Diki-diki da-da and more Ava quotes

Due not to popular demand, but more because I wrote these down so I'd remember, I have more to add after your 31-month post.

"Diki-diki-da-da"
You sing this often, without provocation, as you are going about your daily toddler routine. Sometimes I spontaneously sing it and it makes you laugh outrageously, perhaps because I am speaking to you in your language, even if I don't have a tiny clue as to what it means.

"Go to the snow and see Grandma Bear"
I told you yesterday that we have three more days before we go to the snow, "Boots!" you replied, meaning your brand new snow boots had better be coming too or there would be one upset toddler. Then you told Daddy "go to the snow and see Grandma Bear!"

"Here comes Ava!"
I don't know where this came from, this declaration that you're coming down the stairs into the family room, or into the house, but you say this frequently and it always makes me grin.

"The mommys has to do it"
This one is going to get me into trouble soon, because when Daddy tries to help you do something...anything...from changing your diaper to putting you in your car seat and I'm around, you respond with..."the mommys has to do it" Someday soon, honey, mommy is going to be tired!

"Yay, I did it!"
I'm not sure what you did, but you definitely did IT!

love,
Mommy

Thirty one months, but who's counting?

Hi little one,

Where do I begin to tell the story of my little girl who is getting bigger and smarter by the day? I begin with your words, and see where they lead me.

"Stop please moving cars!"
...you said last week as we were crossing the street. I had decided we needed to get out of the house at 5PM on a Sunday so we went for a walk along Cortland, the main street of Bernal Hill. Daddy and I have been encouraging you to look for 'moving cars' for a while now before you cross the street, and I was infinitely pleased that although you'd run ahead at each block, you'd wait for me at the curb to hold your hand as you crossed.

"Mommy's tea, where are you?"
you called to my tea the other day, that I had made earlier and couldn't find on any flat surface in the whole house. "Ava, have you seen Mommy's tea?" I asked. To which you responded the above. I finally found my tea in the microwave, where I'd reheated it and left it for evaporation, I suppose.

"I need Moose and Rabbit and Donkey!"
Before you go to bed, or even lie down to watch baby einstein on the TV in my room, you gather around you the likes of one moose (featured on here frequently), one white rabbit, and a purple donkey that you insist says 'woof' and not 'hee-haw'. This is your tribe of friends, constant members of your ongoing tea party. Speaking of...

"I need to have a tea party!"
There are a few things that made me laugh in this exclamation of yours a couple days ago...okay, maybe one. That you NEED to have a tea party. Need and tea party have never been together in a sentence in my speech, but hey, I can understand. I need lots of things that don't make sense to anyone else! And who attended your tea party, but Moose and Rabbit and Donkey arranged fabulously around your tea set!

"Go to the snow, I need to go to the snow!"
After we bought you cute snow boots for our upcoming trip to visit Grandma Bear, you thought snow was right around the corner. Sorry honey!

"Please, I'm saying please!"
I wish I could remember what you were asking for specifically, but not only are your "please-s" and "thank you-s" becoming more prevalent, the fact that you reiterated your please with "I'm saying please" makes me a card-carrying member of the Mothers-of-Smart-Daughters club.

I love you honey, happy 31 months in this adorable body.
Mommy

But what does Ava look like now?

Ava looks like this when she's vacuuming.















Ava looks like this when she's typing on Mommy's computer while shouting the ABC song.

















Ava looks like this when she's in a field of pumpkins with Moose.

How to care for your moose part 2 & 3

Part 2:
Make sure moose is properly seated in high chair and feed assorted colors of crayons


Part 3:
When moose is tired of eating crayons, make sure he has a proper seat at the table and gets a serving of french toast and yogurt.


The actual conversation this morning after you diapered and seated moose at the table:
"Moose wants french toast."
"Okay, does moose want a pink plate?"
"Pink plate."
"Moose needs fork."
Pause.
"Moose needs yogurt."

If you ever doubt I love you, please read this post.

Thirty Months (or two and a half years)

Hi sweet girl,

You are officially two and a half years old, not almost two and a half, and old enough to not be just two anymore. Halves will become more important when you're in school but before you're 18. After that it's just not so important and sometimes you'll even forget how old you are. I went a whole year once thinking I was a year older.

But alas, I've stopped aging you in months, like a fine wine, you have graduated from months to years and fractions. You could have been two and quarter and you will be two and three quarter years old, but not twenty nine months or thirty four months.

You've graduated from the toddler bed you didn't sleep in to the full size murphy bed that has been at your nana's house since you were born. Suddenly you want to sleep in Ava's bed, likely because there is enough room for Mommy to lay down with you until you fall asleep. Some nights Mommy hops beds depending on who gives me more room - you or Daddy.

You are up to so many things these days, and even though it's 6:30AM you woke up early anyway and now you're sitting on my lap as I type. You're not awake enough to try and take over the keyboard but you likely will soon so I have to type fast.

"Mommy, what's that?" you ask me often, usually when you know what something is.
"I don't know Ava, what's that?" I respond.
"Kitty cat!"
"Yes, that's a kitty cat!"

We have lots of these conversations throughout the day.

I ask you often how many birds, how many cheerios, how many toys, and it doesn't matter how many there actually are, you count "One! Two! Three! Four! Five! Six! Seven! Eight! Nine! Ten" Sometimes you count up to eighteen, skipping a teen or two.

You have officially begun toilet training - you have gone pee pee in the big toilet (with your little toilet seat insert) three times. Three times we've actually heard pee pee hitting the water with a small but astounding, accomplished splash. The first time we weren't having such a good afternoon but at the sound of that I could have done cartwheels. Often you'll just sit there, and I'll ask, "Ava, where's the pee pee?"

You'll smile and say "no pee pee!" but you'll reach for toilet paper anyway and wipe.

You're starting to remember what happened a few hours ago or even the day before. We were camping over Labor Day and a tiny mouse scurried through our campground. "Mommy, I saw the mouse." I heard over and over again, especially in the tent where I was trying to get you to take a nap.

You like to grab your baby doll or one of your stuffed animals and lay a blanket over it on the kitchen floor. You lay down next to it and ask for a blankey. "Going night Mommy, I'm going night night."

Pronouns. There is now an I in your vocabulary, and a me, although I'm not sure if there is a you.

You know all of your colors, and pass all of my "what color is that?" quizzes. You're even starting to identify if an object is two colors now, like the frog at the aquarium that was green and black.

But alas, you are awake enough to want to type, and I smell the disaster in your diaper. When I go to change you, you'll say "Holy cow!" Which is exactly what I say when your diaper is a mess because I knew it would be better than if you went around saying "Holy ..." something else.

You are getting big, getting long, running fully into your amusing, delightful, challenging year of being two.

Do you know I love you? I hope so.
Mommy

Mommy & Ava Day

Hi honey,

You're taking a late nap today and if you're not awake by the time I finish writing I'll plant kisses on your warm flushed cheeks until your eyes flutter open.

Yesterday we had a Mommy and Ava day. Before you were around there used to be Julie days where I would go off on some brilliant adventure near or far, but now, there is you, so there is us, and there are Mommy and Ava days.

I asked you whether you wanted to go to the zoo or to the Discovery museum. Zoo! Zoo! Monkeys! G-affes!

So we went to the zoo. We saw all manner of things animal and bird like, and you greeted each animal in turn
"Hi tiger!"
"Mommy I see the tiger!"
"Bye-bye tiger!"

We rode on the train, shared a ride on a carousel horse, waved at penguins, bears, lions, rhinos, hippos and lots of peacocks. For the first time I didn't bring a stroller and you walked all over the zoo pausing to ride on my shoulders when you wanted to see better.

All in all, a wonderous Mommy and Ava day. Let's plan more.

Twenty nine months

Hi, my sweet wonderful nearly two and a half year old girl!

Time, you will find when you get older, is something that doesn't stretch quite far enough from when you wake to when you go to sleep. But for now, you don't have to know so much about time.

Where do I begin in the changes over the last two months? You talk, talk, talk all the time talk. You have opinions, you love to wear your kitty cat shirt and orange halloween kitty cat pants. You don't like ponytails in your hair, but will sometimes tolerate it if I put one in while you're distracted. Your food tastes are changing and you even threw out the dreaded words "I don't like that" the other day. Daddy and I, we didn't like those words and they earned you a time out until you were ready to sit at the table and eat your spaghetti.

You are doing great in school, not like you're earning straight A's kind of great as it's pre-preschool and there are no grades, but you've adjusted and play well around the other kids. All the three year olds graduated and you're now the oldest in the troop!

My work schedule is changing as I'm nearly done with my old job and working at my new one, plus starting to teach mom & baby yoga classes. All this so I can have a work life I love and have enough time with you!

Work, you'll find out later after you find out about time, is something necessary, but if you believe it can happen, you can love what you do for work and money.

You can count up to fifteen, although when I ask you how many hands you have, you keep counting right up to fifteen. You know all your colors and get them right about 80% of the time. You like to do yoga, and spontaneously take downward dog or warrior two pose when you hear someone say yoga. At my yoga teacher graduation last weekend you had fun running back and forth from daddy to me during the ceremony. Then later you impressed my yoga friends by showing them your slick yoga moves.

You are two, delightfully, wonderfully, challenginly, two. You still love pancakes, you will often eat broccoli, you never turn down mac & cheese. You say please and thank you regularly to my delight. You are jumping with both feet now and Daddy wants to buy you a trampoline.

I love you, my sweet girl, and I always will.
Mommy

Absence

Dear Ava,

I miss you.

Last Friday night you got on a plane with Daddy to the Grand Cayman Island via Atlanta with your brand new passport and three days later my heart is heavy. I mean really, the center of my chest is heavy.

Sure, I'm getting good things done. I'm working on the web design for something brand new which is cool, and tomorrow is my birthday and I have lots of fun and friends lined up.

But I miss you.

I was unloading the dishwasher of all things, selecting your small plastic spoons and metal forks, which you also call spoons, and putting them into the cup for your utensils and it hit me. For three days now nobody has called me Mommy or demanded strange things like yogurt or play-doh. Nobody has tried to wedge themselves in the space of the open fridge door because they were hungry and wanted what they wanted not what I was about to cook.

I have had to let the kitty cats in and out all by myself - you've taken over this job now that you can reach the handle of the back door. "Ava," I say, "will you let the kitty cat in?" And you do. This is really cool and always surprises me that you open the door and let the cat in.

Nobody has put their shoes or coat on the couch when I've asked them to put it in their room. Nobody has said "Mommy, want that!" "This?" I ask. "This!" you respond.
Nobody has said "Mommy bed!" when I say it's time for night-night.
Nobody has said "Blue jammas" when I ask which pajamas you want after your bath.
Nobody has said "yoga" and stolen one of my mats and wrapped themselves up in it.
Nobody has grabbed a paper sack from the stash on the side of the fridge and walked to the door saying "Bye Bye Mommy!" These days you reach up to the doorknob like you can actually open it as Daddy and I roll our eyes and laugh.

No naked baby dance, no requests for TV on, no dragging all the toys from your bedroom into the kitchen. Nobody else to bathe, to feed, to kick me in the middle of the night, to comfort, and to be comforted by. No declarations for "EIEIO" when I start singing "Twinkle twinkle little star." No spontaneous ABCs, no counting to twelve (which you did last week and shocked the pants off of me) with only nine blocks. Math, you'll learn that in school along with imaginary numbers.

Nobody to sing Happy Birthday when it's not my birthday and bring out the tower of legos declaring it's a birthday cake. I'm only hoping that Daddy helps you call me tomorrow.

My little one, you are a kazillion miles away in the Caribbean, likely going night-night by now and I wonder if you're asking for Mommy's bed?

I love you, with more love than my heart can hold, and so, I need the whole ocean.
Mommy

Success measured in vegetables

Ava, you just said words that made me feel like I'm doing something right in my job as a Mom:

"More broccoli."

No, I didn't make you say please.

Euphamisms in the bathroom

Someday you will probably want to throw me fully dressed into a large, cold, swimming pool for what I'm about to write, but for now, I have to share because it's so cute it's funny.

For the longest time, like three or four months now, you've had a training toilet. No, it's not a potty because I hate that non-word. Okay, so Merriam Webster's online dictionary says this is a word, but that doesn't mean it is a word I like. As a word it sounds condescending, as if a the word toilet is so multi-syllablic or foreign that a toddler can't understand.

In our house we don't use that word, but instead we say "pee pee." This doesn't bug me and I can live with the hypocracy.

Up until the last couple weeks of training toilet ownership, you've used your toilet as a place to sit fully clothed while someone else is using the big toilet. You insist on having a square of toilet paper to wipe the back of your pants, right about where your sacrum is. Then you have to throw your square of paper into the big toilet so you can watch it flush.

But since you've started at school you have a new routine. We ask you now if you want to "go pee pee" and you shreek, delightely, as if this was better than Elmo and Nemo on a joint Saturday morning special "go pee pee! go pee pee!"

Then you want to strip. This would be highly understandable if you just wanted to pull your pants down and your Dora easy up diaper. (Elmo diapers weren't allowed in our house any more once you wore your first Dora.) But alas, you want to take off every shred of clothing to go pee pee on your training toilet.

"Shirt off!" you say authoritatively. "Shoes off! Socks off! Pants off! Diaper off!" until we have a bare naked Ava sitting on her training toilet to go pee pee.

But you don't actually pee. You just sit there grinning, naked, sitting on your royal plastic throne. Someday, I'm certain, going pee pee will actually produce urine, and not just a naked Ava.

Twenty Six Months

My sweet little girl,

You are blossoming before my eyes. You are on balancing on the teeter totter between baby and little kid. You once spoke in single words but now the words come together in twos and threes. Soon whole complete sentences will parade out of your mouth in your little kid voice and your baby laugh will loose its nasal tone.

You are jumping! Mostly your jumps are upwards for a fraction of an inch and then plummeting onto your bottom, but I did really see you defy gravity and take both feet from the ground then land back on them. Congrats, little one!

I think two is the most fun of all ages - you're independent and dependent; you use words to communicate and I understand a majority of the time. You laugh at me, yourself, and the kitty cats. Daddy and I, we laugh at the things you do.

When I'm leaving and ask for a kiss, I sometimes get a kiss from your lips, but usually you hold out your right palm for me to kiss and then your left palm. No, I have no idea where you got this idea, but I can understand the importance of having redundant kisses.

We started last week at Little People's Workshop, a co-operative parent run pre-pre school. Daddy and I both liked the atmosphere, the parents, and the kids; we knew it was time for you to be around those your own age. I wasn't prepared for the shock of sending you to a place by yourself though! I know you'll be fine, but I'm so used to our routine established over the last year of Mommy, Daddy, Nana shuffle that it's strange to throw a foreign entity into the mix. I'm just scared; scared of what I haven't identified.

I knew you were with my departure if you wave at me and say "bye, bye mommy." I know you were also saying "I'll be okay mom, don't worry about me."

Ah, but I do worry. I try not to worry. I think about many other things so I worry less, but after I gave birth to you the second line in the prophetic motherhood implicit instruction manual was, simply,

You will worry like you have never worried before.

The first line, in case you were wondering, was "You will love like you have never loved before." That's just the way it is.

This morning as I walked into my office I thought of a line from an old 38 Special song, which I will take on as my mantra in progress:

Hold on loosely, but don't let go. If you cling too tightly, you're going to lose control.

It's so hard to know what's right, to trust my instincts, to think before acting instead of reacting. Our moods are so interconnected, I get tired when you're tired; you get crabby when I'm crabby. I guess that's just the way the mother-daughter unbilical tie goes.

With love, worry, and everything in between,
Mommy

These are for Uncle Anthony

1: Driving the stroller


2: Wait! I hear the phone!


3: I have to take a call

4: Smile for the camera and show off that dirt lipliner!

How to teach a moose to jump

Step One: crouch down


Step two: bounce back up


And that, moose, is how you jump.

Twenty Five Months

Oh my gosh, little one, you are growing in all directions! You are taller, yes, but you are smarter too. You keep putting together new words and suprising the pants off of Daddy and me. You have also started speaking in a foreign babble-baby language that is quite fun and endearing. I join in and you think this is hysterical.

Your laughter, well, the cliche is that laughter is the best medicine, and to me your laughter is ambrosia. The other day we were driving somewhere and you said "Car!" so I said "car" - we volleyed "car" back and forth until we both started laughing. I often ask you to say words just because I love hearing your voice. We have a :moving things" game where I say words and you repeat. Car, boat, plane, truck, bike, and ROCKET! We both say ROCKET with such blast-off enthusiasm that it deserves the ill-reputed all caps in the blog.

We also play another car game where I open the mirror on my car visor and say Hi Ava! You mostly respond "Hi Mommy" but sometimes you say "Hi Julie!" I do not know where you learned my name is Julie, but this is quite funny. Daddy heard you the other day and asked, increduously, "did she just call you Julie?"

Someone told me once that by age two you should have about twenty words in your vocabulary. I think you have too many to count. My favorites though are "thank you welcome" and "more please." I also love all of your animal sounds, especially "ribbit" which anyone that is anyone knows is what a frog says.

You have found your one true beloved toy: your moose. Today you wouldn't lie down without Moose and I swear it took us both looking for 30 minutes to find him on the wall near the toilet. We walked around calling "Moose!" and you were earnest in your search for your favorite toy. Someday I knew this would happen, not the Moose adoption, but that I would spend a sizeable chunk of time looking for a toy of some sort. That's just the way parenting goes.

You love watching the Yoga Kids videos I've bought to figure out how to teach yoga to kids. "Watch yoga" are words that get you happy and excited. The first time I the video finished you looked at me and said "more please yoga." Seriously! I'm not making this stuff up!

Your video and TV favorites still are Nemo, Bear and the Big Blue House (which you just call "House" as in "watch house!!!") and Elmo from Sesame Street. You have recently adopted Monsters Inc among your favorite, but you call it "Cookie Monster" because, to you obviously, Sully looks like Cookie Monster from Sesame Street. This week alone I've watched Monsters Inc four times. No matter, I love that movie.

Your awareness has expanded. I know this because you laugh at funny parts on TV, and I mean the bits that I think are funny!

We see bits and pieces of those two year old tantrums, but nothing so big that a good distraction doesn't cure you. You oscillate between fierce independence and Mommy-don't-you-dare-leave-my-sight. I don't wonder about that independence with Daddy and me for parents there's no doubt you got it from both of us.

We are running into the times of the Naked Baby. Yesterday you refused to put on a shirt. After trying every trick I could remember including you choose the shirt and putting the shirt on my own head I let you be while I made lunch for the zoo. I made egg salad sandwiches, cut in triangles (because squares are so last week) and wondered if you would eat egg salad. (Not to skip ahead, but you loved it!) I chatted with Becky while I made egg salad and she gave me suggestions for remedying the shirt aversion. "Have you tried the 'we're going to the ZOO so let's put on a shirt' routine?"

No! I forgot about the subtle diversion with emphasis on Zoo tactic. It worked too!

Today you didn't want to wear any clothes, not even ones you put on yourself, so I let you wander around naked while I took a shower. I figured worst case I'd have to clean up pee but as a side bonus you'd realize that pee comes out between your legs and I could then invite you to use your training toilet. Nope, no pee to clean up and no spontaneous toilet training session either, but after my shower you were willing to wear clothes although you did have to put them on yourself.

A bit about naps, my love. They're good things, not things to be avoided like last week's leftovers. I know you must think you're missing out on something wonderful by not napping, but really, it's not true. Some days you crash hard (like yesterday after a 3 hour walk around the zoo!) and other days you resist until you are a crabby cranky mess. Kitten, even the kitty cats love naps.

Anyway....you are napping now, at 5PM and I wonder if you're calling it a night again. Kate, your favorite babysitter of all times said you just fell asleep before I got home. Maybe this is a little gift from the nap fairy and I can have a precious few moments to myself tonight before Daddy comes home tomorrow morning. We've had a fun week being Single Mom and Ava but I'm glad he's home tomorrow.

I love you sweet girl,
Mommy

How to care for your moose

Priceless

Yesterday we took the plunge. After looking at dozens of plastic kitchens, or not as good wood kitchens, Daddy said I had to see the Pottery Barn Kids kitchen. Originally he wanted to get the stove and the sink, but it's quite a big price tag for a kitchen for a little girl.

So we drove to Corte Madera to look at the kitchen. Daddy's right. There is no way we could buy any other kitchen after seeing this one. We did agree to just get the stove for now, and add the sink in a few more months.


Kids Retro Stove from Pottery Barn Kids: $250


Kids real cookware set from Pottery Barn Kids: $29



Eating our first pretend soup...priceless.

Two

My little one, Wednesday was your birthday. You are now officially two.



Two has brought a few changes, including a traipse into those dreaded tantrums two-year-olds have made famous. You get upset about strange things, mostly it seems when you ahve an idea in your two year old head that things should be a certain way and then they change. You got upset this morning that I put another pair of pants in the dry cleaning bag and moved toys from the living room into your bedroom. You scream and cry like the world was ending, we ask you what's wrong and you cry louder. This morning that got you a time out in your room with the door shut. Your Daddy swears this doesn't happen when I'm not around and the funny thing is, it doesn't happen often when it's just us. Something smells funny, and it's not a disaster diaper!



Your first time out, for two minutes on the green chair in the living room, came for writing in pen on the living room wall. What's this about anyway? You know you're only supposed to write on paper, but there's now pen circles on one wall, pencil circles on another, and pen slashes on the red couch. Daddy and I shake our heads about the couch, again saying we're glad we bought the $500 couch from IKEA instead of the $2000 couch we really wanted from Room & Board. That and move all the pens so they're out of your reach.



All of the crayons in your reach are washable - thank heaven - although you've taught yourself to peel the wrapper off by biting in the middle so the paper gets wet and tearing it off in the middle. Yes, all of the big fat Ava-designated crayons in the house run around naked.



Crayons aren't the only naked objects; you like to run around naked too when you're not trying to put on your own clothes. The other day you asked for "hep pees" (help please) putting on shorts over your pants. Okay, no problem. Dress in layers right? But then you tried to put on more pants over the pants and the shorts and got frustrated that it just wasn't working out. I guess I could have handed you some 3T pants for the top layer, that would have worked, but instead I suggested that two layers could be enough.

You are getting good at saying "thank you" but since everytime you say "thank you" someone says "you're welcome" that you've decided to help them out and say "thank you welcome." Can you say "thank you"? I ask. You respond, "thank you welcome."

Water. You love, love, love water. You don't love drinking water as much as you like stirring it. You love bathing in it, but mostly you love stirring water (or any liquid) in a cup with whatever utensil you can grab. All utensils are spoons, which is fine for now, because I'm not going to start an arguement with you by calling a fork a fork when clearly, in your mind, it's a spoon.

You know so many words now I'm amazed. You can nearly count to ten by yourself, with prompting from someone who can count to ten. I asked you in the bath the other day how many feet you had and you said, clearly, "Two!" Thinking it was a fluke, I asked you how many hands you had. "Two!" How many heads do you have? That one stumped you for a bit, probably because you couldn't see how many heads you have.

Your hair is finally long enough for pigtails, which I can only master if you're watching TV. I hate to admit how much you love TV. You walk into my bedroom frequently and point at the TV. "TV off!" I know that means "Mommy, why is the TV off?" But I just agree, "Yes, the TV is off, let's go color in your room."

You are starting to drive me crazy, just a little bit, but I still wouldn't trade you for anything.
(For the record, neither would Daddy. We would consider renting you out for a couple days, but then we'd want you back.)

I wonder if someday you'll know how much I love you?
Mommy

Ava and Mommy Time

Hi sweet girl,

Since I started yoga teacher training a couple weeks ago I have been much busier than before trying to get in all the practice hours and going to classes on top of that. We've seen each other, but the time always seems rushed and frantic.

When I wasn't looking you rushed head-first into being two, or nearly two, with minor tantrums, use of the n-word (no), and basically tearing the house apart cabinet after drawer. I asked your Daddy if this just started...yes, he said, why do you think I got the tricycle? Evidently he's found the secret weapon against your pre-two behavior: get you on that trike and get you outside! (I'll post a pic when I take one!)

Today though, was all ours. We started with yoga (me) and Sesame Street (you) although you joined me in corpse pose at the end of my practice by pushing me off my mat and laying down yourself. I was done enough.

Then I made the three of us bo-da-lee-da-lee pancakes. Those are Mom's special recipe blueberry pancakes topped with Brown Cow vanilla yogurt. You said "mo pees, mo pees" (more please) a few times as you finished each one.

After breakfast, you, Daddy, and I took off with you on the tricycle and went for a good walk up around the park.

Then we had a party to attend. Our friend Zoya was celebrating her second birthday and we went to join in the festivities! We partied with wild abandon for nearly 3 hours until it was well beyond naptime. You were still wide awake when we got home, and it took more than usual convincing (aka I resorted to sitting with you in the rocking chair) to get you to sleep.

When you woke up you insisted you had to have oatmeal. Oat-meal! Oat-meal! Okay, fine, I am not going to argue with you wanting oatmeal that I top with applesauce. In our household cereal is acceptable dinner fare so how can I argue?

What are we going to do with the rest of our day? I asked you. We decided to paint.


After painting we went for a quick drive with Daddy to photograph a house. We came home and played with play-doh, read books, took a long bath, read more books. Now you're in bed, I think asleep, and can I just say I had a wonderful FUN day with you today.

love,
Mommy

My little yogini

While Grandma Bear was here a couple weeks ago, I jumped into a yoga teacher training at www.yogatreesf.com. It's been marvelous, if not a little tiring.

I really, really, really want to teach yoga to toddlers. I wasn't quite sure how young those toddlers could be though. As I practiced a couple poses in front of Grandma Bear and you, I said that I thought you might be too young for yoga.

As luck would have it, you jumped with an abundance of enthusiasm into a replication of my triangle pose:

Or maybe it's warrior two from the look on your face.

Then you showed us what else you could do:

parsva upavista konasana (seated side angle pose)


we'll call this warrior two, or action figure pose
(virabhadrasana)

And it was time to finish, with savasana, of course (corpse pose)


Thank you for teaching me that you're never too young for yoga.

all my love,
Mommy

Twenty three months, aka are you really almost two?

Hi little one,

Tonight before bedtime your Daddy put you up against the growth chart on your wall and we saw you've grown nearly four inches since last year. Four inches! You still have one month left until you are two whole years old, which according to someone, somewhere if you double your height at two years that will be your height when you are done growing.

Thirty-one inches you were today. Daddy adds and says sixty-two. I say, yes, sixty two inches, the same as me. What a surprise that you wouldn't be six feet tall with such giants for parents.

You are up to so much lately! You have a hard time laying still so I can change a diaper but you are not quite ready for your training toilet although you like sitting on it with your clothes on. You've sat on it twice naked before taking a bath, but no action. I know if I was a really motivated parent I would have had you toilet-trained at 18 months, but in some ways I'm just a lazy American with easy access to diapers. I do feel a tinge guilty about landfills and such, but I mitigate that guilt when I remember I used cloth diapers when you were an infant.

From what I understand though, about those toddlers who are toilet trained at 18 months is that it takes supreme dedication and devotion from the parents on getting the toddler behind onto that seat all the time. It's more about training the parent than the toddler at this point, which seems to be the case a lot.

You have a few new tricks up your sleeve. You like to take keys and hide them in strange places. One time I found my keys in the back of your baby stroller. The other day Daddy was frantically searching for his keys and never found them. Two days later you pulled them out of a pot in the cupboard. Of course! Where else would you keep keys!

Grandma Bear was out visiting a couple weeks ago and she read you lots of books. She also taught you to say "Thank you Mommy" or "thank you grandma." After she left we started a new game where I say "thank you Ava" and you respond "sink you mommy." We volley the thank yous back and forth about six times until we are both laughing.

You have broken past the P boundary when you sing your ABC's. You skip a few letters now and X sounds a lot like F, but you make it all the way to Z. Just like Mommy, you say Z with all of the enthusiasm you have.

After bathtime you still often give me a big hug, when you are naked and dripping wet. I always make sure I approach bathtime in clothes that don't have water stain issues. You then like to run around in just your hooded towels like a miniature super hero. You are rapidly nearing the stage where you prefer naked to clothed.

Well, I take that back. You like clothes, but what you really like is to put more clothes on over the clothes you are already wearing. You can get pants on but still aren't sure about shirts, except today for the first time you got a sweater over your head.



You love painting at your easel,


wearing Mommy's big shoes while eating tortillas,


and hats. You adore hats!

As for Mommy and Daddy...

we love you. Happy 23 Months, big girl.