Horsin' around

Coming up Lanie

Background info: 1) Steve has been out-of-town since Tuesday so Emma and I are on our own. Aunt Susan, as luck would have it, has been working late every night so we don't see her much, either. Consequently, meals are very simple. 2) Emma has been practicing with rhyming and making up nonsense words. She sometimes spends many minutes just saying crazy things that mostly don't make sense. If she didn't have an amazing vocabulary and spend lots of time speaking clearly and logically, I would be worried. 3) Grandma has a goat named Lanie, whom Emma remembers quite fondly. Lanie may have come up in other posts- one time Lanie called Emma on the phone (thanks to creative Aunts KA and Susan). Grandma and Grandpa sent Emma a stuffed animal goat and kid. Emma calls them Lanie.

Story: Tuesday night Emma and I had tortellini with a mushroom, tomato sauce. Emma and I ate our tortellinis and chatted our way through the meal. Then Emma started on one of her silly word binges. I nodded along until she said, "Torte-Lanie!" At that point I was laughing so hard that my eyes watered. That was all the encouragement that Emma needed and she took Torte-Lanie to whole new levels of creative word fun. I have no idea if she was imagining Lanie covered with tortellinis. Or perhaps Lanie was very small and wrapped up like a tortellini. Or maybe it was just the words that worked so well together. Either way you cook it, it was darn funny.

Epilogue: Yesterday morning Emma woke up and said that she wanted steel cut oats with javelinas on them. I obliged, but had to tell her that you couldn't tell the oats from the javelinas when she asked to see them in her bowl. They were mixed in. When she kept insisting I think I mentioned something about it being pretend. Did she really think that I would put javelinas on her oats? What did she think that would look like? Is this something to be worried about?

No running

Steve witnessed a near catastrophe this past weekend when he and Emma were home by themselves. Emma was running around like a little tornado after dinner- running from the family room, through the kitchen area to the back room- from carpet to Pergo to carpet. After clearing the last boundary area Emma tripped on somethig (most likely the edge of the carpet) and went sailing across the floor, landing on her stomach just inches from the edge of the wooden end table. Of course there were tears but no real injuries. Much unlike what would have happened if her little face had smashed into the table. Let's not go there!

So Steve and I decided that we should implement a no-running-in-the-house rule. So we have brought it up to Emma just a few times and for the moment she seems satisfied that running raises the risk of tripping and falling. And she doesn't run in the house.

So the other day when Emma woke up from her nap she didn't want to come downstairs. I had the monitor on so I told her that was fine. I locked the gate and went downstairs to fix dinner. I heard her reading to herself and talking to Sleepy Joe and Baby Doll. Then I heard her voice in stereo saying "Mommy" from the top of the stairs and through the monitor. I walked over to the bottom of the stairs and there she was standing at the top issuing me a directive.
"Mommy, hurry up with dinner so you can come upstairs."
"OK, Emma. Should Mommy go quickly? Should Mommy run, run, run?"
"yes!"
As I began to run away she yelled down the stairs at me, "Mommy, no running in the house!"

Finger-licking good

This morning we had steel cut oats with apple chunks and cinnamon. It was a good switch from the standard steel cut oats and cranberry or blueberry toppings. Emma gobbled up every last bit of the mixture- willingly and without any directives from me. So there I was in the kitchen putting away my dirty bowl and tidying the place up a bit. I look over at Emma who is licking her fingers. She proceeds to tell me, "You can suck your fingers instead of you wash your hands." (That is exactly what she said; I didn't edit the grammatical errors.)

Despite my chuckles, which were no doubt encouraging, we followed standard clean-up procedures with a trip to the sink and some scrubbing. Although, I have to admit, it was much easier to clean her hands this time around!

chocoholic

Emma loves hot cocoa, especially after a fun snow day. We've had quite a few this winter. We get all bundled up and head out to the front yard. Sometimes Emma brings her baby doll and stroller and we walk up and down the sidewalk pushing baby doll through the snow drifts. It is a pretty funny sight I am sure.

Other times we build mini-snowmen because the snow is too dry to make a full-sized snowman. Other times we walk up and down the sidewalk, sitting in the drifts making "bum prints" in our neighbors' front lawns. Sometimes we make snow angels in our front lawn or go tromping through the yard making big foot prints. Or sometimes we crunch snowballs or ice chunks and watch the tiny pieces shoot off to the sides.

After one day of playing outside, we decided to save our hot cocoa drinking until after dinner when Daddy was home. So there we were sitting at the table, watching Emma scoop up the mini-marshmallows and suck up her cocoa.

Daddy asked, "Is it good?"

With a twinkle in her eye Emma replied, "Yes! It's better than milk."

If you pee-peed in the potty

shout hooray! Hooray!
If you had spent the last 2 weeks in our house you would have heard that song probably over a hundred times. It is from this great book that Emma loves, called "Tinkle, Tinkle, Little Tot." All the songs and rhymes have to do with using the potty. Thank goodness there is a limit to the number of times you can renew it from the library.

Anyway, Emma woke up Monday morning of last week and said I want to sit on the potty. I don't think she was successful until that night before bath, but at bath time she said she wanted to go potty and she did! Then, every night before and/or after bath she would go pee pee. For the first few days she would ask for sunflower seeds (her reward) and was so happy and proud to be eating them. (They are chocolate covered, candy coated sunflower seeds.) But by the end of the week she was using her potty without asking for the sunflower seeds. Yay! Also by the end of the week she was asking to use the potty at random times during the day- and having success! Some days she went 3-4 times over the course of a day. It is so exciting.

Now, just like they describe in many books, she hasn't been too keen on using the potty during the day. She seems to like the before/after bath timing. That is just fine with me. I have all the potty books memorized, too. :) Plus, our whole approach has been that Emma is the boss. She doesn't really know that, but we have not pressured her or even asked her about the potty much at all. I think it has been a much more fun process that way, and I am sure that Emma loves being in charge! Don't all 2 year olds?

This morning, Stella (you remember the Cabbage Patch kid without her pants), had some potty time and promptly filled the potty right up with pee pee and poop. I guess Emma doesn't want to be too far ahead of her friends. "Look, Tella peed and pooped in the potty! Good job!" exclaimed the queen of the potty throne.

Apricot Show- the next generation

If you search back through the posts you will discover another Apricot Show posting. Or perhaps you remember what they are all about. But it's always good to have reminders... Before Emma's bath time she runs around all nakey and gives anyone and everyone an apricot show. When she was really little, Steve refered to Emma's bum as apricots and the term of endearment has stuck around since then.

The other day Emma ran to the top of the stairs in her birthday suit and yelled, "Daddy, I have a bum!" She turned around and pressed her apricots to the bars of the gate and giggled like mad. I, of course, was laughing like crazy.
Lately Emma has been asking to see her bum. I guess she is starting to wonder what the fuss is all about. So Steve and I have both lifted her up so she can see her bum in the mirror. If she can't find a mirror (like if she is all wet and soapy in the bath) it is quite humorous watching her try to see her apricots and bum. It's like a dog chasing its tail.

The other day we were all in the kitchen area preparing for dinner. In comes Emma with some dolls, a couple of which were Cabbage Patch Kids. She laid them on her chair and proclaimed, "Apricot Show!" Sure enough, the dolls pants were all pulled down, exposing their apricots, and they were laying face down- probably hiding from their shame. (Cabbies have fairly well defined bums in case you didn't know. In fact there are some Cabbie stories from my youth that I will probably share with Emma someday....)

Again this morning, Emma paraded around with Stella whose pants were missing and whose bum was being shown for anyone to see. "Apricot show!" Giggle, giggle.