Marianna had a Little Lamb

In honor of Greek Easter (aka: Greaster), Marianna paid tribute by wearing a dress with little lambs on it....so cute! Now that she is a walker...it is much easier to wear her cute dresses so you will see many, many more this summer!
In the video, Marianna is showing you how she does "soooo big!" and a little wave "bye, bye".

Other Milestones...even though my sister Jill believes Marianna said "frog" to her over vacation..I heard Marianna's first word "duck" while reading her favorite book, Peek a Boo Who this week. She is really good with her D sounds and has been adding a very throaty CK every time we come to the page with the Duck on it.

Marianna loves books and will stop anything that she is doing if she thinks you will read her a book. I have a video of her walking over to her books..her favorite, of course, Peek a Boo Who?.

Video: Marianna Walking

Marianna started walking on Saturday (10 Months, 1 week 3 days!), but didn't walk at all Sunday and Monday. Today, she started again so I got it on video. Here are a couple clips..

i'm not saying she's a golddigger...

get down girl, go ahead, get down!

Marianna's Big Weekend

This past weekend was great for two reasons...1. The Weather 2. Marianna became a walker!
She surprised us all this past Saturday at up her Grandma and Grandpas by taking her first several steps solo! In the past, there were two and three steps here and there, but Saturday she really took off! Unfortunately, i didn't have my camera...can you believe it?? Sunday, I think she was so tired from walking, she barely even cruised!
Here are some pictures from Friday that I took while DJ had his friends in town.




(She is really into squatting while playing..I have always loved it when kids sit like this!)



Some of Marianna's new favorite things to do right now are to do "So Big...!" and then clap for herself!


Our future golfer...


Marianna and the boys...


Here is Marianna trying out broccoli for the first time and LOVING IT! Is there nothing the girl won't eat?!?! (yes, her bottle and mangos!)

(the one handed...so big!..)

Getting Warmer and Getting Excited!

Today was a little warmer and Marianna had some playtime today on the grass. She was so funny...it took her the LONGEST TIME to sit down. Once she did, she was very curious about the feeling of the grass. It didn't take long before she was trying to eat the leaves she could find on the ground and pulling up grass and trying to put it in her mouth.

We are so excited for summer to come and I will be taking every Thursday off in June through Labor Day. I just got our pool club newsletter and it is opening the weekend of May 17...I cannot wait to get our little waterbug back into the water... (and mommy needs a tan!) One month and counting...

Spring is in the Air...but it sure is COLD!

We have spring fever over here in the Becharas House since getting back from California. Marianna loves every opportunity to go outside. She has several walkers and we go out in the front and watch the kids or back and forth, back and forth, on the back patio.
Here is Marianna getting some fresh air and getting tired out for the next nap...

California...part one

At the airport...we left for the airport at 4:45am...our flight was at 8am so I thought after getting to the airport early and tiring Marianna out, after she took her 8am bottle upon take-off she would be OUT for a couple hours...after all I heard babies love to sleep on the plane!

7:15am and still WIDE AWAKE!

Right after take off, she fell asleep....for only 25 minutes!! She was up the rest of the 4 hour flight. Thank god we had the seat empty next to us for her to "play"! Marianna loved looking out the window especially as we were getting ready to land!

The first day in Palm Springs, Marianna spent a lot of time exploring her new home. We were a little nervous about the two steps down to the sunken family room since Marianna was heading down stairs head first at the time. However, after a few nasty falls, she realized that she got less hurt by turning around and heading down backwards (she was a fast learner!). She is still going down properly at home, too, which has been great!

Marianna had a ball with her two cousins, Shannon and Jack. Here they are playing in the fountain on El Paseo drive. Marianna is so curious about touching and splashing water..especially water fountains! We could burn at least a 20 minutes of time at a fountain...


DJ, my dad, and Adam played a round of golf on the first day and we were ready to watch them from the villa as they played the hotel course..

Marianna loved looking off the patio. You will see several pictures of her here. She was watching DJ's second shot off the tee here...

...what a follow through!
Golf Clapping...

In the morning, we would usually head out for a walk. The sun is pretty low and in the direction we were headed, the sun would be directly in Marianna's eyes. We had to take this picture of her with her baby "shades" on. She looked hilariously and surprisingly kept them on!

After bathing Marianna in sunscreen and putting the sunglasses on, she fell asleep and the sunglasses (which ended up getting sunscreen on them also), found their way into her eyes:( We had to retreat back to the villa to wash her eyes out in the bath (they were so red, puffy, and tearing...i felt horrible! lesson learned!!)

Finally, here we are getting out to the pool on day two (one of the only days I brought my camera).

Here is "Mariannita" (little Marianna in Spanish as we learned at the Mexican restaurant we went to Monday night!). She was a water bug... Marianna loved floating around the pool in her little "boat". She is tall enough for the kiddie pool that her feet would touch the bottom of the pool and she could maneuver around.

All the kids at the pool loved Marianna! They would all take turns pushing her around and she kind of became the pool mascot. Here she is being pushed by her cousin, Shannon and a friend we met there, Madelyn (who was with us everyday until we left!)

Jack loved the camera..therefore I loved Jack!!!

Her is my niece Shannon...she was such a big help!!

Marianna loved being outside, too! After getting out from the pool, we would just put down some towels, toys and Cheerios...she would play and let us soak up the sun!

Shannon is showing Marianna a little barking dog she got at the dessert fair. Marianna loved it!!