Weekend with Mallory

The last week in April, I got a call from my brother.  He had decided to take his wife on a fun little train trip for their anniversary, but they needed someone to take care of little Mallory. Of course, I was delighted to do it for them.  A few days later, Cody and Becki and Mallory spent the night at our house and then in the wee hours the next morning, they left on their adventure.

Having a 2-year-old around the house was an adventure as well, but one that I enjoyed so much. It made me miss having a toddler pretty bad. I enjoyed getting to know Mallory more and we had a great time. 

After getting the kids off to school Friday morning, Mallory and I had the house to ourselves. We watched a bit of tv, ate some breakfast, and ran some errands. And of course we had to hit the park for a little while. Mallory adores swinging on the swings at the park!  We did a little grocery shopping and visited Uncle Joey at work for a bit.  We had lunch and then I got to sing to Mal and we both had a bit of a nap before my kids got home from school.  JJ adores his cousin and he loved coming home and getting to play with her. I swear he is the only one who can make her laugh so hard. I always love to see the special relationship that Mallory has with JJ. We ended up going to the little park in our trailer community for some playing too.  Then of course we had to watch "Meet the Robinsons, " which I'm pretty sure is Mal's favorite movie. It was darling to see her giggle and enjoy it. We had Chili for dinner which Mal just gobbled right down.  After getting my kids to bed, it was a bit of an adventure trying to get Mallory to go to sleep.  She was missing her parents pretty bad. I sang to her and we watched part of Meet the Robinsons yet again. We hit a snag, where she kept asking me to sing, "the dog song." I couldn't figure it out, so I ended up calling Becki, where I was informed that she was saying "duck" not "dog." So once we solved that mystery...we sang "5 Little Ducks went out to play" and she calmed right down. I thought she would sleep with me, but for some reason she really didn't want to sleep in my room, so she ended up sleeping on the air mattress. Once she got to sleep, she slept all night.

On Saturday, we went to the park again and Mallory loved swinging. We came home and had Mac & Cheese for lunch. We played and played and played.  The kids loved playing outside with Mal.  We also finally got Mallory to take a little nap before her Aunt Ashley came over to take her for a little while. I spent some time with my own kids and we had dinner and cleaned up before Mallory came back to us.  After getting my kids showered and off to bed, it was some special one-on-one time for Mallory and I (Joey had gone to a movie with a friend.). This was probably my favorite couple of hours that I had with Mallory the whole weekend. We watched some tv, sang some songs, and I finally felt like we really connected. We started actually having a conversation and giggling and snuggling. She would not go to sleep, but I was enjoying her too much to really make it happen. I was kind of sorry to hear the knock on the door and see Cody and Becki arrive back. I had been having so much fun with my niece. But Mallory was so glad to see her parents and she just wouldn't let go of them.  It was fun to visit with Cody and Becki for awhile. Joey came home soon after they did, and we all stayed up and talked for awhile, before all heading to bed.

It was such a fun weekend with Mallory!