle her so much). I love when she says "I love you too ma ma" as I leave her bedroom.  Sweetest girl in the world!    

A few cute stories:

During dinner one night this past summer, Emma asked us if we knew the cupcake man. I said no who's that, and she said the only person who can make cupcakes. Then John asked Emma if she knew the Marshmallow Man and she said yes they're cousins (with the cupcake man). And then John asked, using a voice from Shrek, do you know the muffin man? And Emma a said oh yes that's what I meant, I meant the muffin man. Do you know the muffin man? And then she started singing the song. :)

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Emma asked me one night after seeing a pretty full moon,  "what happens if you get inside the moon?" I replied,  "the moon is so high,  how do you think you'd get up there?", to which she responded,  "with lots of stools."  Yes, why if course!  :)