Tales From Toddlerhood

I picked the kids up from daycare this afternoon & was trying to sit Ella in her car seat when she did what I call her 'stiff as a board' trick. Anyone with small children knows what I'm talking about. She will straighten her body out & I cannot wrestle her into a sitting position no matter how hard I try. Usually she does it so I can't buckle her in. This time she wiggled out of my grasp into the floor of the car, said something about 'up', crawled up in the seat all by herself, turned around, sat down & just looked at me like, 'now you can buckle me in.' Obviously she is getting to the 'I can do it all by myself' stage. I alternate between feeling frustrated (b/c of impatience), tickled at how funny it is, downright proud about her learning to do so many things without my help, and sad that she doesn't need/want my help as much anymore. How's that for an emotional rollercoaster? Hee, hee.

Then there are the really adorable things that go along with having a toddler. Like yesterday in the car on the way home hearing her 'read' The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss. It went something like this... "[indecipherable jibberish] baseball, baseball, baseball, [flip page], bye-bye [jibberish], [flip page], Mommy, Daddy, Wesley, Pops, [more jibberish]. I wish I could catch her doing it at home so I could record it - it's adorable.

Or there's tonight when she took two of her finger puppets in the living room & gave one to Anthony. He put it on his finger and said, "Hi, Ella," and she said, "Hi, Daddy."

Then there's her vocabulary that is growing so fast it's unbelievable. Up until yesterday she would almost always say "uh-huh" for yes & only occasionally repeat us and say "yes," which came out sounding like 'sess.' Suddenly she doesn't say "uh-huh" anymore. Now it's "yeah" every time. She almost sounds Canadian the way she says it.

I could go on with more little stories about the joys & trials of having a toddler, but it's midnight & my eyelids are getting pretty heavy so I'll have to save them for another day.