Little princess

I don't ever want Maddie's mindset on "love matches" to change:

She was telling me the other day (very seriously too) that the reason she HATES the end of "Enchanted" is because Giselle is a princess, and Robert is a "just a man. He is not a prince like Edward. That's just not a match, Momma. A princess is supposed to be with a prince, now that's a match."

She's got her sights set high, and I'm hopeful this will continue on throughout her life so that she never settles for just any plain, old "man!" Hahaha.

Dance class, take 2

Maddie started dance class last night. 

We'd been back and forth about whether or not to enroll her for this year. Of course, she (and Faith) have been begging to take dance again, but we weren't 100% about spending extra money every month. We finally decided that she truly does enjoy it so much, that it is worth the $40/month. 

Anyway, we had the most overwhelming thing happen to us while we were at Maddie's dance class. There is only one girl in this class from last year that Maddie remembers, and all of the other girls are new. Well, there was a little girl in a pale blue leotard with short brown hair and Minnie ears that came right up to Maddie and said, "Hi! I'm Alexia. Do you want to play with me?" Maddie started jumping up and down telling us, "Oh my gosh! It's my friend Alexa! Look, it's my friend Alexa! Yes, I'll play with you, Alexa." The little girl went on to explain that her name was Alexia, and not Alexa but was as sweet as could be. Maddie heard something similar to Alexa, and automatically thought of her "friend", Alexa.

Midway through the class, we were asked to come in to see some of the tap steps they had just learned. The woman standing next to me told me that this little girl, Alexia- only 5 years old,- has Stage IV neuroblastoma. She was just diagnosed two weeks ago, and is already on her 2nd round of chemotherapy. My heart sank and I had tears filling my eyes. I couldn't stop looking at this little girl and thinking, "this could so easily be our Crannie" and thinking about Alexa in Texas and her family and everything that they endured. 

She and Maddie were fast friends from the get-go, and Maddie insists that this is her friend AlexA. Not, AlexIA. She tells us, "this is great, now I don't have to send pictures to her on the helicopter."

I think she's gonna like it here...

.... Just like in the song from "Annie!"

We've been learning about and finding some great little shops and activities for the girlies to do around here. Maddie was just ecstatic the other day when we happened to run into a friendly woman in front of us in line at Redner's. I've been walking there with the girlies and letting them choose their baking stuff once or twice a week (Abrie's nap is our baking time!), and the woman in front of us took notice to how enthusiastic both Maddie and Faith were talking about the strawberry cake they were going to make, and of course Maddie standing there looking at the Holiday issue of the Pillsbury magazine. She told us that she owns a little bakery right up the road from us, and she was getting all sorts of flour, sugar, Phillo dough, etc etc which Maddie especially thought was so interesting. 

She went with Dan the other day to Blockbuster because she was specifically looking for a Strawberry Shortcake video called "Cooking up Fun" that we can't seem to find at the library. She did find it, and now she desperately wants to start her own cooking show with her Beebster. Haha!

We also found a little place called "Le Petit Artist" up the road from us (walking distance) where you can make all kinds of neat things with beads, pottery painting, mosaics, etc etc. I'm going to have to look into it because Maddie is already asking to go. This might prove to be an awesome place to go in the winter when we can't get out to the playground or outdoors due to the cold.