Bed Time Talk

Last night, after tucking the girls in bed, this is what we hear:

Mia: I had a bad dream. (sounds of bed creaking as Mia starts to get out of bed)

Zoe: Mia! You haven't even gone to sleep yet!

Zoe Speak

Zoe: Mommy, I wish you were my mommy. Oh wait, you are!

______________

Mom: Zoe, you just changed your pajamas.

Zoe: No, I didn't.

Mom: Yes, you did. You were wearing the pink ones.

Zoe: Well, like I so had to wear these because I have to totally wear them as much as possible before they get to small for me.

Um...who taught Zoe how to talk like a "valley girl"?

Sophie - One Year Old

Happy 1st birthday Sophie!

We had a beautiful day outside to celebrate you this weekend. You had fun opening presents with your sisters and eating your first birthday cake. We took a long walk and played in the park. Most fun of all though was how much laughing you did! I could barely get you to eat at lunch time because you kept giggling.

That's been the case pretty much all week. Maybe it's the change of seasons, I don't know, but you have become a regular giggler. You're also feeling much better after recovering from an ear infection earlier this month. It appears though that you may have a new tooth or two on the horizon to add to the five that you already have.

Feeling lousy earlier in the month didn't stop you from trying lots of new foods. This month, you tried: cucumber, water chestnuts, blueberries, celery, vegetarian chili, cabbage, plum, black-eyed peas, stuffing, cranberry sauce, tomato, pinto beans, red kidney beans, black turtle beans, spinach, brussels sprouts, nectarine, and pomegranate. You eat most foods easily and do very well with finger foods and drinking from a cup. We'll start introducing milk in a cup now and hope you like that as much as water from a cup.

You are very much wanting to walk. You crawl quickly, pull up on anything and everything, and try to scale around things and from one place to another. You also wave more purposefully. You're also quite the talker. You babble, loudly, especially at meal time.

You still shake all over when you get very excited, usually at meal time or when a family member comes to greet you. When we brought you the birthday cake, you were shaking so much the chair nearly moved. Very exciting cake!

You spend a lot of time playing with your sisters. We continue to be impressed and relieved at how well the three of you play together and want to be around each other.

Your hair is much longer and is often in a barrette or elastic band now. You weigh 17 lbs 3 oz and are 29.5 inches long. You still hug the bottom of the curve for weight (3%) and top of the curve for heigth (75%).

Happy birthday Sophie!

We love you!

Mom

Planitarium

When the Planitarium announced showings for 3-5 year olds, I was excited to go check it out. It wasn't until I walked in with Zoe and Mia, that I remembered just how dark a Planetarium gets and how it seems like the ceiling moves. I wondered how this would go over.

Their curiousity in the surroundings kept them so interested that they weren't as put off as they typically may have been by the darkness or the reclining seats. Whew! The person in charge did a great job of talking the audience through a story of science and astrology so that they barely noticed the lights dimming and the stars gliding across the dome. Zoe and Mia thought he was funny and smart and they were interested in following along.

The content was more sophisticated and at times the humor was too. When he teased "Everyone duck! Here comes an astroid that could kill us!", I held my breath. But Zoe and Mia were really calm and engaged. They just held my hand and watched the ceiling, asking lots of questions.

The age categorization of 3-5 was definitely a bit off, but overall I highly recommend it.

A Good Laugh

Today, I had to take a polygraph for work. As part of the process, I was asked several serious questions where they wanted to assess my truthfulness. Then, the assessor said she needed to identify a few statements that I needed to deliberately lie about so that she could see my response. For example, the door of the room was closed. If she asked, is the door of the room closed, she would want me to say "no", so she could see my lie response on the polygraph.

One of the initial questions she asked was: Do you ever get so angry you think you could lose your temper? I started laughing out loud as I said "No, never." She asked me what was going on, and I simply told her that I had three kids. We had found the perfect question.

Mia Speak

Mia: Mommy, for Sophie's birthday, I want to get her a teeny tiny little black dog with a string. And also a really, really big dog.

(The black dog with string is another Chloe/dachshund with a leash.)
_________________________

Mia: (walking around the house chewing) I've got chocolate bubble gum.

_________________________

Mia: Mommy, I love you. You're so comfortable.

Scavenger Hunt

I am slowly accumulating a mountain of parts and pieces of things that need to be replaced. However, when I call a company thinking that it will be as simple as "can you please send me another X?", I learn that they have discontinued the game, outfit, or whatever I was looking for. Is the shelf life for new merchandise a nanosecond these days?

Last year I took the girls to get ballet clothes. They were so excited that they couldn't keep their hands off them. They wore them for dress up and spontaneous dance recitals around the house. So, I shouldn't have been surprised when I took them out yesterday to get the girls ready for ballet (Mia's first ever ballet class no less) to find that Mia's tights had a run in them the size of the Grand Canyon.

You can imagine that this discovery led to tears. Although I'm not sure why because she must have noticed it whenever she did it. Oh, yea, that would require some element of being rational. My bad.

Anyway, I gave her a choice of pink sweatpants or a pair of pink regular dress stockings which calmed her for the moment, and she settled in to the bulky non-matching stockings. I assured her that I'd pick up a replacement pair this week before class next Monday.

How over-confident was I? Entirely it turns out. I've learned since then that Danskin has had major production issues and has been all but out of business for the past 1.5 years. Finding a toddler 2-4T Danskin 58 in pink is next to impossible. Oh, I did find them on one website for $5.99 (clearance) with $15.00 shipping charges. I'm way too stubborn to pay that much in shipping. And why are there so many shades of pink for toddler tights and none of the internet photos match real life? Yes, I'm the dork holding my ripped tights up to the computer monitor trying to compare.

Urgh! Will my kid be the one next week in a tutu and leotard, tight-free? Stay tuned for the next installment of ballet drama.