decorating

Malayna LOVES to decorate for Christmas. She especially likes anything little, shiny or just plain garish. Luckily, I'm okay with giving up control of Christmas decorating - there was a time when I would've waited until she went to bed and then "fixed" the decorations. Actually, that thought DID cross my mind. But she's so proud of her work that I didn't have the heart to move anything. We got a Christmas tree the other day, and Malayna was very excited to get started with the trimming. Unfortunately, since she's under 5 feet tall, most of the ornaments are on the bottom half of the tree.

Over the weekend, Jimmy and I took Malayna to Reading Terminal Market. On the train. It was her first train ride, and now I know why we didn't take her before now. When I told her that we were taking the train, she immediately got upset and started to cry. She got used to the idea after a little while, and we drove to the Jenkintown train station (which we've driven past many, many times). When I went to get her out of her carseat, she started to cry again and freak out. She told us to go back home, that she didn't want to go on the train. Um, no.

Luckily we only had to wait a little while before the train pulled in. I carried her onto the train {to make sure she actually got ON}, and she started freaking out again. Of course the train was packed and there were no seats. Malayna was screaming, crying and flailing. We had to walk the entire car in order to find an empty seat. Which means we had to pass EVERYONE on the train.

{giant lollipop}

Thankfully, we were facing away from everyone when we sat down. She was fine after about 5 minutes and the rest of the day was great. We walked around the Market, she talked to a woman playing a piano, and even requested a song. {What?! She started a conversation with a stranger?} We had a snack and bought ingredients to make pizza {which she and Jimmy did when we got home}.

Hopefully we'll be able to take train rides without the fuss from now on. I'm sure she freaked out because it was something new. Have I mentioned that she doesn't like change or new things?!

{This was on the ride home. There was no smiling
on the ride to the Market. From any of us.}