"M" stands for MADNESS at the Darby household!! 
And I guess she is really going to have to get used to the idea because she is going to be a
Mimi is a year-and-a-half old, and, oh my goodness, no one bothered warning us what that meant. She is go, go, go nonstop from the second she wakes up until she goes back to sleep at night (other than to snuggle on the couch with me for a few minutes every now and then). I look back on the first year of her life and had no idea how easy we had it. She was so calm and patient, but now she yells, "No!" and throws her food. If she has something she shouldn't, she makes sure I see her being bad and then runs away laughing! When she does get in trouble, she is so dramatic and has a horrible cry that would break anyone's heart. She tries so hard to run away from us when we are in public places, and she even made a three-year-old little girl cry today at Davis Kidd because she wouldn't share her Thomas trains! Yikes . . .
. . . but as Katharine Hepburn once said, "If you obey all the rules you miss all the fun," and Miss Mimi never misses fun. She does everything to the extreme -- dancing, talking loud, eating everything in sight (we recently learned she steals food at preschool). She counts everything now to ten and claps excitedly when she finishes. She yells out "HEY!" to complete strangers and always brings a smile to their faces. She is obsessed with her Little People farm and loves to stack all her animals on top while she yells out the sounds they make. Mimi can find a way to make anything fun and silly like putting a toy cup on her head and shaking until it falls off or jumping on her head in her crib. Discipline is something we're trying to work out but I pray that she keeps this independence and passion for the rest of her life. Not that it will be easy for us . .
Channeling all this crazy energy in the winter has been difficult, so we recently went to the Children's Museum and let her run wild. She made a bracelet, colored a picture, went grocery shopping, and almost beat some little girls with a drum stick (oops), but her favorite part was the boats. She got completely drenched and could have stayed there all day . . . but of course we had to pull her away screaming.
A couple of weeks ago we had some nice days, so Mimi and I were able to go to the park after work. She can finally go up and down the slide by herself, and loves to go down on her belly!
Our adorable nephew J.R. recently turned 3 years old, and I loved seeing how excited he was about his presents and cupcakes. He is always so sweet to Mimi, but he can't seem to understand why she wants to eat all his crayons and take all his toys. He'll soon learn that she is someone he can boss around, but right now she still seems to think she's in charge.
For the longest time, Mimi has been the youngest grandchild and the youngest out of all her friends (and even in her preschool class), but that is no longer the case. Kyle has Banks, Jordan just had Georgie Grace, and Amery is due in April. One of my dearest friends from Corinth has a 4-month-old sweetie named Kendal, and Mimi got to meet her over Christmas. She liked to point to her and say "Baby" and rub the back of her head, but she then let us know that she deserved all the attention by performing all her tricks.
And I guess she is really going to have to get used to the idea because she is going to be a big sister in August!!!
We are so excited about the new addition to the Darby family, and we will definitely keep the blog updated throughout my pregnancy. Right now I am extremely tired, a little nauseous, and, well, a little "moody" to put it lightly (I'm sure Clint would call it something else, poor thing!). I can't wait to find out the gender of the little one and get to work on Mimi's big girl room.
The highlight of her present-opening was her gi-normous kitchen! It now sits in the middle of our den and is the first thing she runs to every morning . . . and the last thing we have to pull her away from screaming when it is time for bed!
