Mercy is TWO!

Pure sweetness.  Absolute cuteness.  Total fun!  Mercy is adorable and a complete joy to our household.  Mercy turned 2 on July 19th, and is so enjoyable.  I wish you could all get to know her because it's hard to describe just how wonderful it is to have her in our family.  She's talking in complete sentences now, trying out new words all the time.  She loves to pick up her toy phone and "talk" to us.  "What's Daddy doing?"  Then "What's Joshua doing?" and on through every name in our family.  She loves having books read to her; one of her favorites is Sandra Boynton's Snuggle Puppy.  Watching Signing Time videos is also a favorite pastime for her.  Lately she seems to be becoming more of a daddy's girl, attached to him, not wanting him to leave.  So sweet.  When Daddy or I come home, Mercy will run to the door yelling our name because she's so happy to see us.  She adores her brothers and the feeling is completely mutual.  She will run behind them trying to do what they do.  (Though sometimes her running looks like she's running in place instead of moving forward.)  Mercy loves to "be silly" to make the boys laugh at her, putting on silly hats or wrapping blankets around herself like a cape.  Anything to be like brothers or to make them laugh.  She is a bundle of energy and likes to do little silly dances a lot.  She loves to "help" me set the table or "help" brothers pick up in their room (which is helpful since she's often the one who made the mess!).  Her name is so very fitting for her because she just oozes compassion.  When a brother is crying, she will immediately go to them and comfort them, patting them on the back and saying sweet words to them.  She will stick up for the "victim", too.  If one of the boys hurts another, she will march over to the perpetrator and shake her little finger in their face and sternly say their full name, then march back over to the victim and continue her comforting.  Of course, sometimes she gets the middle names mixed up and calls Luke, "Lukey Joel Wideman".  Joel is Micah's middle name.  :o)  

She enjoys coloring, stacking cups, and lately putting Duplos together.  She does not like strangers and will just stare at them and not smile - very unlike herself.  Once she gets used to someone, though, she will gladly share smiles, books, food, and toys.  She loves anything with Minnie Mouse on it and sleeps with a sheep named BaBa.  Amazingly, as small as she is, she can put away a serious amount of food.  The girl can eat a ton - if it's something she likes.  She likes to look at books even when no one is around to read to her.  Her prayers are priceless, making sure to mention everyone in the family.  Everything she does is cute, even when she cries (which, thankfully, is not all that often, actually).  She is already demonstrating a little flare for the feminine drama.  Once she was crying because I had told her she couldn't do something.  She was inconsolable, so I told her if she wanted to keep crying she could go get on her bed until she was done.  So, I helped her onto her bed and she just dramatically flung her head into the pillow and proceeded to cry even harder.  Then when she was finished, she got down and came out of the room completely calm.  I asked her if she was finished and she assured me she was.  Even in all that, she was so cute!  

So, without further ado, I will proceed with the millions of cute pictures I have of Mercy....

And here are the pictures from Mercy's birthday.  She decided to wear this dress because it looks like something Minny Mouse would wear.  That was her theme - Minnie Mouse.  Mercy enjoyed opening her presents from her grandparents and eating some of her favorite foods that day.  Of course, she thoroughly enjoyed her strawberry flavored cake.  Anything pink and purple!  We had some friends come over that evening to enjoy the cake with us.  Celebrating Mercy was fun for us all!

Happy Birthday, sweet Mercy girl!  We are all thrilled that God has blessed our family with you.  What a wonderful two years we've had together, and we all look forward to many more!!!