Just for the record...

...Mädchen does smile. A lot. I realized that she looks so serious in so many of the pictures we post on the blog, but she's actually a really funny little girl who basically never stops talking/laughing when she's with us or close friends/family, but as soon as we get the camera out the smiles stop (or she actually runs away). Then again, Gretchen's Dad (who was one of the most gregarious people you'd ever meet) never smiled in photos either. She was a very serious baby who didn't smile a whole lot and would just study everything very intently, but now she's a little comedian.

It's the same thing when we're around people she doesn't know so well--she gets really shy and clams up. She's evidently even that way in school, where her teacher says she never speaks unless she's responding to a question. There's nothing wrong with her being shy, of course (she gets it from me, after all); it's just funny that people who don't know her well probably think of her as a quiet, timid child, when at home she's a dynamo who runs us (especially Gretchen) ragged.

Anyway, here's proof that she does indeed smile (with her Ama at Thanksgiving):