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Sigh.... I can't wait for her hair to be a wee bit longer, so these adorable pigtails will stay in all the time!

Happy Birthday HP!

My little brother and his fabulous wife G live toooo far away. I wish they lived in the apartment next door, because that way I could pinch the cheeks of their gorgeous daughters every single day.

HP turns 3 soon. In a matter of days. And she's all about Tinkerbell. Because SHE'S a fairy, too.

I love you HP. Happy Birthday sweet girl!

The Aristocrats

Jellybean is hysterical.

Well, at least SHE thinks so.

See, the thing is, lately she's been telling 'jokes.'

She'll look at me (or M, or Monkey), and say something like this:

"Wooshoo gaga, mama pa mmmdada." Then she'll pause, waive her hand in the air with a declarative flourish (you know, like she's a freshman at college who's stayed up all night long having a really in-depth, heart-felt conversation about the meaning of gender in Shakespeare's sonnets, and VOILA she's made her point, dammit!), and then after about two seconds of dramatic silence.....

She'll start laughing.

Hard. Like, throw your head back and laugh until your belly aches hard.

It's so funny, that M and I start laughing, too! Convincing her that she's a comic genius....

I told one of the teachers at school that she's started to tell jokes....and before I could finish my story, one of the fathers said I should teach her The Aristocrats. Ha. Um, no. Not yet.

My lovelies...

Travel

M is traveling this week. But check out this photo - I SO don't feel sorry for him!

What's mine is yours?

Jellybean is a trip. At 13.5 months I think she weighs 18, maybe 18.5 pounds. But she doesn't know she's small. She thinks she's MIGHTY.

And, recently, she got her very first time- out. Yup, she got in trouble, BIG trouble.

Because she smacked her big sister in the face...on purpose.

Jellybean's pretty mellow about sharing. Monkey takes her books, her toys, even her food...and she's pretty OK with that.

But the other morning, Monkey tried to get on daddy's lap at the same time (M was reading to Jellybean). And that, that? That was NOT OK with Jellybean.

So, being a pre-verbal, 13 month old, she did what she could to demonstrate her displeasure with sharing her daddy: she smacked her sister in the face.

For a long time, I've thought that I would need to protect Jellybean from Monkey, especially with Monkey's liberal interpretation of "sharing" (which is to mean that everything that's Monkey's is Monkey's....and everything that's Jellybeans is ALSO Monkey's....).

Maybe it's the other way around.

HUH?

So Monkey had a ruptured eardrum back in December. Plus a variety of colds that caused her to use up more tissues that the entire country of Denmark uses in a given year, give or take.

For the last two months, she's been saying "huh?" a lot, and complaining she couldn't hear her TV show.

Two things happened yesterday that have greatly relieved our concern that something might be wrong with her hearing:

1) Turns out that two of our speakers in the living room weren't really working. Oh. Glad we plugged those wires back in.

AND

2) She passed her hearing test at the pediatrician with flying colors.

So, as it turns out, when she says "huh?" when I tell her its time to stop playing and pick up, or go to bed?

Yeah, that's called selective hearing. She's ignoring me.

I know her!

Monkey is hilarious.

We were talking about the (of course, gawd can I gag now puhleese?) Disney Princesses the other day, and I suggested that she could be Belle since she has brown hair, and cousin E could be Ariel with the red hair, and Jellybean could be Cinderella with the blonde hair, as could HP and.....

.....then Jellybean about jumped out of my arms because that's what she likes to do and my mouth stopped working as I prevented my youngest child from ending her short life by impaling herself on...something....

And as my mouth stopped working Monkey filled in the blank, saying "B, mom. B. I KNOW HER."

(like um DUH, old lady, I know who my blonde bombshell cousins are, sheesh!).

Awww.

I've been missing you........

This past month has been hard. We’ve suffered through a slew of illnesses; I joked that it was the cold that kept on giving, as we all seemed to rotate who was sickest, who was on antibiotics, who was crankiest. But now, in the fresh New Year, we’re all on the mend. And it is about freakin’ time! I’m sick of being sick. Done. DONE, do you hear me?

It’s always rough to watch your kids when they are sick. You are helpless to do much other than offer hugs (when they’ll take them) and offer sustenance – food, shelter, a warm bath. Maybe a few DVDs of Pixar movies. You try to be kind when you give them medicine, and try not to be forced to pin them to the floor with your knees while one hand holds their mouth/eyelid open and the other drops in medicine. You get good about enticing them to take their medicine – coloring it purple, covering it in chocolate haagen daaz ice cream. You do whatever it takes.

But that takes something out of you, in return.

For the last month, Monkey has been a bit of a pill. Rather…..unenjoyable at times. And I’ve been telling other friends that are parents that 3? 3 is REALLY hard. And worse, that I don’t really like 3. I love my child, but don’t like 3. And that made me feel bad. Rotten, in fact. Like I was betraying my child to say I wasn’t enjoying every single second of my time with her….even if what I wasn’t enjoying was the temper tantrums and tears, the crabbiness and drama.

But for the last week? Yes, 3 has been hard at times, but it’s also been…..magical.

Monkey has violent swings of emotions all 3 year olds experience - yes they are still there - but we’ve been able to move past them. And we’ve moved past them into fun, imaginative, magical play.

I celebrated my 40th birthday this past Monday, and spent most of my day playing with my girls. My two, beautiful, fun girls.

And other than my heart swelling up and breaking into a million little pieces when they hug each other or fall into one another’s arms giggling, the most prevalent emotion I’ve felt is something akin to recognition. As in – hey, I recognize you, kid – and I’ve missed you! I’ve been lonely, missing my happy Monkey. God, am I glad she’s back!

(Until the next cold….that is. Knocking on wood, here.)

I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you...

I'm 40 today. Wow.

And, apparently, Monkey can't be trusted with state secrets.

She just told me that tonight, when daddy gets home from work, I get to open the secret present she wrapped for me that's hidden in his drawer.

Giggle.

Turning 40 has never been so awesome as when you're with these two little girls. They rock my world.

Tastes even bettah

Monkey is a 3 year old with VERY defined food preferences. As in, she'll eat any thing in the world, so long as it is:

rice
white bread
a hotdog bun
a hamburger bun
a frozen burrito
macaroni and cheese
grilled cheese
sliced (not whole, mind you) apples
chips
chocolate
water
and.....that's about it.

Jellybean, on the other hand, enjoys:

broccoli rabe with garlic
forest mushrooms and ricotta cheese pizza
tuna salad with onions and hot peppers
grilled green beans with salt and pepper
sloppy joes
and....
anything that has flavor!

M tells me he was a picky eater as a child. I remember begging for sushi when I got good grades in 4th grade. And asking for more wasabi.

I think that perhaps the kids take after their parents in more way than one....brown eyes and picky food = M. Blue eyes and flavorful food = me.

Let's see how long this lasts. (Jellybean might decide to eschew all flavor when she gets to be a picky 2 & 3 year old, too...only time will tell!).

Meanwhile, pass the broccoli rabe, baby!

Home again

We're back. You didn't know we left? Well, we did. We snuck off to Washington, D.C., for a little family vacation.

What did we do? We went to museums, and kicked some snow around, and ate Trader Joe's macaroni and cheese, and watched Monsters, Inc.... and what? What's that, you say?

You say our vacation sounds EXACTLY like stuff we can do here at home in little ol' New York City? Hmmmm. OK, busted. You're right.

But there, you see, someone came in every single day and tidied up after us. They made our beds, gave us new clean towels, ran the dishwasher....yes, dish washer.....and OMG SQUEEEEEE there was a washer and a dryer IN THE APARTMENT we rented. I though I'd died and gone to heaven. I came home with MORE clean clothes than I left with! (so my jeans were dirty...sue me, I was on vacation and everyone has a cold so if I stunk they wouldn't have even noticed! so there, ha!). Yes, I know. It was nirvana.....a constantly cleaned environment with cleaning appliances at my fingertips.....an anal-retentive's nirvana, but nirvana none the less!

We went to the Smithsonian and saw Dorothy's ruby slippers from the Wizard of Oz. Man, that Judy Garland had tiny feet - size 5! Monkey's face was priceless when she figured out what we were standing in line for all that time.

We went to the Museum of Natural History, saw the White House, the Capital, Washington Monument, the reflecting pool (minus the Octopus from Night of the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonium, a movie Nana just gave us for Christmas), kicked around on the Mall, and generally just farted around. It was nice.

The girls really bonded. They wrestled, battled over toys, tickled each other, and had a lot of fun. Monkey told us, in a heart-breakingly precious moment, that she couldn't wait for Jellybean to get older so they could walk and hold hands together. I know! Seriously sweet. I'm going to bottle that feeling and try to break it out when they're 15 & 13 and scratching each other's eyes out.

As we rolled into town today, after a seriously hassle-free trip back (in comparison to our death march on the way there - ugh), M asked Monkey what her favorite part of the vacation was.

"Playing in her closet" was the answer. Of course it was.