Extended Christmas Shopping

My wake up call this morning was 4:30 am to the melodic screaming of Little Bug. She alternatively cries and screams, "Mommydadday, Daddymommy...then MY NOSE" since her nose is most likely running from her crying. The trick on Sundays (my day to get little bug in the morning) is to keep her entertained long enough before she wants to wake up daddy. "Tip toe" is her favorite game, which consists of her tiptoeing and giggling into our room and she gets right in front of whoever is still asleep in bed and she screams at the top of her lungs, "wake up, wake up!" When she wakes daddy up, she hands him a white t-shirt and his glasses and makes him get up and get dressed.

This morning I decided to have her help wrap Christmas gifts. She'd grab the gift and then roll it around in paper and I'd tape it up. Except for Aunt M's gift - little bug had to wrap it herself, during which she used almost an entire roll of tape. I didn't find much tape on the gift itself, so I'm not sure where she actually put all the tape.

Keep in mind that I'm not done with my shopping - so not everyone has a gift yet. We put tags on the gift and I'd tell her to either put the gift under the tree or in a box to ship. After she was done putting the gifts in their places, she yelled, "oh no". I asked her what was wrong and she said, "Where's T's gift? Where's Diego's and sleep sacks' present?"

Looks like we have some more shopping to do.

Tall Tales

We were talking last night when Little Bug walked up to us and said, "ear hurt, popcorn." She had been eating popcorn and realized that she might have stuck a kernel in her ear.

I asked her, "did you put popcorn in your ear?"
Little Bug: yes
me (holding up a USB stick): did you put this in your ear?
Little Bug: yes
Me: What else did you put in your ear?
Little Bug: a puppy

At this point, we figured there was a chance that she may have put a popcorn kernel in her ear - but it was going to be impossible to get the straight story from her. I tried to scare her into telling the truth so I told her we were going to the doctor's office. She got excited and started singing, "doctor, doctor, doctor." I realized that trying to make her not afraid of the doctor's office by telling her the doctor's office was fun totally backfired on me.

We called some friends and they advised us to pick up one of those scopes to look in her ear and hopefully save us a trip to the emergency room. We headed to Walgreens and sat her down while we used the scope to look in her ear. She kept saying, "I can do it."

Her ears wound up fine, and she was thoroughly entertained by the whole ordeal.

Oh my Goodness, Halloween

Last night when we were getting ready to trick-or-treat for Halloween, Little Bug wasn't really excited about putting on her costume. So, I told her that "M" (the little boy in the neighborhood who she is obsessed with) wanted her to be a pink princess so they could trick-or-treat together. I've never seen her get dressed so quickly.

I was fixing her hair and she looked in the mirror, put her hands on her cheeks and said "Oh my goodness, Halloween."

We met up with the other kids from the neighborhood to take a group photo where not a single kid looked in the same direction, but no one had a melt down so we chalked it up as a success. Little bug wanted to walk around with the big girls (7 year olds) who were also dressed like princesses. She would run to keep up with them and if she was behind she'd yell, "Hey guys, I'm coming!"

Most houses she just took the candy and then yelled, "TANKYOU" - every once in a while she'd remember to say trick-or-treat. One guy answered the door and asked the girls to tell him who they were dressed up as, and they all stared at him as if to say 'listen man, just give us the candy and cut the small talk.'

We ended the night at a neighbor's house for some hot chocolate (since it was cold and raining). The bigger girls all started opening up their candy, so little bug started eating their candy. I showed her that she actually had some, too so she'd stop stealing from the girls. Little bug walked up to one of the girls and pointed to her own candy and then the little girl's and said, "this is mine, that is yours."

Making Wishes

Last night we went out for dinner at a Mexican restaurant that has a fountain inside. Little Bug loves the fountain and wants to stand by it the whole time we eat, just watching the water and then imitating any kid that stands there with her. Daddy went over to her to make sure she was okay, and she turns to him - puts her arms out and says, "Where are my coins daddy?" so she could throw them in the fountain and make a wish. Its hilarious to see how her little mind works.

Trick or Treat Drills

Little Bug has been so excited about Halloween that she's wanted to play "Trick or Treat" which sounds like "Turkey-treat" when she says it. The game works like this, I stand behind her bedroom door and she'll knock and yell, "turkeytreat". I toss candy in her plastic pumpkin and she yells, "THANKYOU" then slams the door. Repeat...until we run out of candy.

Then she decided we'd switch roles and I'd be the one to knock on the door. So I knock on her bedroom door and she doesn't answer it. After waiting for a while, I open the door and see that she's opened one of the candy wrappers and is about to eat the chocolate. She looked up at me like the cat that ate the canary and said, "surprise mommy, look-I-open-it".

It has been raining all day, so even though she has practiced so much I'm sure she'd win the gold medal for trick or treating, we might not be knocking on too many doors tonight.

Brain Freeze

This morning little bug stayed home with me for a few hours because I had to take her to the doctor's to get her H1N1 nasal spray vaccine. She was playing in her room while I was getting ready and I heard her yelling into one of her speakers, "Hello? Chicken nuggets, French fries, please!" She apparently is running a fast food restaurant out of her house.

On the way to the doctor's office, I had a work call so I told Eve she needed to be quiet that I had to talk with JP. She thought that was so fun, so she starting chanting from the back seat, "JP, JP, JP..." - my co-worker felt like a celebrity.

When we were walking through the parking lot she said to me, "run mommy run." So I ran through the parking lot carrying her and we got to the front door and she yelled, "good job, mommy".

She was great at the doctor's office, which is rare since normally she's not in a good mood there since she's usually sick. When she got her nasal vaccine, she held onto her forehead like she had brain freeze. As soon as I told her we were leaving the doctor's office, she jumped up and down and said, "Yay! I did it! I habba princess Ariel sticker?"

I dropped her off at her nanny's and we had made candy necklaces for the little girls that she is with. Apparently when daddy picked her up, she and her little friend had eaten pretty much all of their necklaces and only had strings left around their necks.

Jury is out on whether or not Little Bug will actually be a pink princess for Halloween or not. She's been telling me she wants to be a pink princess for months now. Of course, this week as I'm almost finished making her costume I held it up and said, "Look you are going to be a pink princess" - she looked at me and said in all seriousness, "No mommy, I'm going to be a puuuuuurple princess". Honestly. Now all she wants to be is a bat, like the Diego Halloween special. So I'm either going to make a bat costume or photoshop Diego into a pink princess outfit.

Blue One Please

We are trying to potty train Little Bug, and right now it is more of a game for her. She gets an M&M if she goes in the potty, so now my little chocolate addict has started asking for the M&Ms before we even head into the bathroom. She likes the blue ones the best, and starts yelling, "mommy, blue one, blue one." I know she has to go, when I hear her talking to herself, "pee-pee potty, okay, blue one, thank you".

Yesterday I took her to the grocery store to pick up some marshmallows for one of daddy's experiments at school. As we were walking into the store I told her the things that we needed to get. I completely blanked out as we were walking down the aisle and said out loud, "What did we need?". A little voice piped up and said, "Mommy, mush-bellows". She's getting better than a list.

Worst Hider Ever

Little bug has started asking us to play hide-and-go-seek. She pushes us in another room and instructs us to count. She runs into the other room and hides, behind the ottoman, behind the curtain, in her tent, etc.

When you walk into the room saying "ready or not, here I come", she jumps up from where ever she is hiding and yells, "Here I am! Here I am!". It was hilarious, I kept trying to get her to hide and stay quiet, and she'd keep popping up like a jack-in-the-box.

I was counting down and I heard her hide behind the curtain, so when I walked into the living room looking for her, I was impressed that she didn't jump out. But then, she started banging on the drum that was also behind the curtain. Not so good with the hiding concept.

Quiz Time

Since we are teaching Little Bug colors, every place we go it is an opportunity to show her new colors. We've been walking through the parking lot pointing to cars and asking "what color is this?" Yesterday, I was carrying her through the parking lot and she pointed to a car and said to me, "What color is this? Hmmmm...do you know?" She's starting to pick up on daddy's teaching techniques with the Socratic method alive and well in our household.

From the Mouths of Babes

Little Bug's vocabulary is really starting to pick up, she's surprising us every day with her newfound ability to string together words into sentences. Here's a snippet of some recent dialogue:

Mommy: Where are your socks?
Little Bug: Good question

Little Bug: Come here and play
Daddy: What is the magic word?
Little Bug: Diego
(eventually she said, 'please Diego'...clearly some work to do on this one)

Little Bug: Would you like some cookies? Okay, cookies. Thank you, mmmm cookies please? (this is her favorite monologue)

Mommy: Are we going to get dressed?
Little Bug: Ummm, no. Sorry, not today.

She also says, "I'm going to catch you", "oh my goodness", and "I made a mess". Three phrases that are used quite often throughout the day.

Private Tea Party

Daddy has been mister mom for the past few weeks since the school board decided to generously give him a few extra days of unpaid time. He's been hanging out with little bug each day - going to the park and feeding ducks so much that he specifically went to the store to buy more bread to feed the ducks.

One day little bug ran into our bathroom and slammed the door. He tried to get in but she wouldn't let him, she kept running back and forth between her room and the bathroom for a while - not letting him in either room. Finally she said, "okay daddy come here" and she let him into the bathroom where she had set up a tea party for him.

Do Not Disturb

I think one of the funniest things from our beach vacation trip was when little bug grabbed the "do not disturb" sign from the door, and proceeded to run up and down the hallway screaming.

Every morning she'd wake up and say, "beach, ocean, whale..." then she'd ask to go "shopping!"

Duck Call

This morning little bug walked into the room and was holding her toy telephone. Out of no where she asked me, "mommy, bread, feed ducks?" I said, "No, not today". She sighed, picked up the phone and said into it, "Sorry ducks, not today".

Pillow Songs

Little bug has started singing A LOT. All the time now, she'll sing along to songs in the backseat of the car, in the store, where ever she is. Her latest venue is when she is supposed to be sleeping. We put her to bed, and I just walked past her door (an hour after she is supposed to be asleep) and I hear her belting, "Heeeyyy, get uuup, get louuuuud. Pumpin up the Party..." the Hannah Montana song.

At least her stuffed animals are getting a free concert and she's performing it from beneath the covers.

Lots of Words, Little Bit of Fever

Little bug is now starting to link her words together better, so we are getting lots of new requests from her. Yesterday she was eating vegetable soup, picked up a green bean and said, "What is this?" We told her it was a green bean and she said "hmmm" and ate it anyway. This morning she handed daddy the fish food and said, "Daddy fish hungry, feed fish."

Unfortunately she woke up at 1:30 in the morning burning up, so our Fourth of July party plans are going to be cancelled, since the party we were going to was going to have a lot of kids there. I gave her some Tylenol and climbed into bed with her, I'm not sure if she was sleeping with her eyes open - but every time I looked at her, her big brown eyes were in my face. When I tried to climb out of her bed, she'd say "stop mommy, sleep" and she'd try to push my head back on the pillow. Finally she feel asleep and daddy got her this morning. Her fever is now at 100.2 - so not crazy high, but combined with her runny nose, we aren't going to have her around other kids.

Of course, she's running around this morning laughing and singing like there is nothing wrong with her.

Sorry Bees

We were walking out the door to the pool and two bees came buzzing at us. Daddy stayed behind to "take care" of the bees with the pool noodle he was carrying. Little bug didn't miss a beat, without turning around she muttered to herself, "sorry bees" and then went running off to the pool.

Golf Etiquette

We've started to make a routine out of heading to the golf course early on Saturday mornings to hit the driving range. Note the word "early" meaning - before it gets ridiculously hot. Daddy has been watching golf on TV with Little Bug and taught her to do a golf clap. Whenever I hit the ball, Little Bug would say "good shot mommy" and then she'd clap for me.

She is also obsessed with the Monkey Joe's bouncy place. A few times a day she looks at me and says "Monkey Joe's?" and starts bouncing around. Tonight we took her there and as she was chanting "Monkey Joe's - Monkey Joe's - Monkey Joe's" from the backseat, I told daddy that the place better be open or else we are going to have to stop for a huge bowl of ice cream for her to drown her sorrows. Luckily the place was still open, and as we walked in Little Bug screamed with excitement. She walked right up to the check-in counter with her arm out for her arm band before they even asked.

Lost

I love the irony in the fact that the toy in the Happy Meal was an Amelia Earhart plane. And it has since been lost in the car.

Daddy's Day Hijacked

Since today was Father's Day, I took little bug downstairs when she woke up so he could sleep in. She made him a card on which she drew a bunch of squiggles. I asked her what her drawing was and she looked at me like it was very obvious. "Horse, mommy". Clearly, it was a horse - how could that jumble of lines and dots be anything else. Well we made daddy coffee and decided he had slept long enough so we crept upstairs and little bug crawled into bed with daddy and handed him her horse card. She then force fed him hot coffee.

When we were hanging out on the deck, little bug pulled all of the seat cushions off of our chairs and laid them on the floor. She then pulled daddy and I over and pointed to the cushions. "Sleep" she instructed, pointing to the cushions. So here were the three of us, laying on the floor of our deck pretending to sleep. I think I actually dozed off, but I felt something looking at me. I opened my eyes and little bug was staring into my face. "Shhh...sleep mommy" she said, and she took her hand and slammed my head back into the cushion. Then she grabbed her Dora blanket and covered me up.

One of daddy's requests for the day was a red velvet cake, so I pulled out the hand mixer and started making him one. I handed little bug her little battery powered mixer and a bowl so she could be just like mommy. She seemed to be doing fine, so I turned my back on her and then I heard her shriek. Little bug put the mixer in her hair and it twisted and pulled out a little chunk of hair. She got over it pretty quickly, and it's pretty funny considering that I took her to get her hair cut yesterday.

When we went to the kids hair cut place yesterday, I asked the stylist to only cut little bug's bangs to be just above her eyebrows. I'm not sure where it got lost in translation, but after the first clip I knew we were in trouble. She now has bangs that aren't exactly even and are halfway up her forehead. I took some hairspray to them to try to salvage it, but we definitely aren't going to get any professional photos taken until those bangs grow out.

Anyway, after the hair crisis daddy decided that he wanted to go to the bouncy place. How she managed to turn Father's Day into a day all about her, I'll never know - but I guess having those big brown eyes not covered by her bangs any more might have magnified her manipulation. As we walked into the bouncy place she started screaming "Monkey Joe" over, and over. She loves this place. It wasn't crowded at all so she bounced her heart out and even went on the biggest slide.

In one of the areas we have to help her climb up a steep area so she can get to the slide. After I helped push her up to the top, she turned to me and said, "thank you mommy". Yes, little bug, after that - I'll let you do whatever you want to do on any of my special days, too.

Coach Buggy

Daddy and I went jogging tonight with one of our friends, but unfortunately Little Bug didn't want to stay in her jogging stroller. After taking a bunch of breaks for her to get out and walk, I finally told the two guys to run on ahead so I could have a talk with buggy. I've seen Super Nanny, so I've started disciplining her by getting at eye-level and holding onto her shoulders while I explain what she is doing wrong and ask her to say "sorry" and give me a hug. Apparently I've been disciplining her a lot because as soon as I kneeled down and grabbed her shoulders she looked me in the eye and said, "sorry" and gave me a hug - saving herself a lecture.

I asked her to get back in the jogging stroller and she climbed right in. I told her we were going to catch daddy and our friend. So as I started jogging, I could hear her yelling, "I'm coming daddy, I'm coming daddy." We jogged onto a long stretch where I could see the guys in front of us, and Little Bug noticed them, too. She started yelling at me, "mommy, daddy, run". At this point I was in a full sprint and was starting to lose energy, so having my little coach hollering at me really didn't help. The guys turned around a corner, out of site and poor little buggy just said quietly, "daddy...." Nothing like the motivation of a sad little girl to kick me into high gear and start sprinting again.

I sprinted until I caught up with the guys and little bug was so happy to see them. As we got closer to the end of the path, she decided that she was finally through with the jogging stroller, so daddy decided to take her. I jogged on ahead with our friend and the jogging stroller. We got lots of strange looks from people as the two of us were jogging with an empty stroller and no kid in sight.

Apparently, as soon as I was out of site, Little Bug started saying, "I'm coming mommy!" and made daddy carry her, and jog with all 28.5 lbs of her to the end of the trail. She was a good coach, pushing us to run, but not the best jogging buddy overall.

Hereyougoduck

We went over to feed some ducks this morning and little bug was so excited to toss all the bread in the lake. Every time she tossed them something she yelled, "hereyougoduck".

This summer is definitely the summer of the pool. We've been in the pool every day this week after work. I made the mistake one night of just taking her for a walk, since it was getting close to bedtime. We walked by the pool and of course she wanted to go in the gate and see what everyone was doing. I let her sit on the side and splash her feet in the water. Then when I was talking to another mom, I look and see that she's now standing on the top step with soaking wet shorts.

I took her shorts off, so she decided it was time to just dive in. Clothes and all. So we let her scoot around in her t-shirt and diaper, and finally wrapped her up in daddy's t-shirt to walk home. The other parents laughed when we showed up the next day, fully dressed in swim suits, with pool toys and towels. We were ready that time.

Yesterday when I was done with work, I took little bug upstairs and told her we were going to the pool. So she ran around in a circle screaming, "pool, pool, pool." She saw me put on my swimsuit and then she tore off for her room. She ran back to our room with her swimsuit that she took out of her drawer, a bottle of sun tan lotion and a pack of wipes. She took off her shirt all by herself and almost put her swim bottoms on, too. If she could actually swim with both of her legs through the same leg hole.

So we've got a water bug for the summer.

Snack for the Drive

Little bug and I were playing around in the house and I handed her some puffs to snack on in a little bowl. She turned around the corner and handed me back an empty bowl. I thought she polished them off in a hurry, but that is nothing new. A few minutes later she was riding around the deck on her tricycle and I watched her as she stopped, stood up and said to herself, "hungry? okay" then opened up the trunk on her tricycle, pulled out a puff and ate it. She apparently packed snacks for the road trip.

Pool Party, It's What's for Dinner

I picked up little bug yesterday from the nanny's and they had her out at their pool running around with all the neighborhood kids. Little bug looked like she was having a blast pretending to be a big kid and was fearless in the water. When she saw me, she ran over and jumped up on me, soaking wet onto my work clothes. It was awesome.

I sat down and hung out with her godparents and our nanny and watched as little bug packed away a cookie every minute or two. She had trained one of her little friends to get two cookies, one for herself and one for little bug. Little bug sat like a queen on my lap, hanging out and eating cookies that were brought to her every few minutes.

Her godmother told me that little bug gets excited about the pool, but REALLY excited about the buffet of food they bring with them.

Breakfast to Order

This morning little bug walked into our room and woke me up. She crawled into bed and curled up next to me. Then she took my face in her hands and earnestly said to me, "Mommy, breakfast. Coffee, waffles please". So I told her we had to go downstairs and tell daddy, she said, "no". So I picked up the phone and called Daddy's cell phone downstairs. Little bug was very pleased to be able to call in her order.

Then when we went downstairs, she walked up to daddy and said "waffles, waffles, waffles, waffles..."

Goodnight Mommy

Day three and the toddler bed is a success. After the dramatic start to the adventure, little bug has completely given into going to sleep in her bed. Last night when we went to check in on her before we went to bed we found her asleep, IN HER BED.

Tonight she started fussing, so I rubbed her back for a few minutes and then I said, "goodnight, can I have a kiss?" She sat up, kissed me and said "night mommy" and waved goodbye, then turned around and went to sleep.

The Fox Incident

Since our townhomes back up to a national forest, we get our share of woodland creatures from time to time. Mainly postings on our community message boards about the animals that have been killed by our neighbors to keep us safe. We were driving up towards our community and there was a fox sitting on top of the hill. It was clearly not afraid of cars (although we were coasting in Hybrid mode, so it is possible it didn't hear us). We parked the car and showed little bug (through the window) the wild fox.

me: Can you say, fox?
little bug: F*CK!

Yes, you heard it here, apparently little bug can't add an "s" sound to fox so it sounds like she's shouting profanities.

me: Foxsssss
little bug: F*****CK!

We tried everything, socks, locks, sssssssssss, to no avail. We were hoping it was a one-time deal, but today when we drove up the hill little bug was dropping "fox" bombs in the backseat. The problem is that she's so proud of herself that she yells it.

Hopefully we won't run into wildlife and a pack of conservatives in one place. I'm a little nervous about our next trip to the zoo.

Bedtime for Little Bug

The past couple of nights have been a challenge to get little bug to go to bed. And by challenge, I mean we have to wrestle her into her crib while she screams at the top of her lungs. Then she wakes up 2-3 times during the night. Since she sleeps in a normal size bed for her naps with her nanny, and seemed to like the toddler beds that we saw in IKEA last weekend, we figured it must be that she doesn't like her crib anymore and wants to go to a toddler bed.

So we bought her some toddler sheets and a pillow and decided to turn the daybed in her room into her new toddler bed. Of course this means we dismantled her crib to get it out of her room. After the crib was in pieces daddy and I looked at each other and started laughing. No turning back now, so much for easing her into a new bed.

It all seemed to be going great - all she wanted to do was hang out in her bed, read, play with her toys. So it was officially time for bed, she had her glass of milk, story, brushed her teeth and that is when the wheels fell off the bus. You would have thought her bed was a lava pit the way she clawed and climbed and tried to get away from it.

Step one - Tough Love: we kissed her goodnight, left her room and shut the door. Within a few seconds we heard banging around, heard her turn off her sound machine, and then she started pounding on her door.

Step two - Desperation: I walked into her room, picked her up and asked her if I could turn her sound machine back on - she said, "okay", like 'whatever, mom'. I crawled into her bed and she curled up with me. So I waited until she was breathing a little deeper, then I went to leave her room. She grabbed my arm and put her big brown eyes in my face and said "wait, pleeeze mommy." And that is when my heart broke, and all the books with advice about not sleeping next to your kids until they fall asleep went out the window.

Toddler bed is a half success because once she is asleep she sleeps through the night. The catch is getting her to sleep.

Today for her nap, we went through the same drama. We closed the door and luckily I waited outside the door for a few minutes to see if she quieted down. I was standing in the hallway when I saw her door knob turn, and buggy walked out the door like it was no big deal. Apparently opening doors is a trick she picked up in the last 24-hours. So I took her downstairs and figured we'd let her tire herself out some more.

We also decided that her Diego doll needed to take a nap, and we tucked in Diego with her sleep sacks and had little bug leave the room with us. She kept asking for Diego and finally said "okay nap", like we finally broke her.

It'll be interesting to see how many days it takes for her to get used to putting herself to sleep again. So much for a restful three-day weekend.

Ewww....

So the cleaning theme continues. Little Bug's new favorite word is "Ewww!" which she screams as loud as she can, and points at whatever she thinks is gross (including people). This morning she picked up daddy's flip flop and said "Ewww mess". She ran out of our closet, into her room, picked up the pack of wipes, and sat on the floor cleaning daddy's shoe with her diaper wipes. Daddy admitted that they were pretty old and promised little bug that he'd look into new ones. So now I have to train her to say "eww" to the shirts of his I don't like.

Little bug has also gotten wise to calling for daddy. She starts off very sweet, saying "daddy", if he doesn't answer she yells "baby!" and if that doesn't work she calls him by his name at the top of her lungs. I've listened to this go down at least three times over the weekend. To her credit, the third way always works.

Here, Let me Clean that Up

Little Bug may be slightly OCD. She puts all of her plastic food in individual ziploc bags, carries all paper to the trash, dusts everything with her socks and tonight she cleaned up after me. She was drinking her glass of milk before bed and it was in a sippy cup with a straw, she accidentally flicked the straw and sprayed milk on me.

She pointed at me and said "mess", then ran to her dresser, opened the door that has cloths in it, pulled one out and wiped my face off, then threw it in the hamper. She is ridiculous.

While we were driving around this weekend she was in a chatty mood, so I started asking her questions. I asked her if she was going to be a doctor, she said no, teacher - no, marketer - no, we finally got to one profession that she said yes to....ballerina. I then asked her if she was going to be an engineer, she paused and then said 'sure'. So I guess she'll fall back on her engineering degree once she's too old to turn pirouttes.

We were shopping in Macy's and Little Bug likes to hide in the clothes racks. She was hiding and then jumping out at daddy, yelling "boo". We'll he walked around the corner to surprise her, and she jumped out at some poor woman walking by, and yelled "boo". The woman clearly was not expecting a little girl to come screaming out of the clothes rack, so she was shocked and started laughing. I'm not sure who was more surprised - the woman Little Bug scared, or Little Bug herself.

Handy Little Bug

This weekend we were fixing up some things around the house since we've decided to officially get it on the market in the next month or so. We were clearing out the storage room downstairs and little bug was bopping around pulling things apart. I look up and see her walking down the front hallway with a stuffed animal in her right hand and daddy's power drill in her left. I guess it was time for some surgery.

Later that day we were in the master bathroom talking and we turn around to see little bug holding a cup of grout and stirring it with a stick, calmly while she was listening to us. It is amazing what she can get a hold of in a few seconds.

When I get home from work she usually wants to wear my high heels, necklace, and work badge while she bops around the house. Tonight she made me sit in the corner next to the couch while little bug grabbed two cups and a plate. She handed me the cup and asked "coffee?" then handed me the plate, "cookie?". So we sat in the corner eating our make-believe cookies and coffee.

I pretended to ask the imaginary server to please have another cup of coffee. Little bug had the more direct route. She stood up, put her cup in the air and yelled, "COFFEE".

Next lesson = manners.

True Fortunes

Little bug and I were eating Chinese food the other night and I opened up our fortune cookies. I read little bug her fortune which was something about building something new, handed her the cookie and she munched away.

Her eyes lit up when I pulled out the second Fortune Cookie. I opened mine and it said, "you will bring sunshine into someone's life". I asked her if it was true.

With her eyes still locked on the cookie, she nodded her head, yes. I handed her my cookie and she gave me the biggest grin, full of half eaten fortune cookie and she said, "mommy".

Guess my fortune came true, all it took was a cookie.

Shhhh...We are Hunting Birds

We were walking down the street to get the mail, and on the way we spotted birds. Three of them. On the ground. Chirping to each other. I though Little Bug was going to explode with excitement. I was really surprised that she stayed quiet as a mouse and starting creeping up on them. She'd turn around and give me big eyes as if to say "keep up mommy" and then would continue her stalking.

Finally when we had tracked them all the way into the woods which was probably a good 15 minutes after we started she yelled, "BIRD" which kind of sounds like "butt" when she says it. So there we are yelling "butt" at the woods, as our neighbors are starting to come out of their houses to walk their dogs.

When we got back to the house, she wanted to run around on the porch. I realized that she doesn't have a concept of being afraid of bugs yet. She was staring at a spider web and touching it. I told her what it was and her eyes got big as she said, "pie-der". I realized that she is probably thinking this was from Miss Spider like in her books.

I let her continue to stare at the Web while I found the real spider. And killed it. No need to introduce her to reality just yet.

Chips-A-Hoy & Church

Last week when we headed to church we left the house like we were traveling with a teenager. We had a cup of water, a diaper and little bug. We sit down at church and realized that we had absolutely nothing to entertain her. She found a pack of 100 calorie chips-a-hoy cookies in my bag, but that was about it. We let her munch on cookies to keep her occupied. Five minutes later, sugar rush kicked in. Chocolate high + no toys = a loud little bug in church.

Luckily we go to a church that is a rock concert for the first 20 minutes, so she just rocks out and claps. The music is so loud you don't hear her chattering away. Once the actual sermon starts, then everyone is quiet. Well, everyone but little bug and a few other toddlers whose parents don't want to drop their kid off at the childcare place either.

So daddy and I took turns letting her run around in the lobby with about 20 other kids whose parents had given up trying to keep them quiet. There are TV screens in the lobby so you really don't miss a beat, other than chasing after your kid. Little bug proceeded to walk up to everyone and show them her shoes. She held up her leg and said, "shoe!", then she picked up her dress and yelled "dress". She's already fishing for compliments.

This morning, we were much more prepared and had a ton of toys, books, munchies, and her little magnetic writing pad. She lasted longer than any other service - a whole 40 minutes without getting too chatty. The wheels fell off the bus when she took off her socks and shoes, pulled on my hand and yelled, "walk". So I scooped her up and took little bug, her socks, shoes and Minnie Mouse out into the lobby.

The lobby was packed with chairs set up for the crazy overflow from the main areas. So we sat down, put on her socks & shoes while little bug chattered away. With only 10 minutes left, and 5K of our closest friends about to all converge on the parking deck, we headed out to the parking garage. Chatter, chatter, chatter in the elevator. Then we get to our floor of the parking garage where two police officers were waiting to start directing traffic. They said hi to little bug, and wouldn't you know it, she was completely silent and just stared at them.

On the Hunt for Eggs

Last weekend we decided to try out some local Easter activities, one was called the "Egg Scramble". We got a little lost driving there, but knew we were getting closer when we were stuck in bumper to bumper traffic and saw tons of kids holding baskets running down the street. The "egg hunt" began promptly at 11am, as all the Web sites warned. Little bug and I got dropped off by daddy at 11:03. As she and I jogged up the hill to toss her into the egg hunt (zoned by ages), we rounded the top of the hill and saw the field and the reason they call it an egg scramble.

The recipe for the egg scramble is as follows...Step 1 - Throw a few hundred kids on a field with candy on the ground, Step 2 - blow whistle, Step 3 - watch the chaos and parents scrambling to pull their kids out of the mash pit. Very Darwinian where some kids walked out with overflowing baskets and some were crying, with parents promising to buy them eggs later on.

Thank goodness she's at the age where she had no idea she missed eggs, and was more excited that there was a slide and swings at the park. We watched the chaos for a bit, she even yelled "chaos" at the top of her lungs. Or "oss" anyway. Then I realized that I didn't have a a cell phone on me, and daddy was somewhere in the crowd. I figured we'd head to see the horses and after that, I'd borrow someone's cell phone to call him.

Being in a relationship with me for almost nine years has taught daddy one thing about me. I am all about 'programming' and showing little bug everything. So he figured that after the egg scramble, I'd head right to the horses. Long story short - he found me with no problem.

Little bug had a blast exploring the new playground, slides and drums. It is nice that she had no idea that we actually missed the main event.

Thermometer Conspiracy

When I picked up little bug today, the nanny said that she was acting sick (at least that is what I think she said, my Spanish is pretty bad - plus little bug had a runny nose. So like all good parents, I took her to the park. Nothing like fresh air and dirt to make you feel better. She terrorized the little kids section of the park and then headed to the big kids section with the two story slides. I wasn't ready for her to go down those on her own, so I had to maneuver myself and her down a tunnel slide and not give either of us a concussion. It was a feat.

As we were leaving the park we said goodbye to everything, or at least she repeated me....
Me: Goodbye park
LB: BYE ARK
Me: Goodbye swings
LB: BYE INGS
Me: Goodbye slide
LB: BYE IDE SSSS
Me: Goodbye drainage ditch
LB: BYE HMMDDDMMMSSSFFRRRGGGHHH

Other than a runny nose, which I'm convinced are just allergies, she was fine when we came home. She was sticking stickers all over her legs and arms and then my arms. Then she ripped them off, basically waxing off any hair I had on my arms. Halfway through sticker-palooza I gave her some dinner and rice pudding (since she's sick and all). As she was finishing up her pudding, I realized some stickers were missing. Then I found one. On her tongue. So there's some fiber to go with the pudding.

When I was drying her off from her bath, I figured I'd better take her temperature. But couldn't find a single rectal thermometer with a battery that worked in it. So I found a case of thermometers that came with a "newborn kit". One was a pacifier thermometer, and one was a stubby thermometer with bulb on the end. Where the heck does that go? I asked out loud, and little bug said "arm".

Alright, so I stuck it under her arm. She clenched her arm by her side to hold it to her skin and looked at me with the biggest grin. We both started laughing. I said to her, "Do you think this is really an underarm thermometer?" She said, "sure". Why not? She came out at 90 degrees. I'm not sure what a normal underarm temperature is supposed to be so that (plus the giggling) seemed fine. I then gave her the pacifier one to try out. Since her nose was stuffed up, that wasn't the best idea. She was a trooper though and would pull it out of her mouth take a deep breath like a diver coming up for air, and then put the pacifier back in. When it beeped, she pulled it out of her mouth, looked at it and said "uh-oh". She was 90 degrees again. I'm good with consistency, so I left it at that.

I had to bulb syringe her nose to clear it out which is always an adventure. She decided she wanted her doll to get her nose cleaned first. So we laid her doll on the floor and little bug laid down next to her. I cleaned the doll's nose, then little bug's and she thought it was hilarious. Whenever I sucked something out of little bug's nose she said, "WHOAH"!

Sharp Elbows

On Sunday I took little bug to a birthday party for a friend's little girl who was turning three. The party was at one of those incredible "activity centers" designed to wear kids out. Since it was a party for a three year old, little bug was the youngest by a few months, so I wasn't sure how she'd react to the insanity of "big kids" running around screaming and knocking each other down.

Turns out, little bug is a tough one, and I wound up picking up three year olds that she had knocked out of her way.

The activity center had a trampoline floor, a foam block pit, slides, bouncy house and then they set up an obstacle course. Little bug jumped around on the trampoline and took some serious spills, but got herself back up like nothing happened. She even used the big kids as a handle to pull herself up. When I tried to get close to her to act as a spotter, she'd look at me and put her hand out and said "no mommy", like I was Swiper the Fox. Apparently I was embarrassing her. Which was fine by me, because it gave me time to catch up with my friends while the other parents I didn't know whispered about what a bad mom I was letting my baby get roughed up.

Of course, this is where the benefit of having a kid that looks nothing like you comes in. You can just point in the general direction of the kids when someone asks which one yours is, and they'll assume it is the blonde one. Not the black haired one making the boy cry in the corner.

At one point, they broke the kids into two groups. Destructo team one and terror team two - or something like that. So little bug decided to get in the single file line as if she was a big kid. An obstacle course was set up where the kids had to climb through tunnels and over bridges, down a slide, through cones, etc. The first obstacle was really tall to climb over, so little bug was a little stuck (yelling "no mommy" when I got within a five-foot radius), so I decided to let her work it out on her own. Until I saw that she was starting to get lapped. And the big kids were treating little bug like she was part of the obstacle course by pushing past her. Luckily this propelled her over the first obstacle and back on the course. To which she ran headfirst into the pit of foam blocks.

As the grand finale, the "instructors/kid wranglers" lined all the kids up to sit around the trampoline floor while one kid laid on the trampoline. The instructor them jumped on the floor and propelled the kid up about 5 feet and caught them mid-air. I thought for sure that little bug wasn't going to go for that. But she patiently watched all the kids lay on the ground, cross the arms over their chest and get kicked into the air. She actually laid down on the floor by the mat and put her arms across her chest like she was practicing. When it came time for her turn, she walked up like a little soldier, laid down, crossed her arms and stared at the ceiling like it was a military drill. Even the instructor laughed. She popped little bug up, caught her and little bug didn't even crack a smile. She just ran off the trampoline mat as if to say, "alright, checked that activity off the list" and ran headfirst into the pit of foam.

Bye Birds

Tonight's "run off all the energy we can activity" started off with a simple question.

me: Where are your shoes?
little bug: (shrugging her shoulders) I don't know!
me: are they upstairs?
little bug: socks
me: not helpful, looking for your shoes
little bug: bear...

This is how it went as she went through her extensive, but not very relevant vocabulary. We found the shoes and I grabbed one of her mini soccer balls and we headed out of the house. She wanted to carry the ball, so I let her and she tossed it in front of herself and started kicking it (i.e. it was in her way as she ran down the street). Apparently a toddler soccer ball is just the right size to fit down the sewer drain, and I am not a very good goalie.

Ball #1 donated to the public sewer system. Little bug teared up. We headed back to the house to get ball #2 which amazingly wiped her memory of ball #1 ever existing. We played "soccer/pick up rocks and try to stick them in our pocket" for a while, sat on the community rocking chairs (she wouldn't let me touch her chair so I had to sneak rock it back and forth), and then watched some birds chirp. When she was ready to head back to the house for dinner she yelled "bye birds" waved and started running back in the direction of our house screaming.

Deception

I was upstairs with little bug and she started crying when I closed the gate to the stairs (the one that prevents her from falling down the stairs). She heard daddy's voice downstairs and started saying, "da-da". I tried to get her to walk down the stairs with me and she kept saying "no" and running away. So I left the gate open since I'm faster than her and can usually prevent disaster, and the crying stopped. Crisis avoided, or so I thought.

We were playing hide & seek (which consists of little bug standing next to me and then yelling "boo"), and she grabbed my pants and dragged me to the doors to the washer/dryer. Keep in mind that these are right next to the stairs/gate that is not open. She opens the doors to the washer and pushes my legs against the washer. So I figure this is her hint to get some laundry done. I was suspicious of her being so helpful. I watched her slyly back away towards the stairs, she yelled "bye, c-ya" and jetted for the stairs. I caught her of course, but I'm shocked that she's already trying to outsmart me. She clearly thought if I was busy doing laundry, she could book it down the stairs by herself.

Which brings me to her next trick. Apparently she can walk down the stairs by herself (holding onto the rail for part of the way, and just walking for the other part). She got down two flights of stairs by herself today, with me in catchers position just in case.

Happy New Year...a little late

In the full spirit of little bug's delayed sense of reacting to things, she's just now learned how to say "Happy New Year". Last night we were with friends celebrating a birthday, and at one point everyone was quiet and she yelled, "Happy New Year"...so we all made a toast!

Little Miss Independent

We were a little worried (okay, I was worried) about how little bug would react to going back to the nanny's house when we went back to work on Monday. Apparently while daddy was setting up her pack & play, little bug was playing in the toy room with one of the girls. When he went in to say good-bye to little bug, she freaked out and said no, no, no daddy and physically pushed him out of the room. She thought he was trying to get her to leave. So clearly, she had a much easier time going back to the nanny's house than daddy & I had going back to work!

Awesome!

We've had an inundation of new words lately in multiple languages. As if understanding toddler speak wasn't hard enough, little bug is speaking Spang-Lish-Darin. When she says thank you, she says "ta-you, xie-xie". When she says shoe she says "sue, pappo". I'm just waiting for the day that she rattles something off to me in Spanish and I have to go to the Google translator to figure it out, at least I understand the limited Mandarin we've taught her.

She also calls Daddy by his first name. She stands up and says "daddy, daddy..." and if he doesn't answer she yells his first name until he comes over to her. Her other favorite word is "awesome!". I'll hear her in the living room yell, Awesome!, and find her stacking her toys up. Tonight when I put her in her booster seat at the table, she looked at me sighed and said "nice". As if to say, nice dinner mommy!

Her not so cool new thing to do is to take off her clothes. We found her playing with her spin & crash racing set by herself. I was pretty impressed that she turned it on by herself, until I found her in nothing but her diaper with her shirt and pants laying on the floor next to her. It'll be not so awesome if she pulls this trick in public.