Many ways to eat a pb&j sandwich

Hi little one,

After all of the cookies you've eaten over the last three days, today we went back to basics with a pb&j sandwich. Sprouted barley bread, natural PB, and strawberry fruit spread sweetened with juice.

I added a cup of milk (muk!) and walked away for a few minutes as you started eating. You picked up an isosceles triangle of sandwich, dipped it in your milk, sucked the milk out of the sandwich and then ate it.

I've been around a while, but I've never heard of eating a sandwich quite that way before.

Now you are soaking your nails in the milk, which really isn't necessary as you have unbreakable nails already.

I love you.
Mommy

Way-va's Second Christmas

Hi my little love,

As we could have predicted, you made out like a bandit this Christmas. Your Auntie Susi and Uncle John spoiled you with sparkly new pj's, play-doh in abundance and a fabulous Mister Potato Head. Your Grandma Bear spoiled you utterly and completely with toys, books, and clothes to last until high school. Not really, but at least to last until you're three. Her best idea though was from Build A Bear. She built you a lavendar teddy bear that says in her voice:

"Ava, this is Grandma Bear, and I...love...you." I was instructed to play it to you every night before you go to sleep so she knows your voice.

Last night we were at Great-Grandpa Jerry's for the every other year traditional Edson family Christmas. You had fun running around the house, and I had fun not worrying about what kind of trouble you would find. You love playing with your cousins and following around the bigger girls. All of my aunts and uncles were impressed by how independent you are and yet always seem to know where Mommy is.

This Christmas has been my best ever. Last night I had you and your Daddy with me in Sacramento. We went to five houses and sang carols to the neighbors. Yes, when your Great Grandma Susie was around we would have sang to twenty houses all the way down the block, but this time it was five. I don't know what it is about caroling that brings tears to my eyes, but caroling means Christmas to me. We open our hearts and our voices join together in an imperfect harmony and we share love with others. We give a gift so big that it can't be measured in dollars and packaged in brightly wrapped boxes.

This year I got to share the experience with you and Daddy, not to mention Grandma Bear, Great Grandpa Jerry, your aunt, uncle, and cousins, and the rest of our noisy festive bunch.

Then after caroling we opened presents to each other, followed by nibbling on all of the baked delights our family is so good at making. Then, came the time honored tradition of the gift exchange.

Each grown up brings a gift priced at about $25, wrapped brightly. We cut up the numbers of an old calendar and each take a number to determine our ordering. Number one picks a gift. Number two can steal number one's gift or take a new one. New rules this year eliminated family collusion and stealing of the same gift more than once by any single person.

I'm delighted to say that your Daddy's exchange gift was the hottest item. It also helped that there were two of them.

I'm sure some day you will experience the overwhelming love and magic that I have in the last twenty four hours.

For now, you've opened your gifts from Daddy and I, including a fabulous art easel and a wooden tool box. We spoiled you a little, but not as much as everyone else!

The way I see it, as I told your Daddy, if you weren't such a fabulous little girl, you wouldn't be spoiled so much!

But I better make breakfast for the three of us before we need to leave for our friends' house for dinner today.

I love you sweet girl. Merry Christmas.

Boo-bah and Baby Eye-sty

Hi my sweet girl,

You are rapidly toddling your way into being two years old. Sure, you have just shy of four months to go, but the intermittent tantrums have arrived as well as many new words.

The tantrums, they come without warning and cannot always be tied to exhaustion or starvation. Sometimes they are just because. As long as I am well rested and not hungry myself, they don't bother me much. I can nearly always (with exceptions noted above) let you have your tantrum without trying to fix it or get angry about it. After all, it's not about me.

You have fallen in love, head over heels, with Baby Eye-sty. For those not familiar with toddler vocabulary, this means Baby Einstein videos.

"Baby eye-sty," you say, pointing at the TV. "Baby eye-sty!!!" you exclaim, when you find the video case.

Grandma Bear doesn't know what kind of favor she did us when she gave you those videos before you were born. They entertained you when you were three months old, but now they are a big, BIG hit. They entertain you so well now that I use them to relax you before bedtime. They are the only thing I know of, besides tortillas (tee-ahs!) that guarantee your complete attention.

I like them for that reason, but also because they're helping with your vocabulary. From Baby Galileo you've learned to recognize and say moon, star, sun, planet, and cloud. From Baby Doolittle you've learned dog, cat, cow, sheep, pig, and mouse. From Baby Van Gough you've learned to paint masterpieces. Not really, but it sounded good, didn't it?

There are more, but I want to tell you about boo-bah.

Boo-bah.

No, it's not that strange fuzzy toy I saw advertised last Christmas. Anyone in our studio audience have a guess as to what it is?

Give up?

You'll never guess. I swear.

Okay, I'll tell.

Toothbrush. Boo-bah is your name for toothbrush.

You love brushing your teeth. You tolerate me brushing your teeth as long as you get to hold a second toothbrush, and when I'm done, you get to brush my teeth.

We have a deal, you and I. In the morning you brush your own teeth. At night, I do it.

This week you got upset after I brushed your teeth because you saw me flossing my teeth and wanted some of that too. Yes, at nearly 21 months old, you wanted your teeth flossed. If I'm not careful you get floss out of the garbage (yuck!) so now I give you some floss and you diligently put it between your teeth. I make sure I put used floss in the big kitchen garbage so you don't go after it.

Again you are many steps ahead of me. It took me until three months ago to start flossing my teeth every day and you have started before your second birthday.

Boo-bah and Baby Eye-Sty. These are the center of your world.

I love you sweet girl. In a few days I'll tell you about your second Christmas.

Mommy

Not exactly what Clinique had in mind

You discovered my Clinque Angel Red lipstick, although I doubt it was intended to be eyeshadow.

Picture time!

I just noticed there have been no pictures in ages, so here goes...

Ava has figured out how to get around being vertically challenged.














Ava putting on her overalls, not exactly the right way.















Ava in her party dress and beads, next to the bathtub.















Ava playing with sand at the beach.

Bye-bye kitty-cat

Hi my little love,

You are saying lots of words now, so many I've lost count. What your Daddy and I love the most though is when we're leaving the house you turn to look inside and wave, saying "Bye-bye kitty cat."

You say this predictably every time we leave and many other times throughout the day. Bye bye kitty cat.

Where did you get this? Do I say goodbye to the cats when I leave in the morning? It seems extremely important to you that you tell the cats goodbye before you leave. After all, they need to know. Now that you're leaving they can fully relax and take that big nap they had planned for after your departure.

If this is the case, I can understand. It's quite considerate of you to tell the cats we're leaving.

Unagi started sleeping under the Christmas tree shortly after its arrival. It took you a couple days to find her, but now you love pointing out the kitty cat under the tree. Sorry Unagi, obviously you can run but you can't hide from a motivated toddler.

The Christmas tree...in a stroke of complete luck, Daddy brought home a bunch of unbreakable ornaments this year. The tree wasn't decorated enough with my stash of ornaments once all of the breakable ones hung well above your reach, and he happened upon a package that turned out to be unbreakable.

This is fortunate for us because of you and the cats. You love to take the ornaments off the tree and put them into a box we left out for that purpose. We're not dummies, we know what your plans are when you see bright shiny objects at your height.

We also know the cats, who are likely teenagers in cat years but still entertained (like a certain toddler we know) by the sight of those same bright shiny balls dangling in front of them.

What we didn't predict, however, is that you would take one of those bright shiny balls and hold it out for Unagi to hit like a punching bag.

I didn't witness this, Daddy did, and although is imagination is fertile I doubt he made it up.

I want to tell you about the toddler holiday party we attended tonight, about how you played well with all of the toys, surprisingly didn't play with the shiny glass balls on their tree, ate well, and somehow didn't cry at all until we were on the way home and your foot got caught in the handle on a paper bag.

As for the party, if I held up the romper room magic mirror I would have said...
"I see Katie and Ellie, Amy and Jack, Katie and Luke, Victoria and Ian, and Sadia and Zoya..." not to mention all the babies to come that are currently hanging out in their Mommy's tummy!

Having six toddlers in one place guarantees chaos but the party was indelibly fun and the food was sumptuous. Thank you all for being our friends!

As for you, Miss Ava, you fell asleep in the car while I was singing Christmas carols so you wouldn't cry. You barely woke when I changed you into pajamas at home and put you into bed.

Sleep well, my love, and night night kitty cat.

Twenty months old

Hi my sweet girl,

This morning we went for the same walk we took every day when you were brand new. We would start at our house and go up, up, up to McLaren park, swoop down over the foot bridge, back up by the sandbox with cement turtles, past the old and wise eucalyptus trees and back down home.

We haven't done this walk in a long time, and I've missed it.

You're getting bigger by the day. Sure, you're small, in the fifth percentile small, but with such giants for parents I don't expect a WNBA player out of you. You eat well and you've got baby fat in all the right places and your new doctor insisted you looked just right.

Thank heaven I came to my senses and dumped your old doctor who always made me feel lower than pond scum.

But this is about you, walking head on into your twentieth month tomorrow. You say new words every day - this morning we were practicing our animal words: dog, cat, mouse, cow, pig, zebra, giraffe, bear, sheep and elephant. Okay, you can't say elephant yet, but you can say the rest of them!

What amazes me completely is that you know the difference between all these animals. How is it you can differentiate between a cat and a dog? They both have four legs and furry bodies, there are small dogs that are about the size of a cat, yet you know which is which. How?

Speaking of cats, Unagi has started sleeping with you at night. I don't know if you're keeping her warm or vice versa, but it's wonderful to see Unagi curled up at your feet. This morning you woke up happy and when Daddy went in your room, he said you were playing with the cat.

You play "tag" with the cats on a regular basis - lumbering towards them and then running away with shreaks of laughter when they come back at you.

The other day you amazed my waxing lady by signing please when you wanted me to read your book again. "She knows sign language?!" Sofia marveled.

"Ava knows a few signs, just enough to fill in the blanks for words." For once, little one, I felt like I could be a candidate for Mom of the Year.

The other day I brought your Daddy a plate of cookies I just baked. You stole his last cookie and ate it when he wasn't looking.

He asked you, "Ava, where are the cookies?"

You looked at the plate and signed "all done!" I can see your sense of humor is developing at a good rate.

You're starting to figure out how to jump. You bend your knees and bounce a bit, but you haven't worked out the gravity restrictions. You like to bounce on the trampoline at My Gym and you watch the other toddlers jump, you just haven't figured it out for yourself yet.

The Christmas tree has been a big attraction for you. Daddy and I put it up while you were hanging out with your Nana. The first day or two you were afraid to go near it, likely wondering how a full grown tree sprouted in our living room.

Now, of course, ornaments routinely walk off of the tree and mysteriously appear in your bedroom. Of particular attraction are the teddy bear ornaments that your Auntie Brie and I bought at Harrods in England three years ago.

Someday I will take you to England and show you the miles of shopping in Harrods. Maybe we'll buy something there, maybe we won't. We'll take the London underground from place to place, delighting in the foreign accent and new sights.

Someday yes, I will introduce you to my passion for travel. Maybe you will love it as I do, maybe you won't.

I often wonder what you'll like as you grow bigger. Right now you love everything we're doing and I'm even looking for a Ava-sized broom so you can sweep when Mommy does.

For now, you have swept us up with your charm and infectious laugh.

I never knew love could be so big.