Daredevil

This little one may darn well give me a heart attack one of these days ...

A princess and her queens

A little late in posting, this is from way back at Princess Anna's birthday party!

Ring around the rosie!

Nothing is more fun than ring-around-the-rosie with these two girls!  

Anna wanted to Gigi to join them in the video, so sweet!

What's behind the curtain?

Letter to Anna: Month thirty-seven

Dear Anna,

You’re in a stage where you’re constantly surprising us and challenging us, usually in a good way, and I feel amazed and blessed each day to be your Mommy.  Not always every second of every day, like when you’re correcting me or arguing with me over the tense of a verb or when I’ve asked you to do something for the fifth time; but in the quiet moments when I’m putting you to bed, in the moment when you see me walk into your room at school and you dart to me with open arms, in the moments when you remember something we talked about a few days before, or when you snuggle up with me on the couch.

 You’re growing so much every day!  I could swear that you grow an inch a day and will be looking down on me by your fourth birthday.  Just the other day you were walking around the kitchen and picked something off the island, your Dad point out that you hadn’t even had to get a stool or stand on your tip toes and we both just stood there and stared in amazement.  You’re also growing into a polite young lady and have mastered the skill of using please and thank you very nicely.  One day recently you asked if you could wear your “princess dress” that day and I had to say “no” as it was a school day; but reconsidered when you responded “can I please wear my princess dress after I get up, and get dressed, and get ready, and brush my teeth, pretty please?”  There was no way I could turn that down, so you were a princess until you left for school that day.

You and your sister have a love affair with each other and it’s amazing to watch your relationship grow each day.  Nothing makes Charlotte smile like seeing you and no one is more fun to play with in her book.  You guys have a game called 1-2-3 that is played in our bed or your bed almost daily.  It’s a pretty simple game; you stand at the head of the bed and free-fall backwards.  But the part you two have perfected is the infectious giggle that comes right after you land safely.  You turn to each other and just die laughing and it’s the cutest sight and sound ever.  Although she’s still working to get a little steadier on her feet, you love to try to dance together and do ring-around-the-rosie.  She follows your lead and literally looks up to you in every way possible.

You moved to a new room at school this past month and the transition went really well.  I was a little worried given the very close relationship you’d developed with Miss Lisa in the Manatee room, but you did great.  Your first transition day you told us how excited you were to be “an Orca today!!,” and proudly went to your new room on the second day.  Your new room is considered a preschool room, but they follow a school schedule, so many of your activities fall in line with their summer camp programs and are little less academically focused.  You’re still learning a new letter each week, are working on handwriting each day, and focusing on other self-help skills, and are finally at an age where you can tell us more detail about what you did during your day. 

We’ve officially been bitten by the princess bug and you are nothing less than totally obsessed with the Disney movie Frozen.  And I mean obsessed.  We don’t watch it that often, but I made the mistake of downloading the soundtrack to my phone and we generally listen to it most the time when we’re at home.  Getting ready in the morning, during breakfast, car ride home from daycare … you get the picture.  They play the soundtrack at school as well and you know most of the words and have dance steps to accompany the re-enactment.  This, coupled with your Sophia the First obsession means that our house is all-princesses-all-the-time.  What I find the most interesting is that you seem to identify with the secondary characters more than the main characters, Princess Amber in Sophia’s world and Princess Elsa in Frozen.  And you have characters that we each play in your mind.  My favorite is that your Gigi is Sophia’s butler, Bailywick. 

A few of your funnier “tricks” over the last couple of months that’s I’ve forgotten to jot down include your two-week obsession with disrobing at random times, including naptime and when we got home from school.  There were a few instances where I’d turn my head for a second or walk in to get you up from nap to find you in your birthday suit.  Quite amusing, but I’m glad you grew out of that as quickly as you came into it, for now anyway.  One of the other things that’s given us a real chuckle lately is how you’ve developed an independence around washing yourself in the bathtub, and will inform your Dad that you are cleaning off your “messy bessies” or “dusty musties.”  Although we have no idea where these sayings came from, it makes us chuckle nonetheless.

Because my memory is shot most days, I keep notes of what I want to include in your letters and sit with a permanent grin on my face as I write to you each month.  I want to balance being in-the-moment with you and your sister with capturing some of these oh-so-fun-but-sometimes-challenging times.  At the end of the day your Dad and I will sit down and recap the best (and sometimes most trying) things about our day, and we always end with happy stories of you and your sister.  Thank you for giving me something happy to begin and end each day with, you’re my true sunshine in this world. 

Love,

Mom

Asleep at the wheel

If you know Charlotte, you know her favorite activity is eating and it's a BIG deal if she falls asleep mid-meal!

Her future's so bright

Playdate at the park

Blowing kisses!

Letter to Charlotte: Month fifteen

Dear Charlotte,

Although I’m still getting used to telling people I have a three-year-old and one-year-old, you’re having no trouble moving right ahead in your milestones and are every bit the busy body that a 15 month old should be.  I still do, and probably always will, think of you as my baby, but every day it seems that you grow-up just a little more right before my eyes. 

You’re getting *this* close to completely walking.  You can walk, but you only do it on your terms.  Crawling gets you where you need to go, so why mess with anything else?  I have a feeling that you may have inherited a little of your mother’s perfectionist tendencies and you’re simply waiting until you have it totally down pat and will start running after your sister any day.  In the meantime you don’t find yourself limited at all and will carry your sippy cup, a book, or a toy in your mouth en route to your final destination.  A few weeks ago I noticed you were putting your pull-puppy toy’s string over your shoulders and around the back of your neck in *just* a way that allowed you to pull him along behind you.  Genius.

Not walking hasn’t kept you from coasting along at the park and after Anna’s park birthday party you became a bona-fide slider.  You love to go down the slide, but you love crawling back up it more!  There’s a park close to home that boasts a double slide and it’s truly double trouble when you both get going down and back up.  Speaking of Anna’s birthday party, you had a blast.  You’re still a little shy, but were ready to get in on the action and loved watching all of the other big kids play.  The balloons and cupcakes weren’t shabby door prizes, either. 

You’ve expanded your vocabulary this past month with both words and signs.  You use all-done and more effectively when signing and can say book, duck, quack, Daisy (for both cats), nana (blanket and/or Anna), dog, more, and moo.  You especially like to make the quacking noise when you see a duck and have been known to walk around with your rubber ducky just quacking away. 

When you’re not talking, you’re generally happy and smiley, and have one of the most infectious laughs I’ve ever heard.  Anything Anna does is hilarious, and you love to laugh at the games you two make up and play together.  The most fun is the “1-2-3 game” where you each stand at the head of a bed (ours or Anna’s) and free fall backward simultaneously.  You usually wake up from your afternoon nap first and nothing is more fun than going into Anna’s room when she’s awake and playing that game for a good half hour.  Seeing you two scramble to get back up and then dying laughing as you fall again could melt anyone’s blues away. 

You learned to quack while you spent a few days with your Gigi and your Dad and I took a short vacation to Florida.  As if she wasn’t already wrapped around your little finger, you wrapped your Gigi tighter.  Unless she just played us for fools, it looks like you girls were great for her and she loved getting all of the Charlotte snuggles.  Your favorite thing to do with Gigi is to bring her book after book after book.  She’ll read you one just as fast as you can crawl over the bookshelf for another.  And then repeat.  You love lift-the-flap books, touchy-feely books, and Dr. Seuss tongue twisters all the same.  And your Gigi loves nothing more than to sit and read with you. 

My favorite time of the day with you has always been bedtime.  Our special time.  Even though you haven’t nursed in three months, I had still rocked you to sleep most nights.  Your eyes would get heavy as you sucked your thumb and twirled your hair or mine, and you’d slowly drift off to sleep.  Until you didn’t and started refusing to go to sleep for me.  For about 3 weeks straight you’d rock for 30-45 minutes with me and would scream bloody murder if I laid you down; but Gigi or Dad could get you down in 5 minutes flat.  I guess I’m not the only one wrapped around your little finger. 

You started calling your blanket a nana this month.  You don’t keep a blanket with you routinely, but occasionally at school or home you’ll ask for the one that stays in your crib and will cuddle up.  At first we thought you were asking for Anna, and sometimes you are, but mostly it’s your blanket when you need a few minutes to just sit and snuggle.  I called my maternal grandmother Nana and think about her almost every day, and know that she’d love nothing more than to see you and your sister.  When I think of my Nana, I think of comfort, security and love, the same thing you think of with your nana; and I have to think there’s no coincidence there.  Even though my Nana isn’t here on earth any longer, I know that she’s always watching over me.  And that holds true for me, I may not always be with you physically, but I’ll always be your biggest fan and your number one protector. 

Love,

Mom