Mallory @ 2

The epitome of little girliness - loves to traipse around the house these days in her princess skirt and high-heeled shoes. "Will you sleep with me?" she asks when I tuck her in at night, arms clasped tightly around my neck. I always have a million other things to do but she makes it so hard to say no. She refers to her sun hat as, well, her sun hat. It's just funny to hear her describe it so fully. "Where is my sun hat? My sun hat fell off!" Gets out of bed, every single night, sometimes multiple times, and crashes on the floor in front of the door (usually after spending some time trying to coax us back into her room by bellowing through the crack under the door: "Daaaaaaaaaddy! Moooooooommy!") This probably wouldn't happen if I agreed to lie with her until she falls asleep, but that can't be a good habit to start. Cannot yet open a doorknob, which explains why she stays confined to her room. Has really become a Dora fan over these past few weeks, though we're not quite sure how the obsession started, because Liam was never all that into Dora and we don't know who else could have hooked her on it. Nonetheless, as soon as we get home, she is usually asking us to put on a Dora episode and she even goes on to specify which episode she wants to watch. We can usually oblige by pulling one from the free On Demand menu, but every once in a while they change the episodes that are available there and her favourite disappears - this is not good. When she is not watching Dora she is usually baking cookies with her play set and delivering them to me, Chad, Liam and the cat. The cat knocks his down off the counter and she puts it right back under his nose. This scene repeats over and over. She has started to sit on a stool at the island to eat (and hasn't fallen off yet, though the day may still be coming). At Cindy's, she likes to make 'spaghetti soup' by dropping all kinds of debris into any puddle of rainwater she can find. She's been known to push Luke around, and when we ask her why she does this she says, "'Cos". Could spend hours picking dandelions and throwing them in the creek if I didn't get sick of it first and try to distract her with something else. Do not even mention the word 'dessert' in her presence or she will immediately stop eating whatever is in front of her and demand it. Even if what she is eating is breakfast and there is no dessert on its way.

Oh, and don't turn your back on her, or this is how you will find the woodwork around your windows: freshly christened in pink and purple. Ay yi yi.